When Diana told me she was marrying Michael, I thought I’d misheard her. I was standing in the kitchen with my phone pressed to my ear, stirring a pot of soup on the stove, when she blurted it out. “Michael and I… we’re engaged.”
The spoon slipped from my hand and clattered into the pot.
I nearly burned my palm fishing it out. “I’m sorry, what did you just say?”
She repeated it, softer this time, like she knew how wrong it sounded. I laughed—not because it was funny, but because I couldn’t think of anything else to do.
“You mean my Michael? My ex-husband Michael?”
“Yes,” she whispered. The air left my lungs.
“Diana, are you out of your mind? He’s my ex for a reason. Several reasons, actually.
And you—you were the one who used to tell me I deserved better.”
“I know, I know,” she said quickly. “But things are different now. He’s changed.”
I almost dropped the phone.
Changed? Michael, the man who lied through his teeth, flirted shamelessly with other women, and treated me like an afterthought for most of our marriage? Michael, who couldn’t even show up for counseling sessions he swore he wanted?
Changed? “Congratulations,” I said flatly, and hung up before my voice cracked. That was the day I lost both my husband and my best friend.
The months that followed were messy. Some people pitied me; others whispered that maybe Diana and Michael had been seeing each other behind my back. I had no proof, but the thought gnawed at me late at night.
I tried to move on—threw myself into work, picked up yoga, even adopted a scruffy little dog from the shelter. I told myself I was healing. Then came the wedding.
Against my better judgment, I went. Why? I still don’t know.
Morbid curiosity, maybe. Or pride—I wanted to prove that I was strong enough to face them both. I sat near the back in a navy dress, my hands clenched in my lap as Diana floated down the aisle in lace and satin.
She looked beautiful. She always did. And Michael stood at the altar with that same easy smile he used to wear for me, the smile that made people believe he was the perfect man.
When the vows were said, I slipped out quietly, blinking back tears. I told myself I was free now. Free of him, free of her, free of the pain.
But freedom was not so simple. Nearly a year later, my phone rang in the dead of night. I almost ignored it—2:14 a.m.
The story doesn’t end here –
it continues on the next page.
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