The Belated Bride: Becoming My Own Muse Chapter 16

The Belated Bride: Becoming My Own Muse Chapter 16

Bianca suddenly spoke up, her voice soft and full of concern. “Claire, don’t you think you’re being a little too extreme? Arguments happen in every marriage. If you escalate every fight to divorce like this, people outside will think you’re unstable.”

I turned my head toward her.

“Ms. Moore. You’re twenty-seven years old. Not seventeen.”

She blinked.

I continued, “An adult woman. Accepting a wedding dress from a married man. Sitting next to his mother. Advising his wife not to divorce him.”

“Does that not feel ugly to you?”

Bianca’s tears spilled over completely.

Eleanor, furious, raised her hand to slap me.

I didn’t flinch.

But the blow never landed.

Christian caught Eleanor’s wrist.

“Mom!”

Eleanor was stunned.

Christian himself seemed startled for a second, as if he hadn’t expected to block it himself.

I looked at him and felt absolutely nothing close to gratitude in my heart.

It was far too late.

When someone has been pushed into the water for three years, and the person on the shore finally decides to reach out a hand…

I had already pulled myself out.

I picked up the divorce papers and handed them to Christian again.

“Are you signing or not?”

Christian looked at me.

Under the chandelier light, his eyes held something very complicated.

Guilt. Irritation. Reluctance to lose. And a small, belated flicker of panic.

“Claire, I’m not signing this.”

I nodded.

“Then I’ll see you in court.”

I went upstairs to pack.

In the master bedroom, the space for my clothes was pathetically sparse.

Christian’s bespoke suits took up the entire walk-in closet.

I had half a shelf in one of the side compartments.

At the very back was a box. Inside was that three-hundred-dollar white Reformation dress from three years ago.

The dress I wore the day we signed our marriage license.

I pulled it out. Tucked inside the skirt, I felt an old ticket stub.

It was the photo claim slip from the photo studio next to the City Clerk’s Office.

That day, Christian got a sudden phone call and didn’t wait with me for the photos.

I sat in that photo studio alone for two hours and finally picked up the red-background photo of us together.

In the picture, his expression was distant, detached. And I was smiling, so carefully.

Back then, I had actually thought that was happiness.