Chapter 4: The Invisible Husband

The next day, when I woke up, the house was empty. Natalie and Lily were both gone.

The sun streamed through the blinds, painting lines across the living room floor. The silence was heavier than usual. I wandered barefoot from room to room, my steps echoing off hardwood and tile. The house felt less like a home, more like a hotel room someone forgot to check out of.

I stood barefoot in the living room, looking around. The minimalist decor made the place feel even less like home.

Natalie decorated in shades of gray and white—very HGTV, very impersonal. There were no family photos, no kid’s drawings on the fridge, just carefully curated prints and a few potted plants that I never remembered to water.

Actually, Natalie never cooked at home. It was always takeout, or she’d have me eat something at the office.

Menus from Thai and Italian places littered the counter. Most nights, I’d bring home leftovers from the deli near work. The oven had dust on it. I tried to tell myself it was just modern living, but the emptiness gnawed at me.

At this moment, I questioned myself: is this the married life I want?

Standing there in the early morning quiet, I asked myself: Was I really happy, or just going through the motions? Did I want a marriage that felt like a lease agreement?

What I wanted was simple. Couples shouldn’t be so distant; an occasional argument is fine.

I’d have taken a slammed door or a shouted insult if it meant she cared. Sometimes I imagined starting a fight just to break the tension, just to feel alive.

But unfortunately, Natalie wasn’t that kind of person.

She floated through life, untouched by drama. No matter what I did, she stayed unbothered, like a glassy pond.

Just then, I got a call from the office, asking me to go abroad on a business trip.

My phone buzzed. It was the office—my boss needed someone to fly out for a client meeting in Berlin. I said yes without thinking. Maybe a change of scenery would clear my head.

Our company does international sales, so going abroad is routine.

I’d been on a few trips before—endless airports, tiny hotel rooms, learning to say 'thank you' in half a dozen languages. I was used to it.

I sent Natalie a message to let her know. After a long time, she replied with a simple "Ok."

My thumb hovered over the keyboard, waiting for her to ask how long I’d be gone, or wish me luck. But her response was as flat as a weather report.

I scrolled up our chat history. It was almost always me talking. I would share interesting things or ask her questions, and Natalie would only answer the last question, or not reply at all.

Screenshots of memes, links to funny videos, questions about dinner—almost all unanswered. Her replies, when they came, were short, sometimes just an emoji. I tried to convince myself she was just busy, but it stung.

My heart felt heavy. I couldn’t help but ask Natalie why she was too lazy to even reply to my texts.

Once, in a fit of frustration, I brought it up—"Is it really that hard to type more than one word?" The silence that followed was louder than any argument.

I still remember clearly, Natalie holding a mug, her eyes as calm as a pond:

"If there’s something to say, say it at home. We’re together every day; there’s not that much to talk about."

She was perched at the kitchen counter, sipping coffee, her gaze unwavering. I felt childish for even asking.

I was left speechless.

I didn’t have a comeback. Her logic was flawless, her tone final. I dropped the subject and went back to scrolling aimlessly through social media.

But clearly, when I got home, Natalie rarely paid attention to me. Only when I annoyed her enough would she reply, as if words were precious.

I learned to read her silences—when she was really annoyed, she’d sigh and finally answer, usually with as few words as possible. It became a game I never won.

I put away my phone and laughed at myself.

Self-mockery was easier than anger. I told myself it was fine, that everyone’s marriage cooled off eventually. But deep down, I knew better.

Before leaving, I remembered I hadn’t brought my documents, so I went to the study to look for them.

I made my way to the tiny room we called an office, shuffling through drawers overflowing with old receipts and warranties. Dust motes danced in the light.

But I found an old phone in the drawer.

It was nestled between some paperwork and a faded birthday card. I recognized it—the phone Natalie used before we got married, a relic from another era.

It was an old model from five or six years ago, but it had been carefully preserved.

No cracks in the screen, not a scratch on the case. Someone had taken the time to keep it clean, the charger tucked neatly beside it. That wasn’t like Natalie—she never kept clutter around.

Natalie isn’t the type to collect old things—I know this. But I became curious about the phone. When I turned it on, I found it fully charged.

I thumbed the power button, not really expecting it to turn on. But the screen glowed to life instantly, the battery full. That meant someone had been using it—recently.

That proved Natalie used it often.

A chill crept up my spine. Why would she need an old phone? I pushed down a wave of suspicion, telling myself it was nothing.

I don’t know why, but I had a bad feeling.

It was like opening a door in a dream, knowing something you didn’t want to see was waiting on the other side. But my curiosity got the better of me.

When I opened the old phone, I found only one contact in the address book, marked "The one I can’t let go."

The name hit me like a punch to the gut. Who was this person—someone she’d never let go of? My hands trembled as I scrolled through the contacts.

With trembling hands, I opened the text messages. They were all messages Natalie had sent to that number—over ten thousand.

Thread after thread, thousands of blue bubbles, all from Natalie. No replies, just her words piling up over the years.

The earliest date was from before we met.

Years before I’d entered her life, she’d been sending messages to this ghost number. My stomach twisted.

"Ryan, are you well? I know you can’t receive this message, but I have nowhere to confide, so I can only send it to your old number."

Each message was a snapshot of her life without me—a world I didn’t belong to. I read them in a daze, feeling like an intruder.

"Do you know? I’m married now. That person... is so annoying, always asking me to do things I don’t want to do."

My name wasn’t there, but I knew exactly who she meant. I felt exposed, like my flaws had been catalogued and sent to someone who would never see them.

"Ryan, I’m pregnant. What a pity. We promised to have a child together, but in the end, it doesn’t count."

Her happiness, her pain—none of it was ever shared with me. The words bled onto the screen, raw and honest.

And many, many more. Reading them made my blood run cold.

Each message was a brick, building a wall I’d never noticed until it towered over me. The further I scrolled, the heavier my chest felt.

I shakily exited the messages. I didn’t want to keep reading how Natalie confided in her old flame behind my back. In her heart, I was just an annoying person.

Shame and anger warred inside me. I dropped the phone on the desk, feeling like I’d read someone else’s diary—a story where I was the villain.

By accident, I clicked into Instagram. I’d never seen that account, but the profile picture was of two hands interlocked.

It was a private account—one I never knew existed, followers hidden, bio blank except for a single heart emoji. The photo wasn’t us—couldn’t be. Natalie never let me post about her, never took couple photos, never reached for my hand in public. This account was a secret garden I’d never been allowed to enter.

I knew the other hand wasn’t mine, because Natalie never took photos with me—not even simple hand-holding photos.

She hated PDA, she said. But here she was, her hand entwined with someone else’s, broadcast to the world on a private account. I was a stranger looking in through the window.

The Instagram posts Natalie had made—I recognized every word, but couldn’t understand them.

She wrote with a kind of longing I’d never heard from her lips. The captions felt like riddles, each one hinting at a life I’d never touch.

Caption: “If it’s not you, it doesn’t matter who I marry. #nightthoughts 💔”

Caption: “Turns out, emotional stability and passionate love can’t coexist. With you, it’s never this calm. #confessions”

Caption: “Luckily, my daughter looks like me. That way, when the three of us travel, there won’t be anyone else’s shadow. ✈️👩‍👧”

Each post was like a blow, confirming my deepest fears. I was just a placeholder.

I was the ghost in her story, haunting a house that was never mine.