The Night My Husband Confessed His Affair

My name is Mariana, and that night I was waiting for him with my suitcases packed in the middle of the bedroom. Damián had been away for almost three weeks, on a project in the interior, and over the last few days something in his voice on the phone had grown evasive. A woman knows. She doesn’t need proof; silence is enough.

He came in after ten on a Friday, left his travel bag in the entrance, and found me sitting on the bed with my purse on my shoulder and a hard look in my eyes. There was no need for me to say anything. He lowered his head like a child who’s been caught.

—I was with another woman —he said at last, his voice breaking—. One night only. I swear it was just one night.

He cried. He cried for real, with those clumsy sobs that can’t be faked, repeating that he loved me, that without me his life made no sense, that I should give him another chance. And I, who was no saint myself, felt the floor soften beneath my feet.

I have things I keep to myself too, I thought. I can’t be that harsh.

—I’m not promising anything —I told him—. You don’t just forget this. You hurt me. Give me a few days to sort out my thoughts. And tonight you sleep on the couch.

He agreed without arguing. I slept in my bed, alone, in a T-shirt and nothing else, and in the morning I didn’t go to work: I called in sick. When I came out of the bathroom wrapped in little more than a towel, I saw him freshly showered, in lounge clothes, looking at me with a mixture of guilt and desire I knew by heart.

We had breakfast in the bedroom. We talked about small things, like when we were dating, and for a moment the betrayal seemed far away. Then he tried to touch me and I pushed him away. Not out of pride, but because an idea had just taken shape in my head.

—I want you to tell me everything —I said—. How you met her, how it happened, every detail. That will be my condition for forgiving you. And if I feel like you’re lying to me, I’m leaving.

—Mariana, don’t ask me that —he replied, uncomfortable—. We’re going to end up fighting.

—Do you want to make up, or should I take my bags? You decide. Start from the beginning.

Damián took a deep breath, settled back against the headboard, and began to talk. I got comfortable on my stomach, chin resting on my hands, and let him tell it without interrupting more than necessary.

***

—I got to the site on a Monday —he said—. On Wednesday the municipal supervisor showed up with her assistant to take inventory. Her name was Carla. The first time I called her “ma’am,” she corrected me: “Call me Carla, and stop using formal address with me.” We ate in the same house, spent the whole day among blueprints and photos.

—So you were glued to her from day one —I cut in—. And what was she like? Describe her to me. I want to picture her.

—Older than you, in her mid-thirties. Tall, light brown skin, very long brown hair. Slim, with firm legs; you could tell she worked out. She had a way of moving… —he stopped, looking for the word—. Confident. Like someone who knows she’s being watched.

—Prettier than me —I said, pressing my finger into the wound.

—There’s no comparison, Mariana. But I’m not going to lie: she had something going for her.

I pressed my lips together. Inside, though, it wasn’t fury that was growing. It was something else, warmer, more confusing, something I still didn’t know how to name.

—One morning she saw your photo on my phone —he went on—. She asked me who you were. I told her you were my wife. She kept looking at it for a long while and said I was lucky, that you were very young and very pretty. She said it without bitterness, almost sadly.

—How thoughtful of her —I let out with sarcasm—. And the night? Get to the point.

***

—It was Saturday, Andrea’s birthday, her assistant —Damián said—. It was the last day they’d be there, so we organized a little party at the house where they were staying. The construction workers and I brought the food and the beer. By mid-afternoon the music was on, people were dancing. Carla and I stayed seated, talking, already having had a few drinks.

—And that’s where it started.

—She told me her marriage was going badly —he said—. That her husband had cheated on her, that they barely touched each other anymore. She asked me if I found her unattractive. I told her no, of course not. And she confessed she envied the woman who had someone who listened to her like that.

Then I remembered that same night I had been calling him. That he didn’t answer. That we’d agreed he would accompany me to my company’s year-end dinner, and that he stood me up in front of everyone. And I remembered, too, what I did that morning to get back at him, what I never confessed to him. Rage and guilt tangled together in my chest.

—Go on —I said, my voice hoarser than I intended.

—We went out to dance. She was wearing a short denim skirt, tight. While we were dancing she pressed herself against me, subtly, rubbing her body against mine. She took my hands and brought them to her waist. When the song ended, she whispered in my ear that she wasn’t used to drinking, that she felt dizzy, that I shouldn’t leave her alone.

—What a coincidence —I murmured.

—Around eleven she asked me to walk her to her room. She was afraid she’d fall. I took her by the arm. And once inside, before I could leave, she told me to prove she wasn’t ugly, and she tried to kiss me.

—And you turned her down? —I asked, almost hoping he’d say yes.

