When My Husband Had Me Committed for His Mistress

I set the table at six.

Two plates. Two wine glasses. Candles I'd bought that morning because the old ones were burned down to nothing. I wore the dress from our wedding rehearsal. Cream silk. It still fit, though I'd lost weight I didn't have to lose.

Dillon said he'd be home by seven.

Seven came. Then eight. Then nine.

I sat in my chair. The one Sierra hadn't taken yet. I watched the candles burn lower. Wax pooled on the table. I didn't move to stop it.

The food got cold. I'd made his favorite. Steak. Medium rare. Garlic butter. I remembered because I remembered everything about him. Every preference. Every passing comment. I'd built my life around the architecture of his needs.

At ten, I checked my phone.

Nothing.

I called. It rang four times. Voicemail.

"Hey," I said. My voice sounded small in the empty room. "Just wondering when you'll be home. I made dinner. It's our anniversary."

I hung up. Stared at the screen.

Five years ago tonight, we'd stood in front of two hundred people and promised forever. He'd looked at me like I was the only person in the room. Like I was the only person in the world.

I couldn't remember the last time he'd looked at me at all.

The boy appeared across the table. Sixteen. Hoodie sleeves pushed up to his elbows. He looked at the candles. At the cold steak. At me.

"He forgot," he said quietly.

I shook my head. "He's just working late."

"Emberly."

"He'll be here."

But I didn't believe it. And the boy knew I didn't believe it. He always knew.

At midnight, I picked up my phone again.

I didn't mean to open social media. I'd stopped posting months ago. Stopped looking at other people's lives. It hurt too much to see what happiness looked like when you couldn't remember the shape of it.

But I opened it anyway.

Sierra's profile loaded first.

She'd posted twenty minutes ago.

A photograph. Close-up. The curve of her collarbone. Soft lighting. And there — resting against her skin like it had always belonged to her — was the crescent-moon pendant.

My necklace.

The one I'd sketched at fifteen. The one I'd had cast in silver because Dillon said the moon was ours. The one I'd worn every day until he told me to stop wearing it because it "didn't go with anything."

I'd put it in a drawer. I thought he'd forgotten about it.

He hadn't forgotten.

He'd just given it to someone else.

The caption was simple. Six words.

*He said the moon belongs to me now.*

I stared at the screen until it blurred.

The boy was standing now. His hands were fists. "That's yours. He can't—"

"He did."

"Emberly, that's *yours*—"

"It doesn't matter."

"It matters!" His voice cracked. Young. Desperate. "I gave you that. I *promised* you—"

"You're not real."

He stopped. Looked at me. His face was the saddest thing I'd ever seen.

"I know," he whispered.

I set the phone down. My hands were shaking. I stood. Walked to the candles. Blew them out one by one. Smoke curled toward the ceiling. The room went dark.

I sat back down.

I didn't cry. I'd run out of tears somewhere around month three of Sierra's pregnancy. Now there was just this. Emptiness. A hollow space where something vital used to be.

I picked up my phone again. I didn't want to. But I couldn't stop.

I scrolled.

There was an email notification. A press release. Ortiz Capital Group. I almost deleted it. Then I saw the subject line.

*Harper Family Charitable Foundation — Acquisition Finalized.*

My chest went tight.

I opened it.

The foundation my parents built. The one that funded art programs for kids who couldn't afford supplies. The one with their names on the building. The one I'd stayed on the board of even after they died because it was the last piece of them I had left.

Sold.

To fund a new venture. A tech startup. Something about sustainable luxury goods.

Sierra's idea. Her name was in the press release. *Proposed by Senior Advisor Sierra Castro.*

Dillon had signed off on it. His signature was at the bottom of the document. Neat. Confident. Final.

He'd sold my parents.

He'd sold their memory. Their work. Their legacy.

For her.

I closed the email. Set the phone on the table. Stared at the cold steak. The pooled wax. The empty chair across from me.

The boy was gone.

Even the hallucination couldn't stay for this.

I sat in the dark until the sun came up.

Dillon came home at seven in the morning. Tie loose. Shirt wrinkled. He smelled like her perfume.

He looked at the table. At the candles burned down to nothing. At me, still sitting in yesterday's dress.

"You waited up?" he said.

I didn't answer.

He sighed. Ran a hand through his hair. "I told you I had a late meeting."

"It's our anniversary," I said.

He blinked. For a second, something crossed his face. Then it was gone.

"Right," he said. "Sorry. I'll make it up to you."

He walked past me. Toward the bedroom. Toward the shower. Toward whatever came next in a day that didn't include me.

I sat at the table.

I didn't move.

I didn't speak.

I just sat there, in the ruins of a marriage I'd already lost, and waited for nothing at all.