Henpecked Husband

The day I found out I was pregnant, Alex crushed me in a hug, his eyes red-rimmed with joy.
Candy, he swore, his voice thick with emotion, I swear I'll take care of you and the baby!
Everyone said Alex loved me more than life itself, that he was completely wrapped around my finger.
That was until I saw the videos and photos his first love sent me. Intimate, tangled limbs and whispered words.
I found Alex in the nursery, assembling the crib for our baby. I walked up to him, my voice steady.
"Let's not keep the baby."
I felt his body go rigid. I pressed on.
"Alex, let's get a divorce."
1
The baby rattle in Alex's hand slipped from his grasp, landing on the plush carpet with a soft, muffled thud.
He looked up at me, disbelief washing over his face. "Candy."
He closed the distance between us, his hands finding mine. They were cold.
"Are you kidding me?"
He looked so earnest, as if I were the most precious thing in the world to him. So precious that I could feel the faint tremor in his hands. "This isn't a funny joke," he said, his voice low. "Candy, stop messing around."
He thought I was throwing a tantrum. A cold wave of despair washed over me.
"I'm not kidding." My voice was flat. I gently pulled my hands from his, pushing down the ache in my chest. "I'm dead serious."
"Alex."
I held out my phone, displaying the chat logs and all the photos the woman had sent me. I watched his expression freeze, the color draining from his face in an instant. He opened his mouth to explain, but I cut him off.
"You told her you wanted her to have your baby. You told her that if it was a boy, you'd name him Vincent, and if it was a girl, Vivienne..."
I was trying so hard to stay calm. I wanted this to end peacefully, with dignity. Just like wed promised each other when we first got together, that if we ever had to part ways, it would be on good terms.
But then I looked at his face and remembered him whispering to me in the heat of the moment, cupping my face in his hands, telling me how much he wanted a child. I remembered him holding me, his heart full of anticipation as he said, "Candy, if we have kids, let's have a boy and a girl."
"We'll call the boy Vincent."
"And the girl, Vivienne."
I didn't understand the significance of the names back then. I'd asked him about it, pouting, but he just said he liked them and changed the subject. I didn't push it. I thought they sounded nice, too.
How ironic.
I stared at him, my voice cold as I tore his lie apart.
"It's not because you thought Vincent and Vivienne were beautiful names. It's because," I could feel my whole body start to shake, my teeth chattering so hard my words came out trembling, "it's because her name is Vivian."
"Your first love. The one you loved for years but never ended up with."
"It's not like that!" Alexs eyes blazed red as he tried to explain, but my control finally snapped. I interrupted him with a raw, guttural scream.
"If you loved her that much, you should have just told me!"
"I would have let you go!"
"Did you think I'd cling to you? Did you!"
In a blind rage, I grabbed a stuffed animal from the crib and hurled it at him. He didn't flinch. Instead, he lunged forward and wrapped his arms around me, holding me so tight I couldn't breathe, the world starting to go dark at the edges. I sank my teeth into his shoulder. I heard him grunt in pain, but he didn't let go. His voice, when it came, was a choked sob.
"It's not like that!"
"Candy!"
"It's not!"
"I'm so sorry, Candy!"
"I was wrong! I know I was wrong!"
2
Honestly, I truly wanted a divorce. I wanted us to part ways without this ugly, messy drama.
But Alex called in the reinforcements. He summoned both our families. They crowded into our spacious living room, all our relatives and both sets of parents, sitting before me as if I were a criminal on trial. They were here to pass judgment.
I watched Alexs aunt look me up and down, her lip curled in a sneer. "Look at you, playing the housewife and still throwing a fit."
"Alex's out there working himself to the bone for you, for that thing in your belly. And you, living a life of leisure at home, you have the nerve to have an attitude?"
Alex's mother chimed in, her tone softer but just as cutting. "Candy, dear, Alex's not the cheating type. Why else would he have married you? He truly loves you. He wouldn't have asked us all to come here and talk to you otherwise."
She took my mom's hand, and my mom immediately turned on me. "Candy! You dare pull another stunt like this! Alex is one in a million, he doesn't smoke or drink. What more could you possibly want!"
My dad delivered the final verdict. "Don't even think about it. As long as Alex doesn't want a divorce, if you dare mention this again, I'll break your legs!"
The two families, united against a common enemy: me.
I sat in the middle of the circle, listening as they took turns berating me. When they finally paused for breath, Alex spoke.
