This paper emerges from a narrative inquiry focused on academics' perceptions of marginalization and belonging in Canadian universities. Through multiple conversational interviews over a 4-year period, the 15 participants described the ways they came to learn that the academy is not the benevolent place they had at one time imagined. Participants once believed their employment contracts were reciprocal agreements of loyalty with their institutions. We heard echoes of Paul Simon's song, "There Must be Fifty Ways to Leave Your Lover" as the participants shared stories of their efforts to disengage from their contractual agreements when they no longer felt desired or appreciated by their institutions. Their stories reflect a gradual recognition that academic troth is premised on the ruling relations of the academy and that self-preservation sometimes demands disengagement. We emphasize the ways that disengagement leads to both personal and communal loss.