My Husband’s Wife - Chapter 8

Xue Yuwen was in shock. His wife was an ice-cold woman, this fact was a widespread secret. She never minded his many girlfriends or mistresses if you wanted to be pedantic. She didn’t even deny him the right to enter her bedroom as if his outside dalliances were completely insignificant to their marriage. She never even tried to threaten him back home or nag or fret about him.

At first, he had hated her and all that she had signified when they got married. Yet, it is hard to keep hate burning over the years when the target of one’s emotion remains as unaffected and placid as stone. Certainly, Su Yue did show some passion on the marriage bed but that was all. She never initiated, never denied, she gave just as she was required to and nothing more. Nothing more.

Some undefinable element of her attitude made it clear that the only reason she didn’t just lie there unresponsive as he had his way with her was that doing so would go against her duty to satisfy an amorous husband’s tastes. Her dutiful self sometimes made him pity her but more often it gave him a sour taste in his mouth which was why he disliked visiting her rooms and generally avoided it until lust and duty clouded his reason.

Yes, he knew how strange it was to place both lust and duty on the same side. But, no matter what her insides may be like, on the outside at least Su Yue was a very beautiful woman hence the lust. And he had to assuage his mother’s old heart, after all, it was the reason he got married in the first place thus the duty. His Mother had brilliantly outmaneuvered him by pressurizing him into this marriage while she was still in recovery from a coronary bypass. In the wake of the doctor’s repeated warnings to avoid stressing her, he had been unable to categorically refuse the marriage as he had fervently wished to do. At the very least he had to occasionally demonstrate that he still considered Su Yue his wife.

He had always believed that Yue’er was the same and had taken an even more extreme approach than him by nullifying his existence in her world to the barest meaning and relegating him to the status of an acquaintance. He could never have imagined that he was wrong. Even now as the echoes of Su Yue’s whisper skimmed across his flesh, he still could not believe what he had heard. Today’s act of congress with Yue’er had been like the others before it, passionate and extremely pleasurable but accompanied by an uncomfortable emptiness. Like he had always done he had slipped into slumber once he was sated until something had roused him from sleep in time to feel the soft brush of fingers on his lips, in time to hear Su Yue say “…you know Yue’er loves you?”

There are many things a man can do when he first finds out his wife loves him or in Xue Yuwen’s case when he first suspects (for Yuwen would prefer to believe she was speaking of some other person despite all evidence to the contrary). Yuwen picked the first option that came to mind- he ran. The idea of a Su Yue that loved him was so inconceivable, it was frightening. Just thinking about the possibility caused goose bumps to rise along his skin.

Somehow, he wondered if the whole episode was just his imagination but the implications of such a dream arising from his subconscious was an even scarier prospect. He would much rather believe Su Yue was crazy, for one must be crazy to love such a poor specimen of a husband as he, than entertain the possibility that he desired her to the point he dreamt such a scene.

Their marriage had been fraught with complications. In its first three years, he had sworn to force her into taking the initiative to break their relationship yet all his efforts had been for naught. Three years after they first tied the nuptial knot, he had finally admitted defeat, his wife was just too lacking in humanity. Expecting her to crumble was simply a pipe dream that was never going to be fulfilled.

So, he had asked her for the divorce instead and to his great surprise, she had agreed. Her lack of resistance to the idea had forced him to re-evaluate her character all over again. He knew what was in the marriage contract she had signed, he had read every single bit of its fine print. She could not divorce him without losing almost everything that was hers now. If she had had a child with him the situation might have been different but from the very beginning, he had never intended to let her have one so they were still childless.

However, three years of negative opinion could not be wiped out like that and later after his mother found out and put a stop to the divorce proceedings, he suspected that everything may have all been part of her plan. Still, his image of her had taken a hit and he found it harder to hate her with each passing day.

Unlike what he had expected, life with her was oddly comfortable. She didn’t interfere with his life, except that rarely she would ask him to attend some family event at the behest of his mother. She made good company and sleeping with her was a pleasure-filled experience though it always left an unpleasant after-taste.

She was the perfect wife, beautiful, contained, elegant, talented, and completely willing to turn a blind eye to all her husband’s affairs. It was even easier to end relationships he had tired of as a married man. His mother no longer harried him about the company because her protg pleased her so much, only occasionally did she nag him about taking better care of his wife. After much introspection, he had concluded that life after marriage to Su Yue was actually more pleasant and much more comfortable than before.

So, what if she might be mercenary? Why should he ruin a good thing by insisting on breaking their ties? But if Su Yue was in love with him then everything had to change. It was one thing to let an emotionless woman arrange his life while letting her enjoy the wealth and status she wanted, it was another thing to let a woman in the grip of love suffer just so things would be a bit easier for him.

Yuwen had never thought of himself as a coward but he had to admit that cowardice was beginning to look attractive. He would much rather not have to face Su Yue, he had avoided going home for a month now. Although his absence was a common occurrence, this time it wasn’t some beautiful woman that was keeping him away from home. No, that’s wrong. It was a beautiful woman, a stunning one for that matter.

Only this time he was running away from and not chasing after her. Oh, the irony! He didn’t think anyone could understand his dilemma or his fear, he couldn’t understand them himself, but he knew that just the thought of going home filled him with trepidation. Still, he had to go home eventually, he knew that.

Mother had summoned him back and as usual, his wife had been tasked to deliver the message. Listening to Su Yue’s steady and sure tones over the phone, he was unable to reconcile this voice with the soft, sad whisper in his memory. More than a month had passed and the night seemed increasingly like a dream or some figment of his imagination.

There were two possibilities. One, that his subconscious desired love from his wife. If this was true then he was in for a boatload of misery because Su Yue was the Arctic-she was glacial. Or two, Su Yue was not the Arctic and that whisper was real. If this was true then… he didn’t know what to do. To divorce her seemed too cruel, to not divorce her seemed even crueler. Yuwen had somehow become a man stuck between the devil and the deep blue sea with a shark on his tail.

Driving down to the house, Yuwen’s brain contemplated recent events over and over again until he remembered a pertinent fact that he had forgotten; it was possible Su Yue was an avaricious woman. If she truly wanted to be secure in her position she needed to bear a child for him. Was this all a set up so she could obtain what she wanted? If that was the case then he would feel silly for worrying about her feelings.

Sadly, Yuwen knew that he was clutching at straws. Yue’er might occasionally be mercenary but four years had taught him that it was always for the sake of her family. He might be a terrible husband but he was definitely a part of Yue’s family. At first, he had been forced into it and so had fought bitterly until one day he had slowly accepted it. He hadn’t realized how deep his acknowledgment of her as family had become until now.

Two years ago, if he heard that whisper then, he would have immediately been suspicious, now, his response was panic. Although there still was the likelihood that this was a cunning plot, his gut simply didn’t believe so. And that was what it was. It was time to stop running. Time to go home. Home to his family, to the wife who might love him.