I Found Out My Husband Went On A Secret 15-Day Trip With The Woman He Calls His “Work Wife.” When He Came Home, I Asked One Simple Question That Wiped The Smile Off His Face: Do You Know What Illness She Has? He Rushed To The Doctor, BUT THE TRUTH WAS ALREADY WAITING FOR HIM

He proposed on a Wednesday evening while we were doing dishes together in his tiny apartment. No grand gesture, no public spectacle, just him turning to me with sudsy hands and saying,

“I want to do this forever. What do you think?”

I said yes before he even pulled out the ring.

We got married two years later in Prospect Park on a warm September afternoon. Sixty people surrounded us—close friends and family, the people who mattered. My mother cried through the entire ceremony, dabbing at her eyes with tissues my sister kept handing her. Milo’s father gave a toast about partnership and commitment that made even the cynical relatives tear up.

We honeymooned in Maine, rented a cabin by the ocean, and spent a week eating lobster and reading books and planning our future.

When we came back to reality, we moved into a one-bedroom apartment in Crown Heights. It wasn’t much—cramped kitchen, bathroom with questionable plumbing, radiator that clanked all night in winter—but it was ours. We argued about furniture placement. He wanted the couch facing the window for natural light. I wanted it facing the TV. We compromised by angling it diagonally, satisfying neither of us but feeling like a victory for marriage.

We adopted a rescue cat from the shelter on Nostrand Avenue, an orange tabby with an attitude problem who hated everyone except Milo. We named her Pepper. I pretended not to be jealous that she’d curl up in his lap but hiss when I tried to pet her.

The years that followed were good. Not perfect—nobody’s marriage is perfect—but solidly, reliably good. Milo climbed the corporate ladder at his sales job. He’d come home with stories about office politics and difficult clients, and I’d listen while making dinner. I managed community outreach programs at my nonprofit. The pay was terrible, but the work mattered. We helped people build new lives in a country that felt foreign and overwhelming.

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