Ch2: Your Home?

​Amidst the sheer cruelty of what had transpired, Evelyn chose to escape in her own way. She withdrew from reality completely, sinking into a coma that lasted a full week. It was a week of pure psychological and physical agony, during which she fought nightmares far more bitter than her actual reality. In her sleep, she saw blood, and a weeping child stretching his tiny hand out to her, while Kai’s voice echoed relentlessly through her mind: "Defective woman... murderer!"

​When she finally opened her eyes on the morning of the eighth day, her body was completely hollowed out by the exhaustion of the miscarriage and her brutal labor. Her vision was blurred, and her throat was dry to the point of pain. Instinctively, she touched her stomach again in sheer terror, only to collide with the cold, hard truth: she had lost him.

​Before she could fully comprehend where she was or even catch her breath, the door swung open and a nurse walked in carrying a few papers. Her features bore no sympathy whatsoever; instead, she looked down at Evelyn with eyes full of utter disgust.

​The nurse tossed the papers harshly onto the side table, speaking in a dry, contemptuous tone: "Finally, you’re awake. A whole week you’ve been taking up this room, as if the hospital belongs to your father!"

​Evelyn swallowed her spit with great difficulty, struggling to shape her words into a voice she fought to make audible. "I... where is my husband? Did he pay...?"

​The nurse cut her off with a mocking laugh. "Your husband? That man who abandoned you and left on the very first night? He’s not here, of course! And he didn’t pay a single penny. But thanks to the hospital director, who took pity on your wretched condition, the costs of your treatment and surgery were covered as an act of charity."

​Evelyn's body went rigid with humiliation, feeling her dignity being trampled under the nurse’s feet. The woman continued coldly: "And now... you must leave immediately and vacate the room. There are real patients who actually need this space; we are not a homeless shelter."

​Silent, burning tears carved their way down Evelyn’s cheeks. Attempting to raise her trembling hand, she pointed to her wrist, pleading in a vulnerable tone, "Please... just remove this IV cannula from my hand so I can put on my clothes and leave..."

​The nurse looked at Evelyn's hand with cold detachment, then turned her back callously as she headed toward the door, spitting out rudely: "I don't have time for this. Rip it out yourself."

​The nurse walked out and slammed the door violently behind her, leaving Evelyn at the absolute peak of her helplessness and brokenness. Evelyn stared at her hand. With fingers shaking from oppression and blinding anger, she grabbed the edge of the plastic needle embedded in her flesh and yanked it out with reckless, unthinking force.

​A muffled scream of agony escaped her lips as she watched her blood splatter across the white bedsheets—mirroring exactly how her unborn child’s blood had splattered across the hotel marble. At that moment, Evelyn was bleeding from everywhere: from her body, from her dignity, and from a heart where everything had died.

​Pressing tightly on the wound in her hand, Evelyn gathered the scattered remnants of her shattered pride. She walked out of the hospital with heavy, dragging steps, pulling her frail body through the streets under the prying eyes of bystanders. She had no refuge left except the one place she had once believed was her home.

​She reached the old apartment building and climbed the wooden stairs, feeling her consciousness fade and return with every single step. She pushed open the door of the modest apartment with her slender body. Stillness enveloped the place, and dust had already begun to accumulate on the simple furniture.

​"Kai?" she called out weakly, moving through the narrow rooms, searching for the ghost of her husband, for any sign indicating he had been worried about her. But she found nothing but total emptiness.

​She sat in a corner of the darkened living room, pulling her knees tightly to her chest, weeping silently amidst the bleak, desolate sorrow of her apartment. She remained in this state for hours, battling the fever and her failing strength, until the door lock finally turned and Kai stepped inside.

​The moment he opened the door and saw her shadow sitting in the dark, not a single trace of relief or longing appeared on his face. Instead, his eyes flared with blind, unbridled rage.

​"You?!" he screamed in a harsh, roaring voice, advancing toward her with heavy steps that shook the very foundations of the small apartment.

​Evelyn stood up with immense difficulty, leaning against the wall for support. "Kai... I am so tired... The hospital kicked me out and I had nowhere else to go..."

​He didn't let her finish her words. His thick, brutal hand lunged forward, violently gripping her injured arm, tearing open the cannula wound so that the blood began to leak out all over again. She screamed in agony, but he dragged her ruthlessly toward the apartment door, shouting like a madman: "I told you at the hospital that it was over!!"

​"Kai, please..." she begged him in a shattered tone, trying desperately to claw and hold onto the doorframe. But he pushed her with all his might, throwing her outside to crash onto the cold floor of the hallway.

​"Don't you dare ever come back here again!" he snarled, and then slammed the heavy iron door in her face with a deafening, absolute violence.

​Evelyn found herself lying in the pitch darkness, her body bleeding, left with no shelter, no family, and no child.

​Until the door swung open once more. Kai appeared again, knelt down to her level, pulled her aggressively toward him, and kissed her deeply She looked at him in shock