If Love Is Like a Sudden Rain, It Crushes the Dew-Fresh Heart

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When we started playing truth or dare, I drew the card.

I was six months pregnant.

The little childhood sweetheart set the dare. Do you dare climb that tree?

If I refused, I had to down three drinks.

But I was pregnant. I couldn't drink.

And a pregnant woman climbing a tree...

I looked at my husband for help. He only spoke, cold and flat.

"It's just a tree. Nobody's telling you to go all the way up. Climb a little, humor us, that's enough."

So a whole crowd stood around me, taking pictures, forcing me up the tree.

Halfway up, my hands were scraped raw.

They said I couldn't stop.

Two-thirds of the way up.

Then, suddenly, blood began pouring out of me.

I cried and begged. "Please! Someone call an ambulance..."

But not one person below me moved.

"You really thought climbing a tree would make you miscarry?"

The little sweetheart doubled over laughing.

"It's your husband who doesn't want that bastard in your belly."

"There was a miscarriage drug in the soup you just drank."

"As for why we made you climb the tree? Your husband just wanted to grant my wish. I wanted to watch you make a fool of yourself!"

They ignored my agonized begging.

Giggling and laughing, they moved on to the next round.

The little sweetheart drew the card, and my husband asked with a smile, "Do you dare kiss me in front of everyone?"

The words had barely left his mouth before she threw herself into his arms.

"You asked if I dare?"

"This is your answer."

In that moment, my heart died along with the child inside me.

The blood beneath me kept flowing down.

It soaked the white hem of my dress red.

The two of them clung to each other, kissing like they couldn't bear to part.

The people around them egged them on.

"So wild, kissing like this right in front of his wife. You two really have some nerve."

"You call this nerve?"

"They've been playing like this since college."

"Don't you remember, back when Fergus Summers and his wife first got together, Nadia Pruitt was booking hotel rooms with him behind her back."

"They've been sleeping together since they were kids, after all. How could some ordinary little couple compare?"

"And besides, his wife's pregnant. Men, you know how it is..."

The last of the strength drained from my hands. I couldn't hold the trunk anymore, and I fell, crashing to the ground.

A dull thud against the dirt.

That pack of hangers-on drew back.

Someone sucked in a sharp breath.

"A fall like that. Losing the baby's the least of it."

"What if she actually dies?"

"Maybe we should just call the police?"

"Call the police for what?"

Someone cut him off with a sneer.

"The person it's happening to isn't even worried. What are you panicking about, you eunuch?"

Laughter broke out all around.

The man went quiet.

And I forced myself through the pain, gritting my teeth as I looked at Fergus.

Nadia had her legs wrapped around his waist.

The two of them were locked together in that intimate hold.

So lost in it that they hadn't noticed a single thing happening over here.

The pain in my belly grew worse.

Trembling, I reached out my hand, begging that crowd of onlookers.

"Call an ambulance for me. Please, I'm begging you."

"My baby..."

The others stepped back, terrified of getting tangled up with me and offending Fergus.

Only one boy pulled out his phone.

"I'll call for you."

Before he could even dial 911, Nadia slapped the phone out of his hand.

"What ambulance? I've already got a private doctor ready for her."

Nadia clapped her hands, and a private doctor in a white coat walked over.

But the buttons on the coat were done up wrong, one out of line.

The man had a shifty, rat-like look, clearly not much of a professional.

Someone joked.

"Nadia, you really know how to have fun!"

"Bringing in a fake doctor. Isn't this the guy who stole your bag last time..."

Nadia shot him a glare, and he shut up at once.

"My mistake. Carry on, everyone."

Nadia gave the doctor a look, and he stepped forward to examine me.

He groped around at random, then made a fist and coughed twice.

"The baby can't be saved. How about I give you a shot for the pain, write you a prescription?"

"Women are all like this. Miscarriage is a perfectly normal thing, isn't it? Suffering a little is only right."

Even Fergus frowned at that.

"Nadia, is this doctor of yours reliable?"

Nadia's face soured instantly, and she pushed out her lips.

"What? You don't trust me?"

"You think I'd actually hurt your wife?"

"After all, you're the one who put the miscarriage drug in the lamb stew and made her drink it."

"If we really called an ambulance now, wouldn't all that be for nothing?"

Nadia's lips were still a little red and swollen.

Her eyes were still soft and heavy.

"It's her own fault, always playing the pitiful little thing in front of you."

"I just wanted her to suffer a bit. Teach her a lesson."

Fergus tapped the tip of her nose.

