Part 3My Husband’s Student Mistress

"What... what is it? It’s the middle of the night," he groaned, squinting against the light. Then he saw my face. "Joanna? What’s wrong?"

"I know," I whispered, my voice a jagged edge of rage. "I know everything."

I shoved the phone into his chest. "You’re sleeping with a girl who could be your daughter. Have you no shame, Robert? Do you have even a pulse of human decency?"

Robert sat up. He didn't look scared. He didn't look panicked. He just sighed, reached for a tissue on the nightstand, and offered it to me.

"Joanna, let’s be adults. Twenty-three years. That’s a foundation no one can shake. Piper... she’s just a lapse in judgment. A mid-life glitch."

His tone was insufferably condescending, like he was explaining a difficult text to a freshman.

"Look," he said, leaning in. "When we got married, you weren't 'new.' You’d been with that guy before me. For twenty-three years, I’ve had to live with that. I’ve had to carry the weight of being the second man."

He paused, a flicker of something dark crossing his face.

"I just wanted to experience what it was like to have someone who was only mine. To taste... purity."

I couldn't hear him anymore. My ears started ringing, a high-pitched drone that drowned out his voice. I could see his lips moving, but the words were just static.

Twenty-three years. He’d been nursing a grudge for twenty-three years over something that wasn't even my fault.

Before him, I’d dated a man who turned out to be a predator. He’d drugged me. I’d woken up in a nightmare. When I tried to go to the police, he’d threatened me, told me he’d tell everyone I was "used goods."

I went to the police anyway. It was a scandal. My classmates whispered behind my back. Robert was the only one who stood by me. He told me he loved me, that my past didn't matter, that he wanted to protect me.

I had spent two decades being grateful to him. I thought he was my savior.

I didn't realize he was just a bookkeeper, tallying up a debt I could never pay.

"Joanna, do you know what it does to a man’s ego? Knowing his wife was handled by someone else first?" he continued. "I don't blame you, but I needed balance. I found Piper. I promise you, it was a one-time thing. It’s over."

My stomach lurched. I scrambled out of bed, ran to the bathroom, and doubled over. I retched until my throat burned.

Robert followed me, standing in the doorway, looking mildly inconvenienced. "Joanna..."

"I had no idea you were this broken inside," I gasped, wiping my mouth. "If you’ve been in this much pain for twenty years, then we’re done. I want a divorce."

Robert’s face hardened. "No. Absolutely not. We’re an institution, Joanna. We’ve come too far."

He stepped forward and tried to put a hand on my shoulder. I flinched away.

"We’re almost fifty," he said, his voice softening into a manipulative purr. "In a few years, Tyler will get married. We’ll have grandkids. We’ll retire, travel the world. It’s going to be beautiful. Don't throw all that away over a tantrum."

A tantrum?

I felt a wave of vertigo. For a split second, I actually hesitated. The "sunk cost" of my life felt like a physical weight. Our lives were like two vines that had grown so tightly together you couldn't tell where one ended and the other began. To pull apart would mean tearing skin, breaking bone.

Could I actually survive the surgery?