I Took Off My Bandages And Saw My Husband Kiss My Best‑Friend

"Hold still, Mrs. Brennan. Last layer."

Dr. Okafor's fingers moved near my temple. The gauze peeled away, strip by strip, and cool air touched skin that hadn't felt light in six weeks.

Six weeks since the crash.

Six weeks of nothing but black.

"Keep your eyes closed until I say so," he warned. "The light will sting."

"I don't care if it stings." My voice came out thin and eager. "Is he here? Is Liam here?"

A pause. Somewhere to my left, a chair creaked.

"Your husband is in the room," the doctor said.

I bit my lip to keep from grinning like an idiot. All those nights, I'd pictured this moment. Liam's face. His crooked smile. The tiny scar on his chin from a college hockey game.

The first thing I would see in this new life would be him.

"Okay, Wren. Slowly now. Open."

I opened.

White. Then gold. Then a blur of shapes swimming in a haze, like looking up from the bottom of a pool. I blinked hard, and tears ran down my cheeks.

"That's normal," Dr. Okafor murmured. "Give it a second."

The haze sharpened. A face took form, close to mine.

Dark hair. Gray eyes. A jaw shadowed with stubble, as if he hadn't slept in days.

Not Liam.

"Jasper?"

Jasper Cole. My husband's best friend since they were nine years old. The man who stood beside Liam at our wedding and barely said ten words to me all night.

He swallowed. "Hey, Wren. Can you see me?"

"I—yes." Something hollow opened under my ribs. "Where's Liam?"

Jasper didn't answer.

He didn't have to. His shoulders shifted, and over them, I saw the window.

Floor-to-ceiling glass. Late afternoon sun.

And my husband, pressed against it, his hand buried in a woman's red hair. Kissing her like he was starving.

I knew that hair. I'd braided it at sleepovers when we were twelve.

Chloe Marsh. My best friend.

The heart monitor beside me jumped. Beep. Beep-beep-beep.

The sound broke them apart.

Chloe stumbled back first, wiping her mouth with the heel of her hand. Liam turned. For one second, his face was naked, guilty, scared.

Then it closed like a door.

"Wren!" He crossed the room in three long strides. "Baby, you can see? Oh my God, you can see!"

He reached for my hand. I watched his fingers wrap around mine, and I felt nothing. No warmth. Just skin.

"What was that?" I asked.

"What was what?"

"Liam."

He laughed. Actually laughed. "Okay, I know how that looked. Chloe was crying. She's been a wreck about you for weeks. I was just—comforting her. It got weird for a second. Emotions were high. That's all."

"Comforting her," I repeated.

"Wren, honey." Chloe hovered behind him, twisting the strap of her purse. Her lipstick was smeared at one corner. "It's not what you think. I swear. We were both so scared you'd never—"

"Never see again," I said.

She flinched.

Dr. Okafor cleared his throat. "I'll give you all a few minutes. Mrs. Brennan, call the nurse if your eyes start to ache." He left fast, the way people leave a house that's about to catch fire.

The door clicked shut.

Liam squeezed my hand tighter. "Look at me. Please. Do you really think I'd do that to you? After everything?"

After everything.

The words dragged me backward.

The first night after the accident, when I woke up screaming and couldn't tell if my eyes were open or closed. A hand found mine in the dark. Steady. Warm. A voice, low and rough from exhaustion: "I'm here. You're okay. Breathe with me."

The nights after that. Someone reading to me when the pain meds wore off. Someone cutting my food into small pieces so I wouldn't have to ask. Someone humming an old song under his breath until I fell asleep.

Liam. It had to be Liam.

I'd held onto that voice like a rope over a cliff.

"Wren?" Liam's thumb stroked my knuckles. "Say something."

I stared at his face. The face I'd been dying to see.

He looked tired. But it was the wrong kind of tired. Not the kind from sitting by a hospital bed. The kind from late nights somewhere else.

Something hot and ugly rose in my throat. I wanted to rip the IV out of my arm and throw the water pitcher at his head. I wanted to scream at Chloe until the windows cracked.

Instead, I smiled.

"I'm just tired," I said. "My head hurts."

Liam's whole body loosened. "Of course it does. God, of course. You've been through hell."

"Yeah," I said. "I have."

Chloe stepped closer, her eyes shiny. "Can I hug you? I've missed you so much."

I let her. Her perfume filled my nose, sweet vanilla. The same perfume that clung to Liam's collar.

"I missed you too," I whispered into her shoulder.

She pulled back, beaming with relief. Liam kissed my forehead. His lips were dry.

"I'll grab you some real food," he said. "None of that hospital Jell-O. Chloe, come help me carry stuff."

"Sure!" Chloe grabbed her coat a little too fast.

At the door, Liam glanced back. "Love you, babe."

"Love you," I answered.

The door swung closed behind them.

The silence afterward was so loud my ears rang.

My hands were shaking. I pressed them flat against the blanket and stared at the ceiling until the tiles blurred again. Not from the surgery this time.

"You're not tired."

I turned my head.

Jasper hadn't moved. He stood at the foot of the bed with his arms crossed, his gray eyes fixed on me. I'd forgotten he was there.

"Excuse me?"

"You're not tired," he said quietly. "You're furious. Why didn't you say anything?"

"What was I supposed to say?" My voice cracked down the middle. "Congratulations? I hope you two are very happy?"

"The truth."

"The truth is that I've been blind for six weeks, Jasper. I have no job right now, no car, and the man who sat with me every single night while I fell apart just had his tongue down my best friend's throat." I laughed, and it came out wrong, too high. "So forgive me if I need a minute to figure out my next move."

His jaw went tight.

"Every single night," he echoed.

"Yes. Every night." I wiped my face with the back of my wrist. "He held my hand. He read to me. He hummed that stupid song until I slept. I know it sounds pathetic, but that was the only thing that kept me sane in here."

Jasper looked away. Out the window, at the exact spot where Liam had kissed her.

"Wren," he started.

Then he stopped.

"What?"

He opened his mouth. Closed it. His throat moved like he was swallowing something sharp.

"Nothing," he said finally. "Get some rest."

He picked up his jacket from the chair beside my bed. The chair that had creaked when the doctor said my husband was in the room.

As he leaned past me to grab it, I caught his scent.

Cedar soap. Clean and faint.

My heart stopped cold.

Because Liam had always worn expensive cologne, the sharp citrus kind.

But every night in the dark, the hand that held mine had smelled exactly like cedar.