Husband's Affair After Divorce

On the day we were supposed to finalize our divorce, I was hit with sudden, excruciating stomach pain.

“What’s the matter? Can’t keep up the act anymore?”

“If you don’t actually want a divorce, just admit it. Stop pretending you’re sick.”

Miles sneered at me, arrogance radiating from his posture. I gritted my teeth and tried to bear it, but the pain was overwhelming, and I passed out before we could finish the paperwork.

When I woke up, I was in a hospital bed. Miles handed me a stack of receipts, his expression dripping with condescension.

“Lucky you had the surgery before the divorce, otherwise you’d have had to foot the entire bill yourself. It’s $700; you can transfer me $350.”

He tossed the medical bills onto my lap, and the room spun around me. I never thought I’d suffer an acute appendicitis attack on the day of our divorce, let alone that Miles would stoop this low.

I sat there, silent, a bitter smile spreading across my face. Even though I’d resolved to divorce Miles, my heart still throbbed with a dull ache. Struggling to sit up, I saw Miles pushing his phone towards me, insisting.

“$350—PayPal or Venmo, take your pick.”

Under his watchful gaze, I transferred $700 to him. I couldn’t stand his self-righteous ‘savior’ act any longer.

Miles looked at me, surprised. “Feeling generous, aren’t you scared you’ll run out of cash?”

I tightened my grip on the phone, shaking with contained fury. Who would have imagined that Miles, with his lucrative job, could be so petty with his own wife?

I pulled myself together and made a call. Miles, satisfied with extracting money from me, turned to leave. As he headed out, I called after him. “The courthouse is still open. Let’s finalize the divorce now.”

I completed the divorce proceedings in a wheelchair. The clerk at the courthouse initially tried to mediate, but they fell silent when they saw I showed up despite being ill.

The division of assets was a straightforward fifty-fifty split, something Miles and I had agreed upon when we decided to separate. I gave up the house and the car, opting for cash instead.

As we walked out of the courthouse, Miles taunted me with his usual sarcasm. “Always about the money, isn’t it? Guess we were never really from the same world.”

The anesthetic had just worn off, and the pain was brutal. If I could have, I’d have stood up and slapped him. Yet, there was some truth in his words. Miles and I were never from the same world. It had been my mistake to lower my standards and fall for the wrong person.