"You and your mischief."

Fergus turned his head and glanced at me on the ground, covered in blood.

There was nothing in that look. No feeling at all.

Like he was looking at a rag someone had tossed on the floor.

"Fine. We'll do it your way."

"If the baby can't be saved, it doesn't matter."

"Just don't let Paige Henson die on us."

My heart couldn't break any more than it already had.

But the violent pain in my belly was dragging me past the edge of reason.

"Fergus, don't go!"

My voice came out ragged, barely mine.

"This is your child too"

I didn't finish. The doctor behind me caught hold of me.

A needle slid into my body.

They said it was for the pain.

It did nothing at all.

Something twisted in my stomach like a knife, and I curled up around it.

Nadia crouched down to look at me.

"Don't be so upset."

"This baby was never supposed to be here in the first place."

"Think about it. Six months pregnant, and has Fergus touched you even once?"

"He finds you disgusting."

I clenched my teeth and glared at her.

But she drank in the fury in my eyes and only laughed harder.

"What? You hate me? You want to bite me?"

"If you want to blame someone, blame yourself."

"Waddling around with that huge belly, shameless enough to tag along after Fergus to a party. No shame at all."

The pain was almost enough to drown out everything I knew.

But the truth was nothing like what she said.

Fergus had brought me to this gathering.

He'd said Nadia wanted to apologize for how rude and reckless she'd been at the banquet last time.

But once we arrived, there was no apology in her at all.

Instead she kept pushing drink after drink on me.

When I refused, she pulled a face.

Then she got the whole crowd going with a game of truth or dare.

It wasn't until I came out of the bathroom that I overheard what they were really saying.

"Apology, my ass. Paige was tricked into coming."

"They had it all worked out ahead of time. They bet on the baby in Paige's belly."

"If Paige miscarries here today"

"Fergus sleeps with Nadia for a whole month."

"And if she doesn't lose it"

They exchanged a glance. "Ha, then Fergus has crossed our little princess Nadia, and he'll be groveling to that spoiled queen till the end of time."

So from start to finish, it was a setup.

The moment I walked in, I'd already lost.

She wanted to watch me fall apart.

I looked at Nadia's eyes, and in them I saw the reflection of my own face, bloodless and past all pleading.

"Fergus, I want a divorce."

Fergus, in the middle of laughing with his friends, went stiff all at once.

He pulled his gaze back and let it drift over me, light and careless.

"Divorce?"

He let out a laugh, pure mockery.

"You think you can just say the word and it's done?"

"You've got no idea how you ended up married to me in the first place?"

Clutching my belly, my face white, I choked on the words.

He stared down at me from above.

"How much do your parents owe my family? Have you forgotten?"

"You think the Summers family is some open-air market. Come and go as you please."

"Bring up divorce. What gives you the right?"

"With that little curse in your belly that's about to miscarry, or with your life?"

He said all of it in a tone so calm it was almost indifferent.

My fingers dug into the dirt, blood seeping out.

I had married him because my parents owed the Summers family an enormous sum. That much was true.

The year I was twenty-three, my parents were conned into an investment.

Mortgaging the house wasn't enough.

So they borrowed three million more from the Summers family.

The next year, unable to repay it, they ran.

They left me behind, alone.

Fergus came to my door and said that if I married him, the whole debt would be wiped clean.

I agreed.

I thought that maybe he liked me, at least a little.

He had chased me for three months, after all.

But on our wedding day, Nadia rushed into the church in a wedding gown.

She said, "Fergus, we agreed. Once you'd had your fun, you'd come back to me."

Fergus left me standing alone at my own wedding and walked out after Nadia without a single glance back.

My humiliation was total. I became the whole city's laughingstock.

But I had nowhere to go.

With the comfort of the elder Summerses, I stayed on with the family anyway.

Afterward Fergus smoothed it over. "There was a reason. Nadia's young. That's the only reason she came and made a scene at the wedding."

"I've already dealt with her. She won't dare do it again."

It was only later that I learned they had a bet.

Fergus had bet he could win me over.

Nadia had bet he'd be done playing with me inside three months.

And that "lesson" Fergus kept talking about?

It was nothing more than dragging Nadia off to a hotel and tangling in the sheets.

The absurd part was that I'd been kept in the dark the whole time.

Now Nadia was telling me herself.

"Paige, from start to finish, him being with you was just a game."

"You were only a pawn to him."

"If his parents hadn't forced him to marry and have a kid, he never would have picked you."

"He picked you because you were easy to control."

