Useless

Isabella’s POV

Mateo didn’t come. Of course, he wouldn’t.

I shouldn't be surprised that my cheater husband didn't arrive on our wedding anniversary. But it wasn't just about our anniversary.

It was also about Elena.

It was one-year anniversary of our daughter’s death. And he wasn't visiting her grave. He wasn't holding his grieving wife.

He was in bed with Valentina.

I stepped into the bedroom that felt foreign, cold, not a place where I spent my five years. I walked to the wardrobe and stared at the drawer where I kept memories valuable than golds. A shiver ran down my body.

The night was too long. Too cold.

I didn’t bother to turn the lights on. I welcomed darkness, it felt better, warmer.

Darkness.

There was a time I was afraid of darkness. I believed monsters hide in darkness. I was wrong. Monsters don’t always hide in the dark. Sometimes, they wear lace nightgowns and call you "family."

Valentina. The name tasted like poison.

She didn’t just sleep with my husband. She had been stealing from me long before he entered my life.

Five years ago, when my father remarried, she walked into my life wearing soft smiles and fragile sighs, like a woman the world had wronged. She was only a few months older than me, young enough to play the victim convincingly, old enough to know exactly what she was doing.

From the beginning, she wanted everything that was mine. My father’s attention. My stepmother’s affection. The space I occupied in my own home.

“Isabella,” She said gently when she entered my room, touching my arm like we were already sisters. “I hope we can be close.”

She wore pale blue that day. She always wore colors that made people think of calm. Of kindness.

I nodded because I thought she was nice.

At dinner, she laughed at my father’s jokes. She leaned into my stepmother’s side. She asked about my classes with interest that felt sincere until the moment I spoke.

“Oh.” She said once, interrupting me mid-sentence. Her eyes shone. “I didn’t mean to upset you.”

“I’m not upset.” I replied.

But she was already tearing up.

My stepmother frowned at me across the table. “Isabella, you don’t need to sound so rude.”

My father sighed. “Be patient, Isabella. She’s trying.”

Trying. That word followed me for years.

Try harder. Be nicer. Stop causing problems.

Valentina never raised her voice. She never argued. She only looked hurt and the world rushed to protect her.

By the time I moved out, I had learned how to keep my feelings quiet. How to swallow anger before it became visible. How to be the villain in every story without ever knowing what crime I had committed.

Then I met Mateo. The memory came almost painfully.

We were sitting on the cold steps outside the university library, sharing cheap coffee because neither of us could afford a second cup. He listened when I spoke. Really listened. When I told him about my family, he didn’t interrupt. He defended me.

“They don’t get to rewrite you.” he said simply. He said it like a fact.

With him, I didn’t feel replaceable. I didn’t feel like something that could be taken if I wasn’t careful enough.

“I was wrong.” I whispered to myself as I clenched my hand and slid the drawer open.

Inside lay the things I hadn’t yet locked away. Not valuables. Not documents. The small, foolish things that once meant everything.

I picked up the photograph first. I had taken the selfie with my little phone. That was in my university.

Mateo and me were sitting on the steps outside the university library. It was raining behind us. We were sharing headphones, his jacket draped over my shoulders even though he was the one shivering.

I remembered the way he had leaned closer and whispered, “I love you, Bella.”

At the time, the words had filled something hollow inside me. But now, they felt like fresh betrayal.

I placed the photo into the vault and reached for the next item.

A dried flower. I had it glued carefully in a paper.

He had brought it to me after our first real argument. He would stood awkwardly in the doorway of my apartment, holding flowers.

“It’s not much.” He would say at that time. “But I saw it and thought of you.”

I remembered laughing, pulling him inside, thinking that this was what love looked like.

I was a fool.

I slid flower into the drawer beside the photograph.

Next, I noticed the letters. My fingers brushed the top envelope. He had written my name so carefully on it. He used to write to me even when we lived in the same city. Then I touched the first diamond ring he brought me.

It was when he got his first real promotion. He had lifted me off the ground and spun me around our tiny kitchen.

“I wouldn't have done this without you, Bella.” he said. “You are my world.”

I believed that too.

After we married, he used to come home early just to see me. He’d loosen his tie, kiss my temple, tell me about his day.

