And yet, I know the path that men like him are given - society has always paved it smoothly. If he wishes to satiate his "hunger" elsewhere, no one will stop him. An affair, another woman, a paid encounter - it will all be excused.
Men, after all, "have needs." And where would that leave me? As the undesirable, the parasite, the disposable one clinging onto him despite his efforts to cast me away.
And then the questions tear at me like wolves:
If he does it - if he seeks another - will I finally leave?
Will that be the last straw?
Will betrayal free me where violence and humiliation could not?
Will it finally give me the courage to walk away?
Or will I still cower behind the walls of "what will people say," clutching the last scraps of a self-respect I can barely recognize?
I ask myself these questions in silence, over and over, each time with less hope for the answer. Because what I truly want - what I ache for - is not his touch, not his approval, not his forgiveness. It is something simpler, something purer, something that feels almost impossible:
To be seen.
To be valued.
To be treated as human.
And yet here I am, trapped in a bond that reduces me to body parts, to obligations, to a vessel of service - while my worth, my identity, my being continue to rot in the shadows.