An Open Marriage

"Don't you dare walk out of this room!" I screamed.

I lunged forward, my fingers digging into his forearm. I didn't care about being the "Perfect Wife" anymore. I was shaking so hard I could barely stand, my chest heaving with a pain so sharp it felt like physical glass.

"Answer me!" I shrieked. "Do not tell me I’m paranoid! Do not sit there and lie to my face when I am holding the proof in my hands, Damian. You were in Chicago! You had these in your pocket while you were kissing me in the car! While you were inside me!"

He tried to shake me off, his face twisting into a mask of disgust. "Emilka, stop it. You’re being hysterical. You’re ruining everything because you want to play detective. I’m going to the guest room. I can't deal with this drama tonight.”

"No! You don't get to leave!”

 I scrambled away from him, my eyes landing on his suitcase near the closet. It was still packed, a silent witness to his lies. I ripped it open, my hands moving like they belonged to someone else. I threw his expensive shirts onto the floor, pulling at the lining, desperate to find the bottom of this nightmare.

"What are you doing? Stop that!" he barked, but I didn't stop.

I found them. Another strip of condoms, tucked deep into a side pocket where he thought I’d never look. And then, my fingers brushed against something soft. Something that didn't belong to him. Something that definitely didn't belong to me too.

I pulled it out, my fingers trembling. It was a pair of silk panties. They weren't mine. I didn’t own anything that loud, that intimate, that small.

"What is this?" I whispered, my voice cracking. "Whose are these, Damian?"

He didn't even flinch. He just leaned against the doorframe and let out a dry, cruel laugh. 

"Those? Those are yours, Emil. Or maybe you planted them there yourself. You’ve clearly lost your mind. You’re so desperate to be a victim that you're making things up now."

The gaslighting was so effortless it made my stomach turn. I looked from the red lace to his cold, handsome face. He was telling me I was crazy while the evidence was right in my hand.

"Fuck you, Damian!" The words were out before I could think. I stepped forward, fueled by a sudden, white-hot burst of adrenaline, and swung my hand as hard as I could. The slap echoed through the silent bedroom like a gunshot. My palm stung, and his head snapped to the side.

Silence followed. It was heavy and suffocating.

Damian slowly turned his face back to me. He didn't look angry. He looked... bored. He wiped his cheek and took a slow breath.

"I didn't want you to find out this way," he said, his voice suddenly calm. Too calm. "I wanted us to talk about it properly. But since you've decided to go through my things like a child, here it is."

He walked toward me, and I backed up until my back hit the dresser.

"I want an open marriage, Emilka," he said simply.

I stared at him, stunned. "An open marriage? You mean you want permission to cheat? Or you want me to be okay with what you’re already doing.”

"I'm doing this for us," he said, and the lie was so smooth it made me want to scream. "Look at what we've been through. The doctors. The hormones. The three failed IVFs. It’s been years of needles, crying, and disappointment. It turned our bedroom into a lab, Emil. I don't want to disturb you with my... needs anymore. I have a legacy to think about. I need a life that isn't just mourning a child that isn't coming."

The mention of the IVFs felt like a knife to the heart. He was blaming my body. Our struggle to have a baby, for his choice to spend a night in a Chicago hotel with a woman who wore a red lace.

"You’re blaming me?" I whispered, the tears finally overflowing, hot and thick. "You're blaming the fact that I couldn't get pregnant for why you’re sleeping with someone else?”

“Think about it," he said, his voice as casual as if he were discussing a business merger. "You get to keep the house, the car, the 'Mrs. Perfect' title you love so much. I just get a little breathing room. We can still be a team."

We just don't have to be... this."

He looked around the room at the discarded shirts and the open suitcase with a look of utter exhaustion. He didn't wait for me to answer. He didn't wait for me to scream or beg or agree. He just turned on his heel and walked out.

He didn't slam the door. He closed it with a quiet, final click that felt more permanent than any shout.

I stood there for a long time, staring at the closed door. Then, my legs simply gave out.

I collapsed into the corner of the room, my back sliding down the wall until I was sitting on the floor, surrounded by the wreckage of his clothes. I pulled my knees to my chest and wrapped my arms around them, trying to hold myself together, but I was already falling apart.

I began to sob. It wasn't the quiet, graceful cry of a woman in a movie. It was a loud, ugly, guttural sound. I rocked back and forth on the floor, my breath coming in jagged gasps, sobbing like a maniac.

I looked at the red lace panties on the floor beside me. I looked at the diamond ring on my finger.

He didn't want a partner. He didn't even want a wife. He wanted a ghost to haunt his house while he lived his real life somewhere else. He wanted me to stay in this cage and smile for the neighbors while he built a "legacy" with someone else.

The house was silent. I was alone in the dark, and for the first time in five years, I was completely alone.And he expected me to say thank you.