I couldn't hold it in anymore. My eyes burned red as I screamed at the two of them：“Who did this!”
“Naomi!”
Seeing me on the ground, Wilfred's expression shifted. He strode over and reached down to pull me up.
I shook his hand off—cold—and asked again, voice sharp enough to cut“Who did this?”
Lucretia let out a little “oh” and looked at me, eyes wide with innocence.
“Naomi, I flipped through a few pages and figured it was just scrap paper.”
“I'd just stepped in some water, so I used it to wipe my feet.”
Wiped her feet.
Something inside my head snapped clean through.
I lunged, hands outstretched to grab her.
My fingers hadn't even touched her before a brutal force shoved me back.
Wilfred pulled Lucretia into his arms with one hand and slammed the other into my shoulder.
I stumbled, my foot caught on the diary, and a vicious pain shot through my ankle.
Wilfred's face went cold.
“Naomi, stop acting like a lunatic!”
“Lucretia's family to me. What in this house is she not allowed to use?”
Pain and fury tangled together until I was shaking, my eyes locked on the arm he had wrapped around Lucretia.
“So you still know this is ‘our’ house?”
“You let that woman destroy my things and you think that's perfectly fine?”
Wilfred's expression didn't change. He cut me off.
“Enough!”
“It's a beat-up notebook. Lucretia wiped her feet with it. So what?”
He kicked the soaking diary across the floor like it was trash, voice dripping with impatience.
“Besides, all you wrote in there was the same confessions to me over and over. I got sick of reading it ages ago!”
The words hit me like a bolt of lightning.
He was the one who told me he felt insecure.
That diary held the entire story of us falling in love. Wilfred didn't believe in grand promises or vows.
He only wanted the small, quiet proof that we'd been real, day after day, page after page.
My gaze dropped to the diary crumpled in the corner.
I could still see the giddy words I'd written the day we got engaged.
And how Wilfred had waited until I was asleep, then snuck a little smiley face onto the page.
“I always want to be your little sun.”
Lucretia peeked out from behind Wilfred's arm, a half-smile playing on her lips.
“Naomi, Wilfred's not your sun. He's not going to revolve around you forever.”
A bitter laugh escaped me. I shoved Wilfred out of my way, stumbled to the cabinet on my aching ankle.
Thank God. The jewelry box was still there.
I hugged it to my chest and turned to leave.
I was almost at the door when Wilfred grabbed me.
He looked down at the box in my arms, and the color drained from his face.
“Where are you going?”
My voice came out flat and dead.
“Let go.”
Wilfred stared at the jewelry box, something clicking behind his eyes. His lips parted.
“Wilfred~”
Lucretia suddenly let out a little hiss of pain, her voice turning syrupy：“Wilfred, my back's kind of sore.”
He dropped my hand instantly and rushed back to her.
“What's wrong? Is your back hurting?”
I didn't look back. I held the jewelry box tight and walked out of that house.
At the pawnshop, the owner raised an eyebrow at the box full of gold jewelry.
“Looks like wedding gold. How come you're selling it off to me for scrap?”
My face was blank. “He's dead.”
The owner sighed long and low, then transferred the money.
I went straight to the hospital without stopping.
A crowd had gathered outside the room, nurses moving in and out with grim faces.
My heart seized. I pushed through the crowd.
Mom was on the floor, curled into herself, her shoulders shaking in small, silent spasms.
“Mom, what happened?”
She lifted her head. Her eyes were so swollen they barely opened, and her lips trembled for a long time before she could force out the words.