"Your parents skipped town. You had no one."

"You didn't dare fight back."

She stood and brushed the bits of grass off her skirt.

"Now the kid's gone, and you don't even have your last bargaining chip."

"How much longer do you think you can stay in that house?"

Fergus only glanced at me, then reached out and took Nadia's hand.

"Come on, everyone's waiting for us."

"The game goes on."

And I was left on the ground again.

Even the doctor in the white coat from a moment ago had walked off.

Everyone was there to watch me make a fool of myself.

The boy who'd called the ambulance for me quietly took a step back.

He knew he couldn't afford to cross Fergus.

In the next round of the game.

Nadia drew truth.

Someone asked her, "You and Fergus have been childhood sweethearts all these years. Have you ever slept together?"

Nadia's face went a little pink.

"Do you even have to ask?"

"We slept together before we'd even finished college."

"His first time was with me. I taught him."

The crowd broke into whoops.

"Damn, so that means his wife got the used goods?"

"So what if it's used goods? Anything Nadia's had, other people would beg for and still not get."

Fergus had his arm around Nadia's waist.

Smiling, completely at ease.

"Don't tease her, guys."

"She embarrasses easily."

The way he said it, it sounded like he was defending her.

But everyone knew it was his roundabout way of admitting it.

He and she really had.

I'd long since been forgotten.

Lying on the ground in despair, numb, as if I'd lost all feeling.

Maybe the painkiller injection had kicked in.

My belly didn't hurt anymore.

And the baby had gone still.

I knew. The baby was gone.

The daughter I'd carried six months.

Gone, just like that.

When I opened my eyes again, everything in front of me was white.

My belly had already gone flat.

The young nurse said my husband had told the driver to bring me in.

Tall and handsome, my husband. She envied my luck, marrying a man like that and becoming his wife.

I stared blankly at the ceiling.

I didn't even notice when she left.

"Paige, stop grieving over it."

Fergus came over and held out a report.

"Nadia was helping you too."

"When the prenatal report came in, she saw the baby in your belly was deformed."

"You couldn't have kept it even if you'd tried."

I didn't look at him. One cold word came out. "Get out."

But Fergus flew into a rage right there.

"You're telling me to get out?"

"Paige, how do you have the nerve to tell me to get out?"

Fergus grabbed me by the collar.

"Get one thing straight."

"You got pregnant with some other man's bastard, and I didn't hold it against you. That was me being generous."

"Don't act so innocent, sitting there with that dead face."

I stared into his eyes, hollow, and suddenly I laughed.

No wonder he'd gone along so coldly with Nadia's scheme against me.

He blamed me because the baby wasn't his.

But that was pure slander.

That night, Nadia had grabbed me as a prank and tied me up in the basement all night.

Then she took a spliced-together video to Fergus and said.

"Your wife got drunk and cheated on you."

She'd bet the guys around her.

If Fergus believed it, she'd win a million.

But I had explained it, so many times.

Fergus never once wanted to believe me.

Every time he saw me in a lace nightgown.

His face would go cold, and he'd say in disgust,

"Don't touch me. You make my skin crawl."

Then he'd slam the door and leave.

Spending the whole night with Nadia.

And when he came back the next morning, dead drunk, the collar of his white shirt was covered in lipstick.

I used to think that once this baby was born.

It would win our marriage back.

That everything would get better.

After all, once the child was born, a paternity test would shut those rumors up.

But Fergus never let me reach that day.

I tried to call up the warm memories from these years of marriage.

There were pitifully few.

The only one I could think of was a single thing.

Valentine's Day, the year we were happiest.

For once, Fergus had shown up with a bouquet of roses for me.

I counted them over and over, happy, and found there were only ninety-eight.

"Did the florist miscount?"

I asked Fergus. "There are only ninety-eight. Where's the missing one?"

Back then, even if Fergus had just lied and said the clerk miscounted, or that one had dropped by accident.

It still would have felt warm to me.

But no, he had to be cruel, and offhand about it, and tell me the truth.

"Nadia liked how it looked, so she pulled one out and gave it to some little girl on the sidewalk."

"Close enough anyway. You'd never notice one missing. Stop making a fuss over nothing."

All I had left was silence.

Just like now.

Fergus let out a self-mocking laugh and let go of me.

"Look at you, white as a ghost. Like a vampire."

"Instead of wasting your energy nitpicking and fighting with me,"

"you'd be better off getting discharged early and going home so Martha can stew you a chicken to build you back up."

Fergus assumed I'd still be going back to that house.

