It all started three years ago when I first met Ralph. I was running late for work, so I was rushing past all the people walking on the sidewalk, trying so very hard to get to work as fast as I could. I accidently bumped into him and made him drop his coffee all over what looked like, a new suit. Without looking at him, I apologized and told him I would give him twenty dollars for ruining his new suit. Trying to hurry I started pulling out my wallet. “No, no, it’s perfectly fine” “I don’t like this suit anyway” he said jokingly, trying to be funny. “Okay.” Well, thanks!” I said as I started walking again, trying to hurry. I didn’t even look at him once because I was too busy worrying about being late for work. So later that day, my boss called me to his office.
“You wanted to see me sir?” I said as I walked into my boss’s office. “Yes” he said. When I walked in, a man stood up and walked over to stand by my boss. “Lisa, this is Ralph” pointing to the man next to him. The man held out his hand for me to shake. “Ralph, this is Lexi” my boss said, as he pointed to me. We shook hands. “Well, good to see you again “I went and bought a new suit by the way, so it’s all good” he said to me. “Excuse me?” I said with a confused look on my face. “You two already know each other?” my boss asked, looking at Ralph. “Well, we kind of met each other this morning when she bumped into me on her way here” Ralph told my boss, while smiling at me.
“Oh! I am so sorry for that!” I said after I finally realized what he was talking about. “Like I said, it’s perfectly fine” Ralph said to me. “But it’s really good to see you again” he smiled. “Well, anyways Lexi, this is your new assistant” my boss interrupted. After actually looking at him I realized he was a very handsome man. “How could I have not noticed” I said to myself. Guess that’s what happens when you’re late to work. I could’ve met my soul mate and not even know it because I was so lost in my own life. I couldn’t help but stare, he was so perfect. He was tall, with short brown hair, and sparkling crystal blue eyes that shined in the light like stars in a beautiful midnight sky. He wore a blue and black suit with khaki pants and brown dress shoes. His smile was so deadly gorgeous, it could kill a woman. His whole body just seemed to light up, like the bright burning sun was in my eyes again.
After just a couple weeks, we ended up going out. He took me to a fancy restaurant where we ate lobster and drank wine. We started going out often after that. He would take me to the movies, until three in the morning and then he would take me out for breakfast afterwards and then walk me home. One time we even had a picnic in a park where we fed ducks and ran around chasing each other like little kids. It was so perfect. I felt like I was living a fairytale. He made me feel like a princess. And after two months of going out, he gave me a diamond heart necklace and we celebrated our two month anniversary. We both decided to give in and give our all. That night was so magical. We went to his place and had a candlelight dinner out on his patio. When I woke up the next morning and found myself lying next to him I felt so safe, so happy, like I have never been in my entire life.
After that wonderful night, he started sending me flowers at work every day. He would write me poems and put them on my desk underneath his finished assignments he turned in to me. He would smile at me every time I walked by his desk. Everyone was jealous of our unbelievable fairytale. “Why can’t I find a guy like that?” one of the women who worked in my building would always ask herself. One woman actually came up to me one day and gave me this whole lecture about how it’s “too good to be true”. She said that he may act like he’s a perfect guy now but as soon as I fall too hard he’s going to show his true colors and I’m going to find him ending up being a real monster. But I didn’t care what she said, everything was great. She was just jealous that I had a perfect guy and she knew it. I wasn’t going to listen to her; she didn’t know him like I did. She didn’t know anything. He was perfect, and he wasn’t going to change.

Until one day, it happened. The woman was right. She had been right all along. For the first time ever, I finally saw the real Ralph. After knowing him for almost six months, I never would have thought that my perfect prince actually turned out to be a horrible monster. It was movie night, and we were at my house. He had made popcorn and brought over three movies for us to watch. We were half way through the first movie and he asked me if I was thirsty from all that popcorn. I said yes and so we paused the movie and he went into my kitchen to pour us a glass of ice tea. All of a sudden I heard a noise that sounded like a plate had just fallen to the ground, breaking into a million pieces. I jumped up and ran to the kitchen to find out what had caused the noise. When I turned the corner and got to my kitchen I found Ralph standing over a broken glass of ice tea spilled all over the kitchen floor.
