I Died In The Fire While He Married My Best Friend Chapter 03

I Died In The Fire While He Married My Best Friend Chapter 03

The number was mine, and the area code traced back to the city where we had gone to high school.

“Serena.” He ground out my name through clenched teeth.

“You’d better never show your face again. Otherwise, I have a hundred ways to make you wish you were dead.”

Watching him in that rage, I suddenly felt terribly sad.

Zachary, you can’t get revenge on me anymore.

I’m already dead.

I died seven years ago.

The bathroom door opened, and Olivia came out.

She wrapped her arms around Zachary’s waist from behind and pressed her cheek against his back.

“Zachary, let’s go to bed.”

Zachary put out his cigarette.

He turned around, swept Olivia into his arms, and carried her toward the king-size bed.

The next three days felt like torture by a thousand cuts.

I was trapped in the mansion, forced to watch them in their honeymoon phase, sweet and inseparable.

Olivia didn’t know how to cook, but on a whim she decided to pan-sear steaks. Hot oil splattered onto the back of her hand, leaving a small red mark.

She cried out softly, and Zachary immediately abandoned his work in the study and rushed out.

He took her hand and held it under the faucet, his brows drawn tight.

“Does it hurt?” He brought over a first-aid kit and carefully applied ointment for her.

I stood beside the kitchen island.

Watching his lowered gaze and quiet concern, I found the sight almost unbearable.

The kitchen at the children’s home had been big, and it was freezing in winter.

When I was thirteen, on Christmas Eve, I said I wanted chicken and dumplings.

Zachary secretly went to the kitchen to make them for me.

By accident, he knocked over a pot of boiling broth, scalding his entire right hand until it turned red and blistered.

Holding back the pain, he carried a bowl of chicken and dumplings he had managed to save intact to me with his left hand.

He grinned like nothing had happened.

“Serena, eat up. It’s still hot.”

That afternoon, Zachary and Olivia sat on the rug watching a movie.

Olivia leaned in Zachary’s arms while he shelled pistachios and fed them to her one by one.

He never thought it was too much trouble.

Back in high school, I didn’t like pecans because the shells were too hard.

So during every break, Zachary would crack pecans for me, pick out perfect halves, put them in a little container, and slip them to me.

All the favoritism and patience he once gave me now belonged to someone else.

At night, the bedroom lights went out.

In the dark came the kind of breathless, tangled sounds that made my face burn.

I backed away to the edge of the balcony, covered my ears, and squeezed my eyes shut.

But it was useless.

The sounds bored straight into my mind.

“Zachary…”

“Say it. Say I’m your husband.”

His low voice was thick with desire.

I curled into the corner, trembling from the pain.

I couldn’t get out.

The voices from my memories and the gasps from inside the room overlapped, tearing my soul into pieces.

On the third day after the wedding, they went to a high school reunion.

I followed them to the most exclusive private club in the city.

Inside the private room, everyone was busy flattering them.

“Zachary and Olivia really are perfect together. After all those twists and turns, you two still ended up where you were meant to be.”

“Back then, Olivia worked so hard to win Zachary over. Now you’ve finally got your happy ending.”

Olivia leaned against Zachary’s shoulder with a sweet smile.

Zachary toyed with a metal lighter in his hand, responding carelessly.

No one cared about me.

In their memories, I was a vain, faithless schemer.

The door to the private room opened.

Mr. Lewis, our former homeroom teacher from high school, walked in.

Mr. Lewis had retired. His hair was completely white, and he leaned on a cane.

“Mr. Lewis!” Everyone stood up to toast him.

After two drinks, Mr. Lewis looked at Zachary and Olivia with clouded eyes.

He sighed.

“Seeing the two of you married makes me very happy. It’s just…”

Mr. Lewis paused, his eyes reddening.

“It just reminds me of that night seven years ago, the night after senior finals ended. If that fire hadn’t happened, there would probably be more of us here today.”

Zachary’s fingers suddenly stopped toying with the lighter.

The metal hit the table with a crisp sound.

“Mr. Lewis, come on. It’s a happy day. Why bring up something so grim? Come on, cheers. Drink up,” Evan said quickly, trying to smooth things over.

The casualties from the science building fire seven years ago had never been made public, but everyone knew it had been devastating.

“How could I not bring it up?” Mr. Lewis waved his hand, clearly a little drunk.

“They found a charred body when they cleared the scene back then.”

“Since school was out and no one was supposed to be there, the police checked the remains against missing-persons records, but they never found a match.”

“It’s always weighed on me. I keep feeling like it was one of the kids I knew.”

The mood in the private room went cold.

Someone sitting in the corner suddenly spoke up.

“That body… couldn’t have been Serena, could it?”