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“I don’t deserve you,” he used to say, before they were married. “Your goodness, your stability, how calm you always are — the way you just get on with things, and make it look so easy…”

Respect — that was what she’d taken his words to connote, but might they not in fact have been intended as a …

“Whatever you like,” she murmured, then gestured toward her chest. “Will this come off with water?” As though this practical detail was the only thing she was curious about.

“I wouldn’t have thought it’d come off too easily. You’ll have to wash it a few times to—” She interrupted him.

“I don’…

Only then did he realize what it was that had shocked him when he’d first seen her lying prone on the sheet. This was the body of a beautiful young woman, conventionally an object of desire, and yet it was a body from which all desire had been eliminated. But this was nothing so crass as carnal des…

I envied her husband. He was an art college graduate who liked to pose as an artist, yet didn’t contribute a single penny to their household finances. True, he had some property that he’d inherited, but he didn’t bring in a salary — in fact, his activities were limited to sitting around and not doi…

“You’re not hungry? But, my goodness, you’ve barely eaten anything!” There was something flamboyant about the friendly, sociable tone in which my boss’s wife expressed her concern. But the demure, apologetic smile that was the only reasonable response never came, and without even having the grace t…