My Wife Pretended to Be Poor

When Mom was sick in the hospital, she gripped my hand hard and begged, “My son, let’s not seek treatment anymore. I don’t want to give you and Elena more trouble.”

I called my wife, Elena Pascal, in a frenzy. I wanted to ask her to bring my card to pay for Mom’s hospital bills.

But in the brief time I had my back turned, Mom had leapt from the window.

She had folded up her jacket. On top of it, she had placed some money in a tidy stack. I picked it up with trembling hands. There were some coins included with the bills as well. All added together, it totaled up to fifty-three dollars.

I did not manage to contact Elena. I hurriedly handled Mom’s funerary affairs and rushed over to my job cleaning windows.

My wage of three hundred dollars was enough to last our family of three a good few meals.

That was why my heart shattered when I saw Elena in this opulently appointed five-star hotel.

Was this woman, who spent money like water, the same woman as my wife Elena? The woman who had been dressed in mended clothes and ate only the simplest fare with me just the day before?

A cold breeze blew my way, and I could not help but sneeze.

Mechanically, I took out my phone and called Elena. Once again, no one answered.

When my colleague noticed I had brought out my phone, he pointed up and dragged me upward.

Just as my feet touched the ground, I was met with a helmet hurled toward me.

“How dare you play on your phone during work hours? Are you nuts? You’re fired!”

The helmet grazed my head, and it was enough to scratch me, bringing forth some blood.

It hurt. Ah, so this was not a dream.

I went downstairs in a daze. I stumbled into the hotel’s staff, who were all in an excited mood.

“Miss Pascal is giving out bonuses! We’ll all get one if we just say something nice to her!”

The ballroom was luxuriously decorated, and valuable items were littered all over.

The surrounding people were all chattering, saying that the decorations for this birthday banquet cost at least a million dollars.

I tightened the mask on my face and followed the crowd.

When it was my turn, I found myself unable to speak when faced with Elena, who was dressed in a silk gown and wearing expensive jewels, along with an older woman.

“Happy sixtieth birthday. I wish you… The best of health.”

Had Mom not passed away, she would have been sixty this year as well.

A few days ago, I had shared the idea of bringing Mom to someplace special for dinner to celebrate her birthday with Elena. However, Mom had immediately waved the idea off. She would rather we paid off the family’s debt earlier. That was more important than anything else.

In the blink of an eye, she had passed on, and we were separated forever.

Elena could not recognize my voice. She smiled and handed me some money in an envelope. “Here you go.”

I ducked my head and accepted it with uncontrollably shaking hands. The envelope was quite thick, and I could tell that it contained no small sum. This money could have saved Mom’s life, but Elena had no trouble giving away hundreds of these envelopes!

The others around me were raring to get their own bonuses and accidentally bumped into me.

As everyone watched, I stumbled to the floor in my dirty workman’s clothes. They looked at me with judging gazes. All I could feel was bitter resentment.

Just as I was about to clamber back up, a pair of hands reached out to me.