Later, Ivan deliberately scheduled our divorce filing for the same day he and Glenda would get their marriage license.
But this time—
That day, the man who had always been so lofty, so detached, came undone. His eyes locked onto my flat stomach with a wild, desperate intensity, and his voice cracked. "Where's my baby? Where's our child?"
"You promised—you said you wanted to have a baby with me!"
——
"Stella, sweetheart... are you sure you want to go through with this? After everything you went through for this baby..."
My mother's voice broke on the other end of the line, and guilt twisted through me like a blade.
She had been the happiest of anyone when she found out I was pregnant.
She knew what it had cost me. A full year of choking down bitter herbal medicine. Nine failed rounds of IVF. It wasn't until the tenth that I finally conceived.
The moment the test results came back positive, she'd wept with joy.
She believed that with a baby on the way, Ivan and I would settle into a real life together—that he'd step up, become a responsible husband, learn to put his family first.
It wasn't until today that I realized how terribly wrong we'd both been.