Every single one. Then I called the mortgage company. Since the loan was in my name only, I had the right to make changes.

I added a note to the account that all future communications should come to my office address only. And I requested that automatic payments be suspended immediately. By dawn, Asher’s world was about to become very different.

But I wasn’t done. I called my office voicemail and left myself a message to contact HR First Thing Monday about changing my emergency contact information and beneficiaries. I also made a note to call our insurance company about removing Asher from my health plan.

Every safety net I’d built for him over five years of marriage was about to disappear. As the sun came up over the city, I felt something I hadn’t felt in years. Power.

Real power. The kind that comes from finally seeing clearly after months of living in a fog. My phone had been buzzing all night.

Calls and texts from Asher, from Rosemary, from my parents. I hadn’t read any of them. But now I open the message thread.

Asher, Heidi where are you? We need to talk. Asher, you’re being crazy about this. Come home.

Asher, I know you’re upset but you can’t just disappear. Asher, seriously where the hell are you? Mom, sweetheart please call me. We love you.

Dad, don’t do anything you’ll regret. Think about your family. Rosemary, Heidi I’m so sorry.

I never wanted you to find out like this. Please let me explain. Rosemary, the baby needs stability.

We all need to figure out how to move forward together. I deleted every message without responding. At exactly 8am, I was sitting in James Walker’s office with a thick folder of financial documents and a yellow legal pad covered in notes.

You’ve been busy, he said reviewing my list. I’m just getting started. He looked at me over his reading glasses.

Mrs. Martinez, I have to ask. Are you sure you want to go scorched earth on this? Sometimes in cases like these, mediation can. Mr. Walker, I interrupted.

Let me be very clear. My husband has been unemployed for 8 months. In that time, I have paid our mortgage, our car payments, our insurance, our groceries, our utilities, everything.

He has contributed nothing. Meanwhile, he’s been having an affair with my best friend and got her pregnant. My entire family knew about it and said nothing.

I leaned forward in my chair. They had their chance to do the right thing. Now it’s my turn.

He nodded slowly. What are your goals here? I want him to get nothing. Not one penny of alimony, not one cent of my retirement accounts, not one piece of furniture from that house.

I want him gone and I want him to understand that actions have consequences. The house is entirely in my name. I bought it before we were married and never added him to the deed.

Smart. Your retirement accounts. All mine.

I was the only one contributing. This might be easier than I thought. Illinois is an equitable distribution state, but since you kept most assets separate and he contributed so little financially, he made some notes.

We can definitely work with this. There’s something else, I said. I want this done fast.

I don’t want to drag this out for months. How fast? How fast can it be done if he doesn’t contest it? If he agrees to everything? Six weeks, maybe eight. And if he fights it? Could be six months or more.

I smiled. He won’t fight it. Trust me.

I didn’t go home that weekend. Instead, I stayed in the hotel and had all my meals delivered. I needed time to think, to plan, to prepare for what came next.

On Monday morning, I went to work as usual, but my first stop was HR. I need to make some changes to my emergency contact information and insurance beneficiaries, I told Sandra, the HR manager. Of course.

Is everything all right? I’m filing for divorce. Her expression shifted to professional sympathy. I’m so sorry, Heidi.

What do you need from me? Within an hour, Asher was removed from my health insurance, my life insurance policy, and my 401k beneficiary list. My emergency contact was changed to my Aunt Gina, the only family member who hadn’t been at that baby shower. Then I called the mortgage company.

I’d like to know what happens if I stop making payments on my mortgage, I told the customer service representative. Well, you’d be in default after 30 days and we’d begin foreclosure proceedings after 90 days. And if I wanted to sell the house quickly, what would be the fastest way to do that? Are you having financial difficulties, Mrs. Martinez? We have programs.

No financial difficulties. I just want to know my options. I took notes on everything she told me.

By Tuesday, Asher was calling my office. Mrs. Martinez? There’s an Asher Martinez online too. He says he’s your husband, my assistant Rebecca said, her voice careful.

Tell him I’m not available. He’s called four times today. Then tell him I’m not available four times.

Wednesday, he started showing up at my office building. Security called me to say there was a man in the lobby demanding to see me. Tell security to escort him out.

And if he comes back, they should call the police. Thursday, the divorce papers were served. Rebecca bused me around 10 a.m. Mrs. Martinez? There’s a James Walker online one.

Heidi, the papers were served this morning. Your husband has 30 days to respond. How did he take it? According to my process server, he seemed shocked.

Kept saying there had to be some mistake. Any word from his lawyer? He doesn’t have one yet. But give it time.

I hung up and got back to work. I had a campaign to finish and a life to rebuild. By Friday, I had my answer about whether Asher would fight the divorce.

He was waiting in the parking garage when I left work. Heidi? He stepped out from behind a concrete pillar and I was struck by how terrible he looked. His hair was unwashed, his clothes wrinkled.

There were dark circles under his eyes. Asher? I kept walking toward my car. He’s already in my hand.

We need to talk. We really don’t. You can’t just throw away five years of marriage without even having a conversation.

I stopped and turned around. Five years of marriage? When exactly were we married, Asher? Because for the past year it seems like you’ve been married to someone else. That’s not fair.

What’s not fair is me working 60-hour weeks to support a man who was cheating on me. What’s not fair is finding out about it at a baby shower in my own house. What’s not fair is having my entire family know about your affair and not telling me.

Look, I know how this looks. How this looks. I laughed.

It looks like you’ve been screwing my best friend and got her pregnant. Because that’s exactly what happened. It’s more complicated than that.

