Sweet Romance11 min read
I Walked Into My Husband's Room and Got Caught — Then I Took Over His Life
ButterPicks11 views
"I can't believe I'm doing this."
I press my palm to the cold brass of Wyatt's door knob and turn. My heart hammers like a trapped bird.
"I told you not to be ridiculous," I whisper to myself, though I know I'm ridiculous.
The hallway is a black tunnel. The bed is a dark shape. I tiptoe like I'm in a movie and stumble on the corner of the desk. Pain bites my shin and I hiss.
"Are you okay?" a voice asks from the bed.
I freeze mid-step, hand in the air, grin frozen on my face like an idiot clown.
Wyatt sits up slowly. His eyes are the color of storm glass. "What are you doing?"
"I—" I try to play it off. "I'm just passing by. I swear I'm just passing by. I wasn't looking. I tripped. I was just... exercising night walking. Ha ha."
He watches me, unblinking, and raises a brow like he has all night to waste. Then he reaches for the robe and flicks it at me.
"You wore my coat," he says.
I snatch it, cheeks burning, and flee like a thief. My head bangs the door frame. I hiss again, but I run.
He stands in the yellow light and watches me go with something like a smile vanishing from his face.
"I could have stopped her," he mutters.
Later at breakfast he says, "Did you sleep well?"
"Yes," I lie, pressing my fork into my toast like it's a ledge. "Why?"
"Because you looked tired." He keeps it casual. He always keeps things casual.
At work I'm the early one. I like being early. I like being useful. I am an intern at Cloudline Psych Hospital and my mentor is Dr. Gordon Ferrari. He's famous. He takes my mistakes with a small sigh and never laughs.
"Jovie, good, you're here," Emma says, breezing into the office with perfume and a grin. Emma Conner always smells like expensive coffee.
"Morning," I chirp and then whisper, "Emma, quick—what if a husband won't touch his wife? I mean, what if he... can't?"
Emma's eyes pop. "Is this about someone you know?"
"My best friend. Haha." I force a laugh.
"Two things," Emma says, turning the coffee machine like a weapon. "Either it's psychological or it's physical."
"Which one is worse?"
"Both." She smirks. "But if it's physical, it's fixable. There are remedies. It's not the end."
That evening I sit at my laptop and open a forum called "A City Men's Health". I make an anonymous account—"little_butterfly28"—and post, "Hi, I'm new. My husband says he can't... perform. Does anyone have tips?"
The replies are like a swarm. Recipes for soups. Workout tips. "Try ginseng." "Try a tonic." "Try talking about it." Men call each other names that make me laugh out loud.
I read until it is dark and then I go buy herbs.
"I bought tonic herbs," I tell Wyatt when he walks in.
He blinks at the mug. "What is that?"
"It's a strengthening soup. For lung health. For life." I hold the bowl like a treasure. "Drink one cup. Please?"
He stirs it, sniffs, and sips. "It tastes like boiled refrigerator."
"It will work," I say. "I read the recipe for it on a forum."
"Don't trust forums," he says, deadpan. "Trust licensed practitioners."
"You're the licensed practitioner," I grin. "You're my doctor-husband."
He swirls the spoon through and drinks every drop. When he's done he hands the bowl back like it's a live animal.
"Don't make this a habit," he says.
"Promise," I answer, though I'm making five more batches in my head.
At the hospital my mentor assigns me to sit in on a postpartum depression case. The patient comes in wrapped like a shell, eyes hidden behind sunglasses.
"Please close the curtain and take a seat," Dr. Ferrari says kindly.
Her husband barges in loud. "Can you fix my wife or not?" he demands.
I stand, pulse up. "Sir, please wait in the lobby. This is a private consultation."
He glares and then smacks his wife across the back of the head.
"Answer the doctor," he bellows. "Do you want to get better or not?"
I feel hot and cold at once. People stare. The husband is big and mean. I step forward and say, "Sir, this behavior is not helpful."
He sneers. "Who are you to tell me? You're an intern."
"I'm a human being," I say. "And I'm telling you to stop."
His fist jerks. He swings. My left temple hits the wall. White stars explode in my eyes.
"Call security!" Emma shouts. People whip out phones.
He keeps hitting until the nurses pull him away.
"You should press charges," Dr. Ferrari says later, voice low. "You can't keep putting yourself in harm's way."
I touch my swollen temple. "I just wanted to help her."
"You can't help if you get hurt," he says. "Use the team. Use protocol."
Later I visit the woman, Emmaline Neves, in the office with Dr. Ferrari watching. She peels off sunglasses and the bruises are like purple maps.
"I don't want to go home," she says to me, voice cracking.
"We will make a plan," I say. "You are not alone."
Wyatt calls that night. "Are you okay?"
"Fine," I lie. "I got a bump."
He says, "Don't be reckless."
"I won't."
He says, "Be careful with strangers."
"I'm not a stranger."
There are so many tiny moments when he surprises me. He wakes before dawn and cooks breakfast. He leaves folded notes. He makes tea and sets it on my desk. He says one blunt thing and then does a small, perfect care.
"Are we okay?" I ask him one night, blunt and small.
