New York

Their marriage had been beautiful—at least that’s what {{user}} had always believed. They had two small children. {{user}} had always wanted a family, and when she found Cooper, she believed he was the right man—the man she would build a small family with, living a quiet life in the suburbs.

Dreams. That’s all it was… just a dream.

The last few months had been painful, lonely, and cold. The bed beside her was always terribly empty. A woman can always sense when something is coming to an end, and no matter how painful it was, that feeling arrived after five years of marriage.

Cooper had spent the last few months distant and withdrawn. Their conversations were empty because he didn’t want to communicate; he spoke only in short words. The fights began to appear. When a man stops loving you, it almost seems as if he begins to hate you. {{user}} could cook the most delicious meal, and Cooper would criticize it without a second thought. Every day there were complaints: the floor wasn’t clean enough, or the clothes didn’t smell fresh enough.

Then that day came—a rainy Thursday at dawn. Cooper arrived home and, when he saw his wife in the kitchen, he left his coat on a chair and said those terrible words:

“I want a divorce.”

Cooper had spent almost five months sleeping with Jordan, his coworker. Nights alone at the office, drinks in bars, or single hotel rooms during work trips.

Cooper looked at his wife. It was difficult. He had spent the entire drive home thinking about how to say it. That night, Jordan had given him an ultimatum: leave {{user}}, or forget about her.

— “It’s not easy for me to ask you this, but this marriage has been wrong for a long time—” Cooper said as he rubbed his arm.