But I'd treasured it like it was priceless. Even after he made his fortune and bought me countless expensive rings, I only ever wore that one.
Once, I lost it. I cried for a full day and night, couldn't eat, couldn't sleep.
Then one day, while I was cooking dinner for him, I found an identical ring inside the belly of a fish.
I thought it was a miracle. That fate itself had returned my ring.
I found out later that Otis hadn't wanted me to be upset. He'd had someone craft an exact replica and slipped it into the fish himself.
In that moment, the ring became his get-out-of-jail-free card. His golden shield against anything.
But a ring that had been replaced, no matter how identical it looked on the outside, was never the same one.
Just like Otis.
The man who had only had eyes for me, who had loved no one but me, had ceased to exist a long time ago.
I'd been fooling myself. All I'd earned was more heartbreak.
So I pulled the ring off my finger and tossed it into the filthy gutter beside me.
Along with the wreckage of this marriage.
Over the next few days, Otis didn't come home.
Vivian, however, made sure to send me regular updates on their happy little life together.