“The bedroom will go to Valerie. Tonight, you just make do and sleep inside the guest room.”

Isaac made a direct decision. Worried that I might keep bothering him, he warned me, “Kendall, don’t forget, this house is mine.”

“You already don’t have a home in Oakland. You’d better stop showing those small tempers. If you keep causing scenes, how will that look?”

My chest felt as though it had been sliced open by a sharp knife, blood seeping, the pain unbearable.

Sure enough, the longer a person stayed beside you, the more they understood how to hurt your heart.

After sitting blankly inside the guest room for thirty minutes, I finally remembered that I had gotten caught in the rain and needed to shower to chase away the cold.

When heading upstairs to grab clothes, I heard the unclear and suggestive breathing of the two people coming through the crack in the door.

Valerie lay beneath him and spoke shyly, “Brother Isaac, you’re so good to me. I just mentioned wanting to come to your place for some fun, and you actually brought me in front of that long-faced woman.”

Isaac gently pressed a kiss onto the sweat on her forehead. “She has no family or friends in Oakland. If she leaves me, she has nowhere else to go.”

“She’s only a miserable and burdensome parasite. How could she ever match your scent, baby?”

The two of them stayed sticky-sweet, starting another round of their fight.

I stood by the doorway with cold limbs, the sharp pain making my throat unable to make any sound.

Compared with Isaac’s betrayal, what I could not accept even more was his line, “a miserable and burdensome parasite.”

From start to finish, it was clear I had never received his preference. Whether in love or in marriage, I had always relied on myself.

Anything Isaac bought for me, I would give back a present of the same worth to him.

Late at night, smoke choked me awake.

The instant I opened my eyes, thick smoke rolled everywhere, and the fire had already spread close to me.

I had no time to think. I pushed open the window, planning to jump out. The guest room was on the ground floor; nothing would happen.

But when I noticed the fully locked metal bars on the window, my entire body stopped in place.

These bars clearly were not there when I left earlier this morning!

“Kendall, does being stuck feel nice?” Valerie’s voice came from the doorway.

I grabbed the blanket and rushed into the washroom to soak it with water, threw it over my body, and kicked the weak door open.

Valerie was shocked by my move and shouted.

I did not even look sideways as I shoved Valerie away and walked straight out.

Just after stepping outside, I collapsed from having no strength.

In a daze, I saw Isaac standing in front of the doctor, coldly scolding, “Hurry and give Valerie a full-body exam. If anything happens to her, all of you will answer for it!”

The doctor paused. “But that woman is already three months pregnant, and she breathed in too much smoke and dust. If she is not treated quickly, she may end up with a lifelong coughing illness…”

Isaac said coldly, “Don’t bother about her. Hurry and look at Valerie first. Didn’t you notice Valerie’s skin has already been burned?”

I slipped back into unconsciousness again.

When I woke up, waves of numbness and pain spread through my arm.

Isaac pushed the door open and walked in, his face gentle. “How is it? Do you feel better?”

Thinking about the scene before I passed out, I opened my lips, but in the end, I said nothing.

Isaac set down the meal box. “I’ll help feed you.”

Just as his words ended, his phone rang again with that exclusive custom ringtone.

He gave me a guilty look, then lied to me, “Kendall, a client is asking for me. I might not be able to stay with you.”

“You be good, eat your food, take your medicine, and cooperate with the doctor’s checkup. After I finish my work, I’ll come see you.”

Isaac rushed away quickly, even forgetting to shut the hospital room door.

At that moment, two young nurses walked past. Seeing Isaac’s face, they immediately spoke out.

“Did you see? It is that man from a moment ago. Just because the woman in the SVIP private room on the sixth floor gets a small burn on her skin and is scared of pain and marks and feels upset, he goes to look for human skin for a transplant.”

“So loving. I hear that in two days he also holds a big fireworks show for that girl…”

The nurses’ talking voices slowly faded away, but my heart could not settle.

I gradually looked at the arm covered in a bandage, a thought about to break out from the bottom of my heart.

I called the doctor and asked for the bandage to be taken off.

At the moment I saw the dark red skin, my heart completely went cold.

Together with the small bit of remaining feeling for Isaac, it all disappeared without any sign.

Three years of deep love, five years of marriage, in the end, could not compare with fifteen days together.

After being hospitalized for an entire day, Isaac didn’t come to visit me, and he also did not send any message.

However, I heard from nurses walking by that Isaac was keeping Valerie company. To make her smile, he even went to catch hundreds of fireflies and placed them in her room.

Before, when I saw fireflies in storybooks, I had really wanted them and had often asked Isaac to take me to watch them.

Yet he always used many reasons to avoid it, even telling me, “That is only fake things made up in storybooks, meant to trick simple young girls like you.”

