Missed Call

They say if you want to make God laugh, tell her about your plans.

In my last relationship, I didn’t have to lift a finger. I would think of something, and I didn’t even have to speak it; to usher it into existence, it would just be done. It was like my partner was a mind reader. For the first time in my life, I wasn’t asked to prove my love by enduring suffering, at least not at first.

My partner possessed an innate skill. Whenever a trigger was tripped and my mind lit up, he would extinguish any flames of doubt I had in him. My brain would be on fire, and all he would have to do was open his mouth, and a cool stream of relief would pour over me.

Exactly one month before the collapse of the relationship, I wrote the following in my journal.

15 September 2025

I love the life that I have created for myself, and I’m excited to bring more into this world, to create something I’ve only ever dreamt of. I truly feel like the worst is over, that the hardest lessons I will ever have to face, to learn from, have come and gone, and now I get to live life to its fullest.

Boy, was I wrong.

It’s like I thought I’d be exempt from the dismantling that comes with my first Saturn Return. A rite of passage that every twenty-seven to thirty-year-old must confront. When the planet Saturn returns to the exact position it occupied at the time of your birth, the foundations of everything are strength tested. Anything built on unstable ground, has false foundations or lacks integrity will collapse.

In other words, if you aren’t willing to shed or let go of what doesn’t belong to you, it will be stripped from you, and if you resist this transition, it will only be more forceful.

When the truth of what my partner was came to light, everything changed, and in the months that followed, it felt like I was just waiting around to die.

Several names have been changed, not to protect their identities, but to protect myself from legal repercussions. It gives me no pleasure to conceal the names of those I believe deserve public scrutiny, but discretion is wiser.

On Friday the 6th of June 2026 at 10:43 am, I missed a call. I brushed it off as being spam. A minute later, my phone pinged with a message.

I have been fed half-truths my entire life, but today I see everything so clearly.

“He lied to me.” These words fell out of my mouth, but inside my stomach was screaming betrayal.  The man I shared a bed with had harmed someone, violated them, in the same ways I have been by others.

I don’t want to cry, but this isn’t something I have a say in. My body wins the fight over my restraint, and tears begin to fall. I’m on a phone call to my ex’s best and only friend, Marshall (this is a pseudonym).

When my ex stopped messaging me, I knew it was because he had been incarcerated. Call it intuition or call it pattern recognition, my mind arrived at the most logical conclusion.

So when Marshall sent a follow-up message after I missed his call, I knew my ex was behind bars.

There was a court hearing yesterday, and my ex was found guilty. Marshall, a devil’s advocate and lawyer to be, tells me that my ex is facing a maximum of seven years, but theorises he’ll be out in three to four on good behaviour, seeing as this is his first offence. I chime in with, “But what about all his prior offences?” To which Marshall responds, “They aren’t on his record because he committed them when he was a minor.” I compartmentalise this. I know it means my ex hasn’t been honest with his friend. He’s had several other appearances over the last couple of years, all in adulthood for small offences: carrying a weapon, possession of drugs and such.

Marshall relays to me that there will be an opportunity to see him next Thursday. That my ex wants me there. I tell Marshall I can’t go. I don’t feel comfortable going. “It goes against everything, everything I believe in and value.” Marshall tries to sympathise and advocates that he shares those same values, but he doesn’t believe my ex is guilty. I do. That’s where we begin to separate. Marshall tells me he spent the day with my ex on the Sunday that had just passed. That he was hopeful then that the charges would be dropped and shocked at the outcome, which he described as unexpected.

Marshall apologised for meeting (via phone call) like this, given the circumstances. I told him he didn’t need to apologise, and that we had already met. A couple of times in fact, although it was a few years ago. I’m not surprised he doesn’t remember me; there was probably a revolving door of women when they lived together, too many to retain the names of.

I don’t want to ask the following question, but know I have to.

“What were the charges?”

“There were two,” Marshall responds.

“Penetration without consent of a minor.”

That was the second offence mentioned. The first was “Stupefying with intent to cause an indictable offence,” but it’s quickly drowned out by all the noise that came with the realisation that I was romantically involved with a child rapist.

I broke down in tears. “He lied to me.”

Then, my shock turns to anger, and I spit out, “I have two teenage sisters; anyone who is under the age of eighteen is a child. This happened what? Two years ago, when he was 28. The same age I am now. There is no reason he should have ever been in that situation. That he should have even been in the same room as a child.”

It feels like I’ve been punched in the stomach. I start to feel sick.

Marshall attempts to excuse his friend with “She lied about her age and admitted to the judge that she lied about her age to him.”

I couldn’t care about that if I tried. He hurt a child. I won’t listen to anyone that tries to frame it differently.

Images of him being on top of a teenage lookalike of me appear and flash behind my eyes.

