‘I slept with my boss and it cost me my marriage’

My name is Janet. No, you can’t call me Jane; I hate that name now. It is what my husband used to call me (which I really loved), but I can’t bring myself to hear anyone call me that now. Not after what I did.

You see, I’m a very complex woman – exactly why I married a very simple man in the first place.

If my husband and I were to be equations, I’d probably be a matrix while my husband would be a simple, linear algebra. I love my husband, in his simple, calm and stress-free sense of life.

At home, you would always find my husband in his shorts and polo shirt. He even wears those kinds of shirts to work, except on days there’d be a client meeting.

My husband’s best phrase is “it’s fine” or “it’s okay”. This is his most common response to any question thrown at him.

“Is the food nice?”

“It’s fine, Jane.”

“Do you want more cream in the salad?”

“No, it’s okay.”

I liked my husband’s one-front, easy-to-predict person. I think I did. And then I met my boss. Before joining the advertising firm, I was with one of the telecoms in Victoria Island.

While there, sleeping with my boss was something I never could have imagined. I mean, if that man was the last on earth, I would masturbate till I die. Don’t get me wrong, he was not perfectly ugly – in fact, he was fine by any standard. But he stood for all the things I am against: bad hair, bad breath, bad eating manners, I can’t keep mentioning.

And, most importantly, I loved my husband. Deeply. To cheat on a man as amazing as my husband, the man has to be two times better.

And my current boss presented that situation. He is a perfect gentleman. He is my husband, with a touch of adventure. You would find this thrill in the way he dressed, talked, walked, drove, just everything he did. And he works out too.

My husband is not fat – not even remotely chubby – he is a lean-bodied fine man who was everything I wanted. Used to be. I didn’t marry him out of convenience. We were actually deeply in love (I still am). And then I got it and started wanting more. Aint we all stupid and confused in this life?

It had been easy to notice that my new boss was flirting with me. Or maybe he wasn’t – maybe he was only being the gentleman he is. Maybe I just started reading meanings into nothing.

One evening, we worked really late into the evening, in preparation for a big client’s visit the next day. When we eventually got done, my boss offered to buy me dinner.

B-Hive is one of the good restaurants in Lekki. We chatted at length while we ate, of majorly personal issues. He drove me home that night but refused to come in.

My husband asked whose car noise he heard because I hadn’t driven out in my car. “I used an Uber,” I lied.

“Oh okay,” he said. “So did you guys finally get everything sorted out at work?”

“We tried,” I said. “I’m so tired.”

“You must be. Go and get a shower while I microwave something for you.”

“Oh don’t bother about food, I’m not hungry.”

“You are not?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“I had something already.”

“Oh.” My husband said nothing else and just turned to walk inside.

“Babe?” I called him.

He turned back to me. “Yes?”

“I’m sorry I came back late tonight.”

“Oh, it’s fine.”

I did not know why I felt guilty that night. Perhaps it was the Uber lie. But I knew it was not just it. It was the sinful thoughts going on in my mind. I thought that my boss might want to have sex with me, and it scared me that I might not say no.

It was on a very rainy Wednesday night that my boss and I finally had sex. We were away in Abuja, on a UN summit whose publicity we handled. We were lodged in the same hotel, my boss and I, but in different rooms.

After the long day, my boss and I sat with some other colleagues at the hotel’s exterior, chatting over grilled meat and wine.

I was tipsy. I guessed everyone else was too.

It’s been close to an hour after I retired to my room that I heard a knock. I got the door and it was my boss, looking different. Nothing boss-like.

He was not in a suit, or in anything formal – he wore a plain, ash-coloured T-shirt and mustard shorts. The dim lights of the room highlighted his handsomeness. He entered the room and his scent filled the air. He had prepared for this night, I could tell. Without a lot of talking, he grabbed me and started kissing me.

I wanted to resist but I wanted him too. I wanted to have him. He slipped off my sleeping dress and cupped my breasts with one hand. He was masterly, like someone who knew exactly how to please a woman.

“I want you to breastfeed me,” he whispered to my ear and immediately took one of my hardened nipples into his mouth.

He took some time switching between both nipples and then he slid his hand in between my legs and held me tight. And that way he drew me to the bed and came on top of me.

He took off his shirt, revealing a well-chiselled upper body. He moved out of the bed to take off his shorts. His firm, muscular ass ballooned in my face as he bent to pull off the shorts. When he turned, his hardness thrust into the air like a tree branch. He came back to me on the bed, taking his position between my legs.

It was a quick one – what we had – it was over within 10 minutes.

And then the awkwardness descended on us like fog. And then he said it – something that stung me like a bee. “I can’t believe we did this. I can’t believe I did this to my wife.”

The room was cool but beads of sweat crowded my forehead. I can’t remember the other thing he stammered out before creeping out of the room. I tried as much as possible to contain this, to remain normal, but several weeks after, I still felt miserably different.

Every time I looked into my husband’s eyes, the guilt came rushing back. Every time he told me he loved me and I repeated it, I felt like crying. I’ve lived with this torture for many weeks until one day at the office, I received a strange text from my husband.

“I know what you did, Jane; it’s fine.”

I almost peed in my underwear. How could this be? What exactly does he know – what if he was referring to something else? I tried to remain calm.

When I got home that night, my husband sat me down and told me how he found out. One of the hotel staff was his kin. He had told him what he saw.

“Do you deny it?” my husband ended his talk with.

I was still, completely frozen.

“Do you?!”

I jerked. “No.” I shook my head.

“Good. I am going to be away until the divorce is finalized.”

“Divorce?”

“Yes. I’ve contacted a lawyer.”

“Come on, Babe, we can work through this. I really am sorry…I didn’t–”

“Stop!” His voice lowered. “Jane, please stop! Tomorrow, I will intimate you of the proceedings. I want the dissolution of our marriage to be just as peaceful as our wedding night.”

Daniel Nkado is a Nigerian writer and the founder of DNBStories.com.