When I was nearly nine months pregnant, my body no longer fully obeyed me.

That afternoon, I sat in the living room, my legs swollen tight with fluid, mechanically scrolling through my inbox, trying to make time pass a little faster.

One email was buried among a pile of advertisements, utterly unremarkable.

The moment I opened the attachment, though, it felt as if someone had pressed pause on my world.

Page after page of electronic bank statements unfolded—clear, precise, merciless.

My husband, Daniel Hart, had been transferring thirty thousand dollars every single month to the same account. The amount never changed. The date never wavered. Like a program written long ago and running flawlessly.

The earliest transaction dated back two years.

That was when I had just lost my first child.

The memories surged without warning: the harsh white lights of the hospital corridor, the sharp scent of disinfectant in the air, and me calling Daniel over and over, only to hear the cold message—no answer. He had told me he was away on a business trip.

Turns out, he had simply gone to live somewhere else.

Before the chill could fully settle into my bones, my phone vibrated.

A Messenger notification popped up.

A friend request—from a woman I didn’t know.

Her profile picture was clean and beautiful, her smile relaxed and confident.

Her message contained only one sentence:

“A woman who gets thirty thousand dollars a month for spending money must be very happy.”

I thought I would lose control.

I thought I would be furious, or at least reject her immediately.

Instead, a strange calm spread through me.

I lowered my head and placed a hand over my swollen belly.

The baby moved softly beneath my palm.

Then I tapped Accept.

1.

The moment the request went through, her message appeared.

“You’ve already seen the bank statements, haven’t you?”

I didn’t reply.

I clicked into her profile.

Her timeline ended at April 21st, two years ago.

In the photo from that day, she leaned closely against a man, their posture intimate. Her fingers rested on the back of his hand, and a diamond ring flashed sharply in the camera.

The caption read:

“Birthday gift received. Thank you, my love.”

The man’s face wasn’t visible—only his back.

I didn’t need to see his face.

That shirt—

I had bought it myself.

I remembered hesitating at the price, thinking the embroidery along the collar was too expensive.

That same day, I lay on a freezing operating table and lost my child.

And he told me he was on a business trip.

The irony was suffocating.

I kept scrolling, my fingers beginning to tremble.

From then on, her life was filled with luxury—bags, jewelry, clothes, one after another. What tightened my chest even more was how eerily familiar they all were.

Almost identical to what I owned.

Like a deliberate comparison.

There was only one difference.

Her world was always wrapped in the scent of jasmine.

I stopped at her most recent pinned post.

An ultrasound image.

She was pregnant.

My phone slipped from my hand and landed on the carpet with a dull thud.

I stood up—slowly, heavily, yet with startling clarity—and walked to the laundry basket. I pulled out the shirt Daniel had worn the night before.

I brought the fabric to my nose.

Jasmine.

Clear. Foreign.

I never wear perfume.

I still didn’t reply to her.

Soon, she grew impatient.

My phone kept vibrating—photos, videos flooding in one after another, as if she were putting her victory on display. I sank back into the sofa, one hand over my belly, my breathing quick and shallow, forcing myself to open each message anyway.

She was young. Beautiful.

Her ponytail swayed gently in the videos.

She and Daniel rowing on a lake.

Laughing together in the snow.

Walking side by side through an autumn forest.

Four complete seasons.

Tender, intact.

And I had never appeared in any of them.

In the end, I opened one last video.

On the screen, Daniel stood by the sea. The wind tousled his hair, and his voice was low and gentle as he called her name.

“My Karina.”

She asked softly, “Do you love me?”

It was a question he hadn’t asked me that way in many years.

On the screen, my husband of seven years—the father of the child growing inside me—answered without hesitation:

“I will always love you, Carla.”

I replayed the video again and again, watching as daylight slowly drained from the room.

Tears slid down my face in silence, yet no sound escaped me.

When night fully fell, I turned off my phone.

Then I reopened the bank statements.

I backed up every record, one by one, carefully labeled and clearly marked.

Only after I finished did I lower my gaze to my belly.

The baby moved gently again.

And in that moment, I finally understood something—

This story would no longer be allowed to end on their terms.

When Daniel came home, the house was completely dark.

He paused at the door, then turned on the light, his voice carrying a note of deliberate concern.

“Olivia, why didn’t you turn on the lights? It’s so dark—what if you trip?”

The moment the lights came on, he was already in front of me. He dropped to one knee and took my hand in his.

I instinctively raised my other hand to shield my face, but the tears still slipped through my fingers.

“Why are you crying like this?” he asked softly, as if soothing a child. “Who made my wife and our baby so uncomfortable?”

As he spoke, he leaned down and pressed a light kiss against my belly.

