My husband put down the divorce papers with a smile and said, “Accept my mistress, or we’ll break up.”
I signed the papers without hesitation.
My husband turned pale. “No, wait. You misunderstood.”
My name is Linda, and if you had asked me a week ago to describe my life, I would have used words like stable, comfortable, and—maybe, if I were being honest—predictable. I’m forty-eight years old. I live in a colonial-style house in the suburbs of Chicago with a wraparound porch that I spent three summers repainting myself. I have two sons, a meticulously organized pantry, and a husband named Mark whom I have been married to for fifteen years.
Or rather, I had a husband.
It was a Tuesday evening. Tuesdays used to be taco nights, a tradition we started when Jason was a toddler, but lately, Tuesdays were just nights Mark worked late—or said he worked late. I was standing at the kitchen island, scrubbing a stubborn coffee ring off the granite countertop. The house was quiet. The boys were upstairs, Jason doing homework and Tyler playing video games. The only sound was the hum of the refrigerator and the rhythmic swish of my sponge.
Then the front door opened. Usually, Mark comes home with the weight of the world on his shoulders, loosening his tie, complaining about traffic on I-90, asking if dinner is ready. But this time, the energy was different. He walked in with a strut, a bounce in his step. He was wearing his navy pinstripe suit, the one he saves for board meetings, and he smelled like an expensive distillery mixed with a perfume that was floral, cloying, and definitely not mine.
“Linda,” he said. Not honey, not babe, just Linda.
He didn’t come over to kiss me. He walked straight to the kitchen table, pulled out a chair, and sat down. He placed a thick manila envelope on the table with a heavy, deliberate thud. It sounded like a judge’s gavel.
“Sit down,” he said. It wasn’t a request; it was a command.
I wiped my hands on a dish towel, my heart starting a slow, heavy thumping in my chest. “Dinner is in the oven, Mark. It’s pot roast, your favorite.”
“Forget the pot roast.” He waved a hand dismissively. “We need to discuss the future.”
I sat opposite him. The envelope lay between us like a loaded weapon. Mark leaned back, interlacing his fingers behind his head, a smug smile playing on his lips. He looked like a cat that had not only eaten the canary but had also negotiated a book deal about it.
The story doesn’t end here –
it continues on the next page.
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