Assumed I'd give him the silent treatment like the countless cold wars before.

Assumed that once I'd cooled off on my own, everything would be fine.

Right on cue, Nadia's call came in, asking him to come out and have fun.

And sure enough, Fergus had no patience left to sit with me.

He set a bank card on the nightstand.

"There's five hundred thousand on the card. Call it compensation."

"The baby, we'll pretend it never happened."

Fergus turned and walked out.

Just like that, he'd turned the page.

Fergus, when it comes to this kind of skill, I'm no match for you.

But this time, you killed your own child with your own hands.

I'll make you regret it.

I spent three days in the hospital.

Fergus never came once.

On the fourth day, though, Nadia came.

She brought a bouquet of white chrysanthemums.

She arranged them in the vase by the bed.

"Just came to see how you're doing."

"Don't read anything into it. I was only passing by."

"And while I'm here, I should mention. Next Saturday is Fergus's birthday, and I'm throwing a party at the house."

"Do you want to come?"

She tilted her head, watching me, and suddenly gave a dazzling smile.

"Though in your condition, I doubt you're really up for it."

"Having just lost a baby and all."

"For a woman about to become a mother, that has to be a terrible blow."

I closed my eyes and didn't want to deal with her.

But Nadia just kept going.

"Oh, right, Paige. Where are you going to live once you're discharged?"

"I heard you and Fergus are getting divorced."

"Your parents' house was foreclosed on ages ago, wasn't it?"

"So it seems you don't really have anywhere to go now."

Her eyes were full of laughter as she said it.

The kind of laughter meant to press right on a person's sore spot.

"How about I help you find a place?"

"I know an agent who handles those really cheap shared rentals."

"Five hundred a month, six people to a room."

"Think you could get used to that?"

I kept my eyes on the ceiling and said nothing.

"Come on, why won't you talk to me?"

Nadia leaned in closer.

"Paige, are you still holding a grudge against me?"

"What happened that day really wasn't my fault."

"Fergus actually knew the baby in your belly was no bastard. It was his."

"But he planned the whole game anyway. If you're going to hate someone, you should hate him."

I turned my head to look at her. "What did you say?"

She blinked.

"You didn't know?"

"That whole game that day, Fergus planned all of it. The lamb stew you drank, the drug in it, Fergus told me to put it there."

"It wasn't because he thought you were carrying a bastard."

"He said he just didn't want a child born from you."

"He wants to have one with me."

In that instant, all the blood in me froze.

If he didn't want this baby, why not say so earlier?

Why wait until I was six months pregnant?

Why not just let me lose it quietly?

Why did it have to be in front of everyone?

Why did I have to fall out of that tree?

Why did my baby have to die so horribly?

"Nadia."

I heard my own voice come out, almost shaking.

"You're a woman too."

"You'll have children of your own someday."

"Aren't you afraid it'll come back on you?"

Nadia paused for a moment.

Then she doubled over laughing.

"Karma?"

"Paige, you believe in that?"

"Let me tell you, there's no such thing as karma in this world."

"There's only who has what it takes and who doesn't."

"Fergus has what it takes. He has the family money, the resources, the connections."

"I have what it takes too. I can keep him happy."

"And you?"

"You have nothing."

"You can't even count on your own parents. What are you counting on karma for?"

Once she'd laughed her fill, she picked up her bag to leave.

"Oh, right, I almost forgot to tell you."

"Fergus said the divorce agreement is already drawn up."

"In the property division section, it says the wife walks away with nothing."

"He said you came into the marriage with nothing, no dowry, no assets."

"So naturally you leave with nothing."

"You won't even have a house to live in."

Nadia left.

I lay on the hospital bed, staring at the ceiling.

At some point the tears had started falling.

They ran down along my temple and into my hair.

The nurse came in to change my dressing, saw me crying, and hurried to wipe them away.

"Mrs. Summers, please don't cry."

"You just came out of surgery. Crying isn't good for you right now."

She handed me a tissue.

"You'll be discharged in a couple of days. Do you have family? Should I contact them for you?"

Family?

My parents had run.

My husband wished I were dead.

I didn't have a single relative left in this city.

"No."

I wiped my tears dry. "There's no one to call."

The day I was discharged.

Sure enough, Fergus was still off carrying on with Nadia.

He couldn't spare the time to come get me.

Not that I needed him anymore.

When the young nurse pressed me for the third time to finish my discharge paperwork.

I calmly dialed a number I hadn't called in a very long time.

"Come get me, and I'll divorce him and marry you."