—At first, yes. I was thinking of you. But then she started crying, told me to go, and I… I took her by the waist and kissed her.

***

While he talked, something inside me changed direction. I’d expected to feel jealous, like screaming. Instead I began to notice heat climbing up my neck, an uncomfortable wetness between my legs that had nothing to do with anger. I settled better on the bed, on my stomach, and noticed Damián glancing at me out of the corner of his eye, gauging my reaction.

—Should I stop? —he asked.

—No —I said, and my own voice surprised me—. It’s better to hear it from you than from other people. Go on.

—I laid her down on the bed. She climbed on top of me, peeling my shirt off without stopping kissing me. She took off her blouse. She was wearing a white bra that contrasted with her brown skin. She took my hands and brought them to her breasts. “For tonight they’re yours,” she told me.

I closed my eyes for an instant. I didn’t want him to notice, but I was imagining the scene in a detail that frightened me. My husband in another bed, other hands, another mouth. And me, instead of hating him, biting my lip so I wouldn’t moan.

—She leaned down and started using her mouth —Damián went on, his voice lower now, thicker—. Slowly, looking at me. I told her I was about to finish and she didn’t stop. Then she took off her skirt, I looked for a condom, and she settled herself under me.

—And you went in like that, just like that? —I asked. My breathing was ragged, and I prayed he wouldn’t notice.

—Slowly. She was moaning softly, almost in secret. The wooden bed creaked with every movement. At one point she asked me to stop, that it was too much, and the very next second she was digging her nails into my back and wrapping her legs around me. She had a long, silent orgasm, and after that she hugged me and thanked me.

I no longer knew where to put my hands. Discreetly I slipped one under my body, to the edge of my soaked underwear, and pressed my thighs together to hold myself back. What’s happening to me?, I thought. How can I like this?

***

—After that she asked me to stay —he continued, now staring at the ceiling, lost in the memory—. That whatever happened there would stay there. That the next day each of us would go back to our own life and we wouldn’t look for each other. “Women have to respect each other,” she told me. “Your wife doesn’t need to find out.” She promised it like it was a sacred pact.

—How discreet, the bitch… —I began, but the word dissolved in my mouth. I didn’t have the strength for the insult. I just wanted him to keep going.

—We started again —Damián said, and I noticed his hand moving slowly beneath the sheet—. This time she wanted to be on top. She moved in circles, eyes closed, repeating that she had never felt anything like it. She had another orgasm, and then another, until she asked me to stop, that she couldn’t take any more.

I looked at him hard. My husband still had his gaze fixed on the ceiling, oblivious to the battle I was fighting against my own body. I brought one hand up to my breasts over the T-shirt, felt how hard they were, begging to be touched. I slipped the other down between my legs, over the wet fabric, and began to stroke myself lightly, holding my breath.

—There was something more —he said, in a nearly inaudible voice.

—Tell me everything —I pleaded, and it was no longer an order: it was a plea.

—At dawn I heard noises in the next room. Andrea was with one of the construction workers. Carla woke up, felt me getting up, and wouldn’t let me go. She curled up with her back to me. And then she asked me for something her husband had spent years begging her for and she had always refused him. She wanted me to be the first.

I swallowed hard. My fingers were moving on their own, in slow circles, as I listened.

—I did it slowly, carefully —said Damián—. At first she complained, it hurt, there were even tears. I told her to relax, waited without moving until she stopped trembling. And little by little she started to seek the movement herself, lifting her hips, breathing harder. She finished with an orgasm that left her a wreck on the mattress.

That image was too much. I closed my eyes, bit the pillow to stifle the cry, and my whole body tightened at once. I came silently, just a handspan away from my husband, who kept talking unaware of anything, one hand lost beneath the sheet and his gaze on the ceiling.

***

When I caught my breath, I didn’t feel satisfied. On the contrary: the arousal was still there, right under the skin, more alive than ever. Damián finished his story in a tired voice.

—In the morning they came to pick them up. We all had breakfast together and they left. I never heard from Carla again. That’s the truth, Mariana, all of it. I have nothing left to hide from you.

I sat up slowly. I looked at him, and instead of the resentment I had brought with me in those suitcases, I found something else. A new, dangerous idea, burning inside me. I climbed on top of him and kissed him like I hadn’t kissed him in months.

—I love you —I told him in his ear—. And I want you to make me feel the same way you made her feel. But not here.

—Where, then? —he asked, bewildered and already hard beneath me.

—In a hotel. Somewhere I can scream without anyone hearing us. Borrow your father’s car, take a shower and get dressed. I’m going to get ready.

As I watched him get up in a hurry, I smiled to myself. He thought he had confessed his only secret to me. He had no idea that night had just awakened mine.