Falling in Love with the Caveman In My Basement
His Name is Gronk and He’s Very Patient
My wife of 6 years and I have been living in our new home for 8 months now. In all this time, we have never been in the basement. The real estate agent told us the owner had moved all their stuff down there until the place sold, so we didn’t see it on the tour, and we didn’t bring enough stuff to need to put anything down there. Two weeks ago one of our fuses blew, so I went down to the basement to fix it. There he was. The Caveman living in my basement.
I ran back upstairs, still not processing what had truly happened. My wife asked why I was so panicked, and in an attempt to avoid worrying her, I lied. I told her I had seen a big spider and got scared upstairs. She giggled, like she always did, and walked away. That was the first lie of many.
That same night I snuck downstairs while my wife was asleep. I went to the basement in my night gown with a flashlight to see if what I had seen was real. When I reached the bottom of the stairs, I realized he wasn’t just real, he was beautiful. Everything fell silent in that moment and it was just me and this caveman alone in the universe. I asked for his name, and he gave me the most beautiful name I could have ever imagined. Gronk.
It turns out, that’s about all Gronk can say. Maybe it isn’t even his name. I don’t care. It fits him perfectly. When I look at him, all I can think about is Gronk. Every night since then I have snuck to the basement after my wife falls asleep with a plate of food to fill Gronk’s stomach and a loving embrace to fill my soul.
It has begun to affect my performance at my job as a manager of my local Kroger’s. Since meeting Gronk, I have called out “sick” from my job 4 times so that I may “play hooky” and spend the day with my hunting-gathering hunk. Prior to this life changing moment, I had never missed a day. Kroger’s has always been my top priority. Now, I’m not so sure. There’s something about Gronk that makes me want to give it all up and become an oil painter or help out in the community.
I have never felt like this for another human before. Not even my wife. This revelation is tearing my whole world view apart. I still love my wife, but how do I tell her I fell in love with the caveman living in our basement? She’ll be heartbroken. She’ll never love again. I don’t want her to feel like I never loved her, I just never knew what love felt like. But now, I do. It feels like a loincloth made out of tiger pelt being wrapped around your heart. It feels like a wooden club colliding with your chest, rattling your stomach around your chest cavity. It feels like watching a wooly mammoth stepping on your tribe elder who was 31 years old.
I believe I have come to a suitable resolution. It pains me to say this, but I must legally divorce my wife. We did not create any form of prenuptial agreement, but it doesn’t matter. She can have it all. Gronk and I will run away together. The world isn’t ready for an inter-era relationship. We would just be shunned. After my divorce is settled, Gronk and I will walk across the Bering Strait to live with his parents in Mongolia. As it turns out, Genghis Khan, is related to him! How crazy is that.
