Seventeenth date 2, "Does Brother believe those stories?"

D asked me why Brother seemed so tepid in his reaction to the news when I told him about her, seeing that her own family has been nothing but supportive. I didn’t know how to answer the question, because it hadn’t really occurred to me before; I guess I chalked up any awkwardness in our conversation to the fact that I usually haven’t discussed personal things with him in the past. Then she asked if there is any chance that he believes the stories Wife has told about me over the years: the total fabrications about my alleged drunkenness, cruelty, rape, abuse, whoring around, … about my beating her and the children, for example, or any of the other things she has said over and over about me, that have no substance to them whatever. (See, e.g., here or here, just for example.) The possibility shocked me. I had never considered it, and yet there’s no way I can rule it out. For years whenever we have all gotten together as a family I have absented myself from whatever room Wife was in, pretty much sticking with the boys wherever they wanted to go play. I have no idea what she might have said. I do know, now that I think about it, that she has tried to make friends with Brother over the years. I guess I just never thought it would be possible for her to succeed. I always assumed that my family would have my back 100%, without any effort on my part to maintain the relationship. To imagine that anything else is even possible is frankly a little scary. One other thing I know is that for years my father accused Wife of trying to get Brother into bed. I took her word for it that this was preposterous, and fought with my dad about it more than once. But this weekend D told me that Wife had confided in her years before she had in fact done exactly that. (Remember that for years, D was Wife’s best and closest friend.) Now D added that Wife said she had failed … but she had tried. Strictly speaking I cannot rule out the possibility that D made this up for some unclear reason, but I find it kind of plausible. And again, I find the situation scary.

Of course if Brother has been believing Wife all these years, … what can I do? Say, “No it’s all just the opposite?” Not bloody likely. Who wants to listen to fifth graders saying “’Tis!” “’Tain’t!” “’Tis!” “’Tain’t!” “’Tis!” “’Tain’t!” back and forth? Nor would I want to sit Brother down and give him a crash course in just how miserable things have been with Wife: nobody likes to listen to whining. Does that mean I have to write off the possibility of him ever knowing or believing the truth? I don’t know the answer, but that would be very sad. And I suppose I would have only myself to blame, for not having been more forthcoming over the last twenty-five years.