Chapter 4

I circled December 31 in red on my desk calendar.

That was the day my bone cancer would kill me.

My death warranted only a few lines. It was so ordinary that it happened on an otherwise unremarkable New Year’s Eve.

On the day I died, Ethan would be at work.

He would buy flowers on his way home, then find me lying quietly on the couch. Only when he went to hold me would he discover that my body had long since gone cold.

Today was July 16.

I had less than five months until my death.

Ethan had been gone for an entire month.

When he finally came home, he still smelled faintly of disinfectant.

I reheated dinner and set it gently on the coffee table in front of him, then asked where he had been.

He tugged off his tie impatiently. “You know perfectly well.”

Hearing the blame in his voice, I frowned slightly.

“Ethan, have I done something to upset you? I didn’t say anything inappropriate at the wedding.”

I had even handled the bad press afterward.

For a week after the wedding, I worked nonstop. I went three straight days without sleep, all so I could explain things to the media.

“The woman who called during the wedding is a close friend of Ethan’s. They had a misunderstanding over something minor and hadn’t spoken for a long time.”

“Neither of us knew she had cancer. Ethan went to her as a friend. After all, we can reschedule a wedding. But once someone is gone, there’s nothing you can do.”

Even I knew my explanation was flimsy and absurd.

Ethan had appeared before the press with Vanessa before. Under countless flashing cameras, he had openly declared:

“Vanessa is someone I love deeply.”

A lover, not a friend.

The beloved woman who had stayed beside him abroad through four years of financial hardship and emotional struggle.

That history let Vanessa cause as much trouble as she pleased. She could act like a spoiled little girl and make Ethan go four blocks out of his way to buy her favorite salted-caramel ice cream.

She had been spoiled by her lover for four years and helped him climb from poverty into the elite.

From any angle, I looked like the other woman.

But I clearly remembered the third time I rejected Ethan’s advances.

He told me, “Vanessa hates salted-caramel ice cream. You’re the only one who’s ever loved that flavor, Claire.”

Then why, Ethan, when I said I wanted ice cream, did you tell me that shop no longer made salted caramel?

I went to check. Just as you said, they had stopped making it because the two new owners didn’t like it.

But one owner’s last name was Reed. The other’s was Hayes.

I knew exactly what kind of existence I had, so I was always careful around Ethan.

Like a sapling desperate for shelter beneath a towering tree.

Even after I lowered myself and made it clear that I was willing to be gracious about the wedding disaster, it wasn’t enough.

Ethan paused while taking off his jacket. Then his movements suddenly turned angry, and he flung it onto the couch.

“Claire, you already knew Vanessa had bone cancer. Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Do you hate her that much? Do you want her dead?”

“I’ve already married you. What else do you want from me?”