The Dissimulator, Part Three: The Money & The Illness

Check Out Part One and Part Two

That semester, Naïve Nancy's tuition never got paid. The Dissimulator was supposed to be taking care of all that, remember? He didn’t take her to get her books until the third or fourth week of school. Ultimately, she failed almost all her classes.

So the financial aid office was on her back about the tuition and dorm fees. Then there was the matter of the unpaid credit card bill. One day before the winter break, Nancy was leaving early for work so she could stop by a local department store and pay a credit card bill on her way in. She had a check written out and in her hand. The Dissimulator stopped her and took the check from her. "I'll pay it for you," he'd said.*

Thinking her boyfriend fiancé would do as he'd said, Naïve Nancy put the whole matter out of mind until she got a call from the company one day, telling her the bill was long overdue and asking for a payment. The Dissimulator feigned outrage, telling her he'd paid them himself and that he would take care of it the very next day.

You can imagine how this went on. The company calling and sending letters. Nancy, by this point out of a job and out of money, hoping and trusting that her boyfriend fiancé would take care of it all. The Dissimulator doing anything but that.

Eventually, the company turned her over to a collection agency. The Dissimulator was still spewing his game and promising to take care of everything. Naïve Nancy was still trusting him. After they couldn't collect, they threatened to bring charges and have her arrested.

Meanwhile, The Dissimulator was suddenly without cash alarmingly often. It seemed he'd nearly always just transferred a large amount of money from one account to another, but it hadn't posted yet, or some such likely story. Nancy was charging up her MasterCard at every turn. The Dissimulator was promising he'd take care of the bills.

Nancy and I were on friendly enough terms at this point, but it's hard to say we were anything more than cordial. I thought she was an idiot for staying with someone who was obviously a pathological liar. I tried to reason with her (leaving out the bit about her being an idiot, of course), but that just made her pull back from me even more.

The Dissimulator had Naïve Nancy in a great situation for his purposes, though. During the winter break, he'd supposedly gone to the doctor and been diagnosed with liver cancer. She didn't feel she could complain about his habit of spending on her dime because he could die in less than a year. This was the man she was going to marry. And he was going to die.

I asked her questions to get her thinking again and again. Have you been to the doctor with him? No? Why won't he let you go? You're going to marry him, right? Don't you have a right to know what's going on with him? To support him through this? ... Why did he cancel the appointment after he said you could go?... Why did he tell you he canceled the appointment only to go anyway by himself? Doesn't that seem a little suspicious to you?

In retrospect, I wonder why I didn't haul my ass down to the library (or the monitor, whatever) and do some research to help her see his lies for what they were. I think at that point I'd pretty much washed my hands of the matter, convinced she was a moron who would follow him through anything and wondering to my (virginal) self, is (the) sex really that good?

As all these tensions mounted, the thought of a long-promised, long-anticipated cruise with The Dissimulator during spring break gave Nancy pleasant dreams of respite. Those dreams were dashed when, conveniently enough, The Dissimulator found out the day spring break started that he would have to fly (alone) to Chicago for surgery.

I, of course, was already en route for the-most-awesomely-tiresome-spring-break-road-trip-ever when all this happened and (amazingly enough) didn't even have a cell phone. I didn't hear about Naïve Nancy’s non-break until my return. And it made me furious. I just couldn't contain myself. I imagine I laughed or snorted when she told me. I'm certain my face displayed the mixture of disgust and rage and pity I felt at the moment. I started with the questions again. Why didn't he know before? Where is he now? What kind of surgery would allow him to fly back here already? They did what? He says they used a laser to eradicate the cancer... through his belly button?!? Is there even a scar? WHY ARE YOU BELIEVING THIS?

To no avail. My questioning her achieved squat.

Stay Tuned for Part Four: Moving in on the Neighbors

* I was a first-hand witness to the beginning of this story.