Phonecall from a forgotten past

I got the strangest phone call 2 evenings ago. I'd gone to bed early again (seems to be a habit of mine) and was woken by the land line phone ringing. That's unusual in itself as most people ring me on the mobile now. It took me quite a while to identify who it was on the other end as I must have been in a fairly deep sleep. 

It was my X from years ago. Before I met my wife and our daughter was born. We'd moved over here from New Zealand as a couple and had bought a little unit together. It didn't work out though as she drank like a fish, and was a horrible drunk. Angry and aggressive, she used to state many times that she thought more clearly when she was pissed (drunk). A hopeless situation as she was in complete denial about her problem and was therefore not going to change.

She was an absolute vile bitch when she was drunk, and she drank with the sole purpose of getting drunk. Completely unreasonable and argumentative. I didn't know how to handle her, fuck back then I was just a kid. Long story short it all ended badly and we split up acrimoniously. The last time I saw her would have been about 20 years ago I suppose. Had no desire to see her ever again, but now here she was after all that time, ringing me and talking now on the other end of the phone.

I was dumbfounded. Speechless. Just didn't know what to say. Why in the hell was she ringing? I was a completely different person now, so much water under the bridge. It was like talking to someone from another life. There was simply no connection there. 

I thought about maybe filling her in on a few details, but then thought better of it. She said she'd had a few wines, and she would've been in her foul judgemental mood after that. She even said she was thinking very clearly. Ugh, the bitch hadn't changed. And she said "You've still got that laugh, that I hated"  her exact words. WTF? Piss off!

Anyway I was polite and just sort of said the odd thing, like my wife had died, daughter 21 now, bla bla. She's still not in a relationship at all, not surprised I mean she's impossible to live with. Mentioned nothing about HIV, fuck that's a disclosure I'd avoid for sure. I can just imagine how condemning she'd be about it. Didn't bother even getting into a discussion about sexuality, it'd most likely be way over her stupid head anyway even if she was thinking clearly when pissed. 

I was surprised we actually ended up talking for about half an hour. I remained calm and polite through it all, which was a pretty good effort on my part. I can see much better now how she used to manipulate my head, sort of passive aggressive. Like when I was trying to say goodbye to hang up, she says "What you don't like me after that?" (she'd just told me she'd put on weight). I cringed. 

Anyway we exchanged emails and mobile numbers, both of which weren't around when we were together. Fuck that's how long it's been, since before the internet FFS. Late '80's we split up. I thought I'd repay the favour with her ringing me when she was drunk, I had a few beers at the pub and sent off a long email to her last night when I got home. Remarkably it was polite, but also very truthful. Told her straight out how much she hurt me, that it wasn't actually splitting up that was bad, but the way she carried on during the split up. She was a vindictive shit, and I've always been very sensitive. I was trying to be nice about it all, while she was twisting the dagger in my heart. 

She's not going to like the email, but I don't care. Maybe, just maybe, she might come to some understanding of what happened that doesn't involve her being the hard done by woman being left forlorn by the selfish man. 

I also reminded her of what she was like and what she expected me to deal with, citing the particular example of finding her passed out with the stereo headphones on, lying in a pool of piss all over the carpet in the middle of the lounge room. Charming.....

Hopefully she'll get the hint and not bother ringing me again.