I know she knows Virginia is dead, Dad called to inform her Cole will always be safe, yet she hasn’t even looked at me.
Does she think her boyfriend is next?
Well, she should because the fucker is a dead man walking for touching her.
“Okay, you two, how were the last two weeks?” Dr. Chimes begins.
“My wife has something to tell me,” I answer, not beating around the bush.
Dr. Chimes frowns while Ash scoffs, “I’ve got nothing to tell you, Trigger.”
Am I shocked she’s not taking responsibility for her part in all this? No, not really, but am I pissed she’s being stubborn? Absolutely.
Our son needs us to figure our shit out and any other children we may have in the future. He wants a sibling, to come home and have his parents back together. I want it all as well. We just need to figure out how to forgive each other. She needs to ditch thatdickhead boyfriend of hers before I get trigger-happy with my gun and she needs to put her wedding ring back on!
“How about I call Dirty then?” I threaten, and Dr. Chimes opens her mouth, but before she can ask what is going on, Ash snaps.
“You have no right to know why I backed off you, Trigger, you lost that right the moment you slept with that bitch and continued to do so for a year!” she sneers, looking my way.
She may be looking at me with hate but at least she’s looking at me.
“I didn’t sleep with her for a fucking year, Ashley!” I snap back, my anger hitching up that she’s still doubling down.
“Yes, you did!” she says louder.
“I fucked her two or three times a month, that is it!” I state then wince knowing how it sounded, and Dr. Chimes clears her throat, also knowing my fuck up.
“That’s it?” Ash chuckles, “You fuck another woman after being with me since I was ten years old, completely breaking me, and you say that’s it, like you were taking my last chocolate out of the fridge!”
“Pixie –”
She cuts me off and chokes, “I knew I never should have married you. I saw the wandering eye you had over the years, encouraging the flirtations of other women, enjoying it…”
“I was a teenager, Ashley but I never went there, I always came home to you.” I cut in, but she ignores me.
“You don’t love me, Trigger, you never have because if you did you would have torn this world down to find out if I truly did have an affair. Instead you took it as a way to fuck my high school bully, to sow the oats you never got to,” she scoffs, “Just sign the stupid papers and set me free from this heartache, from this agony you seem to love keeping me in.”
My jaw ticks as my anger builds.
I get it, I fucked up, and I know she won’t want to hear that I only pictured her. That while yes, I had a wandering eye, I never once thought about fucking someone else, but she can’t throw us away, not after seventeen years, she fucking can’t.
“Do you really want to do that, Ashley?” Dr. Chimes asks, and I look at my wife, who nods, and I swear, I’m about to boil over.
“I didn’t care about the jeans and the flannel clothes on my wedding day, I didn’t care that I didn’t have an engagement ring or my parents around. I didn’t care that his parents hated me, all I wanted was him. Tell me Dr. Chimes, after giving your whole life to a man, him becoming your very existence, would you go back to your cheating husband who chose a mistress for an entire year believing you cheated without any proof?”
Dr. Chimes looks down, clearly not able to answer her question, and I finally snap.
“Then give me the fucking proof, Ashley, instead of trying to force yourself to move on with that prick!” I boom, not able to keep it in as I stand and shout, “If you are so fucking innocent in the demise of our marriage, why did you stop sleeping with me, huh? Why did you pull away from me? Barely speak to me? Shower the few times you allowed me to touch your body?”
Ashley stands up and finally, she opens her mouth, but what I hear has my knees buckling and my heart stopping.
She screams,“Because I was raped!”
No, fuck, please, no, she wasn’t, she can’t…
Her tears instantly fall as she looks me in the eyes and chokes, “I was raped, Tyler, the night you were supposed to meet me outside of work, the night your mama,” she spits Mamma out, “Lied about being ill, I was raped by a man wearing a denim cut while his friend sat on my back so I couldn’t fight back.”
Breathing becomes non-existent and the urge to die hits me hard when she admits, “One of the secrets I wanted to tell you that night was that I was thirteen weeks pregnant. I-I lostour baby, the trauma caused me to miscarry and when I called your phone, in shock and in pain, needing you, your mistress answered. She explained that you’d gone to look after the child I trapped you with, a child you didn’t want, interrupting you watching her and Hazel get each other off.” A sob releases from her as I stand frozen, not even able to deny watching Hazel and Virginia and I didn’t, but my mouth won’t work.
