Divorce Papers in My Baby’s Gift Box? Fine—I Signed Them! Chapter 02

Divorce Papers in My Baby’s Gift Box? Fine—I Signed Them! Chapter 02

Ryan chased me to the foyer and grabbed my wrist.

“What the hell are you making a scene for? It’s not like you don’t know Maddie has been like this since we were kids. We grew up messing around like that.”

He sighed, as if he were coaxing a child who didn’t know any better.

“Fine. I’ll tell her to watch herself from now on, okay? Today is Emma’s birthday. There’s no need to make this so ugly.”

“So you do remember today is Emma’s birthday.”

I looked at his jacket, which happened to match Maddie’s color scheme.

“Anyone who didn’t know better would think this was your engagement party with Maddie.”

I stared at him, trying to find even a trace of guilt or self-reflection in his eyes. Unfortunately, there was none.

“We’re just childhood friends. I’ve always treated her like one of the guys. Are you seriously jealous of one of my guy friends too?”

“One of the guys?”

My eyes swept over the red mark on his neck, the one he claimed was a mosquito bite, and I let out a mocking scoff.

Behind him, Maddie and that group of friends came after us.

Her eyes were red as she looked at Ryan.

“Ryan, are you seriously going to stand there and let her humiliate me like this? How am I supposed to face anyone after this?”

“Forget it. Your wife takes everything so personally. We should just stop seeing each other from now on, so she won’t accuse me of seducing you again.”

After saying that, she blocked Ryan right in front of me.

It was a perfect performance.

If she hadn’t remembered to take every pair of pajamas and every piece of lingerie she had “accidentally” left at our house before she left, I might have almost believed her.

Ryan panicked instantly. “Maddie!”

He immediately tried to chase after her.

But Emma started crying in my arms.

His friends swarmed around me at once and turned all their anger on me.

“Nora, Maddie was kind enough to come celebrate your child’s birthday, and you just had to drive her away?”

“Gold diggers are always paranoid and insecure. No class at all. If Maddie really wanted to marry into the Whitmore family, do you think you’d have had a chance?”

“Ryan, your wife owes Maddie an apology for what happened today. If you two don’t go apologize to Maddie, how are we supposed to stay friends with you?”

Before long, every guest in the house had left.

The living room was a wreck, and all that remained was Emma’s broken sobs.

Ryan rubbed his brow, then suddenly kicked over the potted white orchid by his feet.

“Are you happy now that things have ended up like this?”

I didn’t answer. I only looked at the smashed potted orchid.

That summer, I was selling flowers from a cart on a street corner. The rain was pouring, and the whole street was empty.

Ryan stood there in an absurdly expensive white shirt, getting soaked with me, pushing the cart with me, and calling out to customers until his voice went hoarse.

Later, he secretly called over his friends and used his own money to buy every flower on my cart.

That money was just enough to cover my mother’s medical bills that day.

Back then, I truly thought Ryan Whitmore was a gift from heaven.

Later, we fell in love, got married, and had Emma.

He once told me he would never let me sell flowers alone in the rain again.

He said he would give me a home.

How beautiful that sounded.

Unfortunately, after Maddie came back to the States, that home slowly became her playground.

At some point, Ryan quietly changed our matching profile pictures.

He stopped wanting to wear matching colors with me when we went out.

The man who used to be too scared to go on a roller coaster with me learned to go skydiving, bungee jumping, and street racing with Maddie.

Every tiny change was like a stream feeding into the sea, washing away the Ryan I once knew until he was unrecognizable.

And yet, absurdly enough, he was still denying that he had fallen for someone else.

…

Ryan seemed to calm down a little. He walked over and took my hand.

“Nora, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have lost my temper with you at Emma’s birthday party.”

“But Maddie and I really are just buddies. She just got carried away, that’s all. Those papers were a prank. I’ve never thought about leaving you or Emma.”

“I’ll spend less time with her from now on, okay?”

When he said that, Ryan looked almost like the man he used to be. His eyes were sincere, and he didn’t seem to be acting.

If this had been three days ago, I probably would have made excuses for him again.

But now, as I looked at his face, all I could think about was the first time Maddie and I had clashed, and she had pulled a disappearing act.

Ryan took my phone and publicly apologized to her from my account in our group chat and on Instagram.

In the end, Maddie was coaxed back, and I became the laughingstock of their entire circle.

Then there was the night Emma’s heart condition flared up.

I held my daughter in the emergency room and waited until dawn.

Where was Ryan?

He was watching fireworks with Maddie at Disney World.

It was always a joke. I was always overthinking. There were never any bad intentions. How evil did someone have to be before Ryan would finally see it as malice?

So this time, I slowly pulled my hand back.

“No. I want a divorce.”

Shock, panic, and resentment flashed across Ryan’s face before he roared impatiently, “Are you insane? How can you be so unreasonable? Are you really determined to tear this family apart?”

“It wasn’t me. It was you. You betrayed our marriage!”

He opened his mouth, as if he still wanted to say something.

In the middle of our argument, an urgent voice crashed in from outside the door.

“Ryan, something happened! Maddie was in a car accident!”