Prologue
Coming home from shopping for vegetables at the stall, Arianti was surprised to find her husband still sleeping soundly. Fakhri was in a hurry to get out of bed after Arianti woke him up. Working on a pile of office work that was being chased by deadlines until dawn made him wake up late, very late. It was already eight o’clock when Fakhri entered the bathroom.
Arianti prepared clothes for her husband to wear while his husband took a bath. A notification from Fakhri’s cell phone rang when Arianti was making the bed. Thinking that it might be an important message, Arianti took her husband’s cell phone from his desk and looked at the incoming messages without even opening the messaging app. From the list of notifications, Arianti can read the message clearly.
“Honey, where are you? Hurry up to the office. I already miss you. Love U.”
Arianti’s hands were shaking. There was disbelief, but the message she was reading was too clear to interpret any differently. From Watining? she muttered. She put the phone back where it was. The contents of the message repeatedly flashed through her head.
Arianti felt her body suddenly weak. She walked over to the bed and sat on the edge. It feels like a dream. Her husband is not the type of man who is easily seduced by women, nor is he the type of man who seduces. More than sixteen years of marriage with him was enough for her to be able to judge who her husband was and how he behaved. Fakhri is a man who is responsible and very rational. Everything he will do is calculated carefully.
Fakhri is indeed a friendly man, but he really knows the limits of relationship with the opposite sex. Although initially Arianti often misunderstood her husband’s friendliness, Arianti finally understood that her husband was just friendly and tried to act that way to respect others, nothing more. What made it difficult for Arianti to believe what she had just seen was that the message was from Watining, a woman they had considered as their own sister. Arianti never had the slightest suspicion that her husband and Watining were traveling together for work or family matters.
When Fakhri appeared after taking a shower, he caught a glimpse of Arianti and then hurriedly put on his work clothes. “I’ll be home later tonight. There’s a dinner party with a client. Maybe I won’t have time to go home first because I still have work until the afternoon,” said Fakhri while combing his hair and spraying perfume on his body. Not getting a response, Fakhri turned to his wife. “What’s wrong with you?”
“Yes, I heard,” Arianti replied.
Fakhri pocketed his cellphone and took his backpack. “Yeah, I’m off to work.”
Arianti was unmoved. She let her husband go without accompanying him outside. About five minutes later, the sound of her husband’s car screeching out of the driveway. Arianti’s head felt dizzy. She lay down on the bed.
