Juliana Hatfield's Bad Boy Decisions

I was attracted to their music and to some extent their appearance (a unique, off-center, scruffy, interesting untraditional handsomeness), and I assumed they were attracted to me for the same reasons. I didn't believe I had much to offer anyone other than those two things. Every failed relationship reinforced this in my mind and drove me deeper into a hole of low self-opinion and isolation and fear of any kind of closeness. All my worth and my identity were tied up with my music (my job) and to some extent my looks (which provided a visual accompaniment for those listening to my songs). Take those two things away, I thought, and I was nothing, no one; I ceased to exist.

After Sam and I had been together for a few months I learned that he, who'd seemed for the most part so sweet and shy, had a dark side. A dark, mean, pugnacious, crazy, jealous side. He was Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.

Sam played guitar in my band on one cross-country tour. The brooding, sulking Mr. Hyde persona took over for most of the tour. The other guys in the band took to calling Sam "The Darkness" when he got like that. After gigs, The Darkness would corner me and accuse me of cheating on him with, say, my drummer, or of flirting with other random men.

One morning in San Francisco, I woke up with The Darkness standing at the foot of our hotel bed, glaring at me. He asked in a frighteningly flat, coldly murderous tone, "Where did you go last night?"

"What are you talking about, Sam?" I said as I wiped the sleep from my eyes. "I was right here, in bed. With you. I didn't go anywhere!"

Sam, unconvinced, said, "Where did you go? I know you left. When I was sleeping. You went to Steve's room, didn't you?"

Steve was my drummer.

"Sam, you're fucking crazy. I was right here."

It was pointless to try to reason with him when he was being so crazy, out of nowhere. His delusion had nothing to do with me. It was his own affliction. And so I couldn't convince him that the truth was something other than what he believed.

This became the routine: After each show, Sam and I would go back to our hotel room, and most nights, Sam would begin his demented, groundless harangue, accusing me of cheating on him/flirting with other guys. I would at first deny everything (because none of it was ever true) and try to get Sam to recognize how wrong he was, but then I would invariably come to the conclusion, within minutes, that Sam was simply insane. At that point I would stop talking — stop engaging — and Sam would storm out of the room. That's when I would close the door, chain it and take a sleeping pill. Then I would jam my earplugs into my ears and get into bed.