Allergic to Me

My husband claimed he was allergic to women. Even the slightest skin contact made him break out in red, swollen welts. In three years of marriage, we had never once been intimate. Even our child had to be conceived through IVF. After three failed procedures, I finally became pregnant with what I believed was our baby. On the day I was discharged, I received a video. In it, my husband was tangled up with another woman in every position imaginable. His skin was perfectly clear, except for the love bites she had left across his chest. I looked up. My husband was standing beside my bed, peeling an apple for me. He wore a mask, his shirt was buttoned all the way to the collar, and gloves covered both hands. He was protected from me from head to toe. The video had been recorded only the day before. Trembling, I reached for his collar, but he violently slapped my hand away. "Don't touch me! Stay away from me!" He looked at me as though I were filthy. That was when I finally understood. He was not allergic to women's bodily fluids. He was only allergic to me. When my husband went into the bathroom to change, I called the number I had blocked five years earlier. He answered almost instantly. "Send me your location. I'm coming now."