By Your Side, Yet a Galaxy Apart

Seven years with Giles Taylor, and everyone thought I was the shameless one, the one who clung on and wouldn't let go.

I'd been slapped across the face. I'd been called a mistress.

The handful of friends who knew the truth couldn't stand it. One of them called him.

You're really going to let Wren Mallory carry all of that, take every insult, and never once give her a proper place in your life?

Giles was quiet for a long time. When he finally spoke, his voice was low.

"Beryl Swanson's husband died saving me. Her parents want to entrust the rest of her life to me. With a debt of gratitude like that, I can't refuse."

"Wren loves who I am. If I give the title to Beryl, she won't mind."

The friend still couldn't let it go.

"But I hear you and Beryl are having a wedding. Wren's five months pregnant now. What if she finds out and can't take it"

Giles didn't hesitate.

"Wren will understand."

I stood in the fitting room, looking down at the white gown I was wearing, and all of it went strangely unreal.

The one who'd once promised to make me the most beautiful bride was Giles.

And the one out there right now, picking out a wedding gown with another woman, was also Giles.

In that moment, the me in the mirror, the one who'd come alone and in secret to try on a wedding dress, looked like a clown.

Giles was wrong, I thought.

I would not entrust the rest of my life to a man who would always need me to be understanding.

...

Outside the fitting room, Beryl had chosen the same gown as mine.

She stood in front of the mirror and asked Giles, smiling, "Does it look good?"

He nodded. There was real admiration in his eyes.

"It looks beautiful."

The saleswoman glanced in through the gap in the door and asked me, "Miss, don't you want to come out and see? On you it'll be just as stunning as it is on the lady out there."

I closed the door. My voice was very quiet.

"No need."

The same gown.

Between me and Beryl, one of us wearing it was enough.

As I was changing out of the dress, Giles called.

"Wrennie, have you had lunch?"

Behind him I could hear the saleswoman gushing, and a woman's soft, low laugh.

Before I could say anything, he went on.

"Sorry I couldn't spend our anniversary with you today. Something urgent came up on Beryl's end. I couldn't get away. Don't be upset."

I stood in the cramped fitting room, staring at that harsh, glaring white in front of me.

"This urgent thing of yours," I asked him. "Is it helping Beryl try on the gown for your wedding?"

"What?" He clearly couldn't work out how I knew.

My voice stayed calm. "Giles, tell me. What do I owe you? What gives you the right to treat me like this?"

The line went silent.

A long while passed. Then footsteps, and Giles's voice, dropped low.

"You already know?"

He drew a deep breath. "Wren, it's just going through the motions of a wedding. You know what happened back then better than anyone. I owe Beryl's family. Her parents are in poor health, and this is their one wish. I can't refuse it."

Everything he said was reasoned, laid out neat, without a single thought for how I felt.

"Then what happens to me?" I asked.

He was quiet for two seconds. His voice dropped a little more.

"Don't make this more complicated than it is. Even after the wedding with her, you're still my girlfriend. Nothing between us will change."

"Is that so?"

He seemed to catch the tone in my voice. When he spoke again he sounded tired.

"What else would it be?"

"Wren, I'm already stuck in the middle. This is hard enough for me."

"Just stop making a scene, okay?"

"A scene?"

I repeated the word, softly.

My chest was so tight I couldn't get a breath.

There were so many ways to repay a debt, and Giles had picked the one that trampled me most.

His debt to repay, and I was the one paying the price.

And in the end, even asking a single question had become making a scene.

I said nothing. I just hung up.

On my way out, Giles was helping Beryl choose a traditional gown, his expression serious, a smile at the corner of his mouth as he turned his head to speak to her.

I walked right past behind him, and he never noticed.

I left the bridal shop and took a car back to my mother's.

I told her about Giles and me.

"Mom, I'm going to break up with Giles. But this baby"

My voice trailed off. It was a few seconds before I could go on. "I haven't decided yet whether to keep it."

She was silent for a long time.

In the end she told me that whatever I decided, she'd stand behind me.

In that moment I understood it clearly, for real: the person who truly loves you can't bear to see you hurt, not even a little.

That night, on the way home, Beryl's post came up in my feed.

She'd put up a photo.

A warm, cozy living room, her holding a cake, Giles watching her with a lazy smile on his lips.

