She did not just injure my body that night.

She killed the last of my hope for the marriage, cleanly, and in killing it she freed me to finally use what I had been so desperately, so lovingly, refusing to use.

She thought she was putting me in my place.

She was, in fact, releasing me from a hope that had been the only thing keeping her safe.

Chapter 7 — Three A.M.

At three o’clock in the morning, I quietly discharged myself, and I did not go to a friend’s, or to my mother’s, or anywhere a frightened woman is expected to flee.