My wife severed our marriage through an email while I was serving overseas…

My mom passed three years later, lung cancer, though she never smoked a day in her life. They left me some money, not a fortune, but enough that Becky and I could pay off her student loans and still have a cushion. I deployed four times during our marriage, Iraq twice, Afghanistan twice.

Each time I came home, Becky seemed a little more distant, a little more restless, like she was playing a role she’d outgrown. I didn’t sign up to be a military wife, she told me once, after I mentioned possibly re-upping for another four years. I’m tired of being alone all the time.

I understood that, I did, but the Army was the only place I ever felt like I truly belonged. I was good at my job. People depended on me.

In 2019, things started changing, small stuff at first. Becky got irritated when I called during her girls’ nights, started talking about how her friend Melissa had divorced her husband and was living her best life now, started making comments about how we didn’t really have anything in common anymore. I suggested counseling.

She said we were fine just going through a phase. Then came the late nights at work, the weekends away with friends I’d never met, the new clothes, the gym membership she rarely used. I should have confronted her.

But that’s not how I handle things. Never have. My dad taught me to think before I speak, to be sure before I act.

So I watched, and I prepared, quietly, because my gut was telling me something was coming. And in this life, you learn to trust your gut. Two weeks after getting the divorce email, I was sitting in the mess hall when my phone buzzed.

A notification from our bank app. Another withdrawal, $8,500, almost everything that was left. I set my fork down and opened the app.

The joint account balance was down to $212.37. Our savings, $47,000 we’d built up over years, was gone completely. Transferred to an account I didn’t recognize. Murphy, one of the guys from my unit, glanced over.

Bad news? I locked my phone. Nah, just some account stuff. That night, I called our bank from the base phone center.

Turned out Becky had been moving money for weeks, small amounts at first, then larger ones. The big transfers started the day after I deployed. I hung up and stood in the hallway for a long time, watching guys laughing, calling their kids, their wives, their parents.

Normal life happening all around me while mine was burning down. That’s when Wilson found me. Heard from Alvarez that you looked like you’d seen a ghost at dinner, he said.

What’s up? I don’t usually share personal stuff, but Wilson had pulled me out of a bad situation in Kandahar once. I trusted him. My wife emptied our accounts and moved her boyfriend into our house, I said.

Sent divorce papers while I was on patrol last week. Wilson didn’t give me the usual bullshit. No, I’m sorry, or that’s rough, or you’ll find someone better.

He just asked, what’s your plan? Not sure yet, I said. He nodded. Let me know if you need anything.

That night, I couldn’t sleep. I pulled out my laptop and logged into our home security system, something Becky probably forgot I could access remotely. The cameras showed a strange truck in our driveway, a man I’d never seen before walking our dog, using my coffee mug, wearing my Seahawks sweatshirt, and there was Becky, laughing in the kitchen I’d renovated myself during my last leave.

Something shifted inside me. Not anger, exactly. Something colder, clearer.

I closed the laptop and pulled out my phone, made a list. Call James, army buddy who became a lawyer. Check the VA loan terms.

Contact Master Sergeant about emergency leave. Review home refinance documents, something Becky mentioned casually last year. Check the security on my military pension accounts…