"Candy, I have never, ever wanted to divorce you."
He took my hand. "I can explain. I can explain everything."
To prove his sincerity, he called Vivian right there, in front of everyone, and put her on speakerphone. He demanded she vouch for their "innocence."
"My wife is about to divorce me because of you!" he yelled into the phone. "You need to clear this up with her, right now!"
Vivian sounded bored. "I was just messing with your wife. Can't she take a joke? God, she's psychotic." Then her voice was directed at me. "So I dated your husband for a few years. Big deal. Everyone has a past. What, you expected him to be a blank slate? Are you so pure yourself?"
Hearing her casual disdain, the emotions I'd been suppressing finally erupted. After the relentless assault from my family and Alex's spinelessness, I snatched the phone from his hand. He seemed certain I wouldn't dare do anything. I spoke directly to her.
"If you were so innocent, you wouldn't have added me on social media and sent me all that crap!"
"Vivian, is it?"
"If you think you're so clean, then what do you call messing with a married man?" My voice trembled, but my words were firm. "Are you just naturally drawn to being the other woman, or is your own life so miserable you can't stand to see anyone else happy?"
Vivian shrieked. "What the hell did you just say to me!"
"Alex! Are you just going to stand there and let your wife bully me like this? Are you just going to let her"
CRACK.
The sound of a palm striking flesh echoed through the room.
I clutched my stinging cheek, staring at Alex in disbelief. He stammered, panicked, "Candy, I didn't mean to"
Through the phone, Vivian's triumphant laughter rang out.
"Got what you deserved, didn't you."
"Let me tell you something, Candy. Alex is my little puppy. He comes when I call. And you know why I can say that? Because your husband gave me the confidence!"
3
"If you've got the guts," she taunted, "tell your husband to come find me. Tell him to hit me."
"Hahaha, Candy, let me tell you, the only place your husband is good is in bed"
"Enough!"
Alex violently ended the call and turned to me, his eyes wide with fear. But I just held my cheek and laughed, a hollow, broken sound. This wasn't the first time I'd met Vivian. She had come to our home before she ever sent me that first message.
She'd waltzed in like she owned the place, inspecting my home, my territory, before offering her verdict.
"Hm. It's just my style."
Vivian had been so sure of herself. "Candy, Alex didn't let you have any say in the decor, did he?"
I'd frozen, listening to her continue. "That's because I love American-style decor. I told Alex that if we ever bought a house together, it had to be American style."
She walked over to the entryway and took down one of the matching keychains from the hook. I found my voice. "That's incredibly rude."
Vivian just dangled the keychain in front of me. "This, too."
She pulled out a photo on her phone. In it, a much younger Alex, his face full of boyish happiness, was holding up the exact same keychain.
"He made it for me."
Now, watching Alex's red-rimmed eyes, his hand hovering in the air, too afraid to touch me, I found it all so laughable. So utterly pathetic.
"Alex, why are you even pretending?" I asked him, my voice dripping with scorn.
"If you love Vivian so much," I met his gaze, "why did you have to drag me into this? Why did you have to ruin me?"
I turned my head, looking at my parents, at all the silent, judgmental relatives.
"So, you're still not going to let me get a divorce?"
"Are you all blind?"
"Can't you see it!" I screamed, the words tearing from my throat. "Can't you see? His heart was never mine! It was always hers! It was never, ever mine!"
The tears finally came, hot and fast, like pearls snapping off a string. I couldn't wipe them away fast enough. I broke down completely, sobbing, until Alex grabbed my hands.
"Candy," he pleaded. "Hit me."
"Please, just hit me!"
He started crying with me. "Just don't divorce me!"
"I don't want a divorce!"
He fell to his knees in front of me, his words choked by sobs. "I love you. I don't want a divorce!"
I thought things couldn't possibly get any worse. But the sight of her son kneeling at my feet sent Alex's mother into a rage. She surged forward and slapped me again, hard.
"How dare you humiliate the son I've cherished my whole life!" she shrieked.
Alex's aunt grabbed a handful of my hair. "You're nothing but a home-wrecking bitch! A curse! Women like you should just die!"
I was being pulled and shoved from all sides, the searing pain from my scalp and the fire on my cheeks mixing with the soul-crushing agony Alex had inflicted on me. And through it all, my parents were still trying to mediate.
"Candy, dear, what man doesn't make mistakes?"
