Chapter 1

If exhausted was a noun, I would be the perfect example to show for it. I was drained; my bones were aching and it seemed as if my blood had clotted and it wasn't flowing again. Worse of all, with the number of people still coming in through the double glass doors of the restaurant where I worked and which was buzzing with noise as if it was noon and not five pm, it seemed like I was not going home anytime soon.

"What are you doing relaxing on the kitchen door, Gina Georgia?"

I turned around quickly to see the five foot thick black-skinned Mr Smith who happened to be my manager.

I quickly stood at alert. My body was already aching; so I could not afford one hour ranting from Mr Smith which I knew was bound to come if he for any moment thought I was not being alert at my job..

"I was waiting for the chefs to serve the orders I have given to them so I could serve our customers" I quickly said.

For a moment, he looked at me looking for another complaint to pick on so he could still get to do his one hour ranting but having found none, he said, "Get serious with work."

Oh please.

With a stiff smile plastered on my face, I watched him strode to his office before reclining back on the kitchen doorway before I would be called to get my orders.

Okay, I didn't hate my job here, at least not that much.

The pay was pretty okay. I don't know how I would have been affording my mum bills at the nursing home otherwise. Or assist my boyfriend, Ken Harrison, financially since he got laid off from work at the construction site four months ago.

We have been dating for six months now and he seemed like a really nice guy.

After all I had been through with guys, it was nice having a supportive and loyal boyfriend for a change. So the fact that he was presently unemployed was not going to make me love him less, not when he had made me really feel special in the last six months

That was why I was still at the job. The great pay was why most of us were still at the restaurant working our asses off everyday despite the fact that it was seriously understaffed.

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6: 40pm.

Finally, the day was over.

Outside, I instantly felt the evening wind chill my face making the beads of sweat that had formed around my forehead evaporate instantly. I wrapped my coat tighter around me as I began to walk to my apartment.

While thinking about Ken and how I had not talked to him on the phone today because of my busy schedule at work, a sharp movement made me turn my eyes to the other side of the street. At first, because it had become more dark, all I could see were silhouettes walking in the same direction that I was going to, then my eyes got accustomed to the darkness and I could make out the outlines of  the persons who I counted as three; two tall persons with a shorter one.

On finally seeing their faces well, I froze, my blood running cold immediately.

My head became hazy as if filled with clouds. My legs became heavy as if they were wooden instead of pumping with flesh and blood.

I continued to walk even though my legs were doing their best to resist doing that so the three of them —A man, a woman and a child —would not get ahead of me.

Was that Ken?

Did I see correctly?

As I looked at the features of the man— my eyes studying his blond hair and muscular build in the poor light— I knew for sure he was my boyfriend, Ken, who was wrapping his hands around the waist of the woman who I had never seen before. The woman was using her left hand to hold the hand of the child as they walked.

It was the sight of the child that made me feel as if I was going to faint right there.

The child who seemed to be only three years old looked exactly like the pictures that Ken had once showed me of himself when he was around that age from his childhood photo album.

Okay, what the hell is going on here?

Steeling myself for anything that might happen and energized with adrenaline, I walked the few steps that would lead me across the road to where they were.

They heard me approaching and turned in my direction.

I watched Ken eyes widen to saucers in shock when he saw me then he drew the woman beside him closer to him as if protecting her from me.

What? What the fuck!

"Hello, Ken," I said, trying so hard to keep any drop of emotion from my voice.

"Hey, Gee." He said casually as if we were talking about something else that was not serious. He used the tone that he usually uses when he played with my hair while I lay across his thighs on the sofa as we watched N*****x and talked casually at the same time.

I blinked my eyes in confusion. If I say I understood a bit of the scene playing before my eyes, I would be lying.

The woman who had her black hair packed in a bun at the back of her head and was wearing a dull coloured long sleeved gown looked so uncomfortable that I felt that if I made one wrong move in her direction, she might start to run. She stared at me while holding the child who was looking at me with vivid blue eyes that were filled with curiosity.

It was the same eyes that had made it so easy for me to fall in love with Ken. The way his blue eyes lit up with emotions whenever we were together…it was a source of immense pleasure to look at them. Now, seeing those particular eyes on the face of a child I never knew before hurt me deeply. I knew for real that something very absurd was happening.

"Ken, who is she?" I asked, waiting for him to say something…anything for it all to make sense so we both can laugh over it later in the apartment that we shared.

"Oh. So sorry, Gee. Forgive my manners. Honey, —" he turned to the woman "This is my friend, the one I told you that helps me a lot. The one that has done a lot for me."

What the fuck?

I was immediately doused in sweat even though the evening air was still very cool. My clothes stuck to my body.

Shocked to my bone marrow, I watched him turn to me.

"Gee, this is my wife, Kate and my son, Luke." He said with a brief smile.

His wife? His son?

Somebody shoot me, please.

