Kent Delgado stood in the doorway, and the instant he saw me, his pupils shrank.
"You're home? I missed you so much~"
As he passed me, he dropped his voice low enough for only me to hear:
"Philippa, go home first."
He didn't look at me once. He just shut the door.
I stood outside for a long time. Then I heard him say:
"Charlotte, were you a good girl while I was gone?"
That tenderness in his voice was one I knew by heart. My nose stung, and before I could stop it, the tears fell.
I hadn't been home long when Kent came back too.
"Why are you sitting in the dark?" He frowned, studying me.
"Kent, why did you betray me?"
I forced the sob back down.
He sat down in front of me and gripped my hands tight.
"Philippa, don't read too much into it. It's just a misunderstanding. She's a younger girl I know. There's nothing between us."
Everything I'd seen at that mansion today flashed through my mind.
"A younger girl? Does a younger girl call you her husband? Does a younger girl get half a million a month from you?"
"Weren't you the one who told me we had to split every penny in half to scrape together the down payment for our wedding home?"
Kent pressed down the impatience in his eyes.
"Philippa Simmons, are you done? I already told you it's a misunderstanding. Do you really have to keep clawing at it?"
"A misunderstanding? Is it a misunderstanding that she lives in a mansion and I live in a basement?"
"Is it a misunderstanding that you buy her a three-hundred-thousand-dollar necklace but wouldn't even give me money to see a doctor?"
The moment he saw my tears, something like panic crossed his eyes.
"Philippa, I—"
"You what? Kent, you look ridiculous when you lie."
"Enough!"
He pinched the bridge of his nose, irritated.
"Fine, I admit it. I've kept her for three years. But I spend most of my time with you, don't I? Is there any need to make a scene?"
"What I give her is money. What I give you is love. That's perfectly fair. What do you have to be unhappy about?"
"Fair?"
The tears dropped onto the table one after another. I pulled a smile onto my face.
"Kent, I've been with you for five years. In your eyes, all I'm worth is fair. Is that it?"
He was silent for a moment, then tossed out one line: "Think whatever you want."
The door slammed hard behind him.
I sat there staring at nothing for a while, and suddenly I felt ridiculous.
We'd been together five years, and he'd been keeping that woman for three of them.
I wiped the tears off my face and got up to pack.
When I saw the scarf by the bed, I paused.
There'd been a rare blizzard in Chicago that winter. The office was far from home, I couldn't get a car no matter what I tried, and I was shaking with cold.
I'd steeled myself and decided to just walk back when I saw Kent making his way toward me, stumbling through the snow.
He'd taken the scarf from his own neck and wrapped it around me. I laughed and told him his hair had gone white.
He said, if we could stand in the falling snow together today, then we could count on growing old together, white-haired, for the rest of our lives.
But Kent, all of a sudden, I don't want to grow old with you anymore.
Once I'd packed, the suitcase was only half full.
Only then did it hit me how little I had to show for all these years.
Early the next morning, I picked up my suitcase, ready to go.
Then someone started pounding on the basement door, bang after bang.
I opened it and looked—it was the woman Kent was keeping.
