Chapter 10: 'The Woman Who Was in Our Lives'

My daughter was already
absorbed in Precure on TV.

She was talking in her usual tone,
as if she weren't the same child who
had been crying and saying
“Get Daddy back” just a moment ago.

“How was Precure today?”

When I asked her that, my daughter
answered while still looking at the screen.

“Today’s villain was a bit weird. It’s really not okay to deceive people, right?”

Her words
made my chest tighten for just a moment.

But she had already moved on.

Beside her, my son was also
glued to Precure as if nothing had happened.

Well then, I should move forward too.

This is no time to be crying.

The first thing I needed to sort out
was my ex-husband’s women.

Who was the main one?

Who was “that woman”
my daughter had mentioned?

I went through the LINE messages in the videos I had recorded,
checking them one by one.

There were six women in total.

However, among them, there was one woman
who was clearly treated differently.

Late at night.

'Can I come over today?'

'Of course!'

Exchanges like that appeared many times.

And at a pace of three times a week, at that.

The other women were different.

'Are you free next week?'
'Where should we go next?'

They were just scheduling dates normally.

But this woman alone was different.

She had integrated herself into his daily life.

It wasn't about 'meeting up'.

It was closer to 'coming home'.

For my ex-husband,
she was a convenient place to be.

A convenient woman.

Her name is,

Mayutanman♡

…No, I thought that was a pretty stupid-looking display name.

I haven't seen that kind of registration style since high school students during the peak of mixi.

But the content wasn't something I could laugh at.

I scrolled back to the beginning. The LINE chat had been deleted halfway through, so I couldn't see from when they first met, but

it started about a year ago with a message from the woman saying, 'Moved in!' 'Good work! Mayu worked too hard, so please get some rest.' It doesn't seem like he was going to her house before that. It also doesn't seem like she moved for my ex-husband.

It seems she is a single mother.

There was also the phrase 'the kids.' Judging by the phrasing, she has two or more children.

Did she move from her parents' house to a different place?

A single piece of information brings up thousands of possibilities.

Moreover, the place she lives in is in the same city as us.

I saw that 'Sushiro [Store Name]' was shared, and she was saying she wanted to go there today.

That Sushiro is 15 minutes from my ex-husband's office. It's also close to our house.

While the other girls would say 'Thank you for the meal♡' after meeting him, this Mayutanman♡ doesn't say anything like that.

She is likely the type who
pays for what she and her children eat.

She welcomes me no matter what time I go.

I can even stay the night.

It's close to home.

Since there are children, too,
it's easy to 'play house'.

The only money needed is for what I eat myself.

I see.
These are good conditions,
I thought.

The LINE message said this.

'Heading over now'
'Can the kids fit in the car today?'

In that moment,
something clicked in my head.

The car.

The company car my ex-husband drives
was either the family car we used to use
that he sold to the company,
or another company car.

Since he was allowed to use the company car for personal use,
I used to use it on my days off, too.

In other words.

There is a possibility that he was driving the woman and her children
in the car that I and my children used to ride in.

Did I pay the down payment?

I did receive the proceeds from the sale properly.

But in the end,
I lost about 900,000 yen after everything was settled.

Thinking about that,
I scrolled back further through the LINE messages.

Then,
I started to feel something was off halfway through.

Marriage.

Wife.

Bride.

Words like that
never appeared at all.

In fact, my ex-husband,
even on his days off from work,

"Just finished work now-"
"Just got home now-"

he would send messages like that.

No,
you were sleeping at home all day today.

I couldn't help but talk back to my phone.

He'd suddenly contact me at times like this,
show up unexpectedly in the middle of the night,
and the times he came home were all over the place.

Don't you think that's strange?

That's what I thought.

But, at that moment,
I calmed down just a little.

……No.

That's not it.

I, too, had always
been on the "wanting to believe" side.

He only came home about twice a week,
didn't contribute to living expenses,
and just slept or played games when he was home.

I believed him when he said it was work.

I believed him when he said he was tired.

I wanted to believe that he wasn't the kind of person to betray his family.

That's why I thought it was more likely that this woman was being deceived, too.

That's what I thought.

My ex-husband, sleeping in the next room, might be worse than a villain from Precure.

I took the car keys from my ex-husband's pants, which had been discarded on the floor.

"We're going to the park, so get ready!"

I called out to the children.

The car my ex-husband drove home today.

I decided to start by investigating that.

Click here for the shocking first chapter.