Because of My Husband's Colorful Sleep-Talk, I Divorced Him

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It feels a lot better without protection. We should try it that way next time.

How could I ever think you're dirty? I'm only afraid of tainting you.

I couldn't sleep, the discomfort of pregnancy keeping me awake, and beside me my husband, long since asleep, mumbled those two lines in his dreams.

The familiar snoring started up next to my ear, and suddenly it felt like a stranger was sleeping on the pillow beside me.

Rex Lambert has severe germaphobia. It took us three years after the wedding to have a real married life, and always with protection.

By the sixth year, wanting a child, my belly was covered with a dense pattern of needle marks. Round after round of IVF, none of it going smoothly.

But for Rex's sake, I chose to swallow all of it alone.

Six whole years, I moved carefully, terrified of getting him dirty, but someone had already become the one exception to his rules.

I forced down the sting rising in my eyes and sent a message to my doctor.

"Cancel tomorrow's checkup."

"Change it to an abortion."

Because I hadn't slept all night, I accidentally made too much breakfast.

Rex looked at the extra fried eggs and went to boil two eggs of his own. Ever since we got together, he'd never once touch anything I cooked, because he thought the way I prepared food wasn't clean enough.

I used to envy other girls who made their boyfriends lunch out of love. I bought produce wash, a brand-new knife, cutting board, and pan, even peeled the celery, and in the end I ate that three-dish-and-a-soup meal by myself across three sittings.

Before, I would have asked a few more questions. But today I quickly scraped the extra fried eggs straight into the trash can by the table.

Rex paused what he was doing. "What's wrong, feeling sick again?"

I was about to shake my head when the smell of the milk hit me and I ran to the bathroom, gagging.

Rex followed. I was hunched over the toilet, unable to straighten up, and wanted him to help me up, but he frowned, awkward. "Daph, this is a new suit. I'll have someone install a grab bar tomorrow. For now hold on to the side and get up slowly."

Only then did I remember that morning sickness was, to him, like a flood or a wild beast. Once the wave of dizziness passed, I slowly pushed myself up off the cold floor.

"Why is it this bad? Ask the doctor about it properly at your checkup today." Rex frowned and reminded me.

I nodded. From the moment I started my prenatal file until now, I'd gone to every appointment at the hospital, big or small, on my own, because he thought even the air in a hospital was full of viruses. Today's checkup, the baby could be seen on the ultrasound. I wanted one last good look at my child.

Even though I got up early, the ultrasound room was as crowded as ever. The nurse handing out numbers looked at my slightly rounded belly and asked, "You're pregnant? Who came with you? Have your family line up. You won't be able to stand the wait."

I shook my head. "I came by myself."

The nurse frowned and wrote me a number by hand. "I'll hold your place. Go sit in the psychology clinic across the way for now, they've got chairs in their waiting area. I'll call you when it's your turn."

I thanked her again and again and went to sit over there.

"Mr. Harrington, how are you feeling this week?"

"Pretty good. I don't recoil from physical contact anymore."

The familiar voice came through, and through the glass of the doctor's office I saw the familiar shape of Rex.

I hurried closer, instinctively worried he might be sick, but what the two people inside were doing froze me where I stood.

That woman doctor had taken Rex's hand, and when he didn't move, she leaned in and kissed him. Rex just sat there, and the two of them shared a deep kiss.

"Looks like last week's private treatment worked pretty well!" the woman said, laughing as she wiped a thread of saliva from the corner of her mouth.

"Simone, stop it."

"How am I stopping anything? Are we continuing the treatment or not?"

"We are."

The cold of the hospital chair spread from the small of my back through my whole body. I think I finally knew who Rex's exception was.

From dating until now, we'd barely held hands a handful of times, let alone kissed.

Once, when we were out shopping, I tried testing him and took his hand, and he flung it off like he'd touched a venomous snake. The big movement drew the eyes of everyone around us, and my face went hot and red.

"There are hundreds of thousands of kinds of bacteria on human hands, and in summer your hands sweat, it's disgusting."