But now, hundreds of fireflies, caught whenever he decided to.

By this time, what else do I not understand? It was never that he was unable to do it; it was only that he did not love me enough.

Valerie’s Facebook was updated right on time.

In the picture, she sat sideways on the hospital bed, and on her belly, there was a head leaning to listen.

Caption: [My dear one is now raised to the child’s father. Before knowing it, he gets one more role.]

Child.

These words pulled at the deepest place in my heart.

In the past, I had also planned to have a child with Isaac after our wedding. But he had strongly backed me, “My sweet baby, do anything you like. No need to be tied down by this role.”

Later, I asked him, “If I never have children in my whole life, will you be upset? Or look for another woman to have a baby for you?”

Back then, Isaac promised seriously, his eyes very sure. “Of course not. In this lifetime, only you are my real love. You like to focus on your career, then I will be your strong support.”

But when I truly became pregnant, Isaac turned completely uncaring, even ignoring whether I was alive or dead.

The following day, I got the notice that the updated documents were finished.

After pushing the call button, I told the doctor. “Please help me abort this child.”

The doctor looked a bit unwilling. “Does the child’s father know about this?”

I remembered the picture on Facebook where Isaac leaned down near Valerie’s stomach, and my stomach turned violently.

Holding back the discomfort, I hardly said, “He doesn’t have to know.”

When I walked out of the abortion room, I happened to meet Isaac guiding Valerie toward the bathroom.

When he noticed me, a brief look of worry appeared in Isaac’s eyes.

“Kendall, why are you here?”

His eyes were just about to move past me when a sudden cry came from the bathroom.

It was Valerie’s voice.

Isaac almost immediately rushed inside without turning back, lifting Valerie in his arms as he moved past me.

From start to finish, he did not even give me one more look.

Eight years of love, it was time for the curtain to fall.

When I got Isaac’s phone call, I had just taken the newly approved documents and, at the same time, booked tomorrow’s plane ticket.

There was a slight testing tone in Isaac’s voice. “Kendall, how are you feeling today? Valerie and I only happened to meet by chance. There is completely nothing going on between us.”

“It has nothing to do with me.” My voice sounded cold.

Isaac believed I was acting jealous and upset. He tried to comfort me several times. When he saw that I gave no reply at all, he could not stop himself from acting proud.

“Kendall, don’t make this too unpleasant. I first planned to get a surprise ready for you tomorrow, but your behavior makes me very unhappy.”

“Valerie is only a young girl. As her leader, giving her some help is not too much, right?”

“Also, she had an accident in our home. If I don’t properly stay with her, what if she takes you to court?”

Hearing Isaac talk in a way that sounded like it was for my benefit, I laughed coldly in my heart.

Whether it was for me or for me, Isaac couldn’t possibly fail to understand this.

I replied coldly, “Isaac, do anything you like. From this moment on, it has nothing to do with me.”

After ending the call, I went back to the villa to gather my belongings.

Noticing that most of the items were already burned, I didn’t feel even the smallest emotion.

After quickly arranging the things I could bring, I headed to a hotel and booked a room.

I had just completed my shower and was drying my hair when my phone suddenly rang.

I picked up the call, and Isaac’s voice sounded out.

“Kendall, if you have a problem, come to me. What kind of ability is it to get others to cause trouble for Valerie?! Did she offend you?”

“I already told you a long time ago that I am completely clean with her. Why do you just refuse to trust me?”

For a short moment, I had no words, unsure how to answer back.

During the past eight years, Isaac had kept me too carefully, unable to argue, unable to answer back, like a canary he kept in a simple two-point-one-line life.

When he noticed I gave no reply, Isaac harshly scolded, “Kendall, I truly did not think you would be this cruel. Valerie still carries a child in her belly. You cannot get pregnant yourself, so you’re jealous enough to hurt another person’s baby.”

“You really make me feel sick! I do not want to meet you for the next few days. Think over your behavior carefully.”

After saying this, Isaac ended the call.

Hearing the beep sound, my chest hurt with a dull pain.

On the trip to the airport, I stayed on Isaac’s contact in my friend list for a full three minutes.

In the end, I blocked and deleted it in one clean move.

At the instant of removal, I felt a relief I had never felt before.

While waiting to board, I noticed a hot trending alert on my phone.

[Shocking! Wealthy CEO uses hundreds of billions to put on a fireworks display just to win his new love’s smile.]

I quietly slid away that notice, then took out the SIM card, broke it, and tossed it into the trash bin.

Following the boarding announcement, I got on the airplane flying over the sea.

At the moment the plane took off, I looked out through the window in a blank state.

Goodbye, my eight years.

Goodbye, my hometown.

We wouldn’t see each other again, Isaac.