No, it really isn’t. I started walking again but he followed me. The baby’s due in two months, he said.

Rose needs support. I can’t just abandon her. And I couldn’t just abandon you when you lost your job.

But here we are. That’s different. Is it? I reached my car and turned around one more time.

You made your choice, Asher. When you decided to cheat on me, when you decided to get another woman pregnant, when you decided to let everyone I love keep your secret. You made your choice.

Now I’m making mine. You’re really going to divorce me? I already am divorcing you. You’ve been served.

You froze our accounts. I can’t access any money. They weren’t our accounts.

They were my accounts. With my money that I earned. I need money for food for gas.

Then get a job. Heidi, please. I know I screwed up but we can work through this.

We can go to counseling. We. I stared at him in disbelief.

There is no we anymore. There’s you and your pregnant girlfriend and your baby. That’s your family now.

Deal with it. I got in my car and drove away, leaving him standing alone in the parking garage. That night I called my aunt Gina.

Heidi, sweetheart. I was wondering when you’d call. I heard about… Well I heard what happened.

You heard. Your mother called me. She’s worried about you.

Are you going to try to talk me into forgiving him too? There was a pause. Baby girl, I’ve been married three times. Two of those men cheated on me.

You want to know what I learned? What? A man who cheats on you when you’re supporting him isn’t a man worth keeping. And family who knows about it and doesn’t tell you isn’t family worth having. I started crying for the first time since this whole thing began.

You come stay with me for a while, Aunt Gina said. And don’t you dare feel guilty about protecting yourself. I moved in with Aunt Gina the following week.

She lived in a cozy townhouse about 20 minutes from my office, and for the first time in months I felt like I could breathe. How are you handling the money situation? She asked over coffee one morning. What do you mean? Well if you were supporting Asher and now you’re not.

I smiled. That’s the beautiful part. I’m not handling the money situation.

He is. By the third week after I’d served him papers, the reality of his situation was starting to sink in. I knew this because Rebecca had been fielding increasingly desperate calls from him.

He called six times yesterday, she told me. He sounded pretty upset. What did he want? He wanted to know when you were going to stop this nonsense and come home.

I told him you weren’t available. And? He asked if I knew where you were staying. I told him that wasn’t my business to share.

Good. What Asher didn’t know yet was that I’d also called the mortgage company and requested a payoff quote. The house was worth about $180,000 and I owed $140,000.

I could pay it off entirely and sell it or I could let it go into foreclosure. Either way, he was going to be homeless soon. I decided to let him figure that out on his own.

The first sign that reality was hitting came in the form of a call from my mother. Heidi, you have to stop this, she said without preamble when I answered the phone. Asher is falling apart.

Good. That’s a terrible thing to say. Is it? Because I think it’s a terrible thing to cheat on your wife with her best friend.

People make mistakes. Mom, if you called to lecture me about forgiveness, you can save your breath. I’m not interested.

But what about Rosemary? She’s eight months pregnant now. The stress of all this isn’t good for the baby. Then maybe she shouldn’t have gotten pregnant by a married man.

Heidi. No, mom. You don’t get to be shocked by my reaction.

You were at that baby shower. You knew about the affair and you said nothing. You chose their side over mine.

We never chose sides. You absolutely did. You chose to keep their secret.

You chose to celebrate their baby in my house with my money paying for the roof over their heads. You chose everyone else over your own daughter. There was silence on the other end.

I have nothing else to say to you, I said and hung up. But the calls kept coming. From my father, from Lucy, from mutual friends who thought I was being too harsh.

Every single one of them seemed to think that because Rosemary was pregnant, I should somehow be okay with the betrayal. That I should swallow my hurt and anger and play the role of the gracious ex-wife who just wanted everyone to be happy. They were about to learn how wrong they were.

Six weeks after I’d filed for divorce, I got the call I’d been waiting for. Mrs. Martinez, this is Jennifer from First National Mortgage. I’m calling because your account is 90 days past due and we need to discuss your options before we begin foreclosure proceedings.

Actually, I’d like to discuss selling the house. Oh, well that changes things. Are you working with a realtor? Not yet, but I’m looking for someone who can move quickly.

I can give you some referrals. I chose an agent who specialized in quick sales and told her I wanted the house on the market immediately. Price it to sell fast, I told her.

I don’t care about getting top dollar. What about your husband? Will he need to sign anything? The house is entirely in my name. He has no legal claim to it.

Oh, well that makes things simpler. Within a week, there was a for-sale sign in the front yard. That’s when Asher finally called my office and demanded to speak to me.

You can’t sell the house, he shouted when I picked up the phone. I can and I am. Where am I supposed to live? That’s not my problem anymore.

I have nowhere to go. You have Rosemary. I’m sure she’ll make room for you.

She’s living with her parents. There’s no room for me there. I felt a spark of satisfaction at that.

Then I guess you better figure something out. You can’t do this. It’s cruel.

What’s cruel is cheating on your wife. What’s cruel is getting your wife’s best friend pregnant. What’s cruel is having everyone your wife loves and trusts lie to her face for over a year.

I made a mistake. You made a choice. Now live with it.

Heidi, please. I’m begging you. Don’t do this.

For just a moment, I wavered. This was the man I’d loved for seven years. The man I’d planned to grow old with.

Hearing him beg was harder than I’d expected. But then I remembered the look on his face when I’d walked into that baby shower. The way he’d positioned himself between me and Rosemary like I was the threat.

The way he’d called her Rose, with such tenderness while treating me like an inconvenience. You made your bed, Asher. Now lie in it.

With your pregnant girlfriend. I hung up. Two days later the house sold.