I Was Her Husband in Name,He Was Her Secret in Full

At a friends' gathering, someone clapped my wife Angela Pruitt on the shoulder and asked：

“Angela, a woman as gorgeous as you must've had some secret crush back in school, right?”

Angela smiled and reached over to straighten my shirt collar.

“Nope. I only love my husband.”

The words barely left her mouth before Carter Simmons, her so-called male best friend sitting right beside her, let out a laugh.

“Secret crush? No.”

“Dirty little secret, though? That's another story.”

He propped his chin on one hand and looked at me, eyes glinting with amusement as he winked.

“Relax, bro. I'm talking about back in the day.”

“This princess right here dragged me everywhere to try it all. Wore me out completely.”

Someone blurted “Holy shit” and the private room erupted in laughter.

But Carter wasn't done. He leaned back, twisting the knife nice and slow：

“What she and I had, how do I put it? Not a secret crush. More like a dirty secret.”

“Some things never see the light of day, but they're the hardest to forget.”

He raised his glass and curved his lips into a smile aimed right at me：

“No hard feelings, right? Just guys messing around. It's all ancient history.”

“If anything were still going on between us, we wouldn't pick the day you two announce you're having a kid to bring it up, would we?”

——

The air went stiff for a beat.

Then someone recovered first, raising a glass to smooth things over.

“Come on, who didn't do something stupid when they were young?”

“Water under the bridge. Let it go.”

“Besides, Angela treats her husband so well. No matter how busy work gets, she's always home. Lets him use her cards, has a car pick him up, drop him off. Now with the baby on the way, she's got the whole household running like clockwork.”

Another voice chimed in：

“Exactly. A woman like Angela is one in a million.”

“Carter just runs his mouth. Don't take it to heart.”

The private room filled back up with noise, laughter and clinking glasses blurring together.

As if what just happened really was nothing more than a harmless joke.

I smiled too. But the tips of my fingers were going cold, one degree at a time.

They weren't wrong.

Angela was good to me. Considerate, proper, impossible to fault.

A watch for our anniversary. A doctor called when I was sick. Gifts and clothes always on time, never missed.

But in bed, Angela was always calm. Controlled. Like she was checking something off a list.

Always the same rhythm. The same position. The same silence.

No kissing. No teasing. She never looked at me.

Start to finish, she barely made a sound. Even her breathing was so measured it could've passed for a board meeting.

Afterward she'd get up and shower, her back already turned, brisk and efficient. Not a single word about how it was.

At first I told myself she was just reserved by nature.

Later I told myself I wasn't good enough.

I tried so many times.

I wore shirts I thought she might like. I studied clumsy, eager moves from videos online. On nights she came home late from work, I'd hold her, face burning.

She just frowned and peeled my hands away.

“Stop. I'm exhausted today.”

“Behave.”

One time I worked up the nerve. New cologne. The suit she'd once complimented.

She didn't even glance at me. Just draped her coat over the couch, voice flat.

“Don't wear that again. It doesn't suit you.”

Doesn't suit me.

That night, alone in the bathroom, I washed the gel out of my hair bit by bit. And the man staring back from the mirror looked like a pathetic clown.

Now here was Carter Simmons, leaning against her side, laughing about the thrill of what they'd had.

Angela told him “That's enough”, but she didn't deny a single word.

I finally understood. She wasn't cold by nature.

She'd given all her fire to someone else and saved the politeness for me.

“Honey?”

Angela called to me, holding out a glass of warm water.