Four

4

Anna's POV 

My hands trembled as I stared at the papers again, his harsh words make me cry more. I swallowed hard with determination and signed the papers.

I couldn’t believe this was happening. I couldn’t believe that the man I had loved so much was now treating me like an ordinary strangers and freak, something to be discarded.

"You’re a coward," I spat, throwing the papers back at him. "You want a divorce right? Fine. But don’t you dare blame me for this. You’re the one who destroyed us, Michael.  You destroyed our marriage with your lies.”

He didn’t even flinch a bit. The papers scattered around the floor. Instead, he turned to Sophie, wrapping an arm around her shoulders and kissing her right in front of me. "I’m sorry it had to be like this, Anna. But this is what’s best for both of us. You’ll understand that one day. But for now…deal with your heart break"

I felt sick to my stomach as I watched them together, doing crazy things in front of me. The reality of my situation hits me. I was losing everything, my husband, my home, my dreams of a family. Everything I had worked so hard for was slipping off my fingers in just a twinkle of an eye.

“Why, Michael?” I choked out, struggling to keep my voice as calmly as possible.  “Why are you doing this to me? To us?”

Michael finally looked at me, with a deadly gaze, almost as if he were looking through me rather than at me. “I’ve already told you, Anna. This isn’t working. We’re not working. Sophie and I... we’re going to have a baby. I need to be with her now. She needs me more”

His words hit me hard. A baby? My vision was clouded with tears streaming down my face. How ironic after so many painful years of infertility, seeking to have a child for ourselves, he’s now getting someone else pregnant. Just as his mother had predicted.

“Michael, please,” I pleaded softly, my voice shaky. “We can work on this. We could go for therapy, we could try again. Do not throw away everything we have built together.”

“Anna it is over between us!”, replied Michael in anger and impatience that was almost palpable. “Sophie is pregnant and this what counts now. I must be there for her and our baby.”

Sophie, stepped out in front of me. She has been so quiet since the discussion. She robbed her hands on her belly, I watched as she gently caressed her small bump, it was so painful and devastating to watch. It was as if she was staking her claim, reminding me of what I could never give Michael. That I'm barren.

“I’m sorry, Anna,” Sophie said softly, her voice laced with regret and mockery at the same time. “I never wanted it to happen like this. I never wanted to hurt you.”

Her words were actually meant to console me, but they only twisted the knife deeper into my heart. I felt so tired, my limbs were aching badly.My husband was leaving me for another woman—a woman who was carrying his child.

“You never wanted to hurt me?” I repeated, my voice rising as the anger surged within me. “How can you stand there and say that when you’ve destroyed my entire life? My whole being!”

Sophie flinched in fear, the harshness in my voice scared her to the marrows. She pretended to feel tired holding her waist.

 Michael immediately stepped between us, his expression hardening. “That’s enough, Anna. Sophie is not the enemy here. I made the decision to leave you because this marriage is toxic, and it’s high time we both move on.”

“Toxic?” I spat the word back at him, disbelief and rage coloring my tone. “This marriage became toxic because you let it, Michael. You lied to me, you cheated on me, and now you’re blaming me for your selfish mistakes?”

“You know what? Both of you should get out, and rot in hell!” I said, my voice shaking with barely contained fury. “Both of you, just get out of my sight.”

Michael wanted to speak but I'm already tired of hearing his fake excuses.

I turned swiftly and rushed down the stairs.I needed to get away from here, to escape the nightmare that my life had become.

Tears that I had been holding back finally breaking free.

Christmas Eve was supposed to be time for celebration, but all I felt was pain and emptiness. Michael very man I had loved with all my heart was gone, and I was left with nothing but memories of what could have been. I immediately slide our wedding ring and threw it right into the wastebin including the gift.

I rushed to the kitchen, gasping for breath as I tried to calm myself down. I searched around the kitchen for something to calm me down but I couldn't find anything.

Finally, my eyes caught something on counter, it was a small glass filled with the concoction my mother-in-law had been forcing me to drink every day. The herbal mixture was supposed to help with my fertility, to give me the one thing I had wanted more than anything—a child.

Without second thought, I reached for the bottle of herbs and began mixing another glass, my hands shaking as I poured the dark liquid. My vision blurred with tears, but I didn’t care. I was desperate, I needed to take anything I see at the moment even if it's an overdose of the concoction.

I am willing to try anything to make this pain go away. If drinking this concoction could somehow erase the hurt, then I would drink every drop.

I gulped it down, the bitter taste burned my throat but I didn't care. Instead of feeling any better, I felt even more hopeless. The reality of my situation still haunts me down, suffocating me with its weight.

I threw the glass into the sink, watching as it shattered into pieces, much like my life had just done. I couldn’t stay here anymore, not in this house, not with the memories of what had just happened. I needed to get out, to run as far away as I could.

I stormed out of the house immediately into the cold night breeze.

My tears blurring my vision as I rushed down the street. I had no idea where I was going; all I knew was that I needed to get away, to escape the pain that was tearing me apart inside.

I ran until I couldn’t run anymore, my legs hurts so much. I collapsed onto a bench in the middle of a deserted park. The cold breeze hits my skin causing cold shivers down my spine. All I could feel was the emptiness inside me, that no amount of tests could fill.

How had it come to this? How had my life fallen apart so completely, so irreversibly? I had done everything that I'm supposed to do dutifully as a wife, everything. I had loved Michael with all my heart, I had sacrificed for him, I had tried so hard to make him happy. And yet, it hadn’t been enough. But cheating was enough for him.

I wanted to scream, to cry out for someone to help me, but the words couldn't come out, strangled by the weight of my grief. I finally realized that I was alone, truly alone, for the first time in my life.

Just then two men surrounded me suspiciously. The look drunk and staggering. Fear gripped me at their sight.

“Hey pretty! You want a night snap with the boys?” One of them asked drunkenly and licking his lips.

“Come here…you would love it.” The other said and they headed to my way. My heart sunk into my stomach immediately.