Chapter1
Leona
“Mommy, are we there?” My seven–year–old daughter asked and I sighed kissing her head.
“Just a few more turns,” I assured her she nodded gently. I bit my lip to hold onto the cries wanting to escape out.
How do you hold it together when your child is suffering for life being cruel? How do you assure her she will be fine? How do you keep going when your whole body and soul are falling apart daily, divided into responsibilities that aren’t unbearable but exhausting when there’s no achievement?
The cab pulled in front of my house and I paid the driver, climbing out with confusion. The driver helped me with the wheelchair and I helped my daughter onto it. The accident had been terrifying but we were grateful that our daughter made it, but the injury was severe and walking became impossible.
“Thank you.” I thanked him, and he smiled gently before driving off.
The house lights were off, which was shockingly unusual because Will hated the total dark. Maybe he wasn’t home. No, he knew I was returning after two days and he had to arrange dinner tonight so I don’t think he’ll skip that.
“Mommy,” Wilona poked me. We named her with our names combined as our first gift of love.
“I’m tired.” She mumbled pressing her discouraged voice under the stone sitting on my heart. Ignoring my drooping eyes asking me to shut down, I wheeled her to the wheelchair ramp that we built almost a year ago.
I pushed the door, bothered about it being left open mainly if Will wasn’t home.
Once I wheeled my daughter inside and turned the lights on, my eyes searched for my husband who
was nowhere to be seen. Especially when his favourite place was the living room, sitting or reading
in his mother’s chair.
I instantly pulled out my phone and dialled his number and his phone started ringing somewhere around because I was able to hear it. I grabbed it from the wall behind the couch and found the screen terribly cracked but somehow it was still ringing. My heart started hammering.
“Willy, go to your bedroom okay and dial 911 if something happens okay love.” I caressed her hair handing her my phone.
“Are there some bad guys in our home Mommy?” She asked unbelievably calmly, it was scary though I knew she was all sort of traumatised inside because of the accident, nothing was helping
and Will had been distant a lot.
“I don’t think so, I’m going to see pers
Chapter1
what’s happening okay?” She nodded and wheeled herself to her
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bedroom.
I desperately searched our big ass house since Will wanted a herd of kids, which just wasn’t happening for us for some reason. Finally, I found him in the attic, his back against the wall head hung low. The lights were off and it was very surprising. I turned on the lights and rushed to his side. He looked like he just showered, without bothering to dry his hair which was another thing
that irked him.
I kneeled beside him, only then did his head snap up and his eyes were bloodshot red, he had deep scrubbing marks on his skin which made me shiver.
What the hell was happening to my family?
“Will? I bit my lip, stopping myself from crying.
“Are you okay?” I muttered he seemed in a trance and he was scaring me, so I didn’t try touching him. His temper has been awful lately, his dream job just wasn’t enough for him now.
It was a long–hauled silence before he spoke. This feeling, where there’s a nerve–crushing terror that something was so wrong that it was scaring your soul was taking over me now.
“I’m sorry,” he muttered with a voice so low, I almost missed it. “God I am so sorry Leo, I’m so sorry.” He started frantically apologising his hands rubbing his face like he was trying to wipe off the guilt he was drowning in. I couldn’t understand, was he sorry for being difficult these past months? Or was he sorry for being distant? Or not cooking us dinner?
My head was spinning in circles, he wasn’t making sense so was our lives.
“What are you talking about? Is it for these past mo-,” I began asking.
“I FUCKING CHEATED ON YOU LEO.” He screamed.
Something inside me just cracked, I heard the voice, and my senses were like glass shattering.
A word that’s a dark curse for any relationship, hovering over my head. Was I trembling or was this an earthquake? I need something, someone to hold onto.
“Leo! My husband shook me to reality. I came back, tumbling down to the realisation of what I’d been told, what I heard and what my fears were pointing at.
With shaky, wanting to give up legs I stood up trying to stop the room or my head from whirling lik
a wild ride.
Long hauled silence scattered, with the only faint noises of my breaking trust.
“No! I yelled at him, glaring furiously. My mind struggled forward to believe him, my heart fought
for him.
“You’re lying, why are you lying Will? I cried out in frustration, my body was on fire my heart was
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racing
“I am not lying, Leo.” He whispered, with so much remorse coating his response. My feet tumbled back unable to stand near him.
My ears might been betraying me, hearing the wrong things. My Will could never be an unfaithful man. The intensity of those claims was strangling my beliefs.
It was impossible though right? Yes! Will would never cheat on me, he wasn’t like those men out there, he was different, he was better, and he was loyal and honest. Or was he?
1 shook my head to dust off the wrong information. It might be a nightmare, I might be thinking too negatively about things now it’s clouding my mind even in sleep, and coming out as monsters of my greatest horrors.
“Leo,” he called out loudly, painfully. Our eyes connected, and I saw doubt, fear, vulnerability, guilt and agonising pain but not a lie.
He isn’t lying!
“No, no, no,” I grunted holding my head, it kept getting heavier and heavier as the seconds passed.
“I’m sorry, 1,” he cries, ugly tears streaming down his face, making my eyes water with the truth they carried. “I didn’t mean for it to happen, it wasn’t. I didn’t. Leo, L.” He rambled unable to form a
clear sentence.
Silent tears flooded my face as the truth sank deeper into my senses, I couldn’t move my legs were glued to the flood