Marshall continues “He was on drugs.” As if that makes this any better.

I bite and ask in quick succession:

“Was he on GHB?”

“Was he back on meth?”

Marshall doesn’t know; he thinks it was a cocktail and that insight confirms everything. My ex lied to him too. A friend that has known him since the single digits. Hardly surprising. He made a habit out of lying to everyone he loved.

I know his parents are in just as much denial, to the point of delusion.

The remainder of the eight-minute phone call is a blur, and I’m struck by a blinding headache, a result of the emotional exhaustion.

I reach for my journal, turning back the pages to a day I hope will eventually fade away. A date easy enough to remember as it’s marked in my mind as father’s birthday. The entry reads:

15 November 2025

Last night I heard The Whispers instruct me: check his phone. I felt my heart rate increase and a heaviness in my stomach, the one that lets me know that something is being kept from me. I pushed it down and avoided army crawling across the floor, to the dissatisfaction of The Whispers.

On the morning of the 15th, we carried out our AM weekend routine; matcha from McDonald’s, a brekkie wrap from Hungry Jack's and a juice from a local café drive-thru. He dropped me home, and we kissed each other goodbye. First, in the car, and then again after I got out, with him still sat in the driver's seat and me leaning over the open window of his car door.

A few minutes later, I realised he had left his backpack at mine. I stared at it as it occupied the corner of my bedroom, and The Whispers reappeared. They urged me to check the contents of the bag. I resisted at first. I told myself that doing so would be fruitless; that I wouldn’t find anything, but I always do. I pulled out his journal and started to flick through it. Skimming passages, I discovered that I loved the way he wrote, his self expression and the parts of him that were unseen, or so I thought.

I kept turning the pages until I opened to one that was mostly blank, but stood out to me.

Robbed $1400/ = $600 owed.

There were a few more lines logged with large dollar amounts.

I allowed some time to pass, to sit with this information. It didn’t really affect me too much at first, but I knew I’d have to bring it up eventually. About an hour later, I did. He cleared it up immediately and told me that he wrote it down on behalf of his ex. I was aware of illegal dealings that he orchestrated and played a part in, but that was all in the past. He told me he had no involvement in these robberies, that he didn’t profit from this activity, and naturally, my brain stirred.

I looked my partner’s name up on the CDA database, an online system that allows users to search a person’s name to view past attended and upcoming scheduled court appearances.

Upon the search, I’m met with a landing page of court jargon, criminal code that I have to decipher. A magistrate's appearance with the description

Stupefying with intent to commit an indictable offence

I have a pit in my stomach. Its presence is undeniable now.

I have to put this wording through a search engine to translate it to layman’s terms. I find this terminology refers to the act by which someone renders an individual incapable of resisting, usually through the means of drugs, for the purpose of committing either theft or assault.

Immediately his writings click into place like a missing puzzle piece, and I’m relieved, thinking that, as horrible as it is, he’s going to court to fight charges for robbing someone.

I tell him about my findings and ask him about it. He’s completely receptive and willing to calm my mind with a sense of peace through explanations.

I apologise for the lack of grammar and punctuation in advance, but I logged this account, and all that precedes it, as it was addressed to me.

Well yeah basically it was a situation with Brady (this is a pseudonym) when we were out somewhere and it means basically drugging someone not by their choice which I didn’t do.

He tells me that his parents have spent thousands of dollars on legal expenses trying to clear his name, that the situation has been a very long and drawn-out headache slash nightmare.

It was quite random to randomly get accused of that years later, but yeah that’s the situation I’m having to deal with atm

I had to clarify that he was still fighting this charge in court and then asked him, “Were you thinking of telling me this at any point?”

I already knew the answer was no.

He said he was sorry he didn’t bring it up with me. That his lawyer had explicitly told him to avoid talking about it, and that his main reason for not telling me was because he didn’t want our relationship to end.

I was scared I’d lose you just for being accused of something.

My lawyer is quite confident with everything so I was hoping to just get it sorted and put it all behind me and just focus on making a great future with you without shit from my past being in the back of your mind.

I asked for details. He was a little reluctant to delve into it, but I told him I needed to know. His lawyer advised against putting any of the details of the case in writing, but he saw a loophole. He sent me pictures through Instagram that could only be viewed once and would expire after opening. So naturally, I put pen to paper to record the following. There were a total of three pictures with written text that read what I have included below.

Image 1

Basically so far in my case we have established that these two girls me and Brady were with told us they were over the age but they weren’t. We drank and did drugs together. And about 2 years later now being accused of drugging and raping them. We did drink and do drugs with them yes but I’m defending in court about the sexual act because that did not happen.

Image 2

It’s a really intense accusation and there’s lots of evidence to support my defence. It’s only one girl making the accusation. The second one isn’t saying much in support of her friend. It’s a huge fucking nightmare and such a long process in court but I’m spending tens of thousands fighting it because I know I did nothing wrong.