After that, before I could hold his hand I had to wash mine to a surgeon's standard, hold on for a little while after he'd inspected them, and let go before my hand started to sweat.

My thoughts were cut off by the nurse calling for me. I hurried over, and she pulled out a thin ultrasound printout. "I took a look for you. The baby's very healthy. See, here's the eyes, here's the nose, here's the little mouth, it's just beautiful."

The moment I saw that blurry little shape, my tears came pouring out all at once.

Baby, what am I supposed to do?

I'm already used to it. But if your daddy won't hold your little hand either, or hug you, or kiss you, will you blame me for giving you a bad father?

Back home, the workers Rex had hired were still hammering away. They hadn't just put rails in the bathroom. There were rails by the kitchen sink, next to the shoe cabinet, along the edge of the living room planter, at every single spot where a person might have to bend or crouch down.

One of the men installing them chuckled. "Your husband really loves you. Even the blueprints we drew up weren't as detailed as his. Next time we install these for a pregnant woman, we might have to pay your husband a licensing fee."

I didn't smile. I just asked, "Do a lot of pregnant women get these installed?"

The worker gave an awkward laugh. "You're actually the first. Goes to show how much your husband cares about you."

I smiled then, because for other pregnant women, the husband might not wait on them hand and foot, but he'd at least lend a hand. To avoid any physical contact with me, Rex had filled the whole house with rails. That wasn't just caring. That was painstaking effort.

By the time Rex got home, I was already in bed.

He carried the faint trace of perfume, and pregnancy had already made me sensitive to smells, so I just rolled over to get away from it.

Rex only moved closer. "How's the baby?"

I sat up. "There's an ultrasound in the nightstand drawer. The doctor said it's healthy."

Rex came in and turned on only the little nightlight. In that faint glow, he looked at the ultrasound again and again. "The nose is like mine, the eyes and mouth are both like yours. It's going to be a beautiful baby."

"It's still tiny, what can you even tell from that?" I said it, but I still wavered, because eyes don't lie. The smile and the joy on Rex's face were real.

Maybe he would be a good father.

The next second, Rex leaned in and kissed me. I froze.

"What? Stunned?" He put his arms around me. "I wanted to surprise you. I've been getting therapy. I'm hoping to be able to hold you and the baby close from now on."

"What kind of therapy is it?"

Rex was quiet for a few seconds. "It's very professional. That therapist is very good."

I nodded. "Let's sleep. I'm tired."

The next day Rex put on a blue shirt I'd never seen before. It still had creases in it, and the tag on the back collar hadn't been cut off.

"Daph, how's this shirt?"

"Is it new?"

"That therapist suggested I buy it. She said I should get used to environments full of germs."

I tried not to think about how exactly he was getting used to it, but my mind kept dragging me back to when we first moved in together.

Back then I'd happily washed Rex's clothes by hand, only to find the clean clothes in the trash the next day.

"Don't touch my clothes. You'll get them dirty."

Anything I washed, ironed, or even just put away for him showed up in the trash the next day.

It was the same now. Two days ago, when I did the laundry, I'd accidentally mixed in his blue shirt, and now here he was, wearing a brand-new shirt that had never even seen water.

"So many people tried that shirt on. That's not dirty?"

Rex frowned. "That's part of the therapy too."

"Then should I bring you one tomorrow?"

"No need. This one's enough."

I smiled, walked into the bedroom, and opened the cabinet door. My hand had barely reached his clothes when he yelled, "Don't touch them, they're dirty!"

I ignored him and kept digging through, until a pair of women's underwear fell out. "What is this?"

Rex flushed red. "That's also treating my germaphobia!"

"So the clothes my hands touched are dirty, but another woman's underwear isn't?" I'd held it in until now, and I finally couldn't anymore. After I'd first suspected Rex was cheating, I'd gone through every one of his things I'd never even dared to touch. After seeing this, for the past few days all I saw when I closed my eyes was the sickening image of Rex and that therapist.

