I thought my life with my ex-husband was firmly in the past until a message request from a stranger appeared on my phone late one night. When I saw who she was married to, I realized ignoring it wasn’t an option.
I’m 32. You can call me Maren. I typed this story the same way I would’ve texted a friend at 1:47 a.m., because even now my brain keeps going, “Nope. That didn’t happen.”
Let me explain.
“Nope. That didn’t happen.”
I hadn’t spoken to my ex-husband, Elliot, in almost two years.
We were together for eight years, married for five. We had no children, but not by choice. Elliot was infertile. Or at least that’s the story he told me, doctors, and eventually friends, until it became the truth we lived inside.
Our divorce was brutal but final.
Papers were signed, and arrangements with lawyers were made. We blocked each other everywhere afterward.
I rebuilt my life. That’s what I told myself I did.
Or at least that’s the story he told me, doctors, and eventually friends…
Then last Tuesday, my phone buzzed while I was half-watching a rerun and folding laundry I’d already put off for days.
It was a Facebook message request from a woman I didn’t recognize.
Weary, I did a quick background check without reading the message.
Her profile picture looked harmless. She had a soft smile, dark-blonde hair pulled back, and a neutral background that could’ve been anywhere. Nothing alarming.
Until I saw her last name.
Weary, I did a quick background check…
It was the same as Elliot’s!
My stomach dropped so hard I actually pressed my palm against it, as if that would stop the feeling from spreading.
I stared at the screen for far too long before reopening the woman’s original message. Like, if I didn’t click on it, it couldn’t be real.
As if the universe needed my permission to ruin my evening.
The message was short, polite, and almost rehearsed.
But it was anything but innocent.
My stomach dropped so hard I actually pressed my palm against it…
“Hi. I’m sorry to bother you. I’m Elliot’s new wife. I know this is strange, but I need to ask you something. Elliot asked me to reach out. He said it would sound better coming from me. I didn’t want to, but… I’ve been feeling weird about how he’s acting. It’s just one question. Can I?”
I stopped cold, wondering what to do.
I considered trying to get a hold of Elliot, but remembered we’d blocked each other.
Then I worried about what Claire, or rather my ex, might ask. That is his new wife’s name, Claire.
“I’m Elliot’s new wife.”
I read the message three more times. Not because it was confusing, but because I was stunned.
I imagined her compiling the message, probably while sitting next to the man it was about and who’d instigated this whole thing.
The message itself was inoffensive, neutral, and kind.
I felt a strange pressure behind my eyes, not tears exactly, but the effort it took not to laugh.
I didn’t answer right away. I knew that whatever I sent back would become part of something bigger than a late-night Facebook exchange.
I read the message three more times.
When I couldn’t sleep because Claire’s looming question kept playing in my mind, I whipped out my phone and texted back tentatively.
“Hi, Claire. This is definitely unexpected. I don’t know if I have the answers you want, but you can go ahead.”
I guess Elliot’s new wife was either anxious about my answer or just glued to her phone because she responded almost immediately.
“Thank you. I am just going to ask you, honestly. Elliot says your divorce was mutual and kind, and that you both agreed it was for the best. Is that true?”
…I whipped out my phone and texted back tentatively.
I didn’t know then whether Elliot had really put her up to it, but the wording felt familiar.
My ex never asked for anything, especially help, without a reason. And he never took risks unless he thought he had control.
I typed, erased, then typed again.
“That’s not a yes-or-no question.”
The response came fast.
“I understand,” Claire wrote. “I just need to know whether I can say it’s true.”
I was confused by the way she phrased her statement. Why would she need to say it?
I typed, erased, then typed again.
I sat back on my bed and stared at the wall across from me, remembering a conference room years earlier. Elliot was sliding a legal pad toward me and saying, “Let’s keep this amicable. It’ll make things easier.”
Easier for him had always meant quieter for me.
I typed again.
“What did Elliot tell you I agreed to?”
This time, the pause stretched longer. I set my phone down, made tea I didn’t drink, and picked it back up.
“Let’s keep this amicable.”
“He said neither of you wanted children as the marriage progressed,” she’d written when I came back from the kitchen. “That you both grew apart and there wasn’t resentment.”
I closed my eyes.