The caption read

[Moved into our wedding home today. Mornings and nights with Mr. Taylor from now on, everyday life together, year after year.]

Below it were plenty of blessings from mutual friends.

Giles had replied to her with two words. "Year after year."

I stared at this so-called wedding home.

And a bitterness rose in my mouth that I could hardly stand.

When I got home, Giles wasn't there, exactly as I'd expected.

I lay on the bed, my mind thick and muddled, turning over a hundred things.

At three in the morning, a nightmare jolted me awake.

Out of habit I reached for the warmth of the body beside me, but my hand found only cold, empty sheets.

I sat there dazed for a while, then took out my phone and called Giles.

"Where are you?"

The voice on the other end was blurred, as if he'd just been startled out of sleep.

"What?"

"I'm at home."

I stood on the cold floor, my fingertips slowly tightening.

"Giles. Which home?"

Three minutes later, Giles pushed the door open, cold air trailing in with him.

He looked at me through the dark, guilt sitting in his eyes.

"I'm sorry, Wrennie. I spent the afternoon helping Beryl move into her new place. I was worn out and fell asleep on the couch. Did you wait long for me?"

"Where did she move to?" I asked it lightly, though I'd already more or less guessed.

Giles was quiet for two seconds. His voice dropped, went rough.

"I promised her parents I'd look after Beryl from now on. To make it easier, she moved into the unit downstairs."

I laughed, one short breath of it.

Right below our wedding suite was the wedding suite for him and Beryl.

Giles really had ground my dignity down into the dust.

He'd never once thought about whether it would hurt me.

Never once thought about how doing this would make everyone see me.

He only had that one line. To make it easier.

I looked away from him, my chest so tight I could barely breathe.

He must have noticed, because he stepped closer, his voice softening into something coaxing.

"Don't sit here sulking. I'll take you to get your wedding photos done tomorrow. You used to bring it up all the time, didn't you?"

The man who'd spent the day helping Beryl try on wedding gowns.

Now stood here, easy and unbothered, offering to take me for wedding photos.

I stood in the dark, worn out in a way I couldn't put into words.

Early the next morning, Giles brought over a bridal magazine.

He'd just told me to pick a style I liked when the doorbell rang.

I moved away from him and got up to answer it.

But when the door opened and I saw who was standing there, I froze.

Beryl's parents stood in the doorway with fruit in their hands and smiles on their faces.

The moment they saw me, the smiles vanished.

Two seconds passed, then Beryl's mother flared up, her voice thick with fury.

"How can a woman have so little shame? You wait until my daughter's out of the house, then march right in with that big belly of yours. What are you trying to pull!"

"You've hounded Giles for years, throwing yourself at him to be his mistress. They're about to get married and you still won't stop haunting him! Have you no shame at all!"

I stood where I was, the nails I'd driven into my palm trembling without stop.

I opened my mouth and got out, hoarsely, "I"

I wanted to say this was my home.

Wanted to say Giles and I had been together seven years, and I was never the one who'd chased anyone down.

But a slap landed hard across my face.

My head snapped to the side, my ear ringing.

Beryl's mother raised her hand again. "I've put up with you long enough. Your parents never taught you shame, so as your elder, today I'll teach you a lesson you won't forget!"

Giles came out of the bedroom at the noise.

When he saw the handprint on my face, his hand shook.

I looked at him with one last, empty scrap of hope.

Hoping he'd say one word in my defense.

But after a moment of silence, like he had countless times before, he looked away.

In that moment, even disappointment felt like too much.

I lifted my head and looked at Beryl's parents, who kept calling me a mistress.

Each word came out sharp and clear.

"I've never stooped to wrecking anyone's family. The real mistress is your daughter"

Before I could finish, Giles shoved me, hard.

I lost my footing and stumbled back two steps, my belly slamming into the corner of the shoe cabinet, catching myself only when my back hit the door frame.

The living room went quiet for a beat.

I opened my mouth to say something and couldn't get a single word out.

A fine, twisting pain spread low in my belly, and cold sweat broke out across my forehead.

Giles went white in an instant. He shifted his feet, meaning to come steady me.

But the step he'd started to take died under the eyes of Beryl's parents.

In the end he said,

"Wren, have some self-respect. Stop coming here to cling to me."

"I have a girlfriend. We're getting married soon."

