For twenty years, my husband’s brothers had the same stupid joke.
Whenever Daniel did something particularly sweet for me, one of them would grin and say:
“Anything for the second wife.”
Everyone would laugh.
Daniel included.
And for twenty years, I laughed too.
Because I was Daniel’s only wife.
At least, that was what I believed…. Continue Reading ⬇️
The joke started not long after we married.Try Marriage Counseling
Daniel had three brothers—Mark, Steven, and Paul—and together they had the emotional maturity of twelve-year-olds whenever they were in the same room.
Nothing stayed sincere for more than thirty seconds.
A birthday gift became material for a joke.
A compliment became an insult.
A childhood photograph could start an argument that lasted through dessert.
So when Mark first called me “the second wife,” I assumed it was more of the same.
Maybe they thought Daniel spoiled me.
Maybe it was their way of teasing him because he had become sentimental after marriage.
I never really cared.
Daniel didn’t seem bothered.
If he brought me flowers and Mark said, “Anything for the second wife,” Daniel would roll his eyes.
If he surprised me with dinner reservations, Steven would say:
“First wife never got this kind of treatment.”
Everyone laughed.
I laughed.
Daniel laughed.
Then someone changed the subject.
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There was never any first wife.
Daniel and I met when we were thirty-one.
We married two years later.
We had two children.
I’d seen his old tax returns.
His college photographs.
His first apartment.
I’d met friends who had known him since childhood.
There had never been a divorce.
No annulment.
No mysterious ex-wife.
Nothing.
Daniel was private about the years before we met, but I never considered him secretive.
There is a difference.
If I asked about college, he answered.
If an old song played on the radio, he might tell me about some terrible road trip he and his brothers had taken.
He told me about girlfriends too.
A girl named Lisa he dated briefly in college.
Someone named Heather who dumped him because he forgot her birthday.
Normal stories.
Ordinary history.
But he never lingered on the past.
I thought that was simply Daniel.
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He lived in the present.
And after more than two decades together, I thought I knew the shape of his life.
