The Woman in the Video Who Looked Like My Wife

For a while, my wife and I settled into the grind of our busy daily lives.

After returning to the office, I scrambled to catch up on the backlog of work and adjust to the shifts in our routine. At the same time, I carved out hours to accompany my wife to the hospital for her narcolepsy treatment, and I kept up with ongoing consultations about the strange condition that had taken hold of me. Even ten bodies would not have been enough for the days that followed.

"Honey. Look at this."

After dinner, I sat on the couch with my wife, savoring a rare stretch of free time. She pulled out her phone and began showing off photos from the daycare center. The tiny screen filled with an endless stream of pictures of her with adorable children.

"Didn't you say you were doing a mascot costume part-time job?"

From the photos alone, she looked like a daycare teacher playing with the kids, so I voiced the question. She nodded and swiped to the next image — and there she was, wearing a full-body princess mascot costume. The costume looked as thick and heavy as it appeared, and her face in the photo was flushed a deep red.

Isn't she pushing herself too hard?

Worry rose unbidden. Her face glistened with sweat, black strands of hair plastered like spiderwebs across skin as white as porcelain. It was not hard to imagine that her body inside that costume was soaked through as well.

"You look exhausted. Are you okay?"

"Yeah. The costume is hot and heavy, but I'm fine. There are long breaks between the skits, and there's a teacher who helps me the whole time, so it's no problem."

"Skits?"

One question only bred another. Looking proud, she explained how she had ended up performing.

"That's right! The daycare is running a new student recruitment drive right now, and while the parents are in consultations, we put on little plays so the kids who came along don't get bored."

Hearing that, I finally understood why the daycare had wanted her — and why the position was only part-time. It was not regular instruction; they only needed her for the recruitment period. And even for temporary help, given the setting, they would have wanted someone they could trust.

So this is how daycares scramble for enrollment when times are hard.

Their strategy for standing out also made sense. For children dropped into an unfamiliar environment, a play was an engaging way to win them over, which would make recruitment far easier. The goodwill and appeal it generated among parents still on the fence was a natural bonus.

"Seeing you in that princess costume — does that mean our Hyeon-ju is the heroine of the play?"

She laughed and shook her head at my teasing.

"Wrong. Sadly, I'm just the lady-in-waiting who helps Sleeping Beauty from the side~ The costume design does look like a princess, though, doesn't it? I made the same mistake at first."

"Ah — that makes sense."

I understood why she had been cast that way. With no telling when her narcolepsy might drop her cold, they could hardly give her a lead role that required long stretches on stage.

"So the play is Sleeping Beauty… You would have been perfect for the part, don't you think?"

I tossed out the joke lightly, deliberately leaning into the association with her condition rather than tiptoeing around it, so she could take it in stride. She caught my intent at once, her eyes curving into a warm smile as she nestled into my arms.

"I know, right? Nobody has any taste. Where else are they going to find a princess as lovely as me?"

I wanted to say that her figure suited a mature, dignified queen far better than an innocent princess — but I managed not to commit that particular blunder. Instead I simply stroked her braided hair out of habit and agreed without words.

A peaceful, warm stretch of time drifted by. But the faint vanilla scent rising from the woman in my arms, and that uniquely sweet, feminine warmth of her skin, slowly stirred something lower. Desire began to lift its head.

Come to think of it, we've been too busy lately.

The days had been so packed that we had not made love at all — and I had not even opened the real-time consciousness check app I had installed to monitor her condition in ages. A wave of guilt washed over me for neglecting her under the excuse of being busy, but the urge to take care of myself was stronger.

I slid the hand that had been toying with the end of her braid down toward her chest. Softness and a gentle heat met my fingertips, and blood began to pool low in my body.

Normally she picks up on a signal like this right away.

Ever since my libido had spiked, she had done her best to match me whenever I sent those quiet cues — as if determined to keep our promise to be intimate often. Yet even as I touched her with clear intent, she gave no response at all. Puzzled, I looked down at the face nestled against my chest.

"Mmm…"

She was nodding off, on the verge of sleep. The moment I saw the exhaustion carved into her features, I knew tonight was a lost cause.

Well — she's earned the right to be this worn out, body and mind.

The mascot costume job, playing with the children, the housework, and a life lived in constant tension because her narcolepsy could drop her at any moment. On top of that, the way she checked in on me whenever she could meant she was still carrying the burden of looking after me as well. And with my newly ravenous appetite, we had been going at it whenever the mood struck — of course her body was running on empty.