I wanted to believe it was a sort of sick joke.

But one look at Luke who was getting agitated by the tension and was tugging on his mother's arms already so she could carry him up, I knew Ken was not lying at all. That there were no lies. That all what was happening was very real

Right there and then, my world shattered.

"You bastard!" I said, blinding pain and anger dripping from both words.

"Ken, how dare you?" I asked, willing all my strength that I could summon to fight back my tears.

One thing I would not give this asshole is the advantage of seeing me cry over what he had done for me.

His friend? His friend that helps him a lot? Is…is that how he had described me to this woman after eight months of dating?

------

When I remembered all that I had done to help this bastard, anger began to heat up tremendously in me, taking the place of the pain that was tearing my insides to bits.

I would work my ass out in King Restsurant every fucking day besides Off days so I could get enough money to take care of both of us since he became unemployed.

I was the one paying the rent for the apartment we both shared. The taxes, the electricity bills and every other bill, I paid them with love in my heart, waiting for the time that Ken would finally get a better job than the one that had laid him off. I thought there was a future in both of us and so I invested in it with everything in me only to have it all crashing around me.

Thinking about the sacrifices I had made for this cheating son of a bitch made every part of me ache.

I looked at him. The fact that there was not even a single drop of remorse in his blue eyes, that his attitude was so casual as if he didn't just shatter my heart to pieces made me want to go clawing at him till there were bruises over him.

I wanted him to feel half of what I was feeling. I wanted him to tremble.

To know the hurt of the highest height. To know the agony of the greatest gravity. To know the pain of the deepest depth.

As I was about to start shouting and kicking him and making a scene, something made my glance go to Kate who was looking very stressed out by what was happening and was using her free hand to rub her stomach that was protruding out from the rest of her body.

I widened my eyes. She was pregnant.

Remembering how my elder sister, Emily, had had two miscarriages because she had been in a toxic marriage, I paused in mid way from hitting Ken in anger.

I was not about to be responsible for making a woman lost the child in her womb because I was angry. I knew too well how it had shattered Emily. For days, she had cried that the stress from being in constant fear of her husband's emotional assault had never been healthy for her unborn children to thrive.

Seeing Emily's tears in my mind's eye was what stopped me from making the scene I wanted to make.

I breathed in and out trying to calm my spirit.

I would cry later. I would mourn how gullible I had been falling for this cheating bastard later. I would feel all these emotions rioting in me later.

Without looking at the man who had made me like him for the two months of being friends before being his lover for the next six months and then had finally shattered me today, I fixed my gaze at Kate who grew more uncomfortable with every second my eyes were on her.

I pasted a stiff smile on my dry lips and outstretched my hands forward as if for a hand shake before letting them fall flatly at my sides.

I made sure that my voice was not going to embarrass me by trembling before I finally spoke.

"Let me properly introduce myself here. shall I, seeing as Ken here could not do that? Or rather, should I say he was not specific?"

Kate did not say anything to that.. Rather, she drew her child closer to herself and visibly swallowed.

"Well, I am Gina, as Ken rightly said. But I am not his friend. I am his girlfriend. No, not am, make that was. I was his girlfriend for six months as of two hours ago. So that means your husband has been cheating on you, maybe not just with me. Who knows he may have been cheating on another person with you. Someone he met before you. Someone after you.”

“Trust me, this son of a bitch can do that. He said I am his friend who helps him a lot. Considering that I was dumb enough to literally take care of his needs because he was laid off from work for about four months now, I guess he was right. Foolish me thought I was in love. That will never happen again."

I was so damn proud of how I was speaking without my voice breaking.

I could see Kate tremble slightly beside Ken as she looked at me. I could not believe that Ken was standing there, not saying anything, not even to his defense.

I continued, "Am I angry with you even though I suspect you play a part in your husband's treachery? No. Rather, I pity you and your children, both the one in your arm and in your womb. Any person who is stuck to this son of a bitch who calls you his wife is bound to be miserable forever. Not a curse or a threat. It's just facts. "

I looked at them both when I took a pause. Shame only bloomed bright red on the face of Kate. Ken was now standing, arms akimbo.

"Is that all?" He asked calmly

"You had the guts to ask that? Man, you really have a lot of nerve, Ken. I regret the day at that studio where I had met you. I regret the last eight months of knowing you."

I wanted to start insulting him with the nastiest curses flying to my mind left and right but I suspected that it would not shake him or do anything to the situation. so it was pointless. Besides, his son was there. No way, I would make Ken make me stoop so low to start swearing in front of a three year old child.

"I don't want you at the house until I am gone by tomorrow. I would have told you to pack out instead but the house would contain too many memories of you that would make me feel sick to my stomach. So keep the house for you and your family. I doubt you can renew the rent when it is time, anyway."

I turned on my heels and left them. Since it was darkness and nobody would really see unless they came very close, I let the tears fall.