I stood outside the house, looking through the window, taking in the cozy dining room.

John, my husband who'd supposedly died two years ago, was sitting in front of a birthday cake. Adaline, my dear friend who claimed she'd gone abroad for work, placed a birthday hat on him.

Greta Parker, my mother-in-law, and Henry Foster, my own son, who'd repeatedly left on trips without me the last few years, were now clapping their hands and singing the birthday song.

They looked like such a warm and loving family of four, while I stood outside in the summer night breeze, feeling chilled to the bone.

For the last two years, I'd dreamed of such a scene every night. Yet it was now right before me, mocking me cruelly.

John clasped his hands together and closed his eyes to make a wish. "I wish for our family to always be safe and happy, and I hope we will never be separated."

That was the last straw that broke me.

My birthday had turned into his death anniversary. And on his birthdays, I would drown myself in booze to numb the grief.

These last two birthdays had caused me nothing but pain, like thorns driven deep into my heart. Yet here he was, wishing for his family to be safe and happy.

Only I wasn't included in this family of his.

It felt as if something had clenched around my heart, the unbearable pain making it hard for me to breathe.

Henry was happily munching his cake while saying, "I wish I could fake my death like you did, Dad! That way, I'll get to stay with Adaline all the time, too!"

"Don't you dare!" Greta chided him at once. "You still need to inherit the family company, Henry. We can't let that damned Cecilia get everything!"

John frowned. "Mom, don't talk about Cecilia like that. She has had to manage the company on her own for the last two years while taking care of you and Henry—"

"Fine. I'll stop," Greta interrupted impatiently.

Greta had never liked me from the start, and after John's supposed death, she despised me even more. She blamed me for insisting on going to the island that day. She said I was responsible for his death.

Feeling guilty myself, I allowed her to lash out at me and hit me as she pleased. But in the end, she turned out to be the best actress in the family.

I took a deep breath and raised my hand to knock on the door. When Adaline opened it and saw me, her eyes widened in horror.

Only then did I realize that she was pregnant.

"Congratulations! You're almost due, aren't you? Why didn't you tell your best friend about your pregnancy?"

Adaline's face turned ghostly pale. Her lips parted, but no words came out.

I stepped right past her and entered the house. Everyone was thunderstruck to see me.

Smirking, I stared right at the birthday boy. "Happy birthday, my dear husband."

John was frozen stiff.

Out of nowhere, I grabbed the cake and threw it to the floor. It just so happened to fall right beside Adaline, making her jump in alarm.

John rushed over at once to steady her, looking extremely nervous.

Henry stomped on my foot angrily. "You nasty woman! How dare you bully my mom! Get the hell out of here!"

I stared at the boy who was glowering at me, his expression hostile. I couldn't understand how the son I gave birth to after much difficulty and cherished with my whole heart would end up behaving like this toward me.

Frowning, John reprimanded him. "Don't be so rude to your mother, Henry!"

His eyes flickered with remorse as he turned to me next. "Cecilia, I can explain—"

I gave him a hard slap, but at the very next moment, my own ears were ringing as my head flew to the side.

"How dare you hit him!" Greta screeched at me. "You're the one who got in between John and Addy in the first place! You're the real homewrecker!"

Eyes red, I smiled bitterly and asked, "Am I?"

John avoided my gaze, neither confirming nor denying it.

The marriage I'd cherished and devoted myself to ended up being nothing more than a joke. The marriage certificate was just a meaningless piece of paper.

Adaline abruptly dropped to her knees, tears streaming down her face.

"It's all my fault, Cece. I'm the shameless one. I betrayed our friendship…"

She kept crying, becoming increasingly agitated. The emotional distress ended up affecting her baby. Clutching her abdomen, she gasped in pain.

I instinctively reached out to help her up, only to be shoved aside. I crashed right into a flower pot and fell onto the broken shards of pottery.

John picked Adaline up in his arms and left without a second glance. Greta also grabbed Henry and rushed off behind them.

But before leaving, she jabbed her finger at me and screamed, "If anything happens to my grandson, I'll make your life a living hell!"

I sat on the pile of broken pottery shards, my blood getting everywhere. It was a devastating sight.