With one careless sentence, he pinned me to the whipping post as the mistress all over again.

Judith glared at me, spitting that I was a shameless mistress, a piece of trash.

Zachary's gaze dragged heavily over my belly, his voice thick with anger.

"Giles, tell me the truth. That baby in her belly, does it have anything to do with you?"

Giles's fist tightened, bit by bit, then loosened again.

At last he said, "No."

I stood where I was and let out a ridiculous little laugh.

Seven years of patience and understanding, and in the end all it had bought him was the freedom to hurt me without a shred of fear.

Beryl heard the commotion downstairs and hurried up.

Seeing her parents worked up, she rushed to soothe them, smoothing things over.

"Mom, Dad, why didn't you say you were coming?"

Judith was about to speak when she noticed the wedding ring Beryl had mentioned wasn't on her daughter's hand.

Her eyes slid past Beryl and landed on my finger.

Then, without any warning, another slap came down hard.

"Why is my daughter's wedding ring on your hand!"

My head snapped to the side, the taste of blood spreading through my mouth.

Beryl's mother turned her glare on Giles, demanding an explanation.

Giles's jaw was clenched tight, his lips pressed into a thin line.

He looked at me, and in his eyes there was a struggle, reluctance, the ache of not wanting to.

But in the end what he said was an accusation. "Wren, is it fun, playing the thief?"

Beryl glanced at her parents, as if afraid they wouldn't believe it.

She spoke up too. "Wren, from clinging to him shamelessly to stealing a ring like a common thief, do you have any self-respect left at all?"

She held out her hand. "Give me back the ring."

I pressed hard against my cramping belly and forced myself upright.

Just as I was about to speak, Giles seized my wrist and pulled the ring off my hand.

Then, with his own hand, he slid it onto Beryl's ring finger.

I stared at him, dumbstruck, unable to get out a single word.

Beryl, wearing the ring that didn't fit, warned me coldly:

"Wren, what isn't yours won't be yours, even if you steal it."

For a moment my heart felt like it had been doused in scalding oil.

Zachary swept a cold eye over the whole farce, then addressed Giles at last.

"Giles, this ex-girlfriend of yours has been hounding you for years, and now she's shown up at your home to steal things."

"Today, in front of us, you make it perfectly clear to her!"

Giles stood in silence for a long time, then finally walked over to me.

His voice was very low.

He said, "Wren, when I used to say we'd be together forever, that was me being young and stupid."

"Your being here has become a burden to me. I don't love you. I stopped loving you a long time ago."

"I hope you'll have some self-respect and stop bothering me."

My hands and feet had gone cold as I stood there, listening to him carve into my heart, cut by cut.

For a moment something in me went hazy, because right then Giles wasn't putting on an act.

Every word came straight from the gut.

But really, none of it mattered anymore.

From the moment he wrote Beryl into his life, we were always going to end without an ending.

Zachary spoke up to advise me.

"Girl, save yourself some dignity. Don't make him feel disgusted every time he thinks of you later on."

Disgusted.

I nodded.

"All right."

I made my ragged way toward the door, strangely calm through all of it.

Giles panicked.

He came chasing after me, but not without explaining back into the room first.

"Uncle, Aunt, I'll walk her down."

He shut the door, pulled me into the stairwell, stayed silent for a long time, then laid his hand on my belly.

"Does it hurt?"

I moved away.

His hand froze in midair.

A few seconds later, he lowered his voice and explained.

"I promised your uncle and aunt I'd take care of Beryl for the rest of my life. I can't let them know about you and me. Pushing you just now, that was in the heat of the moment."

"And those things I said in the living room"

I cut him off in a hoarse voice and finished it for him.

"I know. You only said it to put their minds at ease."

Giles seemed to breathe a sigh of relief.

I tugged at the corner of my mouth, pushing down that nameless exhaustion, and looked at him.

"Giles."

"Hm?"

"Let's break up."

Giles froze for a second, then rubbed the space between his brows and let out a tired breath.

Wren, stop making a scene.

I know you're angry. But you're not really going to walk away from me. We've been together seven years, and you're carrying my child.

Seven years of love.

In the end it had only become his proof that I would never leave.

My heart felt like a needle had gone through it, and yet it didn't hurt the way it used to.

From out in the stairwell came Beryl's soft call.

Giles, are you in there?

