Family members visited at first, offering sympathy and cautious advice. Some suggested professional care facilities. I always gave the same answer, steady and unwavering.
“She is my wife,” I said. “I will take care of her.”
To keep us afloat, I took on odd jobs in the evenings, basic repairs, tutoring, anything that paid cash. I returned home exhausted, my muscles aching, yet every night I sat beside Maya and read aloud from old novels or newspaper articles, describing the outside world in detail so she would not feel erased from it.
She rarely spoke. She nodded. She cried silently when she thought I was not looking. I told myself it was grief, frustration, the slow mourning of a life interrupted. I never allowed myself to doubt her condition, because doubt felt like betrayal.
Years passed quietly. Friends stopped calling. Invitations disappeared. My life became smaller, but I accepted that shrinkage as the price of devotion.
Until the afternoon everything unraveled.
I had just left the house on my way to a tutoring session when I realized I had forgotten my wallet. Annoyed at myself, I turned the car around, already planning how quickly I would grab it and leave again.
When I opened the front door, the late afternoon sun poured through the windows, illuminating the living room in a way that felt almost theatrical.
Maya was not in bed.
She was standing near the dresser, steady on her feet, her posture relaxed, her hair loose around her shoulders. For a split second, my mind rejected what my eyes were seeing, scrambling for a logical explanation that would preserve the last five years as something other than a lie.
She was not alone.
A man I had never seen before was kneeling by the bed, folding clothes and placing them into an open suitcase. They were laughing softly, an easy sound, intimate and familiar.
“Hurry up,” Maya said, her voice clear and strong, nothing like the fragile tone I had memorized. “He will be back soon. Take the envelope from the closet. That is where he keeps the cash.”
The sound of my keys hitting the floor echoed sharply in the room.
They both turned. Maya’s face drained of color, her hands freezing mid motion. The man straightened slowly, confusion giving way to alarm.
I felt strangely calm. Not numb, not angry, just empty, as if something vital had quietly switched itself off.
“How long,” I asked, my voice barely audible.