“Oh my” I said giggling a little. “Well, that’s okay, I can clean it up” I said while still staring at the mess. “No, I’m sorry” Ralph said, still standing over the broken pieces of glass and spilled tea. He didn’t move; he just stared at it, like he just committed a murder or something. After a few minutes I finally snapped out of it and walked over to the kitchen table to grab some napkins. When I turned around to bend over and clean up the mess, Ralph pushed me. “No!” he yelled, as I flew into the kitchen table like a raging bull had just run into me. The napkins had flown out of my hands by the time I finally took a landing. A little confused about what had just happened, I dusted myself off and looked up to see if what had just happened really did happen. I didn’t believe it. Did Ralph just push me across the room because of some broken glass and spilled tea?
When I looked up, I found him still standing over the mess, staring, like he was lost in some different world. It was like he didn’t even realize that he just pushed me across the room. He looked frozen. Like his soul has left his body and is now floating above us. “What the hell!” I yelled, wondering why he would do such a thing to me. Startled by my loud voice, he looked up and he seemed to have changed. He now had these what looked like, evil eyes, and an evil stare. I felt like he was going to burn a hole in my brain or make me explode by just staring at me. He then got up and walked over to me and slapped me in the face. “What is your problem?” I yelled, surprised by what he had just done. Then for one split second he changed again. He now looked like he had no idea what had just happened. It was like another person took over his body. He looked around the kitchen and then looked back at me with a confused look on his face.
“I’m so sorry” he said as he turned around and ran out of the kitchen. A few seconds later I heard the front door open and close. He was gone. I got up and looked around, opening and closing my eyes over and over again as if expecting to wake up from a horrible dream. Did this really just happen? I walked into the living room. The movie we were watching was still paused. I went back into the kitchen and looked at the broken pieces of glass and the spilled ice tea on the floor again, still trying to process in my head what had just happened. “This can’t be happening” I said to myself. What was wrong with him? Why did he do that? I kept repeating questions in my head over and over again knowing that they weren’t going to get any answers.
The next day, a surprised knock came at my door. I looked through the peep hole and saw Ralph standing eagerly and nervously waiting for me to open the door for him. I opened the door slowly. Confused, I looked at him without saying a word. We both were silent for about two whole minutes and then finally, he spoke. “I’m so sorry about last night “I don’t know what got over me “it was wrong and I would understand if you don’t want to see me ever again” he kept rumbling on trying to get a good apology out. “Its okay” I said to him.

I know he pushed me and hit me, but I just couldn’t let him go. It was just something about when I looked in his eyes, it made it seem like he was this innocent angel that would never hurt a fly. At that very moment, when he was standing at my doorway apologizing so very hard for what he had done, I realized that how I felt about him made me not even care if he ever did hurt a fly. At that moment, I had realized that my feelings for him were much stronger than I thought. I was in love with this man, and there was no way I could stop it. There was no turning back. I had fallen. I had fallen harder than I have ever fallen before.
After that day, we went back to our fairytale. He sent me even more flowers, and bought me even more jewelry, and surprised me with even more romantic evenings and magical nights, more than he had did before. I went back to feeling like a princess again. We never mentioned that movie night at my house where he had lost control of himself and hit me, ever again, and after that one night, it never happened again. After just a year of our wonderful romance, we decided to get married. The women at my work were even more jealous than they had been before. Even the woman who doubted our love apologized and decided that she had been wrong about Ralph after all. When he asked me to marry him, I felt like I was dreaming.
We were at a baseball game, and right in the middle of the game they stopped and played soft music, and had a camera right on us that showed up on a large screen above the score board. I had no idea what was going on. He then knelt on one knee in front of the entire stadium, took out a ring and asked me to marry him. It was even on the news that a young man had stopped a baseball game in the middle of play to ask his girlfriend to marry him. It was so amazing. I remember having tears in my eyes while screaming the word yes about ten times. When he put the ring on my finger everyone in the entire stadium clapped and whistled. Then of course the game continued and everyone forgot about the whole thing after just a few minutes, but I didn’t. I never forgot it, and I never will. It was one of the best days of my life.
