My Silent Husband Finally Spoke, But He Said My Best Friend’s Name Chapter 03

My Silent Husband Finally Spoke, But He Said My Best Friend’s Name Chapter 03

Julian picked me up from the hospital the day I was discharged. It had just started to drizzle.

He held the umbrella over me, tilting it toward me without a second thought.

I was about to get in the car when a voice called my name.

“Chloe?”

I turned. It was Valerie Jenkins. We’d gone to college together.

Her eyes darted between me and Julian, and she smiled.

“Oh wow. It really is you.”

“Three years later, and you’re still dragging your mute of a husband around?”

My fingers went ice-cold.

Valerie’s smile widened into a malicious smirk.

“You made such a scene at that reunion defending him.”

“I actually thought love was going to cure him. Like you could just will him into talking.”

She wasn’t even trying to hide her contempt.

A week ago, I would’ve stepped in front of him. I would’ve torn into her the same way I tore into that guy at the reunion.

But this time, I didn’t move.

I just lifted my eyes to Julian.

One sentence. That’s all I needed from him.

If he just said, “Stop.”

If he said, “Don’t talk about her like that.”

If he said, “She’s my wife.”

Even just my name. Just once.

Anything at all.

I hated how pathetic I was being in that moment.

As long as he said something. As long as he stepped between me and the humiliation suffocating me.

I could’ve found one more reason to keep loving him.

But Julian said nothing.

He stood there in the rain like the mute everyone thought he was, and let her verbally tear me apart.

“See, Chloe?” Valerie’s smile sharpened. “You’re a joke.”

I didn’t look at her. My eyes stayed on Julian.

Until the last shred of hope drained out of me. Until I tasted copper from my healing vocal cords. Until something inside my chest went completely dead.

Back at the apartment, Julian set my medication on the table.

He reached for his whiteboard.

[Don’t listen to her. She doesn’t know what she’s talking about.]

I couldn’t answer even if I wanted to. I just walked past him into the study.

Three years of speech therapy cluttered every surface of that room.

Flashcards, sign language manuals, progress journals.

Sticky notes I’d written myself, one for every good day.

[You did so well today.]

[We’ll get there. One step at a time.]

[Someday you’ll say my name.]

I gathered them up, every single one, and dropped them into a trash bag.

That’s when Julian panicked. He caught my wrist.

His hands moved frantically, the signs blurring together.

“What are you doing?”

“You don’t want to do this anymore?”

“Are you giving up on me?”

That last one would have made me laugh if my throat didn’t ache so much.

He’d given up on me first. He just never bothered to say it out loud.

I didn’t look at him. I yanked my wrist free and dropped the last journal into the bag.

Then I turned and walked back to the bedroom.

I barely slept that night.

When I woke in the dark, Julian’s side of the bed was cold and empty. His tablet on the nightstand glowed with a new notification.

His messages were still open on the screen.

Stella’s name sat at the top of the thread.

The thread was full of voice messages. Dozens of them.

All from Julian.

The last one had been sent just moments ago.

I pressed play. Julian’s voice filled the dark room, low, soft, impossibly tender.

“Stella, you still up?”

“Can’t sleep again?”

“It’s okay. I’ll sing you something.”

And then he sang. Quiet, barely more than a whisper.

I kept scrolling.

There were so many. Message after message after message, all for her.

Good mornings. Good nights. Reminders to bring an umbrella. A song he thought she’d like.

All the little things he never gave me.

I sat in the dark and listened to every single one. And then a silent, broken laugh tore at my healing vocal cords.

The laughter cracked somewhere in the middle, and then it was just tears, falling onto the screen.

I turned off the tablet. From the nightstand drawer, I pulled out the divorce papers I’d managed to print at the hospital.

I signed my name, one slow letter at a time.