What am I doing wrong?

I’m almost thirty. Allie has been one of my best friends since we were in the eighth grade. We went to school together for a year during that time. We are the kind of friends that can go for months or even years without talking and just pick up as if we had a conversation ten minutes ago. She is the most beautiful girl I know.

Allie works out six days a week. She does her make-up like a pro. She looks like a pin-up girl. She was an ‘exotic dancer’ (read: stripper). She is the kind of girl every man wants. She has a faithful boyfriend, a home with him, two wonderful children, beauty like no one deserves, and men on the side.

She has men on the side. That part bothers me. Right now, she works as a bartender. Men swoon over her, and as of this writing, she has two whom which she pays extra attention. It started with John. He is a great person. I went to school with him. I am in the process of getting a divorce, and when at a weak moment I hit on him, she informed me that he ‘was her man’. He takes her out after work, buys her drinks, shows her a good time, and goes home by himself.

Most recently, there is Chris. Allie called me last night to say there was a problem. She was going to hang out with Chris, but John stopped by her work and wanted her to go out with him. After work, she met John at a bar, where he paid for several of her drinks, then she told him that Alex (her boyfriend, housemate, and father of her most recent child) was texting her and she had to leave. She left to meet Chris at another bar.

When I went to see my friend Allie while she was bartending the other night, John was there. He made a comment about women only liking men that treated them badly. Tonight I am thinking about how men seem to only like women who treat them bad.

I’m not sure where the quote is from, but I’ve heard ‘We hurt the ones who love us and love the ones who hurt us’. What truth!