My eyes were fixed on the wedding portrait hung up on the wall, depicting the garden wedding ceremony John and Adaline held.

When we got married, I wanted to do it at a chapel, but John refused. I'd never seen him as adamant about something as he'd been then.

Only did it all make sense to me—Adaline was the one who had a thing for garden weddings.

The pain in my chest suffocated me.

Just then, I got a video call from the 32-year-old John. As soon as it connected, he raged at me.

"Cecilia! Why did the date for Addy and my son's birthday move up? What did you do to cause her to go into premature labor? Are you trying to ruin Addy and force her to end up like you just because you can't have children anymore?"

My mind went completely blank, and my throat felt all clogged up.

"What did you say?" I asked.

John froze, realizing that he'd let the truth slip out by accident. Pursing his lips, he hesitated for a few seconds before coming clean.

"Addy was the one who arranged for you to be pushed down the stairs at the mall, causing your miscarriage."

My breath hitched, and my heart seemed to stop beating.

After John supposedly died, I began to starve myself, refusing to eat or drink anything. I spent all my time clutching his urn, crying my heart out. That went on until I found out I was pregnant.

That unborn child reignited my desire to live—but just two days later, I was shoved down the stairs and ended up miscarrying the baby.

It'd broken me completely. I started swallowing antidepressants by the handful, unable to stop myself from trying to take my own life.

It was Adaline who stayed by my side, doing everything she could to help me recover. She's accompanied me through that dark period and helped me emerge from the shadows.

But now, I was told that she was the murderer responsible for killing my unborn child. She had also taken from me the chance to ever have another child.

My blood ran cold.

"Addy did it for your sake. If you kept that baby, it would've only been a burden to you. She just didn't expect the miscarriage to leave you infertile. She was afraid you'd be upset, so she forbade everyone from telling you about it. All along, she's been doing what's best for you—"

"Doing what's best for me?" I cut John off.

It sounded so absurd to hear him say that.

"She made me miscarry my child and left me infertile because that was what's best for me? That's the biggest joke I've ever heard in my life. What about when she betrayed me, then? Did she get into bed with you because that was what's best for me, too?"

John's expression darkened, and his voice turned icy. "Don't be so unreasonable, Cecilia!"

My whole body trembled as I pressed my hand to my broken and mutilated heart. Tears poured down my face.

When John saw the tears, his eyes flickered with pity. Just as he was about to speak, Adaline's voice rang out from the other end of the call.

"Who are you chatting with, darling? It's our 5th wedding anniversary today. You said you'd set off fireworks across the entire city as a gift to me…"

John ended the video call in a panic.

I let out a bitter laugh. He'd said the same thing to me on our 5th wedding anniversary. At the time, I'd looked forward to it with such eager anticipation. But what did I get instead?

"Sorry, Cece."

Those were the words he greeted me with. He went on to explain that he'd accidentally smashed the Lego set that Adaline had already built halfway. She wanted him to issue a public apology all across the city before she'd forgive him.

All this time, he'd always put her first. Why was I such a fool that I never connected the dots before?

When I arrived at the hospital, I heard cheerful laughter coming from Adaline's hospital room.

"My new brother is so cute! I love him!" Henry declared.

"My new grandson is so precious. He has his mom's eyes and his dad's mouth…"

Greta and Henry hovered around the baby while John gently fed Adaline some soup. "I had the housekeeper prepare the soup with your favorite shrimp."

He blew on every spoonful to make sure it wasn't too hot before feeding it to her.

John never remembered any of my preferences, but he knew all of Adaline's like the back of his hand. They'd grown up together, so I always told myself it was only because we hadn't known each other long enough. Surely, after a decade or two of a loving marriage, he would come to know my likes and dislikes just as well.

But now, I figured it out. Time was never the issue. It was only ever a matter of whether he'd bothered making the effort.

Adaline was the first to notice me standing at the door. Her eyes turned red, and she choked out, "You're here to see me, Cece. Does that mean you're willing to forgive me now?"

Greta immediately cradled the baby in her arms, her expression wary.

Meanwhile, Henry ran toward me and tried to push me out of the room.

"Go away! I won't let you hurt my mom and my brother!"

John grabbed Henry and admonished him, so he threw herself into Adaline's arms and started wailing.

