Three months into my pregnancy, my husband told me he wanted a divorce.
I rushed to find him—only to overhear him chatting casually with a friend, saying he'd been reborn. That he'd come back in this life for one reason: to make things right with his childhood sweetheart, Glenda Pruitt.
His friend was stunned. "Are you out of your mind? Your wife is three months pregnant. Aren't you afraid she'll get so angry she terminates the baby?"
Ivan Vance laughed it off. "Why would she? Stella went through ten rounds of IVF to get pregnant. There's no way she'd throw that away."
"Besides, after we divorce, she can just go back to her family. But Glenda—she has no parents, no one. After her divorce from that deadbeat, she's been raising her kid all alone. You know how hard that is?"
"I've already got it figured out. Once Glenda's son turns ten, I'll go back to Stella. It's only five years. No big deal."
I stood outside the door, perfectly still. My fingers moved almost on their own, dialing a number.
"Hello. I'd like to schedule an abortion. As soon as possible."
Later, Ivan deliberately scheduled our divorce filing for the same day he and Glenda would get their marriage license.
But this time—
That day, the man who had always been so lofty, so detached, came undone. His eyes locked onto my flat stomach with a wild, desperate intensity, and his voice cracked. "Where's my baby? Where's our child?"
"You promised—you said you wanted to have a baby with me!"
——
"Stella, sweetheart... are you sure you want to go through with this? After everything you went through for this baby..."
My mother's voice broke on the other end of the line, and guilt twisted through me like a blade.
She had been the happiest of anyone when she found out I was pregnant.
She knew what it had cost me. A full year of choking down bitter herbal medicine. Nine failed rounds of IVF. It wasn't until the tenth that I finally conceived.
The moment the test results came back positive, she'd wept with joy.
She believed that with a baby on the way, Ivan and I would settle into a real life together—that he'd step up, become a responsible husband, learn to put his family first.
It wasn't until today that I realized how terribly wrong we'd both been.
The phone rang, sharp and insistent. I answered numbly. Ivan's voice came through, cold and cutting. "Stella Abbott, how much longer are you going to drag this out?"
"Even if I can't divorce you during the pregnancy, the second that baby is born, I'll file immediately."
"Raising a kid costs money, Stella. And ever since we got married, all you've done is sit at home—eating my food, spending my money, doing a little housework and nothing else."
"No one is going to want a woman who just gave birth with a brat hanging off her. You have no income. When the time comes, you won't keep the child, you won't keep me—you'll have nothing."
Every word dripped with contempt. I listened as he reduced a year of everything I'd poured into our home to nothing—listened as he called my baby a burden—and felt something sharp carve through my chest all over again.
"Ivan." My voice was quiet. Just his name.
He went silent instantly.
"I agree to the divorce."
A beat of stunned silence. Then his tone surged with delight. "Really? Great—we'll go in five days."
He paused, and when he spoke again, his voice had softened into something almost gentle. "Stella, don't worry. I just want to take care of Glenda and her son. I won't cross any lines."
"Focus on the pregnancy. Have the baby safely. I'll come visit you and the child once a month."
"I already bought so many little outfits—I even picked out a name..."
His voice was bright, almost giddy. But my thoughts had already drifted far away.
I knew, in that moment, that I had truly let him go.
A soft chime broke the silence—a text notification. My gaze drifted down.