"What do you mean?" he answers.
"We're married. We sleep in the same house. But you don't... touch me." I feel tears rise like a nervous tide.
He looks at me, and for once his face is unguarded. "If I hurt you, it would ruin everything," he says.
"Then help me fix it," I plead.
He hums. "I will," he says.
This is how it starts: small steps. He helps me file patient notes. He brings home soup. He loaned me a book about treating trauma.
"Why do you care so much?" I ask one rainy night when rain drums slow on the windows.
He shrugs. "Because you care. Because you are loud and ridiculous and you fight like hell. Because you keep coming."
I laugh. He smiles and it's a quick, rare bow of his mouth. My chest aches in a good way.
The wedding crash is a disaster dressed up in silk.
"Is this your friend?" someone asks when we arrive at the Sheraton ballroom. The place is full of neon flowers and champagne flutes.
"Yes," I say.
Onstage the bride is in a white cloud and takes the mic. "I won't marry him," she says.
A hush drapes over the room like a blanket.
"What did you say?" the groom shouts.
"I said I will not marry you," she says, eyes bright and raw. "I am pregnant and I will not be married to a liar."
People gasp. The groom's friend tries to pull him away. The groom rips his tie and charges for the man at the table he thinks is the rival—Liam Bruno—whos hands are still buttered with cake. The scene curves into chaos.
Someone shouts, "Who would want to marry a man who can't—"
The word lands like a thrown cup, and what follows is ugly. Guests murmur and some laugh.
The bride collapses. I see Wyatt watching, body folded with a hand at his throat like it's a raw spot.
He slides forward through the crowd, steady, and steadies the bride. He never says a word to the groom, but later the groom's friends start shouting, and cameras pop up. A viral clip will come out in an hour.
I tell Wyatt as we leave, "I won't be the woman who wears someone else."
He blinks. "I won't let anyone be the man who takes you," he says.
My heart does one of those leaps where it forgets its rhythm.
After the hospital beating and the wedding scandal, things shift. Emmaline's husband, Lane Ortiz, comes back furious. He screams in the lobby, and the crowd gathers.
"You ruined my family!" he bellows. "You made her worse!"
"That's not true," Dr. Ferrari says, steady. "We treated her with protocol and care."
Lane lashes out and shoves chairs. He throws a bottle. People panic. He pushes past a nurse and lunges for paperwork.
"Get security!" Emma screams. Phones come up. Video streams begin.
Lane grabs a chart from the desk and tears it, paper flapping like wounded birds. He points at me in a red blaze. "You get paid to break people!"
"You're lying!" I say, loud enough to be heard.
"It was that woman! She took his money, and now my wife is worse!" Lane roars.
Security hauls him toward the door, but he keeps screaming. Cameras catch the whole thing.
"Stop!" I shout. "Stop. Leave her out of it."
He turns and squares his face to me. "You think you can fix people because you play doctor?" he sneers. He lunges.
A nurse hits the alarm. Then it happens fast and terrible: he strikes me. My head snaps and I hit the wall. Blood beads on my temple.
Someone records. Out of instinct, Emma gets a phone in front of Lane and records his face as he rants.
Security arrests him. The video goes online that night. It spreads like a storm. The comments burn.
"Shameful," someone types. "Abuser."
"Did you see? He hits a doctor!"
Within twenty-four hours, Lane Ortiz's life collapses.
His company—he works in procurement—gets letters. Board members are angry; their brand cannot be attached to a man now on camera beating a woman at a hospital. Two large retailers drop a pending contract. The procurement head calls an emergency meeting. His boss tells him to take leave.
"You're suspended," Lane's partner says. "Don't come in. We can't have you."
Then, the worst for him—his wife speaks.
Emmaline posts a slow, shaking video: "He hurt me. He hurt our baby," she whispers. "I am leaving."
Her mother unfollows and posts about family. A woman who ran a support group for Lane's charity pulls donations. The local parenting group bans Lane from events.
"Where will he go?" an editor writes. "Who will hire him with that on camera?"
People in the hospital bring flowers to me like small white flags.
"You're not alone," Dr. Ferrari says, gentle as a hand on a sore shoulder.
The punishment is public. Lane sits in a small hearing in front of hospital counsel and later faces a police complaint. A prosecutor calls me for a statement. The footage I didn't want to watch again plays in a courtroom. His face goes from hot to pale to wild to broken. He begs in a shaky voice, "I was ashamed. I didn't know what to do."
No one cheers. People film. The judge sentences him to community service, mandatory anger management, and an order to stay away. His company drops him. His wife divorces him. He loses custody of the child until there's a careful assessment. His mother says "I'm ashamed." It's brutal, public, and long.
I stand at a podium in a community hearing and watch his face as it collapses. The room records. Someone posts a video of him on social media where he collapses into tears and pleads for forgiveness.
"This is not enough," some write. "But it is the start."
I don't gloat. I barely breathe. I wanted him punished, yes, but seeing his fall leaves a complicated hollow. I am shaken, but I am also relieved. Emmaline is safe now. That's what matters.
After the hearings, I go home to Wyatt. He takes me into his arms like I'm something fragile and real. He sits me down and says, "You will not do this alone again."
