After My Husband Let His Mistress Replace Me

Tatum moved through the house like she had always lived here.

She started with the kitchen. I heard her talking to Gloria, the housekeeper, about rearranging the morning coffee schedule. Her voice was light. Friendly. She laughed at something Gloria said.

I was standing in the hallway with a basket of Haisley's laundry. I did not go in.

By the end of the week, the guest wing looked different. New curtains. A bookshelf. Framed photographs on the side table. Cecelia's ballet shoes hung on a hook by the door.

It looked permanent.

I carried the laundry back to the servant's quarters and folded it on the narrow bed.

Haisley sat on the floor, drawing. She was making a picture of a house. Two windows. A door. A tree beside it.

"Is that our house?" I asked.

She nodded.

"Who lives there?"

"You and me," she said.

She did not draw anyone else.

I sat down beside her and watched her color.

That afternoon, Tatum hosted a gathering in the living room. I heard voices through the walls. Women I did not know. Laughter. The clink of glasses.

I stayed in the servant's quarters with Haisley.

No one came to invite me.

That evening, I walked past Harrison's study. The door was open. Tatum was inside, leaning against his desk. She said something I could not hear. He laughed.

She touched his arm.

I kept walking.

The pain started that night.

It woke me at three in the morning. Sharp. Deep. Like something inside me was splitting open.

I got up carefully so I would not wake Haisley. I went to the bathroom and turned on the tap. I opened the vitamin bottle and took two morphine tablets.

I gripped the edge of the sink and waited.

The pain did not stop.

I took a third tablet.

Slowly, it dulled. Not gone. Just quieter.

I looked at myself in the mirror. My face was pale. My eyes were hollow. I looked like something already dead.

I turned off the tap and went back to bed.

The next morning, I woke to the taste of blood.

I got up fast. I made it to the bathroom before I vomited into the toilet. Blood and bile. Dark red. Too much.

I flushed it. I rinsed my mouth. I wiped down the toilet seat with toilet paper and flushed again.

I checked the time. Five-thirty. Haisley would not wake for another hour.

I sat on the bathroom floor and waited for my hands to stop shaking.

It happened again two days later. And again the day after that.

I cleaned it every time. I made sure there was no trace.

One morning, I was not fast enough.

I heard Haisley's voice behind me.

"Mommy?"

I turned. She was standing in the doorway, holding her stuffed rabbit.

"I'm okay," I said. "Go back to bed, sweetheart."

She did not move.

"Are you sick?"

"Just a little," I said. "It's nothing."

She walked over and put her hand on my arm.

"Do you need medicine?"

I nodded. "I already took some."

She looked at me with those wide brown eyes. Trusting. Worried.

I pulled her into a hug and held her tight.

"I'm okay," I whispered. "I promise."

She believed me.

That afternoon, I was in the bathroom again. I had just swallowed two tablets when I heard the vitamin bottle hit the floor.

It rolled across the tile.

I turned.

Haisley was standing there. She bent down and picked it up.

She looked at the label. She could not read yet, but she studied it like she was trying.

Then she handed it to me.

"Your vitamins," she said.

"Yes," I said. My voice was steady. "Thank you, baby."

She smiled and walked out.

I stood there with the bottle in my hand.

My chest felt tight.

I put the bottle back in my pocket and left the bathroom.

The next day, I was walking down the hallway when the pain hit.

It came fast. Hard. I stopped and pressed my hand against the wall.

I closed my eyes and breathed through it.

Footsteps behind me.

"Elena."

Harrison's voice.

I straightened. I dropped my hand. I turned to face him.

"Are you alright?" he asked.

His tone was stiff. Formal. Like he was asking out of obligation.

"I'm fine," I said.

"You don't look fine."

"I have a headache."

He stared at me for a moment. Then he shook his head.

"You've always been dramatic," he said.

He walked past me.

I stood there until his footsteps faded.

Then I went back to the servant's quarters.

That evening, I was in the kitchen. Haisley was at the table, eating crackers. I poured myself a glass of water and took out the vitamin bottle.

I shook two tablets into my hand.

I heard footsteps.

Harrison walked in. He went to the fridge and pulled out a bottle of beer.

I swallowed the tablets.

He glanced at me. His eyes flicked to the vitamin bottle on the counter.

He looked at it for half a second.

Then he looked away.

He twisted the cap off his beer and walked out.

I stood there with the glass of water in my hand.

He had looked right at it.

He had seen it.

And he did not care enough to ask.

I put the bottle back in my pocket.

I sat down beside Haisley and watched her eat.

She smiled at me.

I smiled back.

I could last two more weeks.

I had to.