The moment Jenny saw me, she feigned surprise.

She said, "Amy? I’m so sorry! I didn’t know you’d come back. I had nothing to wear, so I borrowed your clothes. Besides, you’re pregnant and too big to wear them now. You don’t mind, do you?”

I frowned and turned to Theo, who was still on the couch, hoping for an explanation.

Amid puffs of smoke, his voice was icy. “It’s pouring outside. I didn’t want something to happen to her, so I told her to stay over. You’re not going to start a fight over this, are you?”

He did not care that his eight-month-pregnant wife was shivering and wet. Yet, he cared so much for his so-called “sister.”

I was beyond disappointed and couldn’t even muster the energy to argue. I walked straight into the bedroom and I did not notice the flicker of surprise in his eyes.

I thought with Jenny in the house, Theo would not bother to find me for the rest of the night.

Yet, imagine my surprise seeing him tiptoeing into the bedroom just before I slept.

His hand that was rubbing my waist felt hot on my skin and he murmured apologetically, “Does it still hurt?”

Then he continued, "I've cleaned up the house. Can you just let things go? There were many people coming here tonight. Why are you so angry, it was just a joke? Being angry is bad for the baby. Just be good and stop making a fuss."

"Huh? Do you still have some concerns about the baby?" I said sharply, could not hide the sarcasm in my tone.

His hand's movement froze for a second.

When he leaned over to kiss me, I grabbed his hand and pressed it against the stretch marks on my belly. He immediately leaped away as if being burned.

When he realized he had overreacted, he tried to apologize but before he could do that his phone rang.

In the silence of the room, I could hear Jenny's pitiful voice, "I'm sorry, Theo. I must have made Amy upset. I shouldn’t stay and be a burden to you. I'll leave immediately, you don't have to worry about me …. Ah!"

After the unfinished word and her cry of alarm, the call was cut off.

Theo panicked, he immediately put on his jacket and pulled me out of the bed.

"If something happens to Jenny tonight, I won’t forgive you! This is all your fault!" He snarled.

“She went out on her own! I didn't ask her to go tonight. How is that my fault?” I asked in bewilderment.

However, he didn’t care. Despite my attempt to fight back, he managed to drag me into the car.

Due to the thin pajamas that I wore, I kept sneezing in the freezing wind.

Yet, Theo did not notice my discomfort. He just pressed his foot hard on the accelerator.

Ten minutes later, we finally found Jenny. She was sprawled on the roadside.

He immediately jumped out, scooped her up and sped toward the hospital like a madman.

Even as he drove, he spat out a warning toward me “If anything happens to Jenny, I’ll never forgive you!”

While Jenny was being examined, sharp pain gripped my stomach. The chaos of the night was taking its toll.

Sweat beaded on my forehead, so I leaned against the wall to keep myself from collapsing.

After what felt like an eternity, Theo finally noticed my condition. However, instead of concern, his voice was cold. “Stop acting it. Did you have to fall to seeing her fall?”

"Amy, I didn’t think you could be this kind of person! Pretending to be all decent, but you can’t even tolerate a young girl behind closed doors!”

At that moment, the night-shift doctor from earlier passed by. His gaze shifted between the two of us and he looked puzzled.

“What’s your relationship?” he asked. “Didn’t you say ….”

My heart sank. As I scrabbled how to come up with the answer, Jenny's pitiful cries echoed from the hospital room.

In a flash, the man beside me turned around and entered the room.

I forced a bitter smile. “It’s nothing. Just distant relatives. A little spat between husband and wife.”

The doctor sighed softly.

“Even though you’ve scheduled the procedure, you still need to be careful. Don’t get caught up in their mess. If something goes wrong, you might not make it to the surgery.”

I nodded silently. As I watched the doctor’s retreating figure, my heart filled with sadness.

Just as I was about to crouch down and rest, Theo came storming out and dragged me back inside. He pointed at Jenny who was lying on the bed and barked, "Apologize to her!"

Then he continued, "Amy, if you didn't stir up trouble tonight, Jenny would've been safe and sound at home and she would not be hit by a car."

I furrowed my brows then laughed angrily at his shameless accusation. "Huh, me? I'm the troublemaker? Didn't you hear the personal attack that she hurled at me tonight?"

"Theo, I’m carrying your child! When she insults me, she’s insulting you too! Are you that clueless?”

It was the first time in five years I had shown him such a cold face. This made Theo so angry, that his eyes turned red because of it.

Before he could say anything, Jenny, who was lying on the hospital bed, burst into tears.

“I’m sorry, this is all my fault! I just wanted to lighten the mood. I didn’t mean to upset Amy. Please don’t fight because of me. It’s all on me.”

“When I recover, I’ll resign and leave. I won’t ever appear in front of you two again," she wailed miserably.

Theo, suppressing his rage, clenched his teeth and growled, "This is the last time I'm saying this, Amy! Apologize!"

“Don’t stoop to her level. I’ve told you this many times before. She is just a little girl.”

I looked at him coldly and stared at him for a long time before turning away silently, walking out and leaving the room.

As I stepped into the hallway, his furious roar echoed behind me, "If you dare leave, don’t ever come back! Amy, sooner or later, you'll come crawling back and begging before me along with that belly of yours!"

Tears streaked down my face as I quickened my pace, ignoring the gawking eyes of the people around me.

Outside the hospital, the rainstorm hadn’t eased up. I wandered the vast hospital alone, wearing nothing but my thin pajamas.

The hospital was in a remote area and I couldn’t hail a taxi no matter how hard I tried.

As if sensing my distress, the baby in my belly finally stopped moving and grew quiet.

