PART 14 – The More I Remembered His Calls From the Ship, the More I Questioned What I Had Believed About Our Marriage

I finally found a quieter place where I could sit with the girls.

I put their bag beside me.

Then I took out my phone again.

There were several messages from Ryan.

I didn't open them immediately.

I was afraid that reading another explanation would make me feel worse.

But eventually I looked.

He wanted to know whether I had eaten.

He wanted to know whether the girls needed anything.

Then he wrote that he had never intended to hurt me.

I read that sentence twice.

I wished he had thought about that before.

I wished he had considered the consequences before kissing another woman in front of the terminal.

I wished he had remembered that his wife was somewhere at home, caring for the daughters he had been so eager to meet.

I put the phone down.

My mind went back to the calls we had shared.

I remembered sitting with the babies while he appeared on the screen.

Sometimes he called when I was tired.

Sometimes he called when the girls were sleeping.

Sometimes he asked me to show him their faces.

I had never minded.

I had wanted him to feel included.

I had wanted him to know that he was still important to us.

Now those memories felt different.

I wondered what he had been doing before or after those calls.

I wondered whether the woman at the terminal had known he was speaking to his wife.

I wondered whether other women had been part of the same period.

He had admitted that she wasn't the only one.

That sentence kept returning to me.

I didn't want to imagine details.

I didn't need to.

The admission itself was enough.

I looked down at the girls.

One had started moving her arms.

I gently held her little hand.

"You're okay."

I said it softly.

I wanted to believe that I would be okay, too.

I wasn't ready to think about the future in great detail.

I didn't know whether Ryan would continue working on the cruise ship.

I didn't know what he expected from me.

I didn't know whether he thought one conversation would make everything disappear.

But I knew I couldn't return to the way things had been before.

Something had changed.

And I couldn't pretend otherwise.

Another message arrived.

Ryan wrote that he wanted to explain everything properly.

I stared at the words.

Then I remembered his explanation at the terminal.

He had already explained what he thought about faithfulness.

He had already told me that being away for months made it difficult.

He had already blamed his behavior on being young and attractive.

What more was there to explain?

I didn't reply.

I put the phone away and concentrated on the girls.

They needed their mother to be present.

Not physically present while her mind was somewhere else.

Actually present.

So I watched them.

I noticed their little expressions.

I noticed the way one moved her fingers while sleeping.

I noticed the way the other settled when I adjusted her blanket.

Those details mattered.

They were real.

Unlike the promises I had spent months holding onto.

I felt sadness again.

But this time, I didn't try to push it away.

I had every right to be sad.

I had every right to feel betrayed.

And I had every right to take the time I needed.

For once, I didn't worry about whether Ryan would approve.

Click here to continue reading: PART 15: I Had Been So Busy Protecting His Place in Our Family That I Almost Forgot I Deserved Honesty From Him Too