I smiled.
For years, I’d believed being a good wife meant making my husband comfortable with every part of our life.
Even the parts that made him jealous.
I downplayed my salary.
Avoided discussing property values.
Never reminded him how much I’d worked to buy the condo.
And when he complained that my ownership made him feel powerless, I tried harder to reassure him.
But no amount of reassurance could repair a belief he refused to examine.
He didn’t want a partner who owned something valuable.
He wanted ownership to become another measure of his importance.
And when I wouldn’t give him that, he attempted to take control in another way.
I thought about the evening I came home after fourteen hours at work.
My suitcase in the hallway.
The key that wouldn’t fit.
Marjorie standing inside in my bathrobe.
Adrian telling me to get a hotel.
I remembered the humiliation.