"I won't—" I begin.
"You will not go out to meet patients alone without telling me. If you want to help, I'm with you. I will be with you." He presses his forehead to mine. "I will guard you."
I look at him and I think of the morning when he quietly made breakfast and the evening he stood calm at a chaotic wedding and the way he kept his hands steady while bandaging my head.
We start going to bed earlier. We start talking about the thing I used to say quietly like it's a secret: what if he's not able?
One night I sit with him and ask, "Will you be okay telling someone?"
He looks at me like I'm offering him a mirror and he sees something he refuses to own.
"What if people find out?" he asks. "What if they think I married you for... other reasons? What if they think I can't be a man?"
"You are a man," I say, fierce. "You are Wyatt Dawson. You cut onions for strangers. You hold a scalpel like art. You don't need proof stamped on you."
Later, at three in the morning, he tells me, "When I was a boy I had surgery. It took something from me I didn't know how to get back."
"Then let's go get it back," I say.
He explains: a childhood operation, scar tissue, fear, a memory of failing when someone laughed at him. He never told anyone. He has been ashamed. He thought being silent meant being brave.
"Then we'll be brave together," I say.
He nods and yet his hands tremble a little.
We meet a specialist. We follow a path of tests and treatments, steady as therapy. There is no miracle. There is work, patience, pills and exercises and the awkward mechanical truth of it. There are nights of tenderness that do not reach what I want and yet build trust. There are small victories—a touch that does not end in pain, a kiss that lingers.
"Thank you," Wyatt murmurs one night, hand on my cheek.
"Thank me?" I say. "You saved our patient. You saved me."
He shrugs. "You saved me too."
One afternoon, after months of patient, mundane care, we have our real first time. It's not a great roaring scene from a movie. It's slow. It is clumsy. It is honest.
"Are you sure?" he asks for the hundredth time.
"I am sure," I say, and then I kiss him. The room fills with the ordinary sound of our breathing. It is everything.
Afterwards, we lie tangled in a quiet that is new, like a room where the light is perfect. He reaches to the bedside drawer and hands me a small photo album.
"Open it," he says.
I flip it open. There are baby photos—his baby face, round and stubborn. Notes he scribbled when he was ten. A small photo with a caption: "Small Wyatt and Small Jovie—play date." Under it, there is a picture of a teddy bear and a child's note that was recorded in a toy.
"Did you keep that?" I whisper.
He nods. "You left me a voice on that bear. I used to play it at night."
My face floods. I press the album to my chest. I'm a thief of moments. I had worried he never noticed any of me. He had always been watching in ways I didn't understand.
He leans in and murmurs, "You were my hero once. You are my hero now."
I laugh and then I kiss him. He is warm and steady and human. He wipes my brow and I feel safe like a child.
We talk about the future. "Will you hold my child?" he asks after a while.
"If we have one," I answer.
"If we do, I will hold them," he promises.
The days that follow are not perfect. There are checkups and small setbacks and the occasional twinge of fear when someone at work asks a joke that cuts too deep. But there is also glue—appointments kept together, the ritual of tea, the whispered planning of a holiday, the small work of love.
Months later, Emmaline comes back to the hospital. She stands before Dr. Ferrari and me, hair loose, shoulders straighter.
"I have a job interview," she says. "I started a class."
We applaud. She smiles thin, then thicker. She says, "Thank you. For not giving up on me."
Wyatt squeezes my hand under the table. The squeeze says: we did this.
We keep going. The forum I once joined anonymously becomes a private folder of notes I share with new interns. I write down soups and safe exercises and scripts to say when a husband balks and a wife needs to hear that it's not a shame to ask for help.
One rainy night, just like the first time I sneaked into his room, I find myself tiptoeing again. I peek through the bedroom doorway. He watches me.
"What are you doing?" he asks.
"Checking if this is real," I say.
He sits up and touches my face. "It is."
He presses a kiss to my forehead and then before I can stop a sound of surprise, he takes my hand and leads me back to the bed.
"Tonight," he says, quiet and real, "we try again. But this time together."
"I like the sound of together," I say.
He smiles then, small and crooked, like he has found the last missing part of himself.
We fall asleep in each other's arms, and when I wake to the pale light I press a kiss under his jaw and leave a small print on his collarbone like a map only we can read.
Outside, the city is alive with its usual noise. Inside, our life is quiet and full. Each day I write small notes and I fold them into his coat pocket. Each night he makes me tea and hands me a new recipe he thinks will make me laugh.
Some things in life are loud and public and messy. Some things are small and private and patient.
I used to think fixing people would be a heroic arc where I patched wounds and moved on.
Now I know it's a slow, two-person work. It is our routine of returning.
"Will you still do crazy things?" Wyatt asks once, eyebrow lifted, after I paint on ridiculous lipstick to wake him.
"Always," I say.
He takes my face between his hands and kisses me like it's the first time and like it will be the last.
We breathe each other in and the bed is warm and the city hums. I put my head on his chest and say, "I am home."
He hums and traces the small loop on the inside of my wrist where the last of my scar faded.
"Stay," he says.
"I will," I promise.
And I do.
The End
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