บททั้งหมดของ More Than The Marriage (English): บทที่ 1 - บทที่ 4

My arms were crossed over my chest as I looked outside. Traffic crawled along EDSA, headlights unraveling into ribbons of red and white. Brake lights flickered like restless fireflies. In the reflection on my office window, the city melted into colors. Red. Blue. Yellow. Green. They shimmered through the blinds, scattering fractured patterns across my desk. Christmas was coming, but no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t feel it. Day bled into night, and night blurred into day. A routine that felt like a cage. Wake up, work, go home. Over and over. Without end. I couldn’t stop. Because if I did, the past might return—the feeling that I was never enough. Those days when I had to keep reminding myself that I was. So since then, every move I made became a quiet scream tha I can do this. One day, I’ll be enough too. But in the deepest, quietest corner of my mind, a whisper said—maybe I’ll never be. The intercom snapped me out of it. “Ma’am Aya, it’s already 6 p.m. Do y

It wasn’t as hot as yesterday afternoon, but the air in San Felipe was still thick and sticky. Yet inside the mansion, it felt different. Every corner of this land seemed to hold its own story. From the peaceful koi pond, to the kalachuchi trees with their yellow-white blooms, to the rosal bushes I loved taking care of. I was kneeling by the greenhouse, holding a small dipper of water. In front of me was the rosal plant that my father and I had planted a year ago. It had grown taller now, fuller, its flowers blooming more than ever this summer. It was more fragrant, and more alive. “Hello again,” I whispered as I watered it. “You’re so beautiful. I hope you last long enough to see me grow up, too.” I opened my sketchpad and began to draw the curve of its leaves and blossoms. Simple as it was, I wanted to capture every detail. The rosal wasn’t just a plant to me. It was a friend. “Aya, you’re going to wear a hole through that paper,” my father joked from the other end of the green