Lacy Splinters : Facing You

I had been scrubbing this tub for the last hour.

Before that I had washed the bedsheets.

Before that I did the laundry.

My bathroom is spic and span now.

But as I stopped whatever I was doing, flashback flooded through my mind like a broken dam.

Holographic recordings of MY husband fornicating with another woman. The way he kissed her all over. The way he touched her. The way he made her feel how I felt.

I threw away the brush and grabbed my hair, pulling it till my scalp threatens to tear. Slowly I slide down the wall to sit on the floor.

My whole body hurts now. Not just my stomach in a knot. My skin itches so bad I scratched it till it bled in certain places. My head is pounding like a Taiko drum in a Japanese summer festival. My eyes sees blotches of colors, it no longer desires any focus. My body trembled like I had Parkinson's.

Then there was a brief sound of keys jumbling before the main door creaks open.

He's back.

Oh my god...

Ohmygod
ohmygod
ohmygod...

What do I do? How do I act? He's going to see through me that I am not going to act normal.

Hell.

Why should I even try to act normal?

This was never my fault.

"Hunny?" I heard his call.

"Hunny where are you?" he's entering the bedroom.

I looked up the door and kicked it shut, effectively pushing on the lock button as well.

I need to think.

How to confront him?

How?

......

...


He knocked on the door. "What's wrong, hunny?"

I tried to drown his voice.

I hate that voice.

I'm disgusted.

Help me...

Lacy Splinters : The button

I took a sip of my morning cocoa.

My eyes never left the brown package, sitting silently on the kitchen counter.

I don't feel like going to work today.

I took a deep breath and reached for the object in obsession.

Slowly I pulled off the tapes like a patient child opening her birthday present.

I take my time.

It revealed a portable hologram player and a few envelopes labeled 1 and 2.

Left the player on the table and started looking through envelope 1.

There's a letter. I guess it's for me...

-----

Hi, you don't need to know who I am. But just know that your husband was involved in another marriage sometime earlier. It's somehow a contract marriage.

You see, I had accidentally divorced my wife. But I had since regretted my decision and I wanted her back. But in order for that to happen, she has to marry someone else, consummate, then divorce her current husband before she can come back to me. It is a tedious task, but I must have her back. I have my reasons.

So she chose one of her ex-boyfriends, which happens to be your husband - sorry to say.

I can imagine the feeling of your stomach knotting as you read this.

As you imagine you husband kissing another woman.

As you imagine them making love.

All these while the trust you nurtured in your relationship, all crushed due to the knowledge of this fact.

His whispers of I love yous...

His promises of your solitude with each other...

Lies...

His kisses which are now shared by another stranger - on your part.

THEY are reliving their younger days...

While YOU sit alone, betrayed...

Why am I telling you all this? Well, you see... I am, a very very spiteful and bitter person. All my life I have been. And I don't really fancy the fact that my wife(ex?) has to go through your husband before coming back to me. And there is also a chance she would not leave your husband at all. Then you will have to share him. And she wont come back to me. Therefore I spite your husband. I hate him with all my guts.

So I send this to you.

I'm sure he didn't mention ANYTHING to you at all... did he?

He's always your loving husband, loyal... a man of his words(?) A person with a calm attitude, albeit too calm it is now serving as his facade in front of you.

Well, in the other envelope are the copies of their legal marriage papers.

In the player? Well, you will have to push the PLAY button to know what is inside. I'm sure you will be as sore as I am after watching it. But doesn't curiosity just kills you?

---

So reads the letter...

I never realized I was chewing on my own lips until I finished reading the letter, then tasted the tangy flavor of blood.

He is right. My stomach is in knots now. It hurts.

I scrambled for the other envelope and tore it open. There it was, the documents which pronounced MY husband and this other person, Man and Wife.

I chewed harder.

My fingers trembled even harder as I reached for the player.

Do I want to know?

Would anything else destroy me more?

......

...

'click'

Lacy Splinters : The Video

I stared at the package in my hand.

It was this morning after breakfast, that my bureaucrat husband left for work. He was as sweet as a man can be also a very responsible husband.

He looked up from donning his shoelaces.

A soft smile fell on his handsome face, he opened his arms and caught me gently into his embrace. "I love you so much, hunny. Forever and ever more." he said as he breathed into my hair. "I was thinking of our last holiday trip just now. No work, no one else, just you and me. I wish it could be forever like that."

I smiled. "I love you too, sweetheart." and tightened the hug.

He was so warm.

He kissed my left cheek before leaving; left a tingling sensation that will last me through the hours he will be away from me.

5 whole years.

My cheek still tingles like a schoolgirl every time he gave me the kiss.

So chaste.

So delicate.

I watched as the door shuts, as I turned around.

Then it came.

Approximately 4 minutes after my husband left. There were 3 knocks on the door.

I opened the door, half-expecting him to return with a sheepish grin - "Sorry hunny, but I left my keys."

But there was no one when I opened the door.

Only a small package on the ground.

I blinked. 2 times.

I held the spot on my left cheek as I looked at the package.

A small card on the brown package wrote.

"Your husband is not the man he seems to be "