Divorce Diaries

STORY 1 IN DIVORCE DIARIES.

ORIGINALLY WRITTEN BY MINNAH

(Synopsis)

After five years of marriage, Anna discovered that her husband Jacob was secretly dating another woman. Instead of apologizing, Jacob asked for an open marriage and admitted he no longer loved her. Anna filed for divorce and began the difficult process of rebuilding her life after years of depending on him. Along the way, she met another man who treated her with genuine love and respect. When Jacob’s mistress eventually cheated on him as well, he was filled with regret and tried desperately to win Anna back. The question remained: would Anna choose the man who had broken her, or the one who had helped her heal?

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After another long day of walking from one company to another in Singapore, Anna returned home exhausted. She has handed out résumé after résumé, only to hear the same polite rejections: "We’ll get back to you. We’re looking for someone with more experience. Unfortunately, the position has already been filled."

Her feet ached. Her shoulders feels heavy. Her mind was even more drained than her body. But she refused to give up. She wanted financial independence more than anything.

She follows the saying of Nicole Reed—"Sometimes the bad things that happen in our lives put us directly on the path to the best things that will ever happen to us."

The two maids working in the mansion immediately bowed when she stepped through the front door.

“Good evening, ma’am.”

Anna managed a small smile and waved them off.

“Good evening.” she would have smiled and asked what they prepared for dinner before but she was just too tired to do that.

She climbed the stairs slowly, walking toward the bedroom she shared with her husband, Jacob Williams.

The moment she pushed the door open, the sound of running water came from the bathroom, made her believe her husband was already home. His phone lay carelessly on the bed beside some of his belongings.

He was showering.

With a tired sigh, Anna walked over and sat down on the edge of the bed beside his phone. For a few seconds, she simply stared at it.

Jacob never wanted her to work. That was the part she still couldn’t understand. He had connections everywhere. If he truly wanted to help her find a job, one phone call would have been enough. Someone would have been waiting for her with an employment offer within minutes. Instead, he insisted she find work on her own since she refused to be his housewife.

He knew she barely knew anyone in Singapore. He knew she just recently moved here after finishing her college education in Indonesia.

He knew how difficult it was for her to navigate a city where she had no friends, no connections, and no idea where anything was. And whenever she complained about how hard the job search was, he will tell her to stay at home.

Anna looked at the phone again. A strange feeling settled in her chest.

"Should I check it?" she thought.

For a moment she hesitated. Jacob hated her touching his phone, he made that very clear. Every time he caught her even holding it, his expression would darken immediately, and he would shout at her as if she had committed some unforgivable crime.

Perhaps that was exactly why she suddenly wanted to look. Maybe there was something in that phone he didn’t want her to see.

Her heart began beating faster. She picked up the phone and turned it on. The screen lit up. She tried to unlock it, but the password was incorrect. Only one more chance remained.

What was his password?

She thought of his mother’s date of birth. Jacob loved his mother deeply. As she typed the numbers, the phone unlocked. Anna almost laughed bitterly at herself for being a genius.

Then she saw the messages.

Her eyes stopped on a contact saved as ☆My Safespace☆

Her eyebrows knitted together.

“Who is his Safespace?” she whispered.

Her thumb hovered over the conversation. She opened it. The first message she saw made her stomach twist. This was not a conversation between friends. They spoke to each other with the kind of softness Jacob hasn’t shown her in months. There were affectionate names. Heart emojis. Little messages asking if the other had eaten. ☆I miss you. I can’t wait to see you.☆

Her hands began trembling. She scrolled down further.

And then she saw ☆You're my Girlfriend, you should never go through anything alone.☆

For a moment, everything around her seemed to disappear. She stared at the screen, hoping that somehow she had misunderstood what she was reading. But there was nothing to misunderstand. Jacob had another woman. That was the real reason he had never let her check his phone.

Her lips parted, but no words came out. She felt something crack inside her chest.

Then she heard footsteps.

Her head snapped toward the bathroom just as the door opened. Jacob stepped out wearing his bathrobe, a towel in one hand as he dried his damp hair.

His gaze immediately landed on the phone in her hand and his expression changed.

“I’ve warned you several times to stop checking my phone!” he snapped at her.

Then walked toward her and snatched it from her grasp. Anna stared at him, no longer frightened the way she always used to be.

“Jacob…” Her voice shook. “Who’s your Safespace?”