Should I Warn Her?

Her face is smiling up at me from the announcement section of the morning paper. Right there next to his depraved grin, she stands beaming, happy to show off the ring. I wonder who paid for it. Tossing the paper in the trash near the door, I walk out into the morning throng. The sun is shining and life is moving all around me.

Should I warn her? Would she believe me?

She does not even know who I am.  I am a stranger to her or worse depending on what he may have told her. Should I warn her that she is the latest in a long line of women he has scammed?  Should I tell her of the dead wife and the missing money? I wonder how they met, a grief support group or maybe an AA meeting. Does she know he cruises those place looking for vulnerable women?

He looks for a woman at her weakest point, a crying woman. He then swoops in for the rescue, wiping the tears from her eyes and kissing her on the forehead as he gives her a comforting bear hug. We are all such suckers for the tear wiping and forehead kisses being fed a steady diet of romantic comedies and romance novels since pre-pubescence.  Tears are his aphrodisiac. He sees them as weakness, a signal that the woman is ripe for the picking. He made a mistake with me. Tears are a weapon in my life. They are shed out of anger never weakness. Strength reside in my tears, anger, and frustration but never weakness.

Should I tell her how romantic and wonderful he is until he has his claws in you? Should I warn her of this flimflam man this carpetbagger from the north who preys on lonely weak women? Should I tell her I’m the one who got away?  Is she strong like me, will she see through him before it is too late or will she be wife number three another gravestone in the pauper’s cemetery?

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