Nothing to be done about it.

Better to put her to bed early and handle things myself.

"Hyeon-ju. Go on in and sleep."

"Mm…? Oh — did I doze off…? Ugh… I still need to run the laundry…"

She stirred in my arms and started fretting about the housework. I rubbed her back and told her I would take care of it tonight — she should just go to bed.

"Sorry, honey. I've been sleeping so much more lately. I don't think it's the narcolepsy, though. And this body-ache feeling just won't go away…"

She complained of muscle pain, kneading her arms and legs. She seemed to have no idea that pure exhaustion was the real culprit. It had been about two weeks since she started the mascot job, which meant roughly half the contract period was left.

When the part-time work ends, I should take her out for something delicious.

The memory of that night at the hotel — the first time I had willingly placed my wife in another man's hands — surged up, and I went hard in an instant. To hide the lust-stained state of myself, I gave her sleeping form a few pats on the rear and hurried her into the bedroom.

"Hah…"

The lingering feel of her backside against my palm seemed to speak for the hollow place inside me. After making sure the coast was clear, I stepped into the study where the computer was. I locked the door just in case, then powered the machine on.

"It's been forever since I watched porn. When was the last time?"

After marrying my wife, I had never had reason to feel sexually unsatisfied, so hunting for flesh-colored videos had simply vanished from my life. I could not even remember how I used to find adult clips, and a blank helplessness settled over me. Once the computer finished booting, I connected to the internet.

"Huh? Did Hyeon-ju use the computer and just shut it down like this?"

The moment the browser opened, her personal SNS loaded automatically. She must have left the window open and powered the machine off as-is. The browser had treated it as a forced close and restored the last page she had been viewing.

She seemed to use social media fairly actively — the daycare part-time photos she had just shown me sat right at the top of the feed.

"She hadn't posted anything for a while, but I guess all this outside activity has her uploading again. There are a lot of new pictures."

As if to insist that what she had shown me was only the tip of the iceberg, her SNS was packed with photos. Shots of her playing with the kids, group pictures of the teachers in mascot costumes, simple food photos that looked like the children's meals. There were enough of them to map out how her days unfolded.

"I guess it makes sense for people who work at a daycare. Plenty of young, good-looking men and women."

Even in still images, the staff radiated warmth and kindness. Soft, natural smiles and gentle auras — the kind of harmless faces children would take to. And even among them, my wife's beauty stood out. Watching her smile, having shaken off the dregs of the misfortune that had crashed over us like a tsunami, I felt her happiness almost contagious.

"Her part-time job has about two weeks left, right? Before it ends, I should stop by with some snacks and thank them properly."

Anyone kind enough to hire a woman with narcolepsy for even a temporary role deserved a face-to-face visit. I made the decision again, then closed out of her SNS and opened a search window for my original purpose, typing in a suitable query. A flood of adult videos appeared — more than enough to make my earlier worry look foolish.

"Married women and concept stuff are popular these days, huh? There's a ton of it."

Because I had just ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠been browsing my ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠wife's personal photos, the algorithm had learned the shape of the user's interests and served matching results — though I did not realize it at the time. Paradoxically, those algorithm-shaped search results became the very thing that let me notice the anomaly surrounding my wife.

"What looks good…"

I was only looking to get myself off, so anything would do. I scrolled idly — and then a single line of text snagged my gaze and would not let go.

The moment I read those words, something lurched hard in my chest. On any ordinary day I would have scrolled right past a title like that — but as if possessed, I clicked it.

The page belonged to a personal adult channel run for profit. Beyond the video I had just opened, a scatter of thumbnail images filled the screen, each offering only the most fragmentary information, designed to provoke curiosity.

"Gulp…"

I tensed like a child who had done something wrong. I glanced once more at the locked door, then began studying the thumbnails with deliberate calm. Across the various videos and stills, the first thing that caught my eye was the background.

"Looks like they filmed at a workplace… but the interior tone and design are unusual."

Most of the footage was set against an overall dark backdrop. The furniture that appeared here and there was done in pastel tones children would love, which only deepened the strange sense of dissonance. It was nothing like the stark primary colors people associate with an office — more like a designer's studio, or a space built for kids. In one thumbnail, a half-naked woman lay sprawled at the center of that cheerful room, hips thrust long toward the camera, her entire body soaked as if she had been sweating heavily. Steam seemed to rise from her; even through the light mosaic over her crotch, the wet folds of her sex created the illusion that you could see right into her.

