The eel was always restless at night, far more than it should have been.
One evening, I got up for a glass of water and stopped short. Jonathan was standing in front of the tank, feeding it. His lips were moving, muttering words I couldn’t make out.
This man, who hated hassle more than anyone I knew—why would he drag himself out of bed in the middle of the night just to feed a fish? And what exactly was he whispering to it?
A chill crawled over my skin.
I shook it off and said flatly, “The eel is pretty, but I don’t like fish anymore.”
“You used to say you loved fish… that you loved water.” His voice caught, trembling with emotion, he was trying to hold back. “You said once our child grew older, we’d keep a whole tank. You said we’d take him to the aquarium often. Have you forgotten all that?”
“Things change.” I pushed the divorce papers toward him. “Sign them. Three days from now, we’ll meet at the court.”
“No! I won’t sign!” He clutched the papers so tightly that the veins in his arm stood out, his knuckles stark white. “Angela, is something weighing on you? Did I not do enough? Tell me, and I’ll change. I’ll change everything! Don’t joke about divorce. Ethan is still so little—can you really let him grow up without a father?”
His voice dropped lower and lower, laced with desperation, like a child terrified of being abandoned.
By then, the relatives around us could no longer hold back. One after another, they spoke, their voices overlapping as they tried to persuade me. Everyone had seen how attentive Jonathan had been over the past months.
When I was struggling with postpartum insomnia, he brewed calming tea for me every night. I once casually mentioned that I liked the pastries from the west side of the city, and he took the long way home for an entire month just to buy them. Even my own mother often said that the greatest fortune of my life was marrying Jonathan.
“Every couple fights,” one relative urged, leaning forward with earnest eyes. “Jonathan has already lowered himself this much—Angela, don’t be so stubborn. Ethan just learned to call him Daddy. Can you really let your child grow up without one?”
“Angela, what marriage doesn’t have quarrels?” another chimed in, her voice sharp with reproach. “He’s poured his heart out for you. Don’t be foolish.”
“Exactly!” someone else added, shaking his head in disbelief. “Look at his eyes, bloodshot from staying up late. He works all day, then comes home and still takes care of you and the baby. How can you bear to say divorce?”
Their voices tangled together, pushing down on me from all sides. I shook my head.
“No secrets. I simply want a divorce. I’m tired of this life.”
My father slammed his teacup onto the table so hard that tea spilled over the rim. “Angela, you explain this to me! What has Jonathan ever done to wrong you? During your confinement, he stayed up nights to take care of you. When you fell ill, he rushed you to the hospital in the middle of the night. And now you already have a child together, yet you say you’ll just leave? Can you face him? Can you face your child?”
I lifted my eyes toward Jonathan.
His bloodshot gaze brimmed with exhaustion and panic. “Dad, it’s because he’s been so good… that I have to leave.”
I ignored the confusion burning in everyone’s eyes and looked straight at Jonathan, expressionless. “Just take it as me being tired of you. Three days from now, we’ll meet at the court.”
With that, I rose, grabbed my coat, and walked out, my back pressed under the weight of silence and baffled stares.
That night, I had planned to stay at a guesthouse. But when I opened my phone to book a room, I realized my bank balance wasn’t even enough to cover one night.
Only then did it hit me. After getting married, I handed over my paycheck card and my bonus card—even the savings I had set aside before our wedding had been transferred into a joint account.
Jonathan had said, 'A family should keep money together. That way, it feels secure.'
Not long ago, when he offered me his salary card, I hadn’t taken it.
For the past year, I’d been a full-time mother. The only money I ever had in my hand was the allowance he gave me, never more than a couple of hundred dollars at most.
I once thought that was a symbol of trust. Only now do I realize I had turned myself into an appendage, surviving completely on Jonathan's support.
...
The next morning, I visited the baby supply shop I always frequented. Before my pregnancy, I worked there as a sales assistant.
Since then, nearly everything I purchased during and after my pregnancy came from that same store.
