This American Life #588 - Blood and Water

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[ preamble to go here when i'm not lazy ... basically nick running down his childhood w/ rafi, blah blah ]

[Intake of breath] In some ways I feel like a fraud talking about my relationship with my brother. Not because anything I'm saying isn't true, or because I feel like I'm misrepresenting him at all... it sometimes doesn't feel like my story to tell. Because somewhere along the line Rafi met Freya, and that led to all of this... Freya saw the real version of my brother long before I did, so it should probably be her doing this story, telling you about what happened to the Khans from Newbury. Freya. What did happen to the Khans from Newbury?

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A long pause. I think you know I'm not good about talking about most things, let alone these things. Where do you begin? From the start? I met Rafi in high school and everything after that was quick. We were in a rush and everything felt fine like that. More than fine. It was such puppy love and when we looked at each other all we saw was perfection. I think everyone can relate to the honeymoon stage.

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I definitely can. I can also testify to how gross you guys were, I couldn't move at school for seeing you two all over each other in the hall, on the stairway, behind the bleachers... you were a total cliche. I should add for anyone who might be listening, Newbury was a comically small town. The kind of small towns you see on TV shows and think they can't possibly be real, everyone knowing everyone, every little thing being gossip, that was Newbury. Everyone knew about Rafi and Freya pretty quickly.

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We only really thought of each other. And the fact that everyone was in our business didn't really seem to matter because we were ignorant of it. He remained ignorant of it, I'm pretty sure he did. When we married everyone thought we were crazy for it and we definitely were, but I didn't see it then. It was like when you go through an emo thing and your mom tells you that the eyeliner is just a phase and you're like ]mimics mom voice, 'it's not a phase, mom!' It might not have been a phase, but Rafi changed pretty quickly after Naila was born and things became more stressful.

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[ He laughs at the impression ] Oh yeah. To rewind a bit, I should probably introduce you properly. This is Freya. She's relevant to the story of my family because she married into it, becoming my sister in law. She and Rafi had a little girl, my niece Naila, who's the most adorable kid in the world, by the way. Though they're no longer together, nowadays I consider Freya and Naila my family, whereas Rafi and I don't speak. [ A smile creeps into his voice ] I should also disclose that Freya is my girlfriend.

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She laughs Hi everyone. I share that too, Nick's as much my family as I am his. You were even a huge part of my life when I was with Rafi, before Naila. Not romantically, of course. We can save that for another podcast.

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[ He laughs again ] Yeah, I promise there was no foul play! I still worshipped Rafi back then, and I loved having Freya as part of the family. Everyone did, she was always round at my parents' for dinner. [ He pauses, taking a deep inhale ] I think you should be the one to say what happened after you got married. After Naila was born.

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Just friends. [Pauses] It's difficult to say and for a long time I couldn't admit that I was being abused, because I never thought that I could be the kind of woman who allowed herself to be hurt by a man. Not that I thought that people who are abused are weak, I just thought I didn't fall into the category. But shortly after my daughter was born, Rafi started getting a little rough. Eventually a little became a lot. [Another pause] It's hard to say things out loud, for so long I didn't. I still had this idea that it would stop and we'd be the perfect little family we were meant to be.

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[ Nick's quiet a moment, and when he speaks his voice is quieter, weaker ] I'm sorry I didn't do anything to stop it. That I didn't even notice.

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[ Her voice is sympathetic and gentle ] I didn't want you to notice, I made efforts to get people not to notice. I can't really do make-up but I really became a master of concealer [ nervous laughter ]. When you did find out though, you really did save me. That sounds cheesy and theatrical, but it's true.

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Still, I was there a lot. You know how I feel about this. Rafi was a larger than life figure to me, he was Superman, I was as blind to his real self as everyone was to Clark Kent. Once I saw it, it was so obvious, it's hard to look back and understand how I could have missed it for so long. [ he scoffs softly at the suggestion ]  You saved yourself.

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Well, I might of threw the rope but you pulled me up. What do you mean it was obvious?

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[ He pauses again, starting to speak but clearly stumbling over his words ] Uh-- I-- it's hard to verbalize. In retrospect there were lots of small things I should have picked up on. The way he glared at you when a waiter flirted, how your texts went from friendly to stiff. He was reading them, right? And he got weird with me, too. Obviously nothing like that, but he went from the benevolent big brother to this... I don't know what. He didn't like it when I started going to the gym, when I was single, when you and I hung out without him, even though we were friends first, being in the same class. He didn't like how hands on an uncle I was either, he made a few comments about that.

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I know, but it's so easy to mistake those for other things. Everyone always says marriage is tough and the first year of it is the toughest, or after you have a kid. I'm not defending him, but those late nights made me cranky. I can understand most of those things being misunderstood as crankiness. He did hate us though. Hated that I was team Nick. Though maybe he was right to.

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[ A sigh. ] Yeah. Us sitting here a couple does make it seem like he was onto something, but he wasn't. Freya was a sister to me, we were thick as thieves but there was nothing remotely romantic about it at the time. Hell, half the time I was living in California, the whole time I had relationships of my own. I don't want to speak on your behalf, which is why I asked you to be here, but I'm sure romance was the last thing on your mind during that time.