"Hoo…"

The provocative thumbnails stoked my imagination until my breathing roughened, and I let out a long breath. I examined the damp image more slowly. On the ring finger of the woman's left hand, limp against the floor, a wedding band was just visible — mosaic-blurred, presumably to prevent identification.

"Tsk."

Frustrated by the scraps of information, I clicked play on the free preview clip designed to pull in subscribers. It was an extremely short fragment. First came a rapid sequence of everyday photos, as if to introduce the woman in the video — and what stood out was a happy scene of her playing among children.

"Eh…?"

I had naturally pictured a capable career woman in some white-collar job. When photos that so strongly recalled my wife at the daycare began to roll past, I froze solid. The video did not wait for my confusion. It cut mercilessly onward, shifting to a scene of a woman lying in that same dark-toned space from the thumbnails. The moment I saw it, I forgot how to breathe.

"A m-mascot costume?"

Footage of her being undressed began to play, as if to declare that this was the woman he was about to fuck — and uniquely, she was wearing a mascot costume. The thick, heavy-looking suit had a design that evoked a princess, and from within it the sensual figure of a woman emerged like fruit peeled from its skin. For the briefest instant, the woman on screen looked as limp as if she had been drugged. The severely limited camera angles only made the hunger worse, as if the whole thing had been framed to tease.

Then the preview drove the spike home, as if asking whether I still refused to watch, and poured out something even more raw and primal.

"Oogh…! Ooh…! H-aah…!"

Thud! Thud! Thud!

The woman's vulgar cries and the wet slap of flesh exploded without warning from the quiet speakers, and I flinched as if I had been struck across the back of the head. But I forgot even to lower the volume, staring blankly at the screen. A cock sheathed in a fluorescent condom was plunging deep between the swollen, waterlogged folds of a pussy. The camera shook wildly, dizzying, the amateur framing so tight that the point of joining filled the entire view. A commercial adult video shot this way would have been torn apart in the comments for its low quality — but the vividness, the raw sense of reality, was overwhelming in its power to stoke desire.

"……"

The preview ended hollowly before I could learn anything more. Under normal circumstances, I would have hit the back button and dismissed it as the usual garbage. But the everyday ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠scenes that so strongly recalled my wife, and that princess-design mascot costume, clung to my mind like melted grease that would not scrape off.

"N-no way… Those costumes are common enough."

I tried to soothe myself — how many mascot costumes were sold commercially? This was just one of them — and reached to hit back. But it stuck in my throat like a fishbone. Instead of leaving, I scrolled down to examine the information beneath the video more carefully. The upload date seized my gaze.

The video had been uploaded today.

My heart seemed to drop with a dull thud, and the hand on the mouse began to tremble.

"Hah… hah… hah…"

My breath came short and tight. Sweat soaked through me in an instant, as if I had been thrown into a boiling cauldron. Forcing my shaking hands to move, I frantically checked the other videos on the channel. It was an ordinary personal adult channel stacked with clips of various women he had fucked — but that was not what mattered to me.

"Two weeks… a video from two weeks ago…"

I searched for anything uploaded around the time my wife had started the mascot job. There it was. Starting exactly two weeks prior, the upload frequency had accelerated, as if announcing that this woman was the current prey.

"……"

A bone-deep silence filled the room, so complete that even the sound of breathing seemed to vanish.

D-did my wife fall asleep at any point during her shifts?

I snatched up my phone and launched the consciousness check app I had not opened in so long. Ignoring the pile of notifications and the recent measurement data, I scrolled back two weeks. Tracing that day's graph hour by hour, I nearly dropped the phone in shock.

"W-what the hell is this."

There was a stretch where the graph convulsed as if an earthquake had hit. Nested inside the calm, steady pattern that clearly marked a narcoleptic sleep episode was something alien — a graph thrashing violently, as if screaming for help. It spiked to the maximum in a single surge, then dropped off as if she had blacked out. That foreign pattern ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠was an indirect record of something my wife had endured.

"……"

The next day. And the next. And the next. The incomprehensible pattern continued. I tore my eyes from the phone screen and cross-checked the upload dates on the personal adult channel against the dates the graph had gone wild.

They matched.

"Ah…"

The sound that escaped me was strangely flat and subdued. For some reason, the offhand remark my wife had tossed out before going to bed floated back up.

Why did the word body-ache, woven so casually into that conversation, surface now of all moments?

As if possessed, I paid for the video from two weeks ago and hit play. Seated before the computer, the front of the male animal's pants strained as if it might tear.