My Husband Slept With His Mistress Outside My Hospital Room

A week after the locks changed, the technicians returned. They mounted two large flat screens on the wall directly opposite our bed.

Mathias called it "exposure therapy."

"You suffer from irrational jealousy, Nyla," he told me that evening.

He sat beside me on the mattress. He had already taken off his jacket, his sleeves rolled neatly to his elbows. He reached out and rested his palm on my knee. His touch was warm, heavy, and completely still.

"In modern medicine, how do we cure a phobia?" he asked, using the same calm, reasonable voice he used when closing tech deals. "We expose the patient to the trigger until the panic stops. Your reaction to other women is an emotional defect. We are going to fix it."

He pressed a button on the remote.

The screen lit up. The feed was clear and high-definition. It showed a luxury hotel suite downtown. Amber Chen sat on a white sofa in a silk robe, sipping red wine. A moment later, Mathias walked into the frame on screen, loosening his dark silk tie.

My chest caved in. I squeezed my eyes shut and tried to turn my head away.

Mathias’s grip on my knee tightened. His fingers dug into my flesh until it bruised.

"Eyes open, Nyla," he ordered softly. His voice wasn't angry. It was clinical. "Don't hide from it. Breathe through the discomfort."

"Turn it off," I whispered, tears spilling hot over my cheeks. "Please, Mathias. Turn it off."

"No," he said, staring at the screen. "Amber means nothing. You see that? I don't love her. This is purely maintenance. It is physical function, nothing more. Once you see it enough times, your brain will stop panicking. You will become an evolved wife."

The terrifying thing was his face. There was no cruelty in his eyes. No smirk. He genuinely believed he was helping me. He looked at me with quiet pity, the way a surgeon looks at a patient who needs a painful procedure.

Two nights later, the feed changed.

This time, the camera was mounted inside the leather interior of his town car. A young woman from his marketing department sat in the back with him. She looked twenty-two, with dark ponytail and nervous eyes.

Mathias sat beside me on our bed, stroking my knee in slow, rhythmic circles.

"Look at my posture on the screen," he narrated quietly. "Notice the lack of emotional tension. It takes five minutes. It takes nothing away from you. You are my wife. You hold the title. Why weep over scraps?"

On the monitor, the young woman leaned in. The audio came through the soundbar beneath the television—sharp, wet, and intimate.

"See?" Mathias murmured near my ear. "It’s just biology, Nyla. Just an appetite."

A strange snap echoed in my head.

The sound suddenly dropped out. The room lost its color. The two bright screens smeared into grey static, like an old television with no signal. The bed beneath me seemed to vanish. I stopped feeling Mathias's hand on my knee. I stopped feeling the air moving in and out of my throat.

I was floating away. Fast and quiet.

***

When my eyes opened, the room was pitch black.

I wasn't in bed anymore. I was curled up on the cold marble floor of the master bathroom. My back was pressed hard against the porcelain tub.

I glanced at the glowing digital clock on the vanity.

*2:14 a.m.*

More than two hours were completely gone. Blank space. I didn't remember the screens turning off. I didn't remember Mathias leaving the room.

My worn leather journal sat open on my bare legs. My right hand gripped the pen, the black ink tip pressed firmly against the cream paper.

I looked down.

The page was completely empty. Not a word. Not a line. Not even a stray scratch.

My fingers went numb. I let go of the pen, and it rolled across the white tiles with a quiet clatter.

A chill crawled over my skin. I wasn't just locked in a lakeside house. I was slipping away from myself. Mathias was breaking down my mind until there was nothing left inside to fight back.

I pulled my knees against my chest and rested my chin on my skin. *Why don't I smash a window?* I thought. *Why don't I scream until the neighbors hear?*

Then the memory came back. It always did.

Two winters ago, before the wedding, I had caught a terrible strain of the flu. My fever spiked to a hundred and four. I was shaking so hard my teeth clicked. I couldn't even stand up to reach the bathroom.

Mathias hadn't called a doctor to replace him. He stayed.

For three straight days and three nights, he sat by my bed. He soaked clean washcloths in cold water and laid them gently across my forehead. When my lips cracked, he held a cup of water and tipped it into my mouth, whispering, "Slowly, baby. Just one more sip."

On the second night, his assistant called. A fifty-million-dollar merger was on the table, and the board needed his signature in New York. Mathias answered the phone while holding my cold hand.

"Cancel it," he had said into the receiver.

"Sir, they won't wait," the voice pleaded through the speaker.

"Let them walk," Mathias said, and hung up.

He had stayed awake until dawn, wiping the sweat from my neck with a warm towel. His eyes had looked so dark, so tired, and so full of care.

Sitting alone on the bathroom floor in the dark, I grabbed onto that memory with both hands. It was a heavy iron chain, and it was dragging me under, but I couldn't make myself drop it.

*He was good to me once,* I told the empty room. Tears leaked down my face, tasting of salt. *A man who did that cannot be entirely this. He loved me. He has to still love me.*

The chain held tight. And like a fool, I let it keep me in the dark.