My parents are asking why you're still not back.

Giles's brow drew together.

A few seconds passed, and he took his hand back.

I'll text you the door code downstairs. Trade places with Beryl for a few days.

With that, he turned and left.

A few steps out, he looked back once more. Get some rest. I'll come down and check on you tonight.

I looked at the code on my phone, and something drew me, against all reason, to stand outside their wedding suite.

The instant the door opened, everything in it spoke of two people.

Two pairs of slippers set side by side at the entrance.

A photo frame on the TV cabinet, the two of them smiling at each other.

On the coffee table, a black cup and a white one.

Even on the bathroom counter, two toothbrushes stood side by side, one pink, one blue.

Seeing Giles's other home with my own eyes, the last bit of foolish reluctance in me crumbled to dust.

Back home, I lay in bed for a full day.

The next day the cramping in my belly was so bad I couldn't even stand steady.

On the way to the hospital, my mother saw the bitterness on my face and told me gently not to be afraid.

I had just started to speak when the car was slammed from behind.

The screech of impact hit at the same moment my belly struck the seat in front, hard, and blood ran down my legs.

I clamped both hands over my stomach, my face white with pain.

The driver's door of the black car behind us was shoved open.

Beryl ran over, her face ashen.

Wren, I'm sorry.

I happened to see you and I wanted to apologize for what my parents did yesterday, so I drove behind you.

She grabbed my hand, tears spilling over in her panic.

I was afraid you wouldn't forgive me, I looked away for a second, and I hit you. I'm sorry

The world swam in front of me. With the last of my strength I threw off her hand.

When I woke again, I was in the hospital.

My mother sat by the bed, looking ten years older overnight.

She said, Wrennie, we couldn't save the baby.

I stared at the ceiling for a long time, then took out my phone and called the police.

Ten o'clock that night.

Giles called and told me to come back for a while.

He said, Wren, come back and sign the accident release.

The pain in my chest split me open.

I asked him, Why should I?

His voice was weary. It was just an ordinary rear-end collision, Wren. You didn't lose anything. Why take it this far?

I didn't lose anything.

I repeated the words softly to myself.

Then I told him, one word at a time, Giles, I won't sign.

From the other end came the sound of Beryl weeping.

Giles, I know it's all my fault. I'll pay for it.

But if Wren really goes to the police and I get a reckless driving record, I won't pass the Bar Association's annual review. If I lose my career, my whole life is ruined.

Giles went quiet. A few seconds later, he sent a video.

In it, he lifted a box out of the safe.

He picked up the photo inside, a lighter in his other hand.

The flame licked upward. A little closer and the photo would catch.

The sound tore out of me.

Giles, that's the last portrait of my father!

So the choice is yours.

Giles's voice was steady. Frighteningly steady.

Wren, sign, and I'll put the box back. Nothing between us has to change.

Beryl cried out my name over the phone.

Wren, you've always been so generous. Just forgive me this once. My career really can't take a stain like this.

One of them using my father's things to force me, the other using my years of tolerance to hold me hostage.

As if I had done something the heavens couldn't forgive.

Yet not once did either of them ask me what I had lost in that crash.

Giles glanced at the time.

I'll give you one minute to think.

I was shaking so hard I could barely hold the phone.

Giles, you promised me. You promised you'd keep my father's things safe.

I know. But I can't let Beryl carry a stain.

The man who once said he would protect me forever.

In the end he was the one who had backed me into a corner with no way out.

In the new video, the first old, faded photo had already been swallowed by the flame.

Not a trace of hesitation in his voice.

Wrennie, don't make me do this.

He was fighting for someone else's fairness.

Not caring in the least whether it would destroy me.

In the few seconds of my silence, another video came through.

The photo of my father holding my hand when I was little turned, bit by bit, into black ash.

I bit down hard on the inside of my cheek until I tasted blood.

Giles, stop.

I'll sign.

Giles sent over the electronic accident release he already had ready.

Sign it.

Tears fell onto the phone, one after another.

With a trembling hand, I signed my name.

Giles finally let out a breath.

Wrennie, I know you've been through a lot. Once this is behind us, I'll take you away somewhere to clear your head

I cut him off. Giles, let's break up.

Giles's voice stopped short.

What?

My voice was very calm.

I said, Giles, the baby is gone. This time, I really don't want you.