"John, it really looks like Bertha's furious this time."
"Does that mean the wedding's off for good?"
John raised an eyebrow, his voice full of certainty.
"She only dares raise her voice at me because she's angry right now. Once she calms down, she'll regret it."
"Call off the engagement? That's impossible."
"A woman who loves me that recklessly doesn't just walk away."
Then he turned to Lena with a warning.
"Don't go making stupid jokes like that again. You hear me?"
Seeing that John was getting a little annoyed, Lena could only nod obediently.
I hadn't gone far from the door at all, and I heard every word between them.
The irony of it. Lena was once trapped in a car crash, unable to get out.
I was the one who risked my life to pull her free.
I never imagined she was no better than an animal, someone who could use her rescuer's mother as a target for a prank and sleep with her rescuer's fiancé. How rotten does a person have to be at the core to do something like that.
If I'd never saved her back then, none of this would have happened.
But life has no ifs. Only the things people choose to do.
So the moment I left the bar, I went to pull the security footage.
I never expected it to be gone. John had already destroyed it.
No wonder Lena was so brazen. I walked through the streets. It was deep into the night now.
A bitter, sour ache sat in my chest and wouldn't leave.
And right then, Mrs. Gilbert called.
"I hear you brought up calling off the engagement with John yourself tonight?"
The Gilberts had always looked down on me, even after I worked tirelessly to help John push the Gilbert Corp from a second-rate company into one of the top technology firms in Boston.
But the Gilberts still thought I wasn't good enough. If anything, they believed John could marry someone of higher standing.
My long silence clearly displeased her.
"Cat got your tongue?"
"Mrs. Gilbert, mind your manners."
"John and I are calling off the engagement. Isn't that exactly what you wanted?"
"Hmph! Since you're the one who called it off, don't you dare regret it later."
"Don't come clinging to him after this. He deserves a far better woman. Not you."
There was nothing pleasant about the conversation, and in the end we both chose to hang up fast.
By the time I got home, it was the middle of the night.
I never expected John to be inside my apartment.
The moment he saw me, he stood up.
"Where did you go? Why are you back so late?"
"I already reprimanded Lena for you. It was an honest mistake on her part."
"To make up for my wrong, and given everything you've done for the company,"
"I've decided to announce something at the office the moment the sun's up. I'm promoting you to VP."
I kept my eyes on him, neither warm nor angry, while he had no idea I'd already settled the broken engagement with his mother.
"John, get out."
"I need some peace."
My sudden coldness left him stunned for a moment.
I have a thing about cleanliness, and I couldn't accept his cheating, still less that he'd helped Lena in the string of things that got my mother killed.
"I didn't only come to see you. I came to light incense for your mother."
His eyes rimmed red as he walked to my mother's memorial tablet, took the incense from the stand, lit three sticks, and bowed low before her.
"I'm sorry. Our thoughtless mistake got you killed."
"But I truly never meant for it to happen."
His voice broke, and I couldn't harden my face enough to throw him out.
Before he left, John told me firmly.
That night, it was guilt that made him drink too much, and in his drunkenness he'd mistaken Lena for me.
