My Husband Claimed Asexuality And Fathered Her Child Instead Chapter 01

My Husband Claimed Asexuality And Fathered Her Child Instead Chapter 01

On the day my husband, Julian Whitmore, was diagnosed with emotional detachment, he asked the doctor if that meant he would never learn how to love someone.

The doctor explained it gently. I tightened my grip on his hand.

He pulled away and said, “Sorry.”

He said he wanted a marriage without sex because physical intimacy made him uncomfortable.

I agreed, thinking it was part of his condition.

We slept in separate rooms for seven years, until yesterday, when I found a folded ultrasound report tucked inside a book he often read.

[Gestational age: 20 weeks. Name: Serena Hayes.]

The date was from three months ago.

On the back of the report, in his handwriting, he had written the same line twice: [Prenatal appointment: City Women’s Hospital, Wednesday afternoon.]

So it was not that he didn’t want children.

He just didn’t want them with me.

Julian, you had already lied to me ten times.

I once told you that after the final lie, I would leave your life forever and never see you again.

***

I put the ultrasound report back where I found it and acted like nothing had happened.

At the dining table, he sat down, drank his coffee, and watched the financial news.

He had forgotten to add sugar to his coffee today, which was careless. He never used to make mistakes like that.

“Julian,” I called.

“It’s Wednesday today.” I cut into my fried egg.

“Mm.” He didn’t look up.

“Do you have plans this afternoon?”

“A meeting.”

He swallowed reflexively, then touched the side of his nose out of habit.

He had lied again.

The eleventh time.

I nodded and kept eating.

The fried egg had gone tough. It had just come out of the pan, but somehow it tasted cold.

Today was our seventh wedding anniversary.

Last night, he had promised to spend it with me. Now, he had forgotten completely.

Or maybe he had never cared in the first place.

“The pothos you gave me is on the windowsill,” I said. “I put it on the windowsill.”

“Whatever.”

He turned a page of his financial magazine, still cold and distant, without even giving me a glance.

The pothos was already dead.

I had noticed it last week when I watered it. The roots had rotted in the soil, but I didn’t throw it away. I left it there to wither on the windowsill. He probably had never noticed.

His phone lit up. I caught a glimpse of the notification on the screen.

[City Women’s Hospital reminder: Prenatal appointment today at 3:00 p.m. Please arrive on time.]

He locked the screen quickly.

“The soup is getting cold.” I pushed the bowl closer to him.

He took one spoonful, then paused. “You added ginger?”

“To keep you warm.” I looked at him.

“You’ve been coming home so late lately. I was worried you’d catch a cold.”

He didn’t speak again. He finished the soup absentmindedly, his gaze evasive.

His Adam’s apple bobbed, and his jaw was drawn tight.

For more than two thousand days and nights, whenever I needed him to see me, he always happened to be looking somewhere else.

Still acting like nothing was wrong, I threw away the pothos he had given me.

It was rotten all the way through.

There was no point keeping it.

People were the same.

At two in the afternoon, I said I was going to the library.

After I left the building, I turned right and went into the coffee shop across from City Women’s Hospital.

At 3:10, he appeared at the hospital entrance.

He wore a dark gray coat and carried a medical folder in his hand.

A young woman walked toward him. She had long hair and wore an ivory knit dress.

It was Serena. I had seen her photo in our high school alumni directory.

When she smiled, the dimples in her cheeks looked exactly like the ones in the graduation photo Julian kept in his wallet.

By the time I finished my third Americano, they came out.

He helped her down the steps, his hand hovering lightly behind her elbow, gentle but unwilling to let go.

When Julian drove away, I hailed a cab.

“Follow the black Mercedes ahead,” I said.

The driver glanced at me through the rearview mirror but didn’t ask any questions.

After a short detour, the Mercedes circled back to City Women’s Hospital. Julian carried a paper bag into the lobby, walking faster than usual.

I didn’t get out. Through the car window, I watched Julian kiss Serena on the forehead, like they were a loving couple.

He and I had never been that intimate in public.

Every time I tried to hold his hand, he avoided me.

Serena took the paper bag from him, looked down at it, and smiled until her eyes crinkled.

He reached out and lightly touched her belly. The gesture was so natural, as if he had practiced it countless times.

It was clearly winter, yet I felt unbearably hot.

I rolled down the window. Wind rushed in, and only then did my head clear.

There was a time when I had wanted a child with him too, but that time had long passed.

After disappointment piled up again and again, all I felt was exhaustion.

Julian, I think I don’t love you that much anymore.