In my foggy memory, there lies a hazy recollection of a particular Escape Pod story where the protagonist is first of all a divorced man. CAUTION: Important plot points cannot be distinguished from unimportant ones. Some points might be correct and some might not be. Yell whenever you read something that rings a bell.
The divorce started (I believe) with her not being happy with him as a husband anymore, but after a settlement was arranged it was discovered that she had been sleeping with an enemy of his from high school. After kicking the protagonist out of his own house, the ex-wife still insists on hanging around. Being alone, he still longs for her attention and help. He lives in an unsafe apartment complex since that's all he can afford and this contributes to his apartment being ransacked.
Through this event, he comes into contact with a woman who seems to know a lot about him in particular and is always a few steps ahead. He gets fed up with how much she knows about him and how little he knows how she knows it all. So, he breaks into the woman's office and tries (and fails) to dramatically catch her off-guard. Unfortunately, she somehow knew he would do this (I specifically remember that she had switched the position of her personal office chair with her guest's chair so she could still maintain the power in the conversation). It turns out that she is from the future and was sent back recently here to divulge other time travelers from an opposing faction. The opposing faction was sent back to purposefully mold the protagonist into someone he wasn't meant to be and thereby alter the course of future history to their advantage. Apparently, the protagonist is the opposing faction's biggest enemy and instead of killing him, they decide to plant several agents (ex-wife, high school nemesis, several other negative influences from past) in the past to systematically resign him to a sad life different from the one they had experienced.
One other thing that might remind someone and bring some sanity to my insanity is the device the female ally of the protagonist uses for her work: a special safe that sends it's contents back in time to a specific date. With this, she is able to predict and plan out her every move, know what to do and what not to do, and all exactly when it needs to happen by telling her past self everything she knows.
As I type this, I realize this might not even be a story on Escape Pod since I've listened to a few different sci-fi podcasts in the past. But, then again, it might be from here. Regardless, if anyone has *any* information on the title, author, possible podcasts to search, existence of such a story will be *much* appreciated.