"A decent doctor uses her own underwear to treat a patient?"

"Enough," Rex snapped. "Simone is a professional. She's helped me a lot. Your hormones are unstable because of the pregnancy. You can take it out on me, but leave other people out of it."

"You shouldn't have gone rummaging through my things. I went for therapy for you and the baby, all of it."

I listened, and I wanted to laugh, but I couldn't get a single laugh out.

Rex and I stayed in a cold war for three days. In those three days I called countless lawyers, and every one of them told me the same thing: if the husband won't cooperate while the wife is pregnant, a divorce petition is very hard to get through.

Holding that ultrasound printout, I finally dialed the number I'd booked before. "Hi, I'd like to cancel my appointment for the abortion."

I wanted to give myself familyone person who wouldn't find me dirty, who could hold me without a trace of hesitation.

Once I made up my mind, everything got simple. I had the lawyer draft a divorce agreement along with a custody agreement, and mailed them both to Rex's workplace.

When Rex came home that night, he acted like nothing was wrong, and I couldn't read where he stood.

"You didn't go to the office today?"

"Of course I did. I told you I had to work late. Stop being so paranoid."

"So the thing I mailed overyou didn't see it?"

"Security probably stopped it and left it at the front desk. What did you send?"

"Divorce papers."

Rex frowned, wearing that look that said I was being unreasonable again. "There's a limit to how much you can throw a fit. My germaphobia isn't something I just came down with, and I told you a long time ago not to touch my clothes. Now I'm in treatment and you want a divorce over it?"

Before I could even answer, Rex went into the study and slammed the door hard.

It was always like this. Rex refused to fight with me. He said two people spitting and shouting at each other was too filthy to look at.

The moment the study door shut, I was like a child who'd done something wrong and been locked away by the grown-ups. No matter how I cried, how I carried on, that door would never open for me.

Just then my phone lit up with a message from my best friend: "Your Mr. Don't-Touch-Me finally took you to the amusement park?"

I blinked, then replied: "What amusement park?"

She sent a screenshot. It was Rex's social media post, a grid of amusement park photos with the caption "Because love can conquer anything."

On the carousel, he sat with a woman, one behind the other. Even from the back, I recognized her at a glancethat doctor named Simone.

He'd said amusement parks were nothing but breeding grounds for germs.

He'd said who knew how many kids in split-crotch pants had sat on that carousel.

He'd said he'd never in his life go on a date at an amusement park, and if I insisted, he'd die there.

I closed my eyes and messaged her: "Do me a favor and like it for me."

She sent back a sticker with the words "Show off your love and break up fast," and a second later a voice message popped up:

"Damn, are you two messing with a single girl like me? The second I liked it, the post vanished."

That night when Rex came home, he wrapped his arms around me and kissed the back of my neck, murmuring low:

"Daph, stop this. See, the therapy's working. That doctor is just a form of treatment, that's all. Aren't you always saying I'm not affectionate enough with you?"

I thought of every time Rex and I were in bedno kisses, no holdingwhen I was like an inflatable doll bent to whatever he wanted, a tool to satisfy his urges.

What I felt, what I longed for, meant nothing to him.

Now he'd learned all of this from another woman, and he'd come to humiliate me with it.

I shoved Rex away with everything I had. My throat was so jammed with emotion I couldn't force out even the worddisgusting.

Maybe it was to prove his so-called therapy was working. This time Rex insisted on coming with me to the prenatal checkup, and nothing I said could talk him out of it.

I sat in Rex's car. He'd owned it three years, and I still didn't know how to work the windows, because I'd ridden in it so few times.

I couldn't ride if I was carrying food, not even bread still sealed in its wrapper. Because of that rule I used to go to work on an empty stomach, and only after I fainted from low blood sugar did he let it go.

I couldn't ride if I'd been sweating. I couldn't ride if it had been more than three days since I'd showered. I couldn't ride if I'd put on makeup. And rain or snow was completely out of the question.