After that, he quit his job because it wasn’t aloud to marry your assistant and still work together. So one of us had to quit, and of course he offered first. Well, he kind of did more than offer, he insisted. He knew how much my job meant to me and he wasn’t going to ruin that just because he wanted to spend the rest of his life with me. We got married a week after he asked me. We just couldn’t wait. It was the perfect wedding. He borrowed money from his billionaire parents to pay for it. He knew he could pay them back when he got a new job. After we got married, he moved in with me. It was okay at first. Everything was basically the same except he didn’t work for me anymore. He eventually got a new job in an office where he was his own boss and worked whatever hours he wanted, and he got paid a pretty huge salary.
We would eat breakfast together every morning before I went to work. Sometimes, when he worked in the morning and didn’t have time to eat breakfast with me, he would wake up extra early just to make me breakfast in bed. He would always be there waiting for me with a single rose and sometimes a new necklace or bracelet or a new set of earrings, when I got home from work, and we would go out to eat for lunch wherever I wanted to go no matter how expensive. After lunch he would take me back home and go to work for a couple hours. While he was at work, I would take a shower, change and just sit around watching TV until he came home from his work.
When he got home I would always have a delicious, warm dinner waiting for him. We would eat dinner, and afterwards watch a movie. After the movie was over, he would pick me up and carry me to the bedroom and tuck me in. He would get in bed next to me and I would always fall asleep in his arms. It was basically like that every day for the past couple months. I never went out with friends or went out anywhere without him, unless it was work. My whole life revolved around him; he was my life. My life would’ve been nothing without him.

Everything was going perfect, I couldn’t have been happier. Until one day, he did it again. He hit me, but this time he left marks. It was just like the last time it happened; he looked as if it wasn’t him who did it, like someone else had took over his body. Then he seemed to snap out of it, and he had this confused look on his face, like he had no idea what just happened. This time he didn’t just lose control, he lost complete control. He wouldn’t stop. He just kept hitting me and hitting me and hitting me. It seemed to never end; it seemed as if he was never going to stop. Finally, after about forty five minutes, he stopped. Then he just left. He always just leaves right after.
When I got up to go look in a mirror to see how much damage had been caused, I found a big bruise right underneath my eye. There was a scratch on my forehead that looked like someone cut me with a little steak knife. My lip was cracked open, and my nose was bleeding. Half my hair was falling out from him yanking it while dragging me around the room. My mascara was all over my face and one of my earrings was gone. I looked terrible. As I stood there looking into the mirror, I had no idea what to do. Was this ever going to end? I would ask myself. Does my husband need help? Is my husband sick? Is there something wrong with him? Am I in denial? Or am I just overreacting? I really didn’t know what to do. He was my husband; I loved him more than anything. I didn’t want to believe that there was something wrong with him. I was scared I was going to lose him.
“I’m just going to have to deal with it” I told myself. Every marriage has its flaws. Every marriage has its bumpy roads sometimes, and in every marriage there are things that you don’t like but have to accept because of the simple fact that you love your spouse no matter what flaws they may have. So after I decided that I was just going to have to deal with it, I stayed up all night waiting for him to come back so that I could tell him it was okay. So that I could tell him that I still loved him and that I would always love him no matter what he did. I waited and waited and it seemed like he was never going to come back. It seemed like I waited forever for him. I forced myself to stay awake. I drank coffee and ate as much sugar as I could. I splashed water in my face every hour; I did whatever possible so that I stayed awake. But I still ended up falling asleep.
He finally came in at around five in the morning. He saw me on the couch fast asleep with a cup half full of cold coffee, some sugar cookies and three bags of candy lying on the coffee table. He picked me up and carried me to the bedroom and laid me on the bed. He put some covers over me and laid down next to me. I knew he moved me from the couch to the bed when I found myself lying in my bed next to him when I woke up the next morning, knowing that I fell asleep on the couch. Even though I was a little angry because I had forced myself to try and stay awake waiting for him to come home, getting even more worried every second that went by and he never showed up, and now here he was lying next to me. Even though I was angry, I was also very happy to see him, and that happiness overpowered the anger so much that I didn’t even care where he was all night, or what he did. I was just so happy that he was still alive and that he was okay and that he was back home.
