Victor sighed deeply — it ran through the house, as if carried by air.
“It’s not a secret, Mason,” he said. “But if we tell Mommy, it’s going to make her sad. Do you want Mommy to be sad, buddy?”
It was my son’s turn to sigh.
“No, I don’t,” he said.
I took a deep breath, sensing that the conversation was over. From my spot halfway up the stairs, I put my bags down and called out.
“Mason! Victor! Mom’s home!” I called loudly.
“We’re in here,” Victor shouted.
I walked into Mason’s room and found Victor sitting on his bed, while our son sat on the floor surrounded by his toys.
“What’s going on?” I asked, Mason leaping into my arms.
“Nothing, honey,” Victor said, winking. “Just a boys’ chat. Welcome home.”
Victor stood up and kissed my head on the way out.
“Got to get back to work,” he said.
I was disturbed for the rest of the evening. I wanted to believe Victor — that the conversation I had overheard was truly nothing important.
It’s probably Victor wanting to hide the fact that he gave Mason too much sugar or junk food in general, I thought to myself.
After all, Victor had never given me a reason to doubt him. Yet, that night, sleep eluded me. I tossed and turned, and when I couldn’t fall asleep, I scrolled through my phone wanting to see how our new clothing line was doing.
I tried to keep my mind as busy as possible. But Victor’s whispered words haunted me — would something as simple as eating the wrong food make me “sad”?
Something was amiss, I knew it.
The week-long business trip that followed was torture. I loved my job, and I loved working on the new campaign we were running out. But I hated being away from Mason for so long. Victor’s daily photos of Mason were my only solace until one of the photos brought about more questions than answers.
Victor had sent a series of photos to me — in each of them, my son was playing with a new toy. But in one of the photos, there was a pair of blue shoes in the background. They were not mine. And yet, there they were, in my living room.
They taunted me.
My heart raced as I scrolled through previous photos, trying to source more signs of betrayal that I had missed in the joy of seeing my son.
The flight back home was a blur. I sat in my seat and scrolled through the incriminating photos — together, there were about six with evidence that another woman was constantly in our home. I drank champagne to keep my nerves calm.
I knew that the moment I entered my home, everything was going to change. Either, my husband would confess that there was someone else in his life — or that there was a nanny looking after our son.
A nanny with expensive shoes, I thought…CONTINUE READING