My Fiance Married His Childhood Sweetheart Before Our Engagement Party Chapter 09

My Fiance Married His Childhood Sweetheart Before Our Engagement Party Chapter 09

The night before I left, Olivia and I ate takeout in her living room.

Burritos with extra cheese and the spiciest salsa on the menu.

I never dared to eat those when I was with Adrian.

He frowned whenever he saw chili peppers and said spicy food was bad for the stomach.

Now no one frowned.

I ate until sweat formed on the tip of my nose.

Just as I reached for a napkin, my phone rang.

An unknown number.

The area code was Boston.

I answered.

There were two seconds of silence.

Then my mother’s voice came through.

Dull.

Pressed down.

As if one wrong word would make her fall apart.

“Where are you?”

“New York. Flying to Silicon Valley tomorrow.”

“What for?”

“Work.”

She went quiet.

I could hear the television on her side.

It sounded like the weather report.

Far away, like it came from behind a wall.

After a long time, she spoke again.

“Your father said… before you leave, come home.”

My nose stung.

My fingers tightened around my chopsticks until they went pale.

“Didn’t he say I wasn’t his daughter anymore?”

“You know your father. His mouth is harder than his heart.”

Her voice suddenly turned rough, like sandpaper scraping over wood.

“After he came home from the hospital, he kept taking out your childhood certificates. One by one.”

“He wiped them with a damp towel over and over again.”

“That student award from third grade had a crease in the corner. He ironed it three times and still couldn’t flatten it. He got so angry he slapped the table.”

I crouched on the floor and buried my face in my arms.

Olivia put down her fork.

The living room went quiet.

Only my mother’s voice leaked from the phone, piece by piece.

“Mom,” I whispered. “I was wrong.”

“You should admit you were wrong.”

She paused.

“But you should also come home.”

The call ended.

I stayed crouched there for a long time.

Tears dripped down my arms and onto the floor.

Olivia said nothing.

She pulled half a pack of tissues from the coffee table and set them beside my hand.

Then she quietly returned to the couch and drank her flat soda.

She said nothing.

But her saying nothing worked better than anything else.

I cried for a long time before stopping.

Then I washed my face with cold water.

In the mirror, my eyes were swollen almost shut.