The Depreciation Schedule of a Marriage

§01

Jonathan came home with another woman on the tenth anniversary of our wedding.

I was in the kitchen, pulling a slow-roasted chicken from the oven, the kind he loved, the kind that took hours.

The aroma of rosemary and lemon filled the house we’d built together.

Or rather, the house I had decorated and he had paid for with money I’d helped him make.

Her name was Brielle Harlow.

She was all long curls and wide, doe-like eyes, poured into a Chanel dress that was last season’s newest thing.

The moment she stepped through the door, she draped herself over Jonathan like a scarf, all boneless grace and practiced possession.

“Jon, honey,” she purred, her voice dripping with manufactured sweetness. “Is this the… housekeeper?”

I placed the roasting pan on the counter, the metal clattering softly in the sudden silence.

I wiped my hands on my apron and took it off, folding it with deliberate care.

I said nothing.

Jonathan, my husband of a decade, just tightened his arm around Brielle’s waist.

“Brie, don’t be rude,” he said, his tone a mild chastisement that was really a form of encouragement. “This is Victoria.”

He paused, letting the name hang in the air between us, stripped of any title.

Then, his voice dropped, turning cold and clinical.

“But not for much longer.”

He strode to the dining table, the one I’d spent a week picking out, and dropped two documents onto its polished surface from his leather briefcase.

One was a divorce agreement.

The other was a thick, professionally bound document, hundreds of pages printed on heavy-stock A4 paper, with a title embossed in gold foil on its black leather cover.

“Victoria, I want a divorce.”

My gaze fell on the agreement.

A single clause was highlighted and underlined in black ink: "The parties acknowledge and agree that there are no marital assets to be divided."

He wanted me to leave with nothing.

Before I could even form a word, Brielle giggled beside me.

She shook her wrist, making the Cartier bracelet he’d given her clink musically.

“Don’t take it so hard, Victoria. It’s just business. A man like Jon has to think about his bottom line. You haven't contributed a single dollar to the company in ten years. You've been… a liability. He just can’t afford you anymore.”

She drifted over to the sofa, plucked a slice of the apple I’d just cut for myself, and took a loud, crisp bite.

“Nice place,” she said, looking around with the air of a conqueror. “The decor is a little dated, though. I’ll have someone redesign it.”

I finally lifted my eyes to Jonathan.

Ten years of marriage, and he couldn't even grant me the dignity of a private conversation.

There was no guilt in his eyes.

Only impatience.

Fine.

Let it be a divorce.

I was tired of this life anyway.

“The assets, Jonathan,” I asked, my voice steady. “How do we divide them?”

He laughed.

It was a sound I’d once loved, now it was just ugly.

“Assets?”

He tapped the thick, bound document on the table.

“Victoria, there are no *shared* assets between us. Only shared debts.”

“For the past ten years, our marriage has operated on a loan principle. Every penny you spent, the roof over your head, the food you ate… I considered it all an advance. A loan. I’ve been keeping a detailed statement.”

He slid the document towards me.

The gold-foil title gleamed under the recessed lighting.

"Statement of Advanced Expenses."

“As of today,” he said, his voice a blade of ice, “you owe me four million, nine hundred ninety-nine thousand, seven hundred and fifty dollars.”

He leaned in, a cruel smirk playing on his lips.

“Pay me back, or sign the papers and get out of my house.”

§02

The number was so absurd, so meticulously crafted in its cruelty, that for a moment, I felt nothing but a strange, disembodied calm.

$4,999,750.00.

It wasn't just a number.

It was a declaration of war, written in the language he understood best: the cold, hard logic of a balance sheet.

It was designed to break me, to humiliate me, to quantify my ten years of life, love, and labor as a negative value.

I reached out and pulled the heavy document towards me.

The leather was cool and smooth beneath my fingertips.

I opened it.

The pages were filled with line items, dates, and amounts, all formatted with the precision of a corporate audit.

"March 8, 2014, Dress for company gala, $899.00."

"May 20, 2015, Dinner for two at ‘Aria’, $520.00. Your portion (50%): $260.00."

"October 1, 2016, Trip to Tuscany, flights and hotel, 4000-100002,000.00. Your portion (50%): $6,000.00."

On and on it went, a decade of my life itemized and weaponized.

He’d even included things that defied logic.

"July 2018, In-home care during your bout with the flu. Three days of my time, calculated at the market rate for a premium registered nurse, plus compensation for my emotional distress: $5,000.00."

I kept turning the pages, a morbid curiosity pulling me deeper into the architecture of his malice.

Then I saw it.

The entry that finally shattered my calm and forged it into something cold and hard and sharp.

"Date: Feb. 14, 2017. Item: Valentine's Day Gift (diamond earrings). Value: $3,200.00."

And then, the memo.

"Memo: Asset provided for purposes of maintaining public social standing. Full value debited to your account as a leased item. See Appendix B for depreciation schedule."

A leased item.

He hadn't given me a gift.

He had leased me an asset.

And he had created a depreciation schedule for my love.

Brielle peered over my shoulder, her breath smelling of my apple.

“Oh my God! Almost five million dollars! Victoria, you’re a black hole where his money goes!” she exclaimed with theatrical shock.

She snuggled against Jonathan’s arm, her eyes wide with adoration.

“You’re amazing, Jon. To put up with this for ten years… your patience is saintly.”

Jonathan preened, soaking in her worship.

He squeezed her chin gently.

“That’s why I’m upgrading to a canary that knows how to sing,” he murmured, his words a poison dart aimed at me.

They were flirting over the corpse of our marriage.

I closed the book, the heavy cover making a soft, final thud.

I took a deep breath, the scent of rosemary mocking me with the memory of a home that was never truly mine.

“Jonathan,” I said, my voice devoid of any emotion he could recognize, “your company, Kratos Logistics. You founded it after we were married. According to the law, I am entitled to half.”

He let out a short, sharp laugh.

“The law? Victoria, you’re a homemaker. Don’t talk to me about the law.”

“The company shares were placed in a family trust under my parents’ names from day one. This house, the cars, everything of value… it’s all under the trust. On paper, I’m worth nothing.”

“You can check. I encourage you to.”

He had planned this for years.

Every legal loophole sealed, every escape route blocked.

“So you have two choices,” he said, delivering the final blow. “Pay the debt. Or get out.”

§03

Just as the silence in the room stretched to a breaking point, the doorbell chimed.

As if on cue.

Jonathan’s mother and sister, Mrs. Baird and Megan, swept in before I could even move.

They were the cavalry, arriving not to save the day, but to ensure the slaughter was complete.

Mrs. Baird ignored me completely, rushing to her son and clutching his hands as if he were the one being victimized.

“Jonathan, my poor boy! You’ve suffered so much! Your mother knew, I always knew!” she wailed.

Megan, Jonathan’s younger sister, marched straight to the table and snatched up the Statement of Expenses.

She whistled, a low, ugly sound. “Wow. Ten years, five million dollars. Tori, you’ve been living better than the Queen.”

She slammed the book back down, the sound cracking like a whip.

“My brother is out there grinding day and night, and you’re at home being a professional freeloader. Don’t you have a conscience?”

They weren’t here to mediate.

They were here for the public execution.

I looked at their faces—the mother’s vicious satisfaction, the sister’s smug contempt—and felt a wave of nausea.

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