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Chapter 1
It’s been months since I have been able to breathe freely and painlessly. My entire protected, familiar world has changed beyond recognition. I was left alone with sadness, shattered dreams, and one huge hole in my heart.
I tried to hold on to my only bliss - my only son, my beloved Roy. Only six years old, and he has already brought so much joy into my life with his kind, pretty face, his heart-melting smile, his scent, and his touch.
“Mommy! Hug me, please! The house looks amazing... and my room is perfect!” He keeps jumping up and down, excited to start this new chapter. Just us two.
It was a two-bedroom apartment with a small balcony overlooking a green forest. I worked hard to make it look like a perfect, welcoming home, clearing away all the boxes, cardboard and clutter before he arrived.
“I’m so happy that you like it,” I pressed him to me tightly and felt content. I had managed to create a warm, inviting nest out of that small apartment. At least until we got settled in again.
“I suggest you don’t ‘raise the dead’ and widen the rift between you and him. I strongly advise you not to provoke him too much,” Andy, my lawyer, had told me. “Don’t let him get to you.”
“Of course,” I agree, understandingly, and continued to take all the poisonous barbs he throws at me, the wounding words he uses to try and drag me into more and more bitterarguments. ‘Just a little longer and it’ll be over’... I keep repeating to myself.
“Who do you think you are? No wonder you’ve been divorced before! You have no one in this world aside from me. Without me, you’re nothing, a zero!”
His words still echo through my mind, all wrapped up in deep-seated disappointment and sorrow.
I still remember the day I first entered the small flower shop that he owned.
“Good morning. Do you happen to have any daffodils?”
“Sam?” He looked at me surprised. “What are you doing here? I thought you’d moved to England.”
“Do we know each other?” I blushed, hoping that my sketchy past wasn’t haunting me again. Could he be another one that I don’t remember?
“I know you, of course.” He chuckled. “You were the main reason that I came to the ‘Eagle Club’ every Thursday.”
“Is that so?” I asked, slightly embarrassed.
“Yes, but you married the club DJ and didn’t even notice me.”
I snickered. “Well, we’re long divorced. His lifestyle and drinking habits weren’t my thing.”
“So, does that mean you’re single now?”
“Apparently so.” I looked at him pensively. Back then, I felt so empty and unloved. My fairytale romance with the club scene’s rising star ended as quickly as it had begun. He terrified me, especially when he went into fits of drunken rage.
“Wonderful!” he continued. “I am, too. How about we have dinner together?” He looked at me, smiled, and handed me the most gorgeous daffodil bouquet I had ever seen.
“Okay,” I gave him my number and was swept away into another love affair.
This time, I was more determined to be safe than sorry. That’s why I tried to choose a man who would respect and cherish me. He was wealthy; he owned two small apartments and an automobile repair shop. He was completely different from all the other shady men I had met. He was also loyal, a homebody, and it seemed like he truly loved me. So, I allowed myself to let down my guard and revealed my innermost feelings. I allowed my dormant hopes and dreams to be reawakened.
“Just look at this breathtaking gift you’ve given me,” he said, wiping a tear of joy that had welled up in his big green eyes. “You’re the prettiest and bravest woman I had ever met,” he breathed little Roy in. When I remember those joyful moments, full of hope and love, I can’t help but cry. How did they all fade away? How could it have happened to me? I couldn’t believe, not for one moment, that this sensitive man who, before we were married, would do everything for me and for whom I had been his entire world, would change so much and become so cruel.
“Why do you think you’re so perfect?” He’d berate me. “You think you know everything.”
“That isn’t true, Matthew. I read about it, which is why I know.” My vast knowledge in various topics, especially when it came to Roy’s parenting, would intimidate him.
“Well, that’s only because you spend the whole day alone,” he’d reply mockingly. “I’m sure that if I had all the time in the world to do nothing but sit around the house all day, he would have been closer to me than he is to you,” he’d taunt me and belittle my organic cosmetics marketing job.
“Matthew, I’m his mother, for goodness’ sake! That’s why he’s so close to me. Could you stop picking on me and being ridiculously jealous?”
“Yes, yes,” he’d snigger and go on with his day.
I tried to hold on to him but the more I tried, the more he pushed me away. Like that time, right after his mother had passed away, when his heart had hardened and had closed off to me entirely. He had become impatient and harsh.
