Blinded By Her Betrayal

edding day. I stood in front of the full-length mirror, adjusting the black bow tie on my crisp white shirt. In the refl

," she murmured, her voice s

face her. "And you lo

in the final moments before the ceremony, in a private suite at the lavish venue she had insisted on. A sharp, sudd

ion of the ceiling, a heavy decorative lighting fixture, came crashing down right where we had been standing. The world exp

throbbed in my head, but a different kind of darkness pressed in on me. I tried to open my eye

alled out, m

fingers cool and trembling. "Oh, Ethan, the doctors... the

g, of trauma, of the unlikelihood of recovery. I was blind. The world I knew, the w

y hand and made a prom

es nothing. I love you, Ethan Miller. We will still have our wedding. It will be the gran

suffocating darkness. I clung to them, believing in the future she

It was faint, a ghost of an image, like a badly tuned television. I blinked, and it was gone. But it gave me a sliver of hope. Over the next few days, the flickers be

w why, but some part of me needed to keep this a secret. So I continued to play the part of the blind man, feeling my way around

door to my room creaked open. I heard Chloe's soft f

Mark Stone, Chloe's brother-in-law. His wife,

day," Chloe whispered back. "T

osed. I felt them move closer to my bed. I co

ed with something that wasn't pity. "He

ic, then a quiet sigh that was unmistakably Chloe's. A wave of co

ace in his hands. And I saw him kiss her. It wasn't a quick, friendly peck. It was a long, deep kiss, full of

ed to ice. This was a dream. A nightmare b

their words were more bru

ay?" Chloe whispered, her voice s

less. He'll never find out about us, and you get to be the loving, devoted fiancée. Everyone will praise you. And once you'

ame real, but this time it was inside me, a cold, black void of shock and betrayal.

a blind, helpless f

tear me apart. My mind raced, piecing it all together. The "accident." Chloe's overly dram

orld of darkness, I made a new promise to myself. They wanted a show? I would give them one. They wanted to see a