I went to another gynecologist without telling my husband and left with a phrase pierced into my body: “What I am seeing shouldn’t be there.” Julian was also an OB-GYN; he handled all my check-ups and smiled every night as if he hadn’t hidden something inside me. I was seven months pregnant. My mother-in-law referred to my baby as “an asset.” And when I heard Julian say he would remove “the object” during delivery, I understood that my womb was carrying more than just my son.
“It’s not medical. It’s trackable.”
I read the message three times. The house was dark, but I felt like all the walls were watching me. In the study, Julian kept talking in a low voice, sure that I was asleep, sure that my body was still a place where he could hide things.