It was three in the morning when I finally left the office. Tired and drained from hours of overtime, I called Garrett. I called him exactly thirty-seven times, my thumb numbly pressing the screen, before he finally picked up, his voice dripping with irritation. “Do you have any idea what time it is? People are trying to sleep.” “Can you come pick me up?” I whispered, looking around the empty, dark parking lot. “I’m scared.” Garrett let out a dry, dismissive scoff. “Can’t you just call an Uber? Do you have to make everything a drama?” And then, the line went dead. I stared at my phone, opening my Notes app to look at the number: “123”. That was the number of times he had driven across town to pick up Mallory after her late-night shifts. Even on our wedding night. He had put his coat back on, car keys in hand, the moment Mallory’s name flashed on his screen. “Mallory’s single,” he’d said, not looking me in the eye as he zipped his jacket. “It’s not safe for her to go home alone at this hour. If something happens to her, I’ll have to live with that guilt for the rest of my life.” But in our one year of marriage, he was perfectly fine with me navigating the dark alone. “You’re a married woman,” he’d tell me. “Who’s going to mess with you?” He didn’t know about the night my Uber driver took a deliberate wrong turn down a sketchy, pitch-black alley, or how I had been cornered by a mugger. In my moment of absolute terror, when I desperately dialed his number, only 911 had answered. For the longest time, I played the fool. I lied to myself, whispering that he only missed my calls because he was a deep sleeper, or because his phone was on silent. But standing under the flickering streetlamp tonight, I finally saw the truth. I was never going to see his headlights pull up to the curb. I gripped the divorce papers in my bag. I wasn’t going to wait anymore. … The house was dark when I finally made it home. I quietly pushed open the bedroom door. The bed was empty, though his side of the mattress still held a faint, lingering warmth. I unlocked my phone. Right at the top of my social feed was a post Garrett had uploaded just minutes ago. Caption: “Mallory is single, guys. Stop dragging her out to bars late at night.” The photo showed him supporting her weight, her arms loosely draped around his neck, a lazy, innocent smile on her face. Asking him for a ride was “making a drama.” But a minor whimper from Mallory was an immediate emergency. Normally, a post like this would have kept me awake all night, my chest aching from the familiar, sharp sting of his favoritism. But tonight, I was just empty. I lay down, closed my eyes, and fell straight into a dreamless sleep. When I woke up, Garrett was standing by the closet, loosening his tie. Seeing me stir, he peeled off his shirt and tossed it onto my side of the bed. “Wash that for me. Mallory had too much to drink and threw up all over me.” The heavy, sour stench of stale alcohol and vomit instantly filled the room. My stomach turned. Garrett was notoriously OCD. Once, when I had food poisoning and threw up on the living room rug, he made me deep-clean the entire apartment and dragged the expensive wool rug straight to the dumpster. Yet, he had spent the entire night wearing a vomit-stained shirt just to keep Mallory safe. I kicked the shirt off the bed. “I have a meeting today. I’m busy.” Garrett glanced at me, his brow furrowing. “I don’t even know why you bother with that dead-end job. If it’s that exhausting, just quit.” He had always looked down on my career. I didn’t make nearly as much as he did, and he’d lost count of how many times he’d told me to stay home. Yet, I vividly remembered him lecturing Mallory on the deck during a summer barbecue. “A woman always needs her own career,” he’d told her, his voice warm with genuine advice. “That way, if she gets married, she can never be controlled.” I knew then, as I knew now: his true beliefs, the ones he actually valued, were only spoken to her. So no matter how many times he pressured me to quit, I refused. My quiet, unglamorous job was the only anchor I had left. Garrett walked out of the bathroom, his eyes immediately landing on the thick manila envelope on the nightstand. He frowned. “What’s this?” I handed it to him. “Take a look. Sign it if you don’t have any objections.” “I wanted to give it to you last night, but you weren’t here.” Garrett tore open the envelope. His eyes scanned the document, and his face went slack. “You want a divorce?” I had been thinking about it for a long time. I couldn’t even pinpoint the exact moment the seed had been planted. Maybe it was the countless nights he’d bolted awake at the sound of Mallory’s ringtone, the heavy slam of our front door vibrating through my chest as I lay staring at the ceiling, crying in the dark. Maybe it was the time he crashed her blind date, decided the guy wasn’t good enough, and claimed to be her boyfriend to chase the man away. Or maybe it was when he missed our first anniversary because Mallory needed someone to drive her to the clinic, leaving me sitting alone at a fully booked French restaurant, becoming the silent joke of our friend group. There were too many moments to count. All those tiny, accumulated fractures had finally shattered the foundation. I finally understood that between Garrett and me, there would