Chapter 2: Closing curtains

~Melissa's POV~

Roberts heart shattering declaration left me dazed for a subtle moment. 

With the bitter realization that now stared me keenly in the eyes, sinking in. 

I could have sworn I felt my heart literally drop down to my rib cage. 

My head spun as though I was being plunged deep into a black hole.

How was it easy for him to utter such an unsettling pronouncement? I wondered. 

Was I truly that worthless to be discarded like soiled rags after serving my purpose? 

“Here! Sign it, so we can finally put this sham of a marriage behind us” he spat out another batch of venomous words, each one striking harder than the last, that had barely even sunk in. 

My teary eyes glare at him, hoping to see a little bit of remorse? empathy? or anything at all. But the man who stood hovering above me glared back with an icy sneer, as he stretched out his hands that clasped onto a neatly folded white envelope. 

“Why are you doing this Robert?” 

“What do you mean we're getting a divorce?" I mumbled out the words through quivering lips, that I desperately prayed I would never say in this lifetime. While pulling myself back up despite how my knees trembled. 

“And did you just call five years of our marriage a sham?” 

“Oh please Melissa……. save me the melodrama. Do not act like our marriage was initiated out of love for each other” he recklessly retorted. 

“You've always known I don't love you, never did and will never come to do so. Yet you continue to delude yourself with a hopeless possibility”  

I guess it took those vile words to do the trick.

 As a waterfall of tears I had painfully suppressed, now flowed down my face.

 I just couldn't believe it. Five years of my life, five years of holding on to a broken and loveless marriage, five years of sucking up to his prejudice family.…….groveling pathetically in submission at their feet for acceptance. Had finally run it's course in an instant moment.

 I nervously retrieved the document from his firm grip, and opened it to unravel it's contents with the words “Divorce Agreement”, written in bold, legible letters at the letterhead.

 My eyes screened through, despite my blurred vision to see his signature already freshly greased at the bottom, next to his name and a blank space was provided for mine.  

“Why are you doing this?” I questioned

“Is it because of her? Huh? Just because she's back.…….you want to toss me aside, despite clinging to your side when she left you back then” the words escape my trembling voice, as my heart palpitates rapidly. 

But all Robert did was stare blankly at me. His silence deafening. He shrugged his shoulders and clears his throat to speak. 

“Look Melissa, just sign the papers” he urged persistently. 

“Now that Jodie is back, we've talked.......about rekindling our relationship, which is for the best. Since she's the woman I love and clearly you know this”. 

“Our marriage was purely contractual and an arrangement that no longer serves either of us”. the finality of his words which hung in the air like a deadly cloud, left me stunned and speechless. My weak knees give out.......as I stagger back lightly. 

I expected the possibility of this happening and now that reality struck, clearing the fog of my delusion. It hurt like hell. 

My hands gently caressed my stomach, as a wave of pity engulfed me for my unborn child. Whose father was yet to know they exist. As a last resort to desperately change his mind, I try to tell him. 

“Robert I'm preg............  

But not soon enough. As Jodie walked in on us like clock work, her voice…….filled with curiosity, trailing from a distance. Interrupting me, as my words falter midway in the air. 

“Is everything alright Robert?” she asked, as her hands clutched at Roberts arm possessively, disregarding my presence like air.

“Everything is fine darling. We were just rounding up on our little chit-chat!” he responded back warmly at her, sounding nothing like the man who talked down at me moments ago. Much to my astonishment. 

And wait……..did I hear that correctly. 

Darling? Chit-chat?. Wow! the absolute nerve of this man, disregarding my emotional state and something as sentimental as us getting divorced. 

“Okay since your done here, can we get back to the party? I'm looking forward to having that dance we talked about”. Jodie whined and tugged at Robert like a child in need of candy, as she glanced briefly at me with a contemptuous smug on her face. 

“Sure, let's go”. With his hand placed firmly on her waist line, they strutted off back to the party, hand in hand like an A-list couple. When Robert halts abruptly in his tracks. 

“Remember to sign the papers Melissa and do not bother returning to the mansion. Your things will be delivered to you soonest”.

“Huh?.……W-what do you mean?” 

“Where do you expect me to go?” I asked, my perplexity intensifying. 

“That’s not my problem anymore Melissa, you a no longer my responsibility”. He utters back coldly and disinterested for a final time, as I watched them disappear back into the party and without so much as a glance at me. 

“Wait! Robert?......Please” I cried out, but my pleas were dismissed. 

 Leaving me shattered by his utterance. 

°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°

As I stood there disoriented for what felt like an eternity. I sluggishly dragged my feet to the nearest exit, despite how much my body limbs ached and got into my car parked outside the driveway, discarding both my clutch and divorce papers to the passenger seat beside me. 

With a tremored hand, I turned the key in the ignition to start, but a click-clack-click-clack sound drifted from the engine repetitively. As my frustration hit its peak, I slammed my palms against the steering wheel, “Dammit! can this night get any worse” my voice bawls out. 

Unwilling to give up as I desperately needed to leave, I go at it again. After much effort, it started. My hands firmly gripped on the steering wheel, turning my knuckles white, as I drove into the dark and desolate road ahead of me that seemed endless. Uncertain of my destination. 

The image of Roberts cold demeanor and distasteful words taunted my mind, as I remember the sacrifices I had made over the years to become the perfect wife and daughter in law that now amounted to nothing. How he always made derogatory remarks about my sense of fashion, changing my entire wardrobe to sooth his taste. Or how his mother Tessa could never be pleased with my cooking whenever she visited, either the meat wasn't tender enough, the food being too bland. 

God! She was such a pain to deal with.  

One time she requested that I cook for a charity event she was hosting, not suspecting any foul play I gladly obliged, but my happiness was short lived when she dumped an entire plate of food at me calling my cooking trash. Making a spectacle of me in front of so many people. 

Damn those ungrateful Mondragons. 

My mind was too fogged with a mix of pain and rage, as fresh tears streamed from my sore eyes blurring my vision. My foot pressed down hard on the accelerator pedal, making me speed recklessly through the rain soaked streets, oblivious of the downpour.  

When suddenly a stray dog appears out of nowhere, crossing the road. 

Impulsively, in a split second I swerved to avoid hitting it, but the wheel jerks in my hands and just before I could regain back control of my car, it crashed head on into another oncoming vehicle ahead.

The impact…….violent, the screeching sound of crumpled metal, deafening. My body is instantly thrown forward as my chest smashed hard into the stirring wheel. Shattered glass from the broken windshield stung and seeped through my body as blood gushed out, causing me excruciating pain. 

My body stiffened in place. My voice too hoarse to cry out for help, with no one else in sight, and for a subtle moment flashed memories of my argument with Robert flooded my mind, instead of resentment all I could feel was fear creeping in. 

Was this truly the end for me?. 

And my child…..what fate would befall them? I thought to myself, just before everything went pitch black, plunging me into darkness.