October and the holiday season was over

There were less and less people around in Golden Sands and one by one the bars and restaurants were closing and the summer season was drawing to a close.

The weather was still warm and mid 20s in the daytime but the days were shorter and the nights much cooler with the sun setting around 6ish.

I was feeling quite homesick for the first time since I had moved to Bulgaria but I think it was more about the situation I was in that was bringing these feelings in me rather than me missing the UK.. I knew that I would not be feeling that way if I still had money and was able to live in my villa and that I would be totally content and still loving my life in Bulgaria, especially if I was free of Valeri and without the pending police charges hanging over me.

My life in Bulgaria now felt tainted and that was all because of my relationship with Valeri which I never wanted in the first place! I did love him but I also hated him and resented him for all he had done to me and I knew that I was only with him now as I didn't have a choice!

Valeri was starting to be more paranoid and controlling again and the only thing that distracted him was gambling which came with a whole other set of problems to deal with such as his intense mood swings from high to low during the entire time from him placing the bets. These bets were always dependent on multiple matches and events and this meant him having to follow every minute of every game with intensity to be able to cash out should it not all go to plan to change his strategy.

I too had to endure the whole thing with him. I even had to ask if I could go out and had to have a good reason for wanting to go anywhere without him.

When I walked the dog, I had to leave my phone and he would expect me back in a certain amount of time and quizz me about where I walked, who I spoke to and tally it all up in his mind by calculating how long I was out against where I said I had been.

On a few occasions when I asked if I could go to the beach if he was going to be watching various matches all day he would insist that I was in eyeshot of the apartment and would regularly watch me from the window to make sure I was not talking to anyone and would insist I left my phone in the apartment.

I would dread anyone especially a man walking past me on the beach or being within 100 metres of me as he would inevitably accuse me of knowing this man and even having an affair with him!

One day a man walked by and sat on the beach about 50 metres away and I tried to not even look in his direction and within minutes Valeri was on the beach and asking me if I knew the man and if he had spoken to me... to save myself from grief I just went back to the apartment with Valeri and sat inside for fear of him accusing me of communicating with the man from the balcony.

We had no money again as the money his mother had given us which was supposed to see us through, he had used what was left to gamble. At one point he was up by alot and had quadrupled the money so at this point I suggested that he should cash out half and then we would have no worries and he would still have more than enough to still gamble with but of course Valeri knew best and by the following morning he had lost the lot!

Of course I knew better than to dare say anything other than it was ok and it didnt matter and that it could not have possibly been his fault and agree with him that the online betting site had deliberately sabotaged him as they were monitoring him and slowing up the internet to make him unable to react within time to change the outcome of his bet etc etc!!

I had no choice in the end but to ask my dad to lend me some money as we were hungry and close to being without a roof over our heads as the rent was overdue which of course was all my fault!

I told Valeri that he had lent me less than he had and just enough to cover the rent for another week, as I knew he would just take the whole lot and gamble with it and I wasn't prepared to go hungry again.

Valeri nevertheless took the all the money that he believed I had which was for the rent and gamble with it after he insisted that he go and pay it at the office instead of me as he didn't like how the man in the office looked at me. The office was 5 mins walk and so I knew when he was gone an hour that he had used it to bet.

When he came back, I said nothing! I knew he had not paid the rent and had had no intention of doing so.

He went straight to the computer and started to intensely watch the games he had bet on without saying a word and didn't answer when I asked if the man in the office was ok with him when he went to pay the rent  seeing as the rent was late, knowing damn well he had not gone to pay it!

About an hour or so later, he was elated and picked me up from the sofa and started swinging me around and telling me how much he loved me and that I was lucky to have such a wonderful boyfriend...

I played dumb and asked him what he was so excited about which was when he finally told me he had bet the rent money but it was a good thing as now he had trebled it!

1. I made it perfectly clear that although I was very happy that he had won, he should not have taken the decision to use the rent money without at least telling me. I insisted  that he also cashed out the rent money from the bet before he carried on which he did without any argument much to my relief.