MY HUSBAND WENT ON A WORK TRIP WITH HIS FEMALE COLLEAGUE—HOURS LATER, HE CALLED ME IN TEARS. So, my husband has this female coworker he’s super close with—basically his assistant. At least, that’s what I always told myself. They’ve always had this easy camaraderie, a shorthand in conversations that sometimes, if I was honest, made me feel a little bit like an outsider. He swore it was just professional, that she was invaluable to his work, and I always tried to believe him. Trust is everything, right? But a tiny, prickly seed of doubt always lingered whenever her name came up, especially about this big project out of state.
He left early Tuesday morning, briefcase in hand, a quick kiss on my forehead. “See you Friday, honey,” he called, already halfway out the door. I watched him go, feeling a strange mix of relief and unease. Relief that the tension of her presence wouldn’t be in our daily life for a few days, unease that they would be together, alone, for all that time. I pushed it down. He loves me. He wouldn’t.
Hours later, the phone rang. It was almost midnight. My heart jumped into my throat. He never calls that late unless something’s wrong. I fumbled for it, my hand shaking slightly. “Hello?”
His voice was a raw, choked sob. My stomach dropped. Pure, ice-cold panic flooded through me. “Honey? What is it? What happened?”
He couldn’t speak, just a ragged, gasping sound. “She’s… she’s gone,” he finally managed, the words broken.
My mind immediately jumped to the worst. I saw it all in a flash: late nights, hushed phone calls, the way he always defended her. My vision blurred. IT WAS HER. HE’S CONFESSING. My world tilted, the air left my lungs. Oh my god, he finally got caught. The betrayal hit me like a physical blow, even before he said another word.
“Gone?” I whispered, my voice barely there. “What do you mean, gone? Is… is she leaving the company? Are you… are you with her?” I was practically begging him to deny my darkest fear, even as I was sure it was true.
Another sob. Deeper. More profound. “No,” he choked out. “She’s… She’s not just gone. She’s dead. And it was… it was always meant to be like this. I just… I never told you. I couldn’t.”
My head spun. Dead? WHAT? My initial shock of betrayal began to recede, replaced by a cold, dreadful curiosity. What could possibly be so bad?
Then, he finally uttered the words that shattered everything I thought I knew. Words that didn’t confirm my fears of infidelity, but ripped a much deeper, wider hole in our life together.
“She wasn’t my assistant,” he sobbed, his voice cracking. “She was my sister. My older sister. The one I hadn’t spoken to in fifteen years because of our parents’ divorce. This trip… this wasn’t just a work trip. It was a last chance. She had been diagnosed. She had been sick for so long. And she decided to… end it. This was supposed to be our reconciliation. And I was supposed to be there. I was too late.”
The line went silent, except for his ragged breathing. My husband, the man I married, the man I thought I knew inside and out, had been carrying this unspeakable secret for years. The woman I’d secretly resented was his own blood, dying alone, and he’d been trying to save her. And now she was gone. And he was utterly broken. And I had never even known she existed. MY GOD.
