Hello, friend.
Thank you for the pictures.
They’re the only ones I have of myself after I gave birth to my children with another man.
I never told you this, but I loved you more than my husband.
I loved you more than the father of my children.
I worked so, so hard at loving him.
I woke up every morning and convinced myself to love him, over and over.
I told myself no one is perfect.
I told myself that duty mattered more than passion—more than ease.
That I had made my choices, and now it was time to live with them.
Since we’re told we make our own happiness, I tried.
I took a deep breath every day and made him the love of my life.
I made it a privilege to serve him.
I told myself I was the luckiest woman in the world—because I had the best husband, the best children, and the best life.
But.
Once a year, I’d hear you were coming back.
And I’d feel this spark—not of love, not even of romance—just… memory.
You were the physical embodiment of the life I’d had before all of this.
Once a year, you’d host a party.
I’d go. I’d watch our old friends get sloshed.
And at the end, I’d give you a hug that lasted less than five seconds.
I lived for that hug.
I always held on a second too long, on purpose.
One year, you didn’t have the party.
You came to see me instead.
We sat at my kitchen table while my kids were out with their dad.
No one was there who needed managing.
No one was there I had to lie to.
So I cried. I sobbed, apologizing the whole while.
And you just sat there.
You were safe.
You have no idea how much that meant to me.
I now know your life was disintegrating, too.
The last time I saw you…
You weren’t a very good guy.
I don’t think you realize how terrible you’ve been to your wife.
I don’t think you saw the looks on your children’s faces when you yelled at them.
But for a while?
Your potential was all the hope I needed to string the days together.
You were there at the beginning, when everyone was too drunk to admit we weren’t actually having fun—we were just pretending to be alive.
And now?
Now I don’t talk to any of them.
That whole world is dead.
It started dying the first time he—
Well.
You told me once you didn’t want to know what happened in my marriage.
I won’t tell you.
If I did, I hope you’d want to kill him.
Regardless.
Thank you.
Not just for the pictures.
But for keeping my soul alive, even if you didn’t know you were doing it.
I still believe there’s a good man underneath it all.
But I’m old now.
Tired of subtext.
Tired of bleeding every time I miss you.
But of course, I can’t tell you that.
Just know that I bleed.