He Cheated, I Exposed His Muse Secret

Chapter 3

Three days later, Ryan was heading to his new book signing. Before he left, he reminded me as usual. "Just stay in, get some rest, and call me if you need anything."

I nodded obediently. The second his car disappeared around the corner, I made twenty phone calls back to back.

Two hours later, our living room had turned into a small party venue.

The drummer of an indie band set up his kit on the balcony. A performance artist painted abstract art on the blank wall with pigments.

A food blogger went live in the kitchen, using a seventy-thousand-dollar bottle of red wine that Ryan had treasured as cooking wine to braise fish.

We cranked the speakers to full volume. The whole building shook. Property management came twice.

Neighbors called in three complaints, and a pack of paparazzi gathered downstairs.

Perfect.

He stormed in, looking absolutely livid, with two reporters on his heels, and Sarah right behind them.

She was holding an emergency medical kit, and her face wore that carefully practiced expression of "anxiety and heartache."

Ryan walked through the crowd toward me. "Nina, you made some new friends? That's wonderful."

When his hand landed on my shoulder, the pressure was so heavy it made my bones ache.

Sarah took my hand. "Nina, did you take your medicine on time today?"

She turned to the reporters beside her. "Her condition has worsened faster than I expected. Sudden overexcitement, excessive socializing, impulsive spending. These are all classic symptoms of a manic episode."

Ray with the purple hair froze. "What? Nina, she...?"

Sarah pulled out a copy of a medical record and opened it. "Bipolar disorder, diagnosed three years ago. She is currently in a manic episode."

She looked at me, her eyes brimming with pity. "Nina, you aren't throwing a party. You're having an episode."

Ray looked at me, then at the medical record, and started packing up his drums.

The performance artist set down his paintbrush.

The food blogger ended his live stream.

People left the house one by one. When they passed me, the look they gave me wasn't appreciation. It was pity.

It was that same look I'd seen for ten years: 'Oh, so she really is crazy.'

Ryan held me from behind, sighed into the reporters' cameras, and said, "It's okay. She's just sick. You saw it yourselves. I could never leave her."

The reporters' shutters clicked over and over.

The next morning, the top trending topic was:

#RyanMiller'sWifeHasManicEpisodeThrowsPartyHusbandRushesHomemidBookSigning.

All the top comments said the same thing.

A: [Oh my god, his eyes were brimming with tears. How much must this man love her?"]

B: [Can't Nina Brown just stop causing trouble? Do you have any idea how much your husband gave up for you?]

C: [Dr. Lane has been having a really hard time.]

D: [Not to be harsh, but Ryan Miller is a saint for not divorcing her.]

I sat in the living room watching Ryan's carefully staged "guarding his crazy wife" moment get praised across the whole web.

I watched Sarah's "professional commentary" get clipped into a popular science post that was reposted a hundred thousand times.

They weren't just suppressing me.

They teamed up with the entire internet to build the story of me being "crazy."

Every repost, every like, every comment that said "My heart goes out to Ryan" was a new iron bar on the cage he built for me.

Thirty million people were helping him guard me.

That night, I heard Ryan on the phone in his study. The door was left slightly ajar.

"Sarah, you reacted so quickly today. That phrase 'manic episode' was perfect. The public's completely on our side... That's right. But she's been way too off lately. Not as easy to control as she used to be... Yeah.

"I also think we went a little too far. Something was off in her eyes yesterday."

A long silence followed.

Then he said, "We can't stop even if we went too far. The new book needs a bigger c****x. The publishing house has been breathing down my neck. The more she fights back these days, the better the material. Keep going according to plan."

I leaned against the wall, my nails digging deep into my palm.

He thought they "went a little too far."

Because the publishing house was chasing the manuscript.

Because the new book needed a c****x.

Because every one of my struggles was just a more exciting plot beat for his writing.

I bit my lip and stayed silent, then turned and went back to the bedroom.

Fine. If I couldn't win going head to head, then I wouldn't fight that way.

You have Sarah. You have the entire internet on your side.

All I have is myself.

But you forgot one thing. All your material, all your stories, your ten year "devoted husband" public image, only one thing is the source of it all. And that is me.

Without me, you're nothing.