kid gloves and retractible claws

The intent of this post is not to gossip, therefore I will give the subject a fake name. Let's call her Beulah, my father's favorite made up name for women of a certain calibre. Because I'm feeling mean.

Beulah and Kevin became friends during 2008, the year in which I returned to Utah to finish my degree. When I moved back, Beulah treated me like the latest fling of her life-long best friend. I was a temporary distraction who could never know him like she did. Of course I took issue with this. Not only had I been around for over four years before her, but also I did not move there without certain promises of a future. I wasn't new, I wasn't leaving, and I was not playing second fiddle.

From the start of our acquaintance, she talked about how much Kevin confided in her and how she'd love --if she could ever get his permission-- to share with me what he said. There it was, her line the sand: Kevin and Beulah on one side, me on the other. She likes to say that she was on my side, angry at Kevin for not proposing and ready to spill all his secrets to me, but that wasn't the case. Never was she rooting for me, and what she failed to grasp is that Kevin and I were on the same side of any drawn line. One was either with or against us, but never in between.

There were enough people opposed to Kevin and me getting back together that I have learned not to hold a grudge for that. But I do still resent Beulah. I have tried not to. I am grateful to her for rides from the airport, taking our engagement photos for free, and for being a familiar face on days when that is what is needed most. But my gratitude is insufficient to make up for her continued possessiveness of my boyfriend, then fiance, and now husband.

Last night, Kevin's friend from BYU, Michelle, came into town and Kevin, Beulah and I drove an hour to go have dinner with her. I had never met her and found her delightful. Energetic for so late (8:30 p.m.) but pleasant.

(Side note: she lives in San Diego. I should set her up with Nora.)

Beulah was not delightful, though she started out innocuous enough. She told several entertaining dating stories, including one with the moral that you shouldn't judge a boy for not calling, because he just may have cancer. Kevin then gazed mournfully off into space and lamented that he didn't have any dating stories this year. I laughed.

Then Beulah said Kevin used to have some pretty interesting dating stories but she isn't allowed to tell.

I did not laugh at that. I couldn't: my head had just exploded. Her little comments infuriated me: about not hanging out with Kevin as much anymore, about how watching "How I Met Your Mother" after FHE was their thing, how she heard his side of the story, how long it took him to propose, etc.. They built up in my head until I was ready to scream.

Get your claws the hell out of my husband! Stop flirting, stop staking claim, and stop pretending you were on "my" side when I know very well that you told him to move on. You wanna-be home wrecker, wake up to the fact that he chose me, will always choose me. I was there first; I know him more intimately than you do; and our thing on Monday night is not watching TV.

But I said...

"Beulah, do you really think that he hasn't told me everything he ever told you?"

I said it politely, with kid gloves on, so no stunned or awkward silences followed; but I said in it all the things I was thinking. It said, I will not pretend that I didn't win.