After awhile it started happening more and more. He would get angry at the littlest and stupidest things. If he forgot to do laundry, or if he forgot to feed the fish, or even if he knocked over a lamp and broke it. As time went by, I began to get used to it. It was the same routine, he broke a lamp, he hit me, I cried, he stopped, he left, I wiped my tears, I cleaned myself up, hide the bruises and scratches with makeup and scarves and long sleeve shirts, I clean whatever mess he made, and I go to work and act like nothing happened. I come home, I cry, and then I stay up as long as I could wait for him. I got to the point where I knew when it was coming. It was like I was just waiting for it to happen; like my life wouldn’t be normal if it didn’t.

When I woke up, it was midnight. ‘I must have fallen asleep’ I thought to myself. I looked over to the other side of the bed, knowing that he wouldn’t be there but still hoping anyway. I got up and looked in the restroom, he wasn’t there. So I went into the living room to see if I would find him there, nothing. I finally accepted that he just wasn’t here. I should’ve already known, he usually doesn’t come back until around five in the morning. I went into the kitchen and poured me a glass of milk, and then I went into the living room and turned the TV on. I sat on the couch watching TV until he finally came back. He opened the front door trying to be quiet. As soon as I heard the front door shut I stood up and walked over to him. He looked surprised to see me awake since I have usually fallen asleep on the couch when he got home. He just looked at me, speechless. He had no idea what to say, and neither did I. We both stood there, staring at each other for what seemed like a lifetime. Then finally, I spoke.
“Hello Ralph” I said to him, trying to find his eyes in the dark. “Hi” he said back quietly. “We need to talk” I said with a shaky voice. He didn’t say anything back. I figured he probably knew what was coming now. “I can’t do this anymore.” I said slowly. Each word I spoke hurt more and more each time they came out of my mouth. For a second I thought about forgetting it and just kissing him and telling him everything was okay, but I stopped myself. This was all I could take; I couldn’t live like this anymore. “I want a divorce, I’m sorry” I said to him, waiting for him to just lose it and start hitting me again. “I understand” he said suddenly. “We will go get the papers after we get some sleep”
We woke up around noon. On our way to the court, I kept wondering if I was making a mistake; overreacting. ‘I love this man. I put up with him for three years, why can’t I take it anymore now?’ No. I have to do this, for me. I’m not going to live the rest of my life unhappy all the time, in love with a monster disguised as a prince. The woman at my work is going to be so pleased with herself for being right about him. “I told you he wasn’t as perfect as you thought he was” she’ll probably say to me after finding out about our divorce. We got to the court and a man sat us down and asked us why we had decided to get a divorce. We both said that it just wasn’t working out; we weren’t happy together. The man looked at us with weird faces, like he didn’t understand how a couple that looked so perfect like us would want a divorce. After talking for a couple minutes, he gave us the divorce papers. “If you want to wait a couple days to think about your decision that would be absolutely fine” the man told us. “No, we’re sure” Ralph said quickly, like if he didn’t say it quickly he would change his mind.
After we signed the papers, we got back and he started packing his clothes right away, into large suit cases. “You don’t have to leave today” I said as I watched him rush his things into his bags. He stopped, and walked over to me. I got prepared. I stood still like a statue waiting for him to start hitting me, but he didn’t. “I’m so sorry, about everything I have done to you. I don’t know why I let it get this far. I love you and I always will, and I hope that you live a happy life. I’m so sorry.” He said with a painful look on his face. Then he turned and continued packing the rest of his things. Before he left he stood there hugging me for about twenty minutes, it felt like he was never going to let me go and a part of me didn’t want him to. Then he kissed me on my cheek, and told me that he would never forget me.
After that day, I never saw or heard from him again. The woman at my work never said anything to me. In fact, no one said anything to me. Guess they just all saw how hurt I was and didn’t want to hurt me even more. Guess they all just felt sorry for me. At first it was really hard without Ralph. I wasn’t used to living my life without him. I always ate out instead of cooking, since I had no one to cook for anymore. I always stayed up all night watching TV because I was so used to staying up all the time. I always volunteered to work later than I usually did because there was no longer any reason for me rush home anxiously anymore. There was nothing there for me to be exited for, nothing there for me to want to run home to. I was so depressed. I just wanted him back.
Until one day, I was late for work, so I was rushing past all the people walking on the sidewalk, trying so very hard to get to work as fast as I could. I accidently bumped into a man and made him drop his coffee all over what looked like, a new suit…