All became a lie.

I didn't know when a tear slipped. I wiped it off and reached out to the bottom of the drawer. There, I found a hospital bracelet.

Elena. My fingers trembled as I picked it up. Her name printed on it.

I remembered Mateo kneeling in front of me when I told him I was pregnant. “I swear,” he’d whispered, holding his sobs back. “I will protect you both.”

For one perfect month, he did.

He learned how to hold her, how to calm her. He used to wake in the night just to check her breathing. He was perfect.

And then, one month later, he was gone. With her. My Elena.

I had gone out for groceries. Fifteen minutes. Maybe twenty. When I came home, she wasn’t breathing. The doctors said it was a traumatic head injury. That she fell.

They blame me and I took them blame.

Mateo didn't accuse. He simply withdrew himself from me. His arms stopped reaching for me in sleep. His eyes avoided mine like they were afraid of what they might see. When I cried, he went quiet. When I spoke, he didn't listen.

I tried harder then. I cooked his favorite meals. I dressed prettier, sexier. I hid my sadness so it wouldn’t bother his.

I bit my lower lip from trembling as I placed Elena’s bracelet gently into the vault. The drawer was almost empty now.

As I closed the drawer, I finally understood something I hadn’t let myself see before.

Mateo didn’t leave me all at once. He left me slowly. And I stayed because I remembered the man he used to be.

My stomach rolled suddenly. I gripped the handle of the drawer until the nausea passed.

I had to be okay. Another life was growing inside me. I wouldn't let anyone hurt this life. Not even myself.

Closing the drawer, I took out my phone and opened Valentina’s messages. I took screenshots of everything. Every insult. Every photo. Every time stamp.

"You want to play the victim, Valentina?" I murmured, “You want to be the center of attention?" I saved the images to a hidden cloud drive.

I wasn't just going to leave. Leaving was too easy. No.

This baby inside me deserved justice for Elena. This baby deserved a world where its mother wasn't a doormat.

"I'm going to ruin you," I promised the empty room, and I meant it with every fiber of my being. "I will strip you both of everything you have. Your reputation, your money, your pride. You will wish you had never met me."

Mateo’s POV

I walked through the front doors of the Santigo Manor, and found Isabella laying on the couch. She kept her one hand resting over her stomach. She looked… small. Fragile. Her hair was a mess, eyes red-rimmed from crying.

And my chest… I don’t know. It ached. It ached in a way I hadn’t expected.

Seeing her like this always made me want to burn the world down, yet here I was, the one who had lit the match.

“I’m sorry, Bella.” I thought, though the words died in my throat.

I couldn't help it. Valentina had been hysterical. When that pregnancy report popped up on my screen, the world had tilted. She had cried for hours, her hands trembling as she clung to my shirt, begging me not to leave her alone with my child. I had stayed because I had to. Because that tiny life was a reality I couldn't walk away from.

I looked at Isabella’s sleeping form. She was so perfect. I remembered her when she was pregnant with Elena. I remembered the way her skin stretched, the way her body became something… different.

It had terrified me. I loved her as my muse, my delicate flower. I didn't want to see her body distorted by another pregnancy.

In a way, Valentina was the perfect solution.

She would carry the burden. She would deal with the morning sickness, the stretch marks, the physical ruin. And in two or three years, when the child was walking and talking, I’d bring it home.

We would call it an adoption. Isabella would take the child in. She would raise my heir, and our family would be whole again.

I knelt beside her as I touched her hair, brushing it from her face. She stirred, murmured something, but didn’t wake.

Last night, when I touched Valentina’s belly, I had felt a joy that Isabella had never managed to give me.

“Useless.” The word flashed through my mind.

I flinched, shoving the thought back into the cellar of my mind. No. I love Isabella. She is my heart.

But she had failed me before. Elena… was gone. And no matter what I told myself, I could not forgive her. I knew, deep down, that the grocery run hadn't killed Elena. The timing was a cruel coincidence.

But if I admitted that, I’d have to look at why I hadn't been there either.

I reached out and finally touched her cheek. "I'll make it up to you, Bella," I whispered. "The gift I’m bringing home in a few years… it’s going to fix everything."