I need to explain a little about the man I call my partner, Michael. I’ve already mentioned that he was arrested in 2002. Right now, he’s serving a prison sentence at the Federal Work Camp at Eglin Air Force Base up in the Florida panhandle. He’ll be out in September 2005, based on his own calculations.
I met Mike on October 30, 1994, while I was cruising for sex in Holiday Park in Fort Lauderdale. I was riding my bicycle, and it just so happened he was riding a bicycle as well, and…we sat down under a tree and hit it off. We moved in together “officially” in March of 1995.
In 1997 we bought a house together. We were in love. We had it all. We could afford to make the leap into drug addiction together. We started out with cocaine, but soon the availability of crystal methamphetamine made that drug impossible to resist.
I wasn’t able to get totally clean until 2001; but Mike wasn’t finished. Let’s just say that in the meantime, he was dealing a large amount to support his habit. I was not entirely aware of the dealing, and the ready access of money made it easy for me to keep looking the other way.
Like all easy things, this had to come to an end. One night in June of 2002, I couldn’t look the other way at his heavy drug use any longer. I decided to leave him and made one last prayer that he would get the message. The next day, Michael got popped in the parking lot of Lowe’s by the Drug Enforcement Agency and the Broward Sheriff’s Office.
I stood by him, and relished the seven months that he was home, between his making bond and then delivering him to his prison sentence. I’m still here, trying to pay the mortgage in the hopes that we’ll have a home when he gets out. I’m happy alone, though. I’m not pining for him. When he comes home next autumn, we’ll take it from there—either start a new relationship between us or sort things out and go our separate ways.
I miss him—I can’t deny it, and I really do love him.