When I was 20, a man I barely knew proposed without a ring.
I said yes.
Our friends were alarmed
about our fast decision to marry and move to New York City from the U.S. state of Tennessee. I got a letter from an elder at church suggesting I wait to get to know my fiancé better. His friends held a tearful intervention. One of our university professors questioned the decision. My mother referred to my fiancé not by his name—David—but by the nickname “rank stranger.”
But we were in love. After refusing premarital counselling (we didn’t need it, we insisted), David and I got married and moved to Manhattan. We could see the Empire State Building at night, if we craned our necks while sitting on our creaky fire escape.
My life was as romantic as a love song. Then the phone rang.
“May I speak to David?” asked a sultry-voiced woman.
I handed my new husband the phone, which he quickly hung up.
“Wrong number,” he said. A few hours later, it rang again.
Another woman. I hovered near the phone. Did my seemingly loyal husband have a double life?
Another wrong number, he said. The calls became more regular, at all hours of the day and night. It got so common, I was no longer surprised when the breathy voices morphed into sighs of disappointment.
David always got off the phone, ex-asperated. Or was it an act?
I took messages when he was out.
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