always be Mallory. And his scale would always tip toward her. He was always worried about her. He worried about single women being taken advantage of, about the dangers of the city, about the bad intentions of other men. She went to bars, stayed out late, lived recklessly. And Garrett was always there, playing the loyal guardian. Sometimes I wondered if Mallory did it on purpose, a calculated dance to keep his attention entirely on her. But eventually, I realized it didn’t matter. They were two willing actors in a play—one loved playing the savior, and the other loved being saved. I was just the unwanted spectator. He had never worried about me, not even when we were dating. He would leave me at a restaurant to pick her up, and he strictly forbade me from going to clubs, claiming those places were for “girls who didn’t respect themselves.” But when Mallory went, it wasn’t about self-respect. It was about her safety, and he had to go protect her. Before we got married, I had asked him, “If you care about her this much, why are you marrying me?” It was the one question that haunted me. He had simply stroked my hair and smiled. “Don’t be paranoid. She’s like a sister to me. Protecting her is just what I do.” “If I actually had feelings for her, I wouldn’t be with you.” I had believed him. I loved him too much, wanted him too much, so I let his easy lies soothe my deep-seated anxiety. It wasn’t until after the wedding that I learned the truth. Garrett had pursued Mallory once. But his mother had fiercely opposed it, citing Mallory’s messy family background. So, they settled into this comfortable, blurred emotional gray area. Then I came along. I was safe. A good girl from a stable family, completely devoted to him. I was the perfect candidate for a wife. So he proposed, we dated, we married. It was a smooth, effortless transition for him. A single bouquet, a modest ring, and he had secured a lifetime of my devotion. I had placed my hand in his on our wedding day with a heart full of hope, only for him to leave me alone in our bridal suite because Mallory decided she wanted to look at the stars from a mountain ridge at midnight, and it “wasn’t safe.” “I had a lawyer draft this,” I said quietly, pulling my thoughts back to the present. “You’ve handled enough divorce cases to know the drill.” Garrett stared at me, dumbfounded. “I’m a divorce attorney, Maeve. You hired someone else to handle our divorce?” He caught himself, realizing he was focusing on the wrong detail. He took a sharp breath, trying to steady his voice. “The cases I handle involve infidelity or domestic abuse. I have never done either of those things to you.” Garrett was smart. His legal training made him naturally risk-averse. His devotion to Mallory wasn’t illegal. It didn’t leave physical bruises. “So a man is a good husband simply because he doesn’t hit his wife or sleep around?” I asked, looking him dead in the eye. He averted his gaze, looking out the window. “Are you still jealous of Mallory? She’s single. I’m just trying to make sure she doesn’t get taken advantage of by some predator. That’s why I look out for her.” In Garrett’s mind, every man around Mallory was a predator. Except him. But he chose to forget that he was a married man, and that his first duty of protection belonged to his wife. “I’m just tired, Garrett. Who you protect is your business. Just sign the papers, and we’re done.” He set the document down, shifting closer to me on the bed. He reached out to put his arm around my shoulders, but I recoiled. A look of mild exhaustion crossed his face, the look of a parent dealing with a toddler’s tantrum. “Babe, stop playing games.” “With my legal background, if I don’t want this divorce, it’s not happening.” He hadn’t called me “babe” since the wedding. Mallory had once remarked that pet names were incredibly tacky, and just like that, he had stopped using them with me. His absolute confidence—the smug air of a trial lawyer who had never lost a case—made a sudden wave of nausea hit me. I pushed him away, ran into the bathroom, and gripped the edges of the sink, dry-heaving violently. “What’s wrong?” he called out, standing at the door. “I’m disgusted,” I choked out. Another wave of dry-heaving hit, forcing tears to the corners of my eyes. I didn’t know if the disgust was physical, or if it was just him. Garrett sighed, his disappointment obvious. “For a second, I thought you might be pregnant. Mom called yesterday asking when we were going to give her a grandkid.” The words froze the blood in my veins. My period was two months late. A cold, heavy dread settled in my chest. If I was pregnant… For a fleeting, desperate second, a small spark of hope flared. If there was a baby, would Garrett finally look at me? Would he finally turn his attention back to his own home? “Can you… come to the hospital with me today?” I asked, calling out to him as he grabbed his car keys. He frowned. “Just because you gagged once? Don’t be dramatic, Maeve.” “Mallory was throwing up all night. I need to go check on her. If she’s alone and passes out, no one will know.” The front door clicked shut. It felt like a solid brick wall dropping between us, a cold mockery of the stupid, desperate hope I had just harbored. I took a sick day and went to the clinic alone. The waiting room was filled with couples. Husbands