"That was a keepsake from my mother! What gives you the right to hand it over to your boy toy as a dowry!"
"Give it back! Right now! Bring it back to me this instant! Or I'm calling the police! I'll make sure you two hold your wedding behind bars!"
I was shaking with rage, every word barbed.
Sabina flinched, then fired right back:
"Watch your mouth! I already told you it's all an act! I'm just borrowing it! It's not like I'm keeping it! Besides, didn't you say it yourself? That you were giving it to me? Well, if it's mine, I can do whatever I want with it. You don't get a say!"
My voice went cold.
"That was my mother's heirloom bracelet, meant for her future daughter-in-law. You married someone else. You have no right to take it."
"Come on, I already told you it's a fake marriage..."
I couldn't stand to hear her voice for another second.
I hung up, walked out the door, hailed a cab, and gave the driver Eustace's address.
I grabbed Sabina's luggage on my way out.
On the ride over, my phone buzzed nonstop. Texts from Sabina.
"I got a little worked up just now. I said some things I shouldn't have. Stephen, I'm sorry."
"How about this—I'll return the bracelet tomorrow, but you have to come to the wedding and be Eustace's best man."
"Think about it. We were supposed to get married, and then I suddenly got my marriage license with Eustace instead. That's not a good look for him."
"If you show up as the best man tomorrow, nobody will think Eustace came between us. And if anyone asks about us, just cover for me... Tell them you cheated, that you fell for someone else, that you'd been wanting to break up with me for a while. Just don't drag Eustace into it."
I stared at her messages and started laughing. The sheer absurdity of it pulled the laughter right out of me.
But somewhere in the middle of laughing, tears had soaked the hem of my coat.
The driver glanced at me in the rearview mirror and silently held out a tissue.
I thanked him quietly, opened the car door, grabbed the suitcase, and stormed upstairs.
I went straight to Eustace's front door and hammered on it with everything I had.
The pounding echoed through the hallway like thunder.
Hurried footsteps scrambled inside, and the door swung open.
"Who the hell—it's the middle of the night!"
Sabina stood there in a pink apron, flour dusted across her forehead.
My eyes burned red in an instant.
Sabina and I had been together for ten years.
I'd watched her climb from a dirt-poor student to a respected professor.
The deepest scar she carried came from college, when she'd been working part-time in the campus dining hall to pay her tuition. A rich girl who was jealous of her had shown up with a posse, pinned her to the ground, and dumped leftover food all over her head.
"A kitchen rat like you thinks she can steal someone's boyfriend?"
After that, she despised cooking. Loathed it.
Even when we got engaged and I brought her home to meet my bedridden mother, all I asked was for her to help me carry the dishes out of the kitchen. She went stone-faced and slammed the door on her way out.
My dying mother was left sitting there, heartbroken on my behalf.
Even then, I forced a smile and made excuses for Sabina.
After that, I walked on eggshells around her even more carefully. I'd never cooked a day in my life, but I burned and blistered my hands until I learned, all so she'd never have to step foot in a kitchen.
And now it turned out her scar had already been healed by another man.
The moment Sabina saw me, she froze. Then, instinctively, guilt made her tug at the apron she was wearing.
"Stephen, what are you doing here..."
Eustace's face appeared behind her, eyes darting nervously toward me.
"...Stephen, man, what brings you here?"
He stepped in front of Sabina, jaw set, staring me down with a look of stubborn defiance.
