“You two were never meant for each other.”
“Now that you've come to your senses, pack your things and come home.”
I nodded, swallowing hard against the lump in my throat. “Okay.”
Five years my father told me Rick Graves was wrong for me. Five years I didn't listen.
When I first met him, he was nobody. A broke kid with nothing to his name.
These last couple of years he'd ridden the boom and made some fast money, but even so, not a cent of it was ever spent on me.
He couldn't even buy our wedding apartment without me covering half the down payment.
Whenever I was tight on cash, he'd hold me close and say, “Agatha, the company's still in its growth phase. There are so many places the money needs to go.”
“I promise, everything I earn in the future will be yours.”
“We're a team, right? What's the difference whose wallet it comes from?”
I'd nod and think that made sense.
So I kept handing over money, again and again, like a fool.
Never knowing that in some bar I'd never set foot in,
Rick talked about me the way you'd talk about an idiot.
“Agatha's such an idiot. She believes anything I tell her. Last month I dropped tens of thousands on a Chanel bag for Lois.”
“Meanwhile she's had a Coach bag sitting in her cart for over two weeks and still can't bring herself to buy it.”
The night I found out, I was ice-cold when he walked through the door. I asked him why he'd said those things.
Rick just pulled me into his arms with an explanation ready. “Agatha, I had no choice. That crowd is full of sharks. The clients are just like that.”
“I have to match my words to whoever I'm dealing with—that's how you close deals, how you make money, how we pay for the apartment.”
And once again, I was naive enough to forgive him.
Only now did I finally understand what everyone had been saying all along.
In those people's eyes, that's exactly what I was: stupid, gullible, and still tripping over herself to throw money at a man who never spent a dime on her.
But this time,
the doormat opened her eyes.
First thing the next morning, I packed two full boxes and threw every last thing into the dumpster.
The cleaning lady's eyes went wide.
“Sweetheart, you're throwing all of this away?”
She fished through the boxes, pulling out brand-new thermoses and handbags. “These are perfectly good. What a waste……”
My voice was calm. “I don't want any of it.”
“Take whatever you like.”
These were every gift Rick had given me over five years. Nothing expensive, but there were a lot of them.
Look closely, though, and every single one was cheap. The kind of thing you'd be embarrassed to show anyone.
I turned and walked away. Behind me, the cleaning lady was still shaking her head and muttering.
“Kids these days. No sense of how to hold on to things.”
I'd already booked a flight for three days from now.
Until then, I had to resign from my job and give up my lease.
After finishing the paperwork at the office, I thought about asking a friend to walk around Liberty Square with me, clear my head. But the moment I opened my chat window, I froze.
In this entire city, my only close friend was Lois Sullivan.
I put the phone down and went alone.
Then I heard the cheering up ahead.
In the center of Liberty Square, surrounded by balloons, Rick was down on one knee, gently sliding the ring he'd had custom-made for me onto Lois Sullivan's finger.
The crowd erupted. “Say yes! Say yes!”
I stood where I was, perfectly still, and felt my eyes blur with tears before I even realized it was happening.
Then someone in the crowd spotted me and shouted.
“Isn't that Agatha?”
“Knew it—total doormat. She slammed the door yesterday like she was really done, and here she is again, pathetically showing up on her own.”
“Don't tell me she's trying to get him back?”
