prologue:
A cold October night, 2003;
“Why did you do this to me?”
The man ran his fingers through his hair, his patience running thin with the woman before him. “I don’t love you anymore.”
The way the man said it so matter-of-factly broke the woman’s heart. “And,” she shrieked, “We have five kids, we were together for eight years, married for four, and you decided to cheat on me instead of trying to fix our marriage? Instead of even trying to talk to me about it?”
He shrugged. “I knew it wouldn’t work.”
The woman was barely containing her tears, “but we could have tried.”
His hard glare met her eyes which were beginning to glass over with tears. “What don’t you get, Victoria, I didn’t want to.”
“Oh, this is about want now? Well I never wanted our kids to grow up without both sets of their grandparents around, I never wanted to put my degree on hold just because we needed someone to watch the kids and you couldn’t do it.” She paused as a small sob escaped her lips and she looked at her feet. “I never wanted to have my heart broken by the man I loved more than anything.”
He laughed cruelly and inserted his hands into his pockets. “Well that wasn’t my fault, you shouldn’t have fallen in love with me.”
That final sentence broke the woman and a waterfall of tears began to cascade down her face. “But it was your fault for leading me on for almost a third of my life.” Suddenly her head snapped up and her eyes, although they were filled with tears, were filled with nothing but rage and hate for the man before her. “You’re a monster Edward.”
A sadistic smile broke across his face. “Oh, so now you finally figured that out? Congratulations, it only took you our entire relationship.” He laughed again, “I thought you said you were smart.”
She wiped the tears off her face, desperately trying to ignore the cruel taunting words he was throwing at her, before she spoke again. “I’m going back home to pack my things,” she paused and glanced into his eyes again, “and to take the kids.”
“Not happening.”
A pained laugh left her lips. “And why not, I’m the one who’s been raising them, you won’t have the time.”
He smirked and a cruel expression crossed over his face. “Yes, but then I have to pay for childcare, and honestly I want to see how you survive on your own.”
Although she thought her heart couldn’t break anymore, it did, never in her life had she imagined this side of her husband. She buried a sob deep in her throat and with the remaining strength spoke the final words she would ever say to him outside of the courtrooms as they battled for custody, “You are sick, and I hope that karma comes and ruins you.”
He almost flinched at the venom in her words, he had never expected her to react like this, no matter how much he had hurt her. Victoria was the kindest person anyone would ever meet, and had the gentlest soul you would ever find. He knew that he would have had to break her heart for her to react like this, but it was for the best. In the end it would be. He took a deep breath in to maintain his composure and turned back to her, then spoke.
“Vicky, we all know I am karma.”
Once he had spoken those final words he began walking off, leaving the sobbing woman behind him, and called a cab to take him to his office; he would give her the proper amount of time to pack her things and leave. The farther he walked the softer her sobs became, and when he was sure she wouldn’t follow him he let a few of his own tears fall.
Three months later;
She stared at the test in shock, her eyes not straying from the two red lines in front of her. “This isn’t happening,” she told herself.
“I’m not pregnant,” is what she said after the second test.
“This can’t be,” is what she muttered under her breath after the third.
Tears of happiness streamed down her face after she took the fourth test. She had lost all of her children but the universe had given her another one.
“Thank you.”
Within minutes she was packing, she had to leave this forsaken town, after all there was no point to stay. She couldn’t afford lawyers to fight for her other children, and her husbands were too good anyway. She didn’t want to leave her children but there was nothing she could do, and she refused to lose this child too. Within the hour she was packed and out the door. She already had this house up for sale, it was her and her ex-husbands first home together, and it was one of the only things she had got when the divorce was settled.
She couldn’t bear to stay there, it was too painful, but she told herself she was going to come back. She would never stop trying for her kids, but she needed time to save up the money to fight for custody, to become financially stable, and to get out of her husband’s reach.
She needed to be smart, and she couldn’t back down.
She whispered into the wind and hoped that her sons would be able to hear. “I’ll be back one day with my beautiful baby boys, and then we can all be together. I love you.”
And then she started up her car and drove out of city limits.
