Leaving His Shadow for the Blazing Sun

Start Reading

1.

This is the twentieth year I've known Elias.

The night before our wedding, a text from him popped up:

I'm fucking someone else right now. Wanna listen?

That message was just a warning.

Before I could even process the shock, Elias started a video call.

I instinctively hit the decline button, my hand shaking so violently it stunned me.

The phone kept ringing, relentless.

Finally, a sixty-second voicemail arrived.

The moment I pressed play, the sounds of lewd gasps and moans stabbed my eardrums like rusty nails.

In despair, I texted Elias:

"Why?"

Elias replied, his breath still ragged:

"I've done this so many times behind your back and you never noticed. It's no fun anymore, Cora."

The wedding dress, which I had fussed over and straightened a hundred times, suddenly looked like a pile of expensive trash.

...

Five minutes later, there was a knock on the door of the hotel suite.

Elias stood there, the bow tie of his tuxedo hanging loose, a bright red hickey stark against his neck.

Just moments ago, he was in the suite next door. With another woman.

And I had been clueless, like a complete fool, needing him to come and humiliate me in person.

Seeing my red-rimmed eyes, he sneered.

"Cora, you're so slow. With an IQ that low, how can you be my wife?"

2.

My voice trembled as I asked:

"When did it start?"

Elias leaned against the doorframe, speaking as if it were nothing important.

"I thought I'd dropped enough hints."

"Remember the day we went to try on wedding dresses in Soho? The moment you went into the fitting room, I said I had a work emergency and left. The truth is, that girl was throwing a tantrum and I had to go calm her down."

"She's not obedient like youDshe's a beautiful little troublemaker, always knows how to drive me crazy."

He said she was trouble, but the corners of his mouth turned up in a smirk.

Honestly, I had felt something was wrong.

I have severe PTSD, and for the last twenty years, my world has revolved around Elias.

I never wanted a big wedding, but Elias insisted he wanted to see me in a wedding dress. He excitedly arranged a private fitting, just the two of us.

But that day, he left in a hurry before he even saw me put on the gown.

"Those pictures you sent me of the dresses? I didn't even glance at them. That girl actually picked this one for you."

"What do you think? Are you happy with it?"

It felt like an invisible hand was choking me, and I couldn't make a sound.

Elias walked in on his own, his fingers tracing the lace on the gown's skirt.

"Looks like she was in a bad mood that day. She didn't pick very well."

"This material feels pretty cheap."

The decorations in the room suddenly seemed garish, the festive ribbons like ropes on a gallows.

Ten minutes ago, I was dreaming of marrying Elias tomorrow.

That was supposed to be the closest I'd ever get to happiness.

Elias was the one who built this castle for me, and he was the one who lit the dynamite to blow it all up.

I stood frozen. Tears streamed down my face, completely out of my control.

3.

I didn't understand.

"Why tell me now? Why tonight?"

Elias clicked his tongue and pulled a pack of cigarettes from his pocket.

"Because you're too obedient. And way too easy to fool."

"If I wanted to hide it, I could hide it until the day I die."

"But playing the part every day is exhausting, my dear."

He patted my shoulder, a condescending gesture that felt completely alien.

I snapped back to reality and stumbled backward until my back hit the cold marble wall.

Only the hard wall gave me a false sense of security.

Elias seemed oblivious to my fear and my brokenness, closing in on me step by step.

I had nowhere left to retreat. I screamed at him:

"Stay away from me!"

In that moment, it felt like I was six years old again.

Only this time, the person hurting me was Elias.

He stopped in his tracks, raising his hands in a gesture of surrender.

"Alright, I won't come any closer."

"You do need to calm down."

He paused, his voice shifting to the cold tone of a businessman.

"Don't worry, I'm not saying I'm leaving you. I just don't want to play the perfect husband anymore."

"The wedding tomorrow is still on. You're my family. The trust fund and properties I promised you, you'll get every single one."

Elias said more, but I couldn't hear him. A high-pitched ringing filled my ears.

He paid me no more attention. There was someone waiting for him next door.

4.

December in New York is bone-chillingly cold. The wind seeped through the window cracks, threatening to freeze me solid.

I found a box of matches in the hotel room and, in a daze, set the expensive wedding dress on fire.

The flames leaped up, the scorching light illuminating my pale face but doing nothing to warm the chill in my bones.

I couldn't help but remember when I was sixteen, when Elias had also started a big fire.

When I was six, my drug-addicted parents left me in the snow. I hid in an auto repair shop owned by Elias's family.

It was Elias who found me, looking like a stray dog.

After that day, whenever my parents locked me out, I could always find a burger and a cup of hot cocoa waiting for me in his garage.

When I was sixteen, Elias's stepfather tried to assault me in that same garage, the air thick with the smell of motor oil.

It was Elias who grabbed a wrench, knocked the bastard out, and then set the whole damned place on fire. He grabbed my hand and we ran as sirens wailed in the distance.

Elias was eighteen that year.

