I needed to see how far he’d take this.
So, I kept my voice steady as I brought up the car.
A woman sitting at a table | Source: Midjourney
“We need to get the transmission looked at, Marcus,” I said. “It’s only going to get worse.”
Marcus didn’t even glance up from his plate. Instead, he poured hot sauce over his fish.
“We’ll have to wait, Jess,” he said. “We don’t have the money right now.”
I stared at him, frozen mid-air. He said it so easily, so naturally, like the stash in the cereal box didn’t exist, like he really believed it. Something inside me snapped.
A man sitting at a table | Source: Midjourney
The next morning, after my shift at the bakery, I did something I’d never imagined doing.
I called up a luxury spa and booked an appointment. A full makeover. Hair, nails, massage, the works. It was reckless, impulsive, and probably so irresponsible, but I didn’t care.
The money was there, and I was going to spend it.
A spa | Source: Midjourney
The whole day felt surreal.
As the stylist worked on my hair, I thought about the envelope, about the sleepless nights I’d spent worrying about bills while kneading dough before dawn, and about the constant ache in my back.
And there was Marcus, calmly pretending we had nothing, sitting on enough cash to just calm our struggles.
When I got home, I barely recognized myself.
A smiling woman | Source: Midjourney
My hair was styled into soft waves, and my nails were painted a deep, rich red. I looked like someone who had it all together, someone who wasn’t clawing her way through every day.
Marcus walked in the door, his eyes going wide as soon as he saw me.
“What did you do?” he asked.
“I found the money in the cereal box,” I said. “I deserved a day to myself.”
A shocked man sitting on a couch | Source: Midjourney
The color drained from his face.
“You shouldn’t have spent that. It wasn’t meant for… for this.”
I felt the anger rise again.
“Then what was it for, Marcus? Because I’ve been working myself to death, thinking we’re barely getting by, while you’ve been hoarding some kind of secret stash that I’ve had no idea about.”
A close up of a woman | Source: Midjourney
“Jess, I wasn’t trying to hide it from you. I just… I didn’t want you to worry.”
“Worry about what?” I demanded. “That is all I do! I worry all the time. About everything!”
He sank into a chair, rubbing his face.
“My boss… he hinted there might be layoffs soon. I wanted to have something set aside, just in case. I didn’t want to talk about something that might not even happen.”
A frowning man sitting on a couch | Source: Midjourney
“So, you lied to me?”
“I didn’t lie,” he said. “I just didn’t tell you.”
Marcus and I had always been honest with each other. At least, I thought we had. I took a deep breath, trying to calm down. But I was hurt.
Well and truly hurt.
He looked up at me, his expression softening.
A woman standing in a dim-lit room | Source: Midjourney
“We’re supposed to be open and honest, Marcus. You should have trusted me enough to tell me the truth.”
“You’re right,” he said. “I’m sorry.”
“Do you even realize what this looks like? I’m over here thinking we’re broke, working two jobs while you’re hiding money for some hypothetical future disaster? How could you not tell me?”
A frustrated man | Source: Midjourney
“I didn’t want to make things worse,” he said, shaking his head. “I thought keeping it to myself would be easier.”
“You thought this was easier, Marcus?” I thundered.
He didn’t say anything.
“And what if you lost your job tomorrow, huh? What then? Were you planning to pull out your secret stash and say, ‘Oh hey, by the way, I’ve been saving this all along’?”
An upset man | Source: Midjourney
“No… I mean, yes. Maybe. I don’t know. I just wanted to protect you.”
“You don’t protect me by keeping me in the dark, Marcus.”
I could see that my words had sunk in a little bit. But I wasn’t sure if Marcus actually got it.
I wasn’t sure he understood how all of this made me feel.
An upset woman | Source: Midjourney
“We’re a team, Marcus. Or aren’t we?” I asked.
“We are, Jess,” he said. “I promise we are.”
We sat there for a moment, the weight of everything hanging in the air. Slowly, I started to calm down. Marcus had messed up, and I could see that he genuinely hadn’t meant to hurt me. But I was hurt nonetheless.
An upset man sitting on a couch | Source: Midjourney
Still, we had a long way to go before the trust fully healed.
The next morning, I promised him I wouldn’t raid any more cereal boxes without asking, and he swore there’d be no more secret stashes.
We might be struggling, but at least we were facing it together now.
Right?
A woman looking out the window | Source: Midjourney
What would you have done?
If you enjoyed this story, here’s another one for you |
I Noticed That Money Was Disappearing from Our Family Stash — I Was Shocked When I Found Out Who Was Taking It
Judy and her family get into the habit of saving money in a “family stash jar,” which is used for emergencies or family outings. But soon, she starts noticing that someone in the family has sticky fingers, helping themselves to the money. Judy has to figure out who it is and what is the reason for such dishonesty.
I’m sure that it’s the same for most families. But in our family, honesty is the foundation of everything. I’ve always trusted my husband, Ethan, my 24-year-old son, Josh, and my 17-year-old daughter, Emma, implicitly.
A smiling older couple | Source: Midjourney
So, when money started disappearing from our family stash, it felt like a punch to the gut. We’d always kept a communal jar of cash for emergencies or spontaneous outings, but lately, large sums had been vanishing without explanation.
“I must be losing my mind,” I said out loud to myself when I noticed that the jar looked a little different from when I had last put in some money.
A jar of money on a counter | Source: Midjourney
At first, I thought that it was a simple miscalculation.
Read the full story here.