02
Under everyone's eyes, I calmly took out the divorce agreement.
"Sign it. County clerk's office, ten o'clock tomorrow."
Marlin looked at my easy, careless handwriting on the divorce agreement, and the corner of his eye gave the smallest twitch.
【Why would my wife have something like this ready? She must be doing it to get my attention, isn't she?】
【Good girl, stop making trouble. It's only ever been you, all of you. Come here and hug me already.】
【You haven't slept beside me for two nights. Tonight I'm going to kiss you until you can't breathe.】
His thoughts came at me from every direction, wrapping around me on all sides.
Just then his assistant, Fern Harding, poked her head out from behind him.
"Summer, Morgan says a lot of superfans have been reselling Marlin's signature lately."
"So if you want Marlin to sign anything, you'll have to sign a confidentiality agreement first, with everything recorded on audio and video."
Marlin clenched his fist at her side and said, without a shred of mercy,
"Summer, when you walk out that door today, you don't get to take a single thing of mine."
"That includes the clothes on your back. Take all of it off."
【Good wife, hurry up and refuse something this humiliating. I've already given you a way out.】
【If I didn't want to get my wife home sooner, I'd never let this crowd into our house. I really want to throw every one of them out.】
【I just want to hold my wife.】
Marlin and I have known each other ten years, dated for eight, been married for six.
His need for control ran deep.
Where I worked, who I saw each day, right down to the clothes I wore, all of it had to be arranged by his hand alone.
If I didn't let him arrange it, that meant I didn't love him.
My closet was full of clothes he'd bought, down to the underwear.
Once, I thought this was proof that Marlin loved me.
Now it looked more like evidence, mocking me, that after all these years I had nothing of my own.
Watching the certainty on Marlin's face, I slowly gave him three words.
"Fine. I'll sign."
A flicker of triumph crossed Fern's face, and she rushed off to prepare the paperwork.
Marlin stared at me in disbelief.
I gave him a faint smile. "Don't worry. I won't take anything of yours."
The people around us traded glances, and not one of them dared to speak.
I turned my room upside down and finally found the down jacket and denim shorts I'd bought ten years ago.
Just as I was changing, Marlin's thoughts started up again outside.
【What does my wife mean by this? Does she really want to divorce me?】
【I don't want a home without my wife. Without my wife I won't go on living.】
The softest corner of my heart trembled, but I didn't let it stop me.
When I pushed open the bathroom door, Marlin was sitting at the head of the bed, smoking.
The moment he caught sight of me, he stubbed the cigarette out without thinking.
Then he made out what I was wearing, and he lost his composure completely.
His thoughts went off like a smoke alarm that wouldn't stop.
【Why has my wife actually put on clothes I bought?】
【I'll never make a joke like that again. Wife, don't stoop to my level.】
【It's over ninety degrees out. My wife will get heatstroke going out in that.】
I ignored those worthless thoughts, set the clothes down in front of him, and moved to go downstairs.
"Summer, are you sure you want to break up with me?"
Marlin's voice came from behind me, low and grim.
I didn't turn around. "I think I made myself perfectly clear just now."
Just as I was about to keep walking, Marlin spoke again.
"Divorce me today, and tomorrow I'll hand your second-generation robot design to Stella Gilbert and let her file the patent."
It was the dead heat of summer, yet I felt like I stood at the South Pole, all the blood in my body running backward.
【I'm sorry, wife. I really have no other way. I won't let you leave me.】
【This matters more to you than anything. If I hold it against you, you won't leave me, will you?】
The second-generation robot was something I'd designed specifically for a paranoid personality like Marlin's.
The concept behind it was simple. I only wanted Marlin to know he wasn't alone, that I wasn't the only one in the world who loved him.
The Stella he spoke of had plagiarized my work at the global robotics competition I entered after I graduated from college.
Before I could even react, she'd gone to the judging panel and accused me of plagiarizing her, turning it all back on me.
During that time I was miserable day after day, and I was diagnosed with moderate depression.
And every bit of it became a bargaining chip Marlin used to threaten and control me.
What a shame, Marlin. This time I won't give in for you again.
