Chapter 1
After my husband signed his entire 1.15 million bonus over to his parents, my bank card had three dollars left on it.
He even leaned in and said it to my face. "You're my wife, so you should cut me some slack. My family comes before anything else."
I didn't cry, and I didn't make a scene. I nodded and told him he was right.
The next day, I packed a suitcase and flew to New York for an eight-month assignment.
A week later, he finally noticed the house was empty and started blowing up my phone. "Where the hell are you? Send me money right now. My mother's sick!"
I blocked him.
*****
The crystal chandelier over the dining table threw down a cold, surgical light that cut straight through the silence between Jonathan Reed and me.
The last dish was the salmon I'd spent the whole afternoon on, and it sat there stone cold with a thin fishy smell drifting off it.
Jonathan Reed set his fork down with a sharp clink that sounded far too loud in that dead-quiet dining room.
He cleared his throat, his expression solemn, as if moved by his own sense of importance.
"Summer, there's something I need to tell you," he said.
I lifted my gaze to meet his.
"I sent all 1.15 million dollars from this year's bonus and project payout straight to my parents," Jonathan said.
My heart dropped like a stone, as if an invisible hand had closed around it and shoved it into ice water.
One million one hundred fifty thousand dollars.
That was everything we'd worked our asses off for all year.
Well, mostly his.
But my salary, the small amount that actually kept the place running, had been borrowed by him over and over for three years, always with some excuse, to fill the bottomless pit his family had become.
He looked at my white face and seemed satisfied with it, then pulled three crumpled one-dollar bills out of his wallet and slid them across the table.
"Here, take this. It's your living expenses for the month," he said.
Three dollars.
It was like a slap in the face.
I stared at the bills, and the numbers on them blurred into a smirk.
He leaned in, his voice dropping to a whisper, his breath hot against my ear, dripping with that smug, condescending tone.
He said, "You're my wife, so you should cut me some slack. My family raised me, and now it's my duty to pay them back.
"My brother's getting married, and my parents want a bigger house for their retirement. That all takes money.
"My family comes before everything else. Do you get it?"
I got it.
There was no way I could have missed it.
Three years of marriage, and I'd been running on autopilot, circling him and that house like a machine with a program loaded into it.
My salary covered the water, the power, the gas, the HOA fees, and every new gaming console he decided he wanted.
He pulled in seven figures a year and never handed me a cent of it.
He said his money was for something bigger, for bringing honor to the family name.
I used to think that was devotion and a sense of duty.
Now I could see it for what it was, which was selfishness and plain stupidity.
I remembered the beige cashmere coat I'd been eyeing in a store window for months. It cost 1,700 dollars, and I touched it again and again, but never let myself buy it.
Because he'd said I was a housewife, so who exactly was I dressing up for?
I also remembered the month before, when my mother went in for emergency surgery on her appendix. I called him for money, and he sounded like I was wasting his time.
"Your mom's sick, so what? Don't you have any money? Where's all your money gone?" he snapped.
In the end, I had to swallow my pride and borrow 1,700 dollars from a coworker to cover the surgery.
That humiliation still sat in my chest like something sharp that wouldn't work its way out.
And now he'd paved his family's future in gold with 1.15 million dollars.
But he'd tossed three dollars at me, as if a whole month of my dignity came to exactly that.
I looked at his face, the one I'd once loved so much, and all that was left on it was arrogance and cold indifference.
The last bit of warmth in my chest went out, and nothing was left but frozen ground.
I didn't cry or question him.
I only nodded, and my voice came out so calm that it didn't sound like mine.
"You're right," I said.
Jonathan clearly liked how agreeable I was. He stretched out and leaned back in his chair like a general who'd won a war.
I stood up and silently began clearing the table.
The clatter of the dishes masked the frantic pounding of my heart.
In the kitchen, I dropped every dish into the sink with a crash, turned the faucet on full, and let the cold water run over my fingers.
My phone buzzed in my apron pocket.
I dried my hands and pulled it out.
It was a message from Diane Carter, the director at my company.
Diane: [Summer, the New York City project runs eight months, and we haven't picked anyone yet. Do you want it?]
It was the chance of a lifetime, and I'd hesitated over it before because of my family and because I couldn't stand the thought of leaving Jonathan.
I stared out into the pitch-black night, my pale, numb face reflected in the glass.
There was nothing left to hold onto.
That so-called home had stopped being a harbor a long time ago and had turned into a cage.
I took a deep breath, the cold air stinging my lungs.
I typed out my answer one word at a time.
I replied: [I'll take it, Ms. Carter.]