4

Tobias

The silence in the bedroom grew so heavy it felt suffocating. Valeria stood before me, her hands trembling, her eyes filled with a raw, desperate pain I had never seen in her before.

"If Serena walked through that door tomorrow," she repeated, her voice cracking slightly, "would you still want me as your wife?"

The question caught me completely off guard. It was an impossible scenario, an irrational thought, and my mind immediately reached for logic to shut it down.

"Serena is dead, Valeria," I said, my voice hardening as I tried to regain control of the conversation. "She isn't walking through any door. The question is completely pointless."

"Your refusal to answer is already an answer, Tobias," she whispered, stepping back from me. A bitter, sad smile touched her pale lips.

"That isn't fair," I said, my voice rising slightly. We never raised our voices in this house. We never fought like this. Our marriage had always been quiet, civil, and predictable. But looking at her now, the composure she usually maintained had completely shattered. "You're turning my grief into some kind of twisted competition!"

"A competition?" Valeria let out a quiet, painful laugh that sounded more like a sob. "Tobias, I have spent four long years competing with a dead woman! And the worst part is, I didn't even choose to enter it. You dragged me into it the day you gave me this ring."

The raw hurt in her voice struck me like a physical blow. I froze, stunned by how deeply, thoroughly unhappy she sounded. I had always thought she was content. She had everything she needed. She never complained. I thought we had an understanding.

"Valeria—"

"Have you ever once looked at me?" she interrupted, her dark eyes locking onto mine, searching my face with a terrifying intensity. "Just once, Tobias. Have you ever looked at me, touched me, or held me without remembering her?"

I opened my mouth to say yes. The word was right there on the tip of my tongue. I wanted to tell her that she was being ridiculous, that I saw her, that she was my wife.

But the word died in my throat. I hesitated. For two seconds, three seconds, I stayed silent.

Valeria watched the hesitation settle between us like a wall of ice. The hope in her eyes flickered and died completely.

"Thank you for being honest," she said softly.

She turned on her heel and walked out of the room, closing the door quietly behind her. She didn't slam it. She didn't scream. The silence she left behind was far worse than any argument.

Later that night, unable to sleep, I found myself walking down the quiet east wing corridor. My feet stopped outside the brass-locked room. I reached into my pocket, pulled out the key, and unlocked the heavy double doors.

I stepped inside. The air was cool, smelling of old paper and dried flowers. I looked up at the large framed photograph above the fireplace.

Serena smiled down at me, holding her bouquet of white lilies. For four years, coming into this room had been my sanctuary. It was where I remembered her, where I held onto the life we were supposed to have before the accident stole it from me.

But tonight, as I stared at Serena's face, her image began to blur.

I couldn't focus on her laugh. Instead, all I could picture was Valeria standing in our bedroom, her shoulders shaking, her dark eyes brimming with tears. I saw the way her lips trembled when she asked if I had ever truly looked at her.

A sharp, unpleasant tightness gripped my chest. For the first time in four years, being in this room didn't bring me comfort. It brought me an overwhelming sense of guilt.

"Mr. Hayes?" my secretary, Sarah, said the next afternoon, standing by my desk with a clipboard. "Mrs. Hayes called the office earlier. She asked me to cancel all her upcoming social appearances for the rest of the month, including the charity committee meetings."

I paused, looking up from my laptop. "Did she say why?"

"No, sir. She just said she wasn't feeling well and wished to take some time off."

"I see," I murmured.

I picked up my personal phone. My thumb hovered over Valeria's contact name. I wanted to call her. I wanted to ask if she was alright, if she had taken her medicine, if she needed anything. But my pride, along with years of built-up emotional distance, held me back. I put the phone back down on the glass desk. She just needed space. We both did.

When I arrived home that evening, the house was quiet. I walked into the dining room expecting an awkward tension or another argument.

Instead, Valeria was already seated at the head of the long table. She was dressed in a simple dark gray sweater, her hair pulled back into a neat knot. Her face was completely calm. The anger from the night before had vanished, replaced by a smooth, unreadable stillness.

Strangely, her calm bothered me far more than her tears ever had. It felt like a wall had been built around her, one I couldn't cross.

I sat down at the opposite end of the table. The servants served a light dinner of grilled fish and vegetables. We ate in heavy, suffocating silence for several minutes.

"I called Sarah today," Valeria said quietly, breaking the quiet. She took a delicate sip of her water. "I asked her to adjust my schedule."

"She told me," I said, cutting a piece of fish. "You don't have to cancel everything, Valeria. If you need a few days to rest, that's fine."

"I am not attending Serena's memorial gala on Saturday, Tobias," she said, her voice completely even, without a single trace of hesitation.

I stopped my fork halfway to my plate and looked up at her. "We already discussed this. The Vale family invited us both. It's an official event, and appearances matter. You have obligations as my wife."

Valeria placed her water glass down on the white tablecloth with a soft, deliberate click. She looked at me, her dark eyes devoid of any emotion.

"Then perhaps I should stop being your wife."

My heart gave a sudden, violent thud. "What did you just say?"

Valeria didn't answer with words. She raised her left hand. Her fingers moved slowly, sliding the heavy platinum diamond ring off her ring finger.

I watched, frozen in place, as she reached across the table and placed the sparkling wedding ring right beside her plate.