Five Years, A Beautiful Placeholder

al bed, the white sheets scratchy against my skin. A doctor stood beside me, his face a

I corrected him, my own v

g at my chart. "We also ran some routine blood work. We noticed something in Liam's medical history you provided that seems... inconsistent

it fit the pattern. Everything about him was a carefully constructed fiction. The pain in my lo

support, I heard familiar voices from a room down the hall. Liam's and Sophia's. My feet mo

, his expression full of genuine worry and affection. "The doctor said it's just a minor scar

mocking echo of my own loss. They were having a baby, a legitimate heir to his name and fortu

out, leaving nothing but a vast, empty space. I walked back to my room, got dressed, and made a decision. I couldn't carry a child into this world o

had first told me he loved me. He got down on one knee, not to propose, but to tie her shoe, the exact same tender gesture he had once performed for me. He was re

mistress, a long-term affair he had kept hidden in plain sight. I had no legal rights, no claim to our home, our life, our

nd my role was over. I walked from room to room, gathering every photograph of us. The smiling vacation picture

our smiles turning to ash. I fed the fire every gift he had ever given me, every letter, every card. I methodically erased him, erased

e physical exhaustion was immense, a bone-deep weariness that settled over me like a shroud. I