My trainer husband was impotent.
That was why, every time I asked to sleep with him, he'd just raise a hand and say, "No."
Even knowing today was our wedding anniversary, he still grabbed his pillow and moved to the guest room.
I knew the truth. He wasn't impotent. He just didn't want to touch me.
I'd begged him once, small and humbled.
"I only want a child. Just one. That's all."
He didn't so much as lift his eyes.
"Now isn't the time for a child."
Even my friends asked me about it.
"Isn't your husband a trainer? Is something wrong with him down there? You've been married all these years and still no baby."
I'd answer, a little embarrassed.
"It's not that he can't. He just says it's not the right time for a child yet."
I waited bitterly for two years, and the "right time" he kept talking about never came.
Then one day I stumbled onto a post from a female fitness influencer.
Under every one of her videos, the same person had commented.
"No ice cream on your period. Did you forget last time, when the cramps had you rolling around in pain?"
"No hot pot. It'll be too spicy for the baby in your belly."
"You've got a baby in there. No working out at the gym."
My finger slipped, and I tapped into the man's profile picture.
There was only one photo inside, of him and his girlfriend, fingers laced together.
The ring on his hand jumped out at me.
I lowered my head and looked at the identical diamond ring on my own ring finger.
There was only one pair like it in the world.
Because I'd made them myself, out of soda tabs.
The other one was on my husband's hand.
1
Ronnie Henson was holding his pillow, about to head for the guest room.
Then he turned his head and glanced at me.
"How come you're not making a fuss about sleeping with me tonight?"
"Finally learned to behave yourself?"
I set down my phone as the cold washed over my heart in waves.
I stared at Ronnie's bare finger.
I hadn't even noticed when he'd taken the ring off.
Because he'd once told me that if the day ever came when the ring left his hand, it would mean he'd done something to wrong me.
He'd hinted at it so long ago.
And I was only realizing it now.
"Ronnie, did you lose your ring?"
I asked him.
He instinctively hid his hand, his expression a little tense.
"It's not practical for training. I was afraid I'd damage it, so I took it off."
He was bad at lying. The moment he tried, he came apart at the seams.
I couldn't help a bitter smile.
He'd taken it off because he was afraid the sharp soda tab would scratch that other person.
And in that comment section, every line was him fussing over that girl.
They were all "no," but the "no" he said to her and the "no" he said to me meant two completely different things.
Suddenly none of it felt worth it anymore.
Two years of bitter waiting, and it never led to the one thing I wanted.
Ronnie squeezed his pillow and walked into the bedroom, guilt written all over him.
I knew my place. I got up and went to the bedroom beside his.
This scene was how every night ended.
Except tonight, he suddenly came back out, pillow in his arms.
"The guest bed isn't made up. I'll just sleep in the master tonight."
It was the first time he'd ever offered to sleep with me.
Before, I would have been thrilled beyond words.
Because that bed was one I'd left unmade on purpose.
Countless times I'd imagined that one day he'd bring his pillow and sleep beside me.
That day had come fast, and I felt nothing at all.
I shook my head.
"Never mind. I'm used to sleeping alone."
Ronnie looked a little surprised, and a trace of awkwardness surfaced on his face despite himself.
"Weren't you always dying to sleep with me? What is it? Change your tune all of a sudden?"
I opened my bedroom door, my back to him.
"Go to sleep. I'm tired."
He stood behind me, no sign of leaving.
"You did nothing all day. How do you have the nerve to say you're tired?"
The next morning, I sat at the table chewing on dry bread.
Ronnie got up, stared at the empty table, and couldn't hold back a complaint.
"Why didn't you make me any breakfast?"
I swallowed the last bite of bread and looked up at him.
"I used to ask you, and you always said you didn't want it. I figured today would be the same."
Every morning in the past, I'd carefully made breakfast, toasted the bread, warmed the milk, and waited for Ronnie to wake up.
Except when he saw the food, all he'd say, coldly, was:
"Don't want it. No appetite. Too much trouble to eat."
It wasn't that he didn't want to eat. It was that every morning he ate breakfast with someone else, out there.
That was why what I made tasted like nothing to him.
Ronnie didn't say anything. He walked to the entryway and quietly changed his shoes.
Just as he was about to leave, he suddenly stopped and told me.
"I've got a private session tonight. I won't be home for dinner. Don't wait up for me."
I looked at the calendar on my phone and asked him.
"Do you remember what day it is today?"
He thought about it.
"Members' Day at the gym. Sign-ups get a discount today."
I dimly remembered this same day a month ago.
He'd sworn up and down that he would spend my birthday with me.
I didn't say anything more. I opened my phone and booked a flight to Seabrook three days out.
Ronnie loved working out. I was a lazybones.
No one had believed in this relationship. They'd said two people with no shared interests could never make it to the end.
At first I hadn't believed them. Now I did.
My best friend asked me to dinner that night.
She was a little sheepish about it, but she said it anyway.
"I've noticed Ronnie's been giving off major dad energy lately. Are you pregnant?"
I nodded, then shook my head.
"He is about to be a dad. It's just that the one who's pregnant isn't me."
"This marriage was never going anywhere. I've decided to let it go."