My heart twisted painfully as I looked at John.

"Let's get a divorce."

John froze. Adaline looked as if she wanted to say something, but in the end, all she managed was a tearful "I'm sorry."

Henry was busy cheering in excitement, while Greta simply scoffed. "This should've happened ages ago. Addy was always meant to be Mrs. Foster!"

This whole time, Greta had refused to complete the paperwork to issue John's death certificate. I'd assumed it was because she couldn't accept that her son had died before her, but now I knew that this was the moment she'd been waiting for all along.

Sneering, I turned around and left.

It took a month for the divorce to be finalized, which felt both painfully long and unbelievably short. Once the divorce certificate was issued, our eight-year marriage officially came to an end.

John called out to me, his tone remorseful. "I'll leave the house to you. You can—"

I walked off without paying him any attention. Every corner of that house held the memories of him and me, each one covered in blood-stained thorns. Why would I want to keep it?

When I arrived at the cemetery to visit my parents' graves, I found Adaline kneeling in front of their gravestones, crying remorsefully.

"I'm so sorry, Mr. and Mrs. Jamison. I hurt Cece terribly! I once promised you that I would take good care of her, but I broke my promise. I'm sorry…"

Mom and Dad had died in a fire while saving her. When she'd felt so guilty that she tried to take her own life to make it up to me, I stopped her.

I treated her as the one thing my parents had left to me—my only family.

Who would've thought that she would team up with the man I loved the most to stab me so deeply in the heart?

I shoved her away and screamed in fury, "Get lost! Don't sully my parents' ears with the details of your sordid affair with John!"

With reddened eyes, Adaline carefully reached for my hand. "I'm sorry, Cece. I truly didn't mean for any of this to happen. We're still best friends, aren't we?"

I scoffed at her. "All because you wanted to avoid facing the situation, you chose to drag me, an innocent person, into your twisted romance with John. And then, because you couldn't control yourself, you got into bed with my husband. You helped him fake his death so that you two could live happily ever after!

"And worst of all, you killed my child! How can you be shameless enough to still say that we're best friends, Adaline?"

With all the strength I could muster, I slapped her hard across the face. She lost her balance and smashed her forehead against my parents' gravestone.

As her blood started to flow, John showed up out of nowhere. Once he saw the blood, he became outraged.

"Cecilia! Have you lost your mind? Addy is your best friend! She came to visit your parents as soon as she recovered from labor! Why are you treating her like that?"

I shouted right back at him, "I don't need her to visit my parents! Get lost! My parents aren't interested in seeing a bunch of filthy cheaters like you two!"

John's chest heaved with anger. "Fine! You don't want to let us visit them, huh?"

He grabbed a nearby shovel and raised it in the air.

My breath caught, and my heart stopped. "What are you doing?"

But even before I finished speaking, the shovel slammed against the gravestone with a deafening crash. It cracked and broke into two.

However, John wasn't satisfied yet. He raised the shovel again.

"Mom! Dad!" I screamed in despair as I threw myself over the remaining slab of stone.

John couldn't stop in time, and the shovel smacked right against my back. I spat out a mouthful of blood.

After freezing in shock, he was just about to rush over to me when Adaline suddenly fainted. Without the slightest hesitation, he scooped her up and dashed off.

Before long, the 32-year-old John sent me a message.

"Cecilia! Why does Addy have a new scar on her forehead now? Did you do it? I'm warning you—don't you dare hurt her again!"

I ignored him. Scalding tears dripped onto the photo of Mom and Dad on the broken part of the gravestone.

"I'm taking you guys away from here…"

…

At the hospital, after learning that Adaline only had a mild concussion, John finally exhaled in relief. Only then did he suddenly remember that I'd been injured as well and spat out a lot of blood.

He quickly tried to call me, but the calls went unanswered. Panicking, he rushed back to the cemetery, only to find that the gravestone had been completely removed. Even the urn had been dug out.

My phone was lying on the ground, on top of a medical examination report.

John crouched down to take a look. His eyes widened in shock, and his heart almost stopped beating.

Just then, the phone started ringing, and the profile photo that popped up looked very familiar. It belonged to the account he hadn't used in two years now.