We jumped on a long-haul bus to New York, huddling together for warmth in a corner at the back.

Watching the streetlights fly by, he said:

"Don't be scared, Cora. As long as I'm here, no one can hurt you."

After that day, I developed a severe contact phobia. I couldn't stand anyone's touch, except for Elias.

I once thought Elias was an angel sent by God.

But now, I think maybe I should have just died in the snow when I was six.

The smoke alarm shrieked, triggering the hotel's sprinkler system. Guests evacuated in a panic.

As the NYPD handcuffed me and led me away, Elias was wrapping his coat around that girl, dodging the paparazzi's flashes at a side entrance.

5.

I spent the night on a cold iron bench in a holding cell.

A high fever left me delirious, and I didn't come to my senses until Elias bailed me out with his lawyer.

The scandal of the real estate tycoon's pre-wedding rendezvous with his mistress was already all over the news. In the car, he blamed me.

"You really should learn from those socialites. How could you not handle a little thing like this? Starting a fire, really?"

He didn't notice I was sick, or maybe he noticed and didn't care.

I couldn't see a trace of the old tenderness in his eyes, only disgust.

I curled up in the back of the luxury car. The heat was on full blast, but I was still shivering.

Five years ago, when he was just starting to make a name for himself on Wall Street, he took me to a charity gala.

Even though he hired top stylists, standing among those socialites, my working-class aura was completely out of place.

People whispered about me behind their champagne glasses. Their stares felt like spotlights, scorching me until I could barely breathe. I wanted to run.

It was Elias who pulled me into his arms in front of everyone and said:

"My apologies. It seems I haven't taken good enough care of the woman I love."

His simple words silenced the entire room.

After that, he really did give me a good life.

I learned about wine, about fashion. I became elegant and sophisticated. No one ever looked at me that way again.

Instead, they looked at me with envy.

When I'd stress about what to wear to a dinner party, he'd say:

"You don't have to compare yourself to them. No matter how well they dress, they can't hold a candle to you in my eyes."

I trusted Elias so much.

I have no idea when he changed.

The wedding was canceled. Elias took me straight back to our penthouse in Tribeca.

6.

The girl who opened the door was wearing nothing but a man's shirt, her long legs bare and her neck dotted with red marks. The living room carpet was strewn with clothes.

No words were needed. The smell in the air told me exactly what had happened here last night.

When she saw me, the girl's smile faded a little, but there was no fear in her eyes.

"Didn't you say the wedding was off and you were taking me shopping for a new bag today?" she whined, pouting at Elias.

Elias ruffled her blonde hair, the same way he used to soothe me.

"Tomorrow, Chloe. Didn't you want to see the Northern Lights in Norway? I already had my assistant book the tickets."

So her name was Chloe.

She seemed to be satisfied.

She changed her clothes right there in front of us, completely unbothered.

I stared at her, stunned.

She noticed my gaze and said as she buttoned her jeans:

"Don't look at me like that. I heard you two were getting married. I was just being nice and testing out the mattress for you."

"Wishing you happiness."

With the wedding already canceled, her "blessing" was dripping with malicious irony.

Then I noticed she wasn't the same girl Elias had been shielding at the hotel entrance.

Chloe left.

I collapsed to the floor, my strength gone.

The room started to spin. I instinctively reached out to Elias.

But Elias just stood there, looking down at me.

"Are you serious, Cora?"

"This is your life from now on. You'd better get used to it."

Everything went black, and I passed out.

When I woke up, I was in the master bed. My dirty clothes had been changed, and a private doctor was packing up an IV stand.

I had been unconscious for a full day.

Elias was tying his tie. Seeing me awake, he said impatiently:

"Why are you so stupid? If you're not feeling well, why don't you say something? Now I have to pay the emergency room bill."

"Anyway, you rest here. I have a meeting."

7.

If I had known I would wake up to his coldness, I would have preferred to never wake up at all.

I pushed myself up and called out to him.

"Are you going to see her?"

Without turning around, Elias adjusted his cufflinks.

"I made a promise. I can't break it."

But Elias, you promised me a lifetime of happiness, too.

What happened to your words?

I didn't have the courage to break up with him.

For twenty years, he wasn't just my lover. He was my family, my best friend, my entire world.

He was like a bone that had grown inside my own body.

He didn't come home that night.

I only saw his social media update: a photo of him and Chloe in Oslo.

Under the brilliant aurora, they looked like any couple deeply in love.

I hired a private investigator and found the woman who was with Elias at the hotel that day.

She was an actress who was just starting to get famous in Hollywood.

I put the pictures in front of her.

"You probably don't know, but you're not the only one he's with."

The actress glanced at the photos, let out a cynical laugh, and lit a slim cigarette.

"Elias really protected you well. Like a flower in a greenhouse. So cute and naive."

The sliver of hope I was clinging to was crushed by her words.

"In this New York circle, who doesn't know Elias has countless lovers? You're the only one who's clueless."

So it turned out the whole world was laughing at me, and I was the only one who didn't know.