"No man is faithful to just one woman his entire life. Candy, don't be so stubborn."
My mom was crying now. "A divorced woman is damaged goods. If you really do this, who do you think will want you then?"
My dad's face was a mask of disapproval. "No one in our family has ever gotten a divorce. I won't be the first to be shamed like this. If you're so determined to leave him, you might as well be dead!"
My parents' words were all the justification Alex needed. He wrapped his arms around me, his tears soaking my shoulder.
"Candy, I'll stop talking to Vivian, okay? I'll cut her off completely."
"Forgive me, Candy!"
"I'm begging you!"
4
The voices swirled around me. Arguments, sobs, accusations, pleas. It was a suffocating whirlwind of noise, stealing the oxygen from my lungs. The weight of it all became unbearable until, finally, I snapped.
"WHY?" I shrieked, a single, desperate word that contained all my pain. "JUST... WHY?"
The chaos ended when I felt a warm gush of blood between my legs.
I was rushed to the hospital.
I spent a week there, hooked up to an IV, undergoing tests. I didn't see Alex once. But I saw him constantly on Vivian's social media feed.
Alex, helping her pick out furniture and decor for her new house.
Alex, in the kitchen with her, making her favorite steak dinner.
Alex, taking a flower arrangement class with her. Their first creations held up to the camera, their smiles mirroring a photo from their teenage years.
Vivian posted the two photos side-by-side with the caption:
The ones you love when you're young always find their way back to you.
Alex had liked the post.
I listened numbly as the doctor stood by my bed.
"Ms. Davis," she said gently. "Your pregnancy is very fragile. Your emotional state is critical. I really must advise you to get out, take a walk, try to relax."
I looked down at my phone. A new voice message from my mom.
"Candy, Alex just bought your brother the new iPhone, the expensive one, over a thousand dollars. And you say he doesn't love you? If he didn't love you, why would he be so good to our family? You just focus on giving him a healthy baby boy, you hear me?"
A new message from Alex's mother. It was a photo of a fortune teller's chart.
"I had your fortune told. The master says the firstborn will be a son. Don't you worry about a thing. You're the only daughter-in-law our family will ever have."
And then, a new message from Alex.
"Candy, I'll be home tonight. I cut my business trip short."
My parents' emotional neglect. My in-laws' suffocating pressure. My husband's pathetic lies. He thought that because he'd deleted Vivian's contact in front of me, I wouldn't see their sordid affair, wouldn't know he was still deceiving me.
I stared at his next message.
"Candy, what do you want for dinner tonight? I'll bring it to the hospital."
At the exact same moment, a message from Vivian popped up.
"Alex already told me. He said he couldn't bear to see me go through childbirth, so after you pop out that kid, he's kicking you to the curb."
It was the final straw.
My vision blurred. I could feel a grim, chilling smile spread across my face as I typed my reply to Alex.
Alex.
I want those soup dumplings. From that little place you took me to on our first date.
I'd never really been in a relationship before him, never been truly cherished. My parents' love was like sand, most of it slipping through the cracks, leaving me with only a few grains.
But that day, watching him sit across from me, carefully wiping down my bowl and chopsticks, placing a perfectly steamed dumpling in my dipping dish, and then looking up at me with that silly, wonderful grin... I think my heart just gave way.
For the first time, I felt the urge to build a life with someone.
Now, I waited. And waited. Midnight came and went. Alex never showed. Instead, I got another message from Vivian: "Just give us half an hour. Half an hour and we'll be done."
"Then I'll let him go."
The pain in my heart had faded to a dull, throbbing numbness. I sat on the ledge of the hospital rooftop, my legs dangling over the edge, and watched a familiar black Audi pull into the parking lot below.
I dialed Alexs number.
I watched him get out of the car, rushing toward the hospital entrance as he answered my call.
"Candy."
"Alex," I said, my voice strangely calm.
"Look up."
"Alex."
"Look up."
The wind whistled past my ears.
He instinctively tilted his head back. His eyes found me, a fragile silhouette against the night sky, looking as if a single gust of wind could carry me away.
He knew. Some primal part of him knew, and his heart seized in his chest. A raw, terrified shout ripped from his throat.
"NO!"
"CANDY, NO!"
He scrambled, sprinting toward the hospital doors in a blind panic, but he was too late. An earth-shattering thud echoed from behind him, a sound that seemed to shatter his very soul, breaking him into a million pieces.

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