Chapter 2

2: 2

2

Philip frowned.

"Wendy's only wish was to register a marriage with me once, to have a home that truly belonged to her."

"You already had the wedding, and you live with me. So stop making a scene."

He said it so calmly.

As if splitting my marriage in two were the fairest arrangement possible.

Suddenly I thought of the wedding five years ago.

When Philip slid the ring onto my finger, he had said, in front of every guest,

"For the rest of my life, I'll have only one wife. You."

The one crying hardest below the stage was Mom.

The first to clap was Cindy.

Wendy even fixed my veil with her own hands, smiling as she wished us a long life together.

So it turned out everyone in that room already knew.

The real bride wasn't me.

And still they watched me tear up in gratitude, watched me take a hollow vow as truth.

My voice had gone numb.

"If the house is hers, then why am I the one paying the mortgage?"

Mom's brow tightened.

"You and Philip lived in it for five years. Paying a little toward the mortgage is only right, isn't it?"

"Wendy is the real owner, and yet she never moved in for a single day, just to spare your feelings."

"She never held it against you for taking over her house, and now you're the one counting pennies?"

I looked at Mom and suddenly had no idea what more there was to say.

Right then, Wendy clapped a hand over her mouth and rushed to the bathroom, gagging.

Philip's face changed at once. He was there in an instant, rubbing her back.

Mom hurried over with warm water, just as anxious.

"Didn't they say it would be fine after the first three months?"

My whole body went rigid.

"What first three months?"

Wendy leaned back into Philip's arms, pale, one hand moving instinctively to shield her belly.

Philip was silent for a few seconds, then finally spoke.

"Wendy is twelve weeks pregnant."

Twelve weeks.

So they hadn't only registered a marriage and gotten the house. There was a child too.

That story about only holding a single marriage certificate was just one more lie they'd all agreed to feed me.

Wendy's eyes reddened as she explained.

"Sis, I didn't want this baby at first."

"But the doctor said I might have a hard time conceiving again later, and Philip couldn't bear to lose it…"

She dropped her head and stroked her belly, saying she was sorry, while the happiness in her eyes was more than she could hide.

Mom immediately stepped in front of her.

"Wendy is risking her life to carry this child. Don't you dare upset her."

"You couldn't hold on to your baby. That just means you and that child weren't meant to be."

"Are you saying that because you had one miscarriage, Philip should never get to be a father his whole life?"

A ringing filled my ears.

The child I lost on the operating table was, in their mouths, nothing more than an accident I should have put behind me quickly.

While the child in Wendy's belly was something everyone would guard like their lives depended on it.

Philip helped her back into her chair, a warning in his tone.

"The baby is innocent."

"Whatever grievance you have, take it up with me. Don't frighten Wendy."

With that, he picked up the marriage certificate on the table to put it back in its box.

The moment it fell open, I saw the registration date.

August seventeenth.

My breath stopped dead.

Three years ago, on August seventeenth, I was two months pregnant when I started bleeding and doubled over in pain.

The doctor told me the baby couldn't be saved and I needed surgery immediately.

I called Philip seventeen times.

He replied with a single line:

【I'm with an important client. Don't bother me with something so trivial.】

I called Mom, Dad, and Cindy too.

Mom and Dad said Wendy was in a bad way and they had to stay with her.

Cindy never picked up.

In the end, the nurse held out the surgical consent form and asked me,

"When will your family get here?"

I lay on that cold hospital bed and signed my own name, alone.

Philip didn't turn up until late that night, after it was over.

He held me, the woman who had just lost her child, and said sorry over and over.

He said that if he'd known it was this serious, he would have dropped the client and come to me.

I believed him.

And it wasn't until today that I understood.

That day, it wasn't that no one had the time.

They were all just busy watching Philip and Wendy register their marriage.

So three years ago, while I lay alone on an operating table losing my child,

Philip was at the county clerk's office, with everyone there to witness it, becoming Wendy's lawful husband.