Then the car stopped. A woman pulled open the passenger door like she'd done it a hundred times, full face of careful makeup, a breakfast sandwich in her hand. One look and I knew her: the therapist.

"Oh, sorry, I forgot your wife was in here. Rex, honestly, just take her to her checkup. Skip driving me one day, it's no big deal."

Rex smiled. "Get in already. I wanted her to see the results of your treatment."

"I've always had faith in you. But I'm not going to the hospital today. I've got a private session at a patient's home, so you'll have to go a little out of your way."

The smell of her breakfast sandwich filled the sealed car, thick and inescapable, while I sat there still dutifully obeying Rex's no-food rule, my empty stomach turning until I wanted to gag.

"Pull over. I'll take the subway. I get carsick!" My shout made Rex slam on the brakes.

The woman spoke up from the back seat. "Rex, just take her first, her appointment time's almost up. I'll grab a cab."

Rex unlocked the doors. "Don't move. Since when does she get carsick?" He frowned at me. "Either drop the attitude and sit still, or get out."

"I'm getting out!"

I hadn't even found my footing before Rex's car sped off.

It was the morning rush. There wasn't even room to stand on the subway, so I pressed myself as far to the side as I could, keeping anyone from crushing my belly.

By the time I finally reached the hospital, the nausea had only gotten worse. I forced it down and handed over my insurance card to register, only for the nurse in front of me to say, "Ma'am, your file isn't with us. You should be going to the city women's hospital."

I asked, anxious, "Are you sure you didn't misread it? I've done every checkup here since I got pregnant."

"Let me check for you. Your file was transferred out by a family member. A Rex."

I dug out my phone and called Rex. "You transferred my file?"

"Ah, you left in such a hurry this morning I forgot to mention it." There was a note of apology in his voice. "That old hospital had terrible sanitation. The city women's hospital is better."

My hand shook with rage around the phone. "What gives you the right to transfer my file? You never came to a single checkup, because you thought it wasn't clean, so every time it was just me running up and down those halls alone. And now, with one word about it not being clean, I have to trek from the East Side to the West Side. Have you thought about me, even once?"

"Daphne, you've been throwing tantrums since this morning. I transferred your file for your own safety. Calm down and we'll talk."

The busy signal buzzed in my ear. The dizziness came on so hard I could barely stay upright, and I braced myself against the hospital wall and sank onto a bench.

"Ma'am, what's wrong?" A nurse hurried over.

I could hardly get the words out. "Haven't eaten breakfast low blood sugar"

Only after I drank the glucose water the nurse brought did the spinning slowly stop.

"Ma'am, where's your family? This is dangerous, and you're pregnant. Where's your husband?"

I pulled out my phone. "Sorry, could you make a call for me? I'm still a little dizzy. There's a note in my contacts."

The nurse nodded. The first call rang until it was cut off, unanswered. The second rang twice and was hung up.

I gave the nurse an apologetic smile. "He's probably busy. I'll call again in a bit myself."

Outside the sky was overcast, dark as evening even though it was midday.

Once my strength slowly came back, I called Rex again. I was used to handling everything alone, but I couldn't make the baby take that risk with me.

By some luck the call went through this time, and a woman's voice came from the other end.

"Rex, your phone keeps ringing. You don't need to get that?"

"Just hit ignore for me. Daphne's being completely impossible right now. She only calls to pick fights."

It was that Simone and Rex, with the sound of a running shower behind them.

Maybe I'd ached for too long. This time I got up calmly and went to the nurses' station to thank the nurse from before.

"Oh, are you heading home alone? The weather's bad, it's going to rain any minute."

"My husband's waiting for me right outside."

I lied. I didn't know how to explain that a woman's husband was in another woman's shower while she was at her prenatal checkup. I didn't know how to explain that my husband had a cleanliness compulsion and never came to pick me up on rainy days. All I could do was try to get home before the rain.

The kind of thing anyone would call absurd if they heard it, and it was happening to me.

Walking out the hospital doors, I sent Rex a text.

"The divorce papers are at your company's front desk."

"Sign them as soon as you can."