Stages of Divorce

Discovery

Four years ago, they sat in their dining room, staring at each other in silence with wide eyes, with Christian's laptop open. He'd been waiting on a company email from his supervisor for the past day, ever since the older man pulled him into his cushy corner office to tell him the news. He rushed into the men's bathroom to call Wesley immediately. When it dinged into his inbox, they both exploded into grinning, blabbering, giggling messes.

He received the supervisor position, after spending his past two years out of college following around his superior like a pathetic, shameless puppy. All of the ass kissing and dreadful hours that had somewhat strained his first year of marriage was all worth it. Christian always talked about this status - excelling in his field and bringing Wesley with him. They would live in a brownstone, in Brooklyn maybe, they'd be invited to important events with influential people, and he could finally prove her parents wrong about him.

His family was conservative, house in the Hamptons kind of rich. He was raised with private schools and personal tutors, and spring break trips to Vale. He could buy her a million roses a day and they could Jetset until they died - but it was never enough for her family. To them, it was worthless if he hadn't earned it himself.

Their entire relationship had felt like a personal mission to prove that Christian deserved her... or maybe, it was to prove he could have her and everything else.

Wesley thought back to the first few months of their marriage, when Christian would come home with flowers for her and her mother would tease the floral arrangements on her dinner table every mid-day lunch she'd stop by for, unannounced. She always defended her husband and hid her hurt feelings when her mother reminded it was all the honeymoon phase. After all, Wesley had spent her entire young adult life trying to prove her parents wrong, like Christian.

But maybe they were right all along.

---

The steel elevator doors slid open, and an invisible hand shoved Wesley into the lobby of Christian's work. She blinked at her reflection in the copper letters of the company's sign. She could trick anyone to think she was composed by her physical appearance, but there was internal war clear to the world behind her eyes.

She collected herself in a swift breath before she rounded the corner of the semi-lit floor, walking down a brief hallway to her husband's office - the corner office he assumed from his predecessor. The light was on, and for a brief moment, Wes was comforted.

Maybe this whole time, he'd been working. The emails and text messages were mistakes, musings of a bored man in need of entertainment. They still made her sick, but she could get over it...

And then she heard it.

From the end of the hallway, it could've been anything, it could've come from anywhere had she been denying herself. But the closer she got to his door, the louder it got.

A soft mewling moan that was entirely too feminine to belong to her husband.

Tears betrayed her and rolled down her cheeks as she numbly approached the door. Her chest throbbed and ached and she wobbled on weak legs, peering through the glass door of her husband's office.

It felt dreamlike. The wetness of her eyes was the only expression of her sorrow. Her lips were parted with slow inhales, her head filled with the heat of illusion, even the hazel of her eyes were dull. Was this shock?

She couldn't stop herself. In the moment she was blind of pain, she took advantage and peered through the glass at her husband.

---

Had it been hours or days? Wesley wasn't sure of anything. She found herself in the same dining chair, staring at the piles of papers now littered around the entire house. There was broken glass in the office. Every portrait of them had been thrown to the floor.

Despite the disheveled state of the house, Wesley sat in her seat, calmly sipping a glass of wine - questioning if she'd dreamt it, if she'd left the house at all.

The obvious answer she couldn't bring herself to accept was that yes, she had in fact gone to Christian's office. What was truly effecting her ability to accept it was that same naivety that pushed her away from the realization months prior. The blind loyalty that convinced her that he'd never do this to her.

She could no longer deny what she saw. She could neither deny that it had been hours, and he was still not home. Had this been days prior, Wesley would have believed his words that he was working late on another project, that he claimed had been passed down to him from his superior. She would have laughed in ignorance at her husband, prideful at his hardworking habits.

Now, she was no longer in the dark.

When the clock hit 2 AM, she abandoned the disarray and slowly climbed the stairs to the master bedroom, untouched since she'd made it the previous morning. Still with wet hair, she crawled into the bed in her robe, door locked behind her on the off chance he'd come home at all.