holding their wives’ hands, whispering softly. I sat in my plastic chair, a solitary island. Everyone else was smiling. I couldn’t even manage a neutral face. The woman sitting next to me nudged my elbow. “Unplanned?” I blinked, confused. “Excuse me?” “You look miserable,” she said gently. “Usually, it’s only the unplanned ones that look this stressed. When it’s planned, the whole family is practically throwing a party in here.” “I’m married,” I said quietly. “But I’m getting a divorce.” The woman’s eyes widened. “Oh, honey. If you’re pregnant, why divorce? Men love kids. Once you tell him, he’ll change his mind.” But did I want a marriage built on a hostage situation? He might temporarily pull his focus back to the house, but it would be a duty, a performance. An illusion. I had lived in an illusion for a year. I wasn’t going to raise a child in one. They called my name. The doctor did the ultrasound, confirming I was six weeks pregnant. I stared at the black-and-white monitor, then looked away. “I want to terminate the pregnancy.” The doctor’s expression shifted, a subtle flash of judgment crossing her face. “It’s always the parents’ choices, but the innocent child is the one who pays the price.” If this baby had come a year ago, I would have wept with joy. But the timing was cruel. I refused to bring a child into a home devoid of love, and I refused to let a pregnancy bind me to a man who didn’t want me. The doctor printed the paperwork. As I walked down the corridor toward the exit, a familiar voice called my name. I turned. Garrett was walking toward me, with Mallory clinging weakly to his arm. She was pale, looking fragile and pathetic. His eyes fell on the clinic folder in my hand. “You actually came to the hospital for a stomach ache? See? It’s probably nothing.” I nodded slowly, tucking the folder against my side. “Just a stomach bug.” Since I had already made my decision, there was no point in letting him know. It would only make the divorce more complicated. Garrett let out a self-satisfied sigh. “I told you so. I’m taking Mallory to get her IV fluids. Go home and whip up a few light dishes. She’s coming over for dinner tonight.” Before I could answer, two kids came tearing down the hallway, laughing and shoving each other. One of them collided hard with my shoulder. I lost my footing. The clinic folder slipped from my grip, its contents scattering across the polished tile floor. Garrett instinctively knelt to help me pick them up. His hand paused over the ultrasound report. He stared at the bold letters at the top, his voice rising in disbelief. “You’re pregnant?” Heads turned in the corridor. I lunged to snatch the paper, but his longer reach easily kept it out of my grasp. “Why didn’t you tell me?” Mallory gently tugged at his sleeve, her voice soft. “Maybe she wanted to surprise you, Garrett.” The tension in his shoulders melted, replaced by a sudden, boyish excitement. He glanced at my stomach, which was still perfectly flat under my sweater. “Sit down and wait for me. Once Mallory’s IV is finished, I’ll take you for another scan.” “You should call Mom first. She’s been praying for this. Let’s get the good news out. We’ll go out for a big dinner tonight to celebrate.” I had never heard Garrett speak so fast, or so much. He was usually a man of calculated, sparse words. He was genuinely thrilled. “You two go celebrate,” I said, my voice deadpan. “I’m going home.” Mallory’s pale face drained of what little color she had left. She pulled her hand back from Garrett’s arm. “I should go. If you’re celebrating a baby, I’ll only be a third wheel.” Garrett’s joy vanished instantly. He turned and caught her shoulder. “You’re sick, Mallory. Where do you think you’re going? You’re eating with us tonight.” She threw off his hand, her eyes flashing with sudden anger. “To do what? Sit there and watch you play happy family?” Garrett shot a panicked look at me. “I’ll just drop her home after her IV.” He leaned down, whispering something soft and reassuring in her ear until her posture finally relaxed. I stood there, watching them with absolute detachment. If this had happened a month ago, my heart would have broken. Now, I just wanted them to get out of my sight. “I’ll take her to the infusion room first,” Garrett said, pointing to a row of vinyl chairs along the wall. “Wait for me here. The second she’s dropped off, I’ll come get you.” The chairs were cold and sterile. Just like him. But I nodded anyway. Satisfied with my compliance, he handed the ultrasound report back to me. “I’ll be right back.” I watched their retreating figures, his arm securely around her waist. Then, I turned around and walked straight into the surgical wing for my scheduled procedure. As the bright overhead lights of the operating room blurred into a halo, my mind drifted back to our wedding day. I had pictured a quiet, happy future for us. Now, I was laying on a cold table, ending it all so I could survive. By the time I was wheeled into the recovery room and the anesthesia began to fade, my phone was buzzing. It was his mother. “Maeve! Garrett told me you’re pregnant! Where are you? I’m driving over right now!” “I served Garrett with divorce papers this morning,” I said, my voice hoarse but steady. “And I just terminated the pregnancy.”
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