After waiting for two hours, the rain subsided and I walked three kilometers to the nearest hotel to check-in. By then, it was already four o'clock in the morning.

As I paid for the room, a notification of a friend update popped up. When I looked at it, it was from Jenny.

The post featured a candid photo of Theo. He was holding a steaming bowl of porridge while gently massaging her swollen ankle.

The accompanying text read, "Sweet words don’t compare to porridge at dawn. The one who loves you never complains of being tired. Thank you, brother.”

As soon as the picture was posted, it quickly gathered many likes., mostly from Theo's friends who had attended the birthday party earlier.

These people had always looked down on me but taken care of Jenny with special affection. It wasn’t hard to imagine what role Theo had played in shaping their opinions and what kind of lies he must have told them about my so-called clingy, desperate behavior.

I was about to put my phone away when the comments began flooding in.

“Wow, Theo! Is there anything you can’t do? You're worthy as a top student who is proficient in everything, even porridge-making! How come I never knew you had this skill in the ten years I’ve known you? So unfair!”

“Next gathering, you better make some for us too, Theo. Show off your skills in front of Jenny again!”

“If I remember correctly, didn’t you once say you’d never do anything for a woman in your life? What a slap in the face! Only our Princess Jenny could change that!”

***

Every comment was like a dagger. It was a highlight of how cheap and pathetic I, as his wife, must have seemed.

They were right. Although we had been together for five years and I was eight months pregnant, we had not obtained a marriage certificate. It was indeed cheap. No wonder, Theo never appreciated me.

I let out a bitter laugh, turned off the phone and headed to the bedroom to sleep.

In the past, I had always kept my phone on because I was afraid. Theo would call me in the middle of the night, asking me to pick him up at the hotel.

For once, I slept throughout the night, undisturbed and woke up the next day.

I slept until noon and when I woke up, my phone filled with his messages.

"Why didn't you come home? Where are you? Send me your location!" he wrote.

"Amy, are you blind? Can't you see my messages? Why are you ignoring them? Don't push it too far!" he added.

"Jenny had already forgiven you for what had happened last night. She even suggested to take you to a movie. Just take this opportunity to get everything off your chest. Stop throwing tantrums at me."

His tone carried the arrogance of someone granting me a monumental favor.

I rubbed my temples in exhaustion.

After thinking about it, I figured it was not a bad idea to talk this through once and for all. After all, I had to show him my stand on this. So, I sent him my hotel's location.

When his car arrived downstairs, he lowered down the passenger window. Theo scanned me from head to toe. His brow furrowed and he looked at me with disapproval.

"You went out with your pajamas?" he asked. "Are you trying to embarrass me?"

"Don't you know that Jenny defended you all night about what had happened? Now, you are causing trouble again, aren’t you?"

For one and a half days I hadn’t really talked to him and I did not have any energy left to argue with him. " “My clothes got soaked in the rain yesterday. What was I supposed to wear, huh?”

The rebuke that he was about to throw at me caught in his throat. For once, my word managed to make him speechless.

Jenny, who was sitting in the front seat, squinted her eyes and flashed me a sweet smile. "See, I've told you, Amy isn't not a bad person. It must have been a misunderstanding. Let’s just talk it out. Oh, Theo gave me a jacket earlier. Why don’t you try it on? It might fit you.”

My mouth stretched into a smile with a deadpan expression. "No thanks. I’m not interested in second-hand items. For me, it's dirty.”

Noticing that she had no intention to move, I got into the backseat without a word.

From his expression, it seemed Theo was about to explode but when he turned his head to look at me, he did not expect to see me so calm and this made him hesitate for a while.

When she noticed his hesitation, Jenny spoke, "I'm sorry, Amy. My injured foot hadn't healed yet, so I needed a lot of room for it. I have to trouble you to sit at the back.

I could feel Theo's eyes directed at me from the rearview mirror but I was simply too tired to care. So, I kept my mouth shut and closed my eyes.

During the drive home, Jenny kept talking about how I should have changed clothes. I knew that she subtly mocked my disheveled appearance, but I did not take her bait. I was too drained to argue.

Eventually, even Theo grew annoyed at her and spoke up, "Leave her alone. She can wear whatever she wants. Who’s going to care how a heavily pregnant woman looks?”

His dismissive tone made Jenny's face beamed with triumph. She kept chattering, recounting how delicious the porridge was last night or how much fun the party games were. In short, they were all their memories, the ones that I had no part in.

Yet, I didn’t mind. I felt relaxed. I was also glad that I had time to rest. Pregnancy had left me constantly exhausted. It was hard to keep my eyes open every day.

Theo kept glancing at me, waiting for my reaction and the lack of it made the uneasiness in his heart grow by the minute.

When we arrived at the cinema, he said, “Stay close to me. The theater is dark and the floors are uneven. Hold onto me so you don’t trip.”

I couldn’t help but smirk bitterly. I never expected that I would watch a farewell movie, thanks to Jenny. How ironic.

However, as soon as we stepped inside, Jenny eagerly grabbed his hand and dragged him far ahead and once again, I was left alone.

When I finally found my seat, Theo was busy helping Jenny unscrew the cap of her drink.

In the dim light, I caught a flicker of guilt in his eyes.

“She got a bit excited earlier and I didn’t notice you. Don’t be mad,” he murmured.

I nodded, indifferent. “I’m not mad. In fact, I won’t get mad anymore … not this time, not ever. After the movie, stay behind. I have something to tell you.”

He didn’t seem to catch my words, distracted as Jenny called him over to open her popcorn bag.

Halfway through the movie, a sudden crash echoed above us. In just two seconds, the steel frame overhead came tumbling down.

Around me, people ducked or bowed their heads instinctively, shielding themselves.