I live with my boyfriend. We’ve been together for a little over seven years. Our anniversary is coming up this month. We talk about everything and anything. We know each other’s sexual history — there are no secrets between us.

But last night, I found something that has since completely unsettled and rattled me from inside out.

I was on his laptop and went on to Facebook. It was signed on to his name. He was on messenger and I saw that he was chatting with someone that I met once, a long time ago.

These were messages that he should not be sending to anyone else but me.

My heart leapt into my throat. He’s having online sex with this woman.

But it got worse.

She said she couldn’t wait to see him.

He said he was coming over after work. He was clocking out in half an hour.

I stared at the screen, not knowing what to do. I scrolled up to see that they had been chatting for two solid months. I was — still am — in disbelief.

A little while later, I received a text message from him.

“Hey going for drinks after work! love u!”

I felt like I was going to throw up.

I closed the laptop and paced around the apartment. I honestly did not know what to do. I tried to calm myself down and distract myself by watching TV, but that didn’t help at all.

I ended up crying on the couch, and I was filled with anxiety, grief, and god-knows-what.

I couldn’t bring myself to talk to him or message him — I was scared. I didn’t know what I was going to say.

The thought of losing him made me scared. The fact that he was on his way to sleep with someone else made me scared. Did I do something wrong? What was happening? Questions swirled in my head, but I couldn’t answer them. I couldn’t answer any of them.

Out of pure desperation, I started drinking wine. I thought it would smooth me out, but instead, I cried harder. I bawled my eyes out over him, over us, over what we had, over our future.

I messaged my friend and said that something bad was happening. A flurry of texts came spilling in from her side.

“can u talk?? over phone??”

I was about to call her when the door unlocked.

He came in with a big smile, but his expression changed when he saw my state. He came running to my side and tried to comfort me. I thought I smelled perfume on his clothing.

“I know what you’ve been up to,” I said.

He froze.

“I know you’re sleeping around.”

I hit him. I slapped his face, I hit his chest, I scratched at him.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa, what the hell are you talking about?” he demanded.

“I read your fucking chats,” I shouted. “I know you cheated on me.”

He put his hands to his face.

“Aw, fuck.”

“Fuck you,” I shouted. “Fuck you.”

He stood up from the couch and walked over to the window.

He simply said, “I wanted to try it before we got married.”

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