I Stopped Saving My Cheating Husband

Chapter 3

And so, ground down day after day, I developed severe psychosomatic disorder.

I swallowed painkillers and antidepressants by the handful.

Until two weeks ago, when my grandmother, the only family I had left, was on her deathbed.

In her final hours, all she wanted was to see Julian one last time.

Julian agreed immediately over the phone.

But the moment her heart monitor flatlined, I dialed his number in a frenzy.

The call connected. On the other end: pounding music and a woman's coy, giggling voice.

It hit me like a bolt of lightning. Every drop of blood in my body froze.

Julian's voice came through, dripping with impatience and alcohol.

"What are you crying about? The old lady's dead, so call the funeral home. I'm not a doctor."

"Tell you what. Pick whichever urn you want, the most expensive one in the city. Put it on my tab."

The line went dead.

I crumpled at the foot of my grandmother's hospital bed, too broken to even produce a sound.

I went into shock outside the morgue that night. When I came to, I was in a psychiatric ward.

The doctor told me that prolonged severe psychological trauma had triggered emotional dissociation.

My mind had shut down my ability to feel pain as a defense mechanism. Along with it went my capacity to love.

There is no greater grief than a heart that has ceased to feel.

What I'd needed to understand all along wasn't how to be a better wife. It was how to cut Julian Ashford out of my life.

So I began forcing myself through desensitization.

I stopped searching for his scandals. I treated him as nothing more than a source of living expenses.

I stopped bolting out the door at midnight every time he called, running through the rain to bring him stomach medication.

When photos of him with other women appeared, my stomach no longer seized. I just stared, numb, and hit delete.

Until one autumn afternoon, watching dead leaves drift past my window, I understood.

This tree was dead. It was time to dig out the rotting roots.

So this time, when hundreds of taunting emails flooded my inbox, I simply finished my last sip of coffee, washed the cup, and put it back in the cupboard.

I didn't reply to a single one. I selected all the photos and deleted them in one click.

Before, images like those would have choked the air from my lungs. This time, the face on screen belonged to a stranger.

Julian was right about one thing. I'd once been obsessed with him.

Back when he had nothing, he'd severed ties with his family for me, taken beatings and refused to let go of my hand.

He'd shared instant noodles with me in a rented room.

That year, we were broke, but we felt like we owned the world. Every day had purpose.

Later, to secure investors, he drank until he hemorrhaged. I carried him to the hospital on my back.

For three years, we were like two vines wound together. Live or die as one.

When we couldn't afford heating, he'd wrap me entirely in his coat.

We pinned every hope on the future, dreaming of what life would look like after we made it.

And every time I looked up at him, he'd lean down and kiss the tip of my nose.

"Viv, I'd give you my life. If you ever left me, I wouldn't survive it."

Vows. Just words.

Back then, I'd been foolish enough to press my hand over his mouth and tell him not to say such things.

We did make it, in the end.

He was the first to change. And I was the one left behind to suffer for it.

I sat in the study for a long time, until the sky went dark. Julian didn't come home.

But I wouldn't leave a light on for him anymore. I simply began gathering my documents.

While sorting through old belongings, I found a yellowed envelope hidden in a false panel of the safe.

Inside: a photograph and a journal entry, in Julian's handwriting.

Vivienne Langley. Since you only got close to me for that exchange program bet, then I'll trap you by my side and we'll destroy each other.

Curiosity made me pick up the old photograph.

But the more I looked, the more absurd it became, until I was laughing through tears.

The reason I'd spent three years begging to understand, the reason he'd turned on me, was a throwaway joke my college roommate had made years ago.

And the love Julian had once sworn was unto death had been so fragile he couldn't even be bothered to ask me for the truth.

I fed everything into the shredder.

In the middle of the night, Julian came home reeking of perfume. He kicked my door impatiently, ordering me to run his bath.

I put on my noise-canceling headphones and slept until morning.