In that instant, I smelled it again.

That familiar scent—

Sweet, faint, unmistakable jasmine.

I forced myself to steady my breathing and looked up at him.

“Where were you just now?”

“At the office,” he answered quickly, without even pausing. “There was a sudden issue with a project. I had to work late.”

His tone was natural—too natural. As if it had been rehearsed countless times.

I nodded, then smiled instead.

“Is that so?”

He visibly relaxed.

“But Daniel,” I said softly, my fingers tightening around his hand, “weren’t you in the eastern part of the city today? Carla suddenly wanted dumplings from that famous place. You drove all the way from the west side—it takes over an hour. She even went live.”

The air fell silent for a single second.

Before he could react, I added with another smile, my voice gentle, almost naïve,

“Now that I think about it, I suddenly want those dumplings too.”

I placed my hand back on my belly, as if reminding him of the role he was supposed to be playing.

As if sensing my emotions, the baby suddenly kicked hard. I frowned and drew in a shallow breath.

“Could you help me get some?”

Daniel withdrew his hand from mine.

He stood up, a trace of poorly concealed irritation flashing across his brow.

“That kind of food isn’t very nutritious,” he said. “You’re so far along now—you need to be careful about what you eat.”

After a brief pause, he added,

“For our son. Try to endure it, okay?”

Without waiting for my response, he turned and walked toward the bathroom. His voice returned to that familiar, gentle tone that allowed no argument.

“I’ll take a shower first. I’m exhausted. Why don’t you call your mother and ask her to make you something light?”

The sound of the bathroom door closing echoed sharply through the house.

I leaned back against the sofa, slowly stroking my belly, and whispered,

“Don’t be afraid, my love.”

“Mommy will find a way.”

The phone on the dining table lit up.

Daniel was always like this—never cautious, never secretive, as if he were certain I would never touch it.

The sound of running water came from the bathroom. I braced myself against the sofa and stood up. My movements were slow, but my mind had never been clearer.

I tried a few familiar numbers.

Our wedding anniversary.

His birthday.

The date of our first date.

All failed.

In the end, I stared at the screen. My finger hovered for two seconds before I entered the date printed on Carla’s ultrasound report.

The screen unlocked.

I wasn’t even that surprised.

In his messaging app, her profile picture stood out unmistakably.

What was more bitterly ironic was that they were using the exact same couple avatar.

The chat history was overwhelming.

“I miss you.”

“Baby, when can we meet?”

“As long as I can see you every day, nothing else matters.”

I didn’t keep scrolling. Instead, I turned on screen recording.

Then I opened his shopping app.

The order list made me let out a silent, humorless laugh.

Prenatal supplements. Skincare. Cosmetics. Not a single thing missing.

The delivery address was always the same.

And the recipient was never me.

I took screenshots one after another, forcing myself to keep my breathing steady, afraid the baby inside me might feel my trembling.

After everything was saved, I carefully erased all traces and placed the phone back exactly where it had been.

When I returned to the bedroom, I lay down almost on my side. The night pressed in heavily, and my chest felt hollow and aching, as if something essential had been carved out.

Seven years of marriage—

it turned out to be nothing more than a stepping stone in someone else’s story.

The bathroom door opened again.

Not long after, his phone lit up once more.

Through the crack of the door, I saw him answer the call. In that instant, his entire body softened. He glanced toward the bedroom, then walked quietly to the balcony, closing the door behind him.

The sound of the glass sliding shut was soft.

But I heard it with absolute clarity.

At that moment, I didn’t cry.

Curiosity—thin, sharp, relentless—pushed me to stand up again. I held onto the doorframe and remained in the shadows, watching Daniel take the call on the balcony.

Through the glass, I couldn’t hear his words. I could only see his face.

It was an expression I hadn’t seen on him in a long time—relaxed, patient, even tinged with indulgence.

The person on the other end seemed to make a request. His brow furrowed briefly, as if hesitating. But not long after, he nodded, the smile returning to his lips.

In that moment, a chill slowly spread from my chest outward.

I turned away and dragged my heavy body back to the bed. The room was terrifyingly quiet, the air feeling as though it had been drained away, every breath suddenly laborious.

A few minutes later, he slipped into the room quietly.

One hand rested on my belly. The other brushed aside the loose strands of hair at my forehead. His movements were gentle—almost flawless.

“Baby,” he said softly, “something urgent came up at work. I need to step out for a bit.”

I turned my head and looked straight at him.

In that moment, I still gave him one last chance.

I spoke quietly.

“I’m not feeling well. Could you stay?”

As long as he nodded.

As long as he chose me—just this once.

Maybe then, I could still persuade myself to forget all the evidence.