Image 3

I left Perth maybe start of last year/end of the year because that’s when I originally had that big drug debt and was scared I’d get shot. Was getting calls from my rents saying that cops have asked me to come back to be questioned. Once I found out the nature of the charge I came back and was arrested and put in jail for the sole reason they considered me a flight risk due to connections and being in Sydney prior. I got out after like 5 months and was on home detention for a couple of months. And just cooperating through the whole process because It’s going to help with showing that I’m innocent and willing to go through the process.

The tone of the messages didn’t match the content of what he was saying; it was jarring. It felt like a magician had performed that trick on stage where he saws a woman in half. Only the assistant hadn’t withdrawn her legs from the bottom compartment of the hinged box, so as to create the illusion of separation before the magician began sawing, cutting her in two. As he pulls apart the two boxes for the big reveal, her intestines spill out onto the stage, and while the audience screams in horror, the magician confidently exclaims, “Oh, don’t worry about that.”

He continues the conversation outside of the pictures through the normal chat feature.

I’ve literally lost a couple of mates coz of simply just being accused of this shit and I was scared to lose you too because of the nature of the case. But I know you don’t deserve to be left in the dark because I really care about you. I’m dealing with this case now but I totally understand if you don’t want anything to do with me because of it. I know I’m innocent and I’m going to prove it but I know that doesn’t even matter for some people.

I hope you can understand why I didn’t tell you about all this, I just wanted to get it all sorted first because I know I’m innocent. But we live in a world where you’re guilty until proven innocent.

I hope I don’t lose you, but if knowing this means I do I can come collect my bag and just sort this mess out on my own.

I had been crying throughout these incoming messages, but there was radio silence on my end until I replied to him, “I’m so confused and upset by this, but I think you should just collect your bag and cease contact.”

I left his backpack on the front porch to collect and stored myself away in a room at the other end of the house to create as much distance as possible, mostly to allow myself to cry freely without that being detected.

Of course, that wasn’t the last of it. There would be months of no-contact and then we would be back on speaking terms again. I shouldn’t have been communicating with him on any level, but at the time I still loved him. I didn’t want to believe he was capable of what he was on trial for, or that he was a predator.

There was more than just residual emotions at play. Years prior when someone had assaulted me, this man had cared for me and had paid a bikie affiliate to harm my perpetrator in retaliation. This was a deal I ordered him to call off as soon as I became aware of it, but that’s what made it so much harder for me to wrap my head around.

Every time I would try to break contact, there would be paragraphs upon paragraphs and messages including:

The case is a big fkn lie and the truth will come out soon so I have 100% faith that god is on my side on this one. Not to mention I’ve completely changed my life around and do not put myself in situations like that, you know deep down I’m a good man and I have a good heart… all I want is to do right by you and treat you like a princess. Everything is so easy with us, we are literally perfect and I hate how an accusation years after a situation has ruined something so amazing. It’s unfair because I have such pure intentions with you more than anything.

I’m so vulnerable with you and it’s scary, but you truly have my whole heart and I don’t know how I’d be able to go a whole life without you.

I just have the feeling that you are the one and we are supposed to be together and I feel like no matter what we do the universe will always bring us back.

I haven’t ever met someone so perfect for me, when we were still together I was thanking god every day I had you.

I can’t picture myself with anyone else.

Babe I’m really lost without you.

My heart hurts so much.

I’d try to end things on ‘good terms,’ telling him I didn’t want to resent him because of the court case; his response to this was laced and soured:

Resenting me for something I didn’t do.

Yeah right.

Some love.

There would be times when I’d notice he’d sent lengthy messages through pop-up notifications on my phone, but he would unsend them before I had a chance to open them, and I would let it be.

I would almost plead with him to let me go: “I think about how you were able to hide the court case from me and it scares me”.

More attempts to win me back and reassure me would flood in:

I want you with all my heart and genuinely want to spend the rest of my life with you. If you just let me I’d give you my absolute all and you will always feel like the only girl in the world to me. I love you so much. Let me clear my name and show you how much you mean to me.

The last time I saw him was when I kissed him goodbye in my driveway, and I wanted to keep it that way. A part of me sought to protect the version of him I had experienced, and the memories of the relationship that I had initially felt so fortunate to have.

He would leave all my favourite things for me to come home to at my doorstep.

Bouquets.

Chocolates.

Coconut water.

Maraschino cherries.

A book that was on my ‘to read’ list.

Following these gestures would be invitations, in which he would try to convince me to let him take me out on a date.

It felt like he would have done anything for me. Anything except tell me the truth.

I had to come to terms with the fact that a man is the sum of his actions, and not just the actions he bestows upon me.

Nothing in my life has changed except for everything.