The other day I saw an article in the Atlantic about a woman named Toby who decided to run away from her life. She was volunteering inside a prison and fell in love with one of the inmates. As they talked together, they began sketching what it would look like to run away together. The fantasy grew and grew, becoming more real and more compelling each time they talked. And so one day she put their plans into action. She left behind her husband and her kids, packed her inmate boyfriend into a dog crate, and drove away with him.
Of course they got caught. (Otherwise there wouldn't be an article about them.) Almost two weeks after their great escape they were trapped by a police barricade on the highway. She went to jail. He went back to jail, with an extra ten years added to his sentence. Now she gives talks about transformation and redemption. She tells her story and works to inspire other women. She has a website. I think this is what penance looks like today.
Joking aside, though, the story reminded me powerfully of Wife, and especially of her romance with Boyfriend 5. As long as I knew her, Wife always had dreams of escape, of flight, of running away from whatever her life looked like at the time, of getting into her car and driving blindly as fast as she could until she was Far Away and could pretend to be Somebody Else. That was always what freedom looked like to her.
And Boyfriend 5? (Who claimed to be a terrorist abroad and turned out to be a lonely woman here in the USA?) What did Wife get from him (her)? Time. Attention. And endless sympathy. Also flattery. Also B5 described many (fictional) problems in his own life, on which Wife could offer advice to help. So B5 made her feel seen, and appreciated, and needed. And that's very much like what Toby describes, in recounting the steps that led her to run away with her felon boyfriend. The article says, "But now she felt someone notice her. She felt someone recognize that she had needs." It can be intoxicating -- obviously, given what Toby did next.
So does that explain Wife's infatuation with Boyfriend 5? I think so. I think she felt the same kind of neglect Toby felt, and responded just as overwhelmingly to the same attentions. It makes sense.
This doesn't mean that I take on myself all the responsibility for Wife's emotional affair with Boyfriend 5. Like in my post last night (but in mirror image), they were her actions and so she is responsible for them. And the story of how we got there in the first place -- how we got to the place where she felt so alone and so neglected and was therefore ready to snap at B5's bait -- is a long and tangled one with plenty of fault on both sides. To understand all is not to forgive all, and I can say I understand it without making her a spotlessly innocent victim.
But I do think I understand (at least a part of) how the whole thing looked to her, and why she could be so intoxicated that she couldn't see any of the rest of the world. And Toby's story sounded very familiar to me as I read it.
Familiar. And compelling. And sad. For Toby's sake, I'm glad she has come through on the other side. I wonder if Wife ever has ...?
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