I walked back into the kitchen. I set the iPad down on the granite counter, right next to the cream folder.

I pressed accept.

The video connected. Maria’s face filled the screen. She was sitting in a bright room, wearing a yellow dress, her hair perfectly styled.

“Hi handsome,” she started to say.

Then she stopped. Her eyes widened. She leaned closer to her camera.

She was looking at a fifty-five-year-old woman in wrinkled blue scrubs, with bags under her eyes and hair pulled back in a messy clip.

“Who are you?” she stammered. Her voice was thin. Scared.

“Hello, Maria,” I said. My voice was completely flat. “I am Richard’s wife. I did not die of cancer five years ago. I am very much alive, and I just finished a twelve-hour shift at the hospital.”

She put her hand over her mouth.

I didn’t yell at her. She was a victim of his lies, just like I was.

I picked up the iPad. I turned the camera around. I walked into the hallway.

“Richard told you he was a real estate millionaire,” I said calmly. “This house is heavily mortgaged. It is in my name. The bank accounts are in my name.”

I walked back into the kitchen. I picked up the cream folder. I opened it and held the itemized receipt directly up to the camera lens.

“Do you see this number, Maria?” I asked. “Fourteen thousand dollars. That is what his new teeth cost. He didn’t pay for them. I did. I saved for two years in a coffee can so he could have a new smile.”

I pulled the camera back to my face.

“He is broke. He has no investments. He just walked out the door with a duffel bag and a smile I paid for. If you want him, he is entirely yours. But you will be paying his bills from now on.”

I have never seen the color drain from a human face so fast. Her fantasy of a rich American savior shattered into a million pieces in real time. She looked at the receipt. She looked at the kitchen. She looked at my tired face.