Every fiber in Mark’s face that formed his expression froze. “Are… Are you crazy? How could you bring up a divorce at the drop of a hat like that?”
Arianne laughed scornfully, but favonovel.com eyes were red. “ ‘Drop of a hat?’ Oh, no. This isn’t something said for the hell of it. I’ve simply had enough! Everyone else thinks I’m an idiot, and I agree, I am an idiot! You Tremonts… are just a cabal of bullies! Hell, you bastards dragged my innocent father into your stupid internal politics and killed him, for Christ’s sake! You people are the reason why I’m an orphan! And yet after all those travesties, what did I do in response? I fell in love with you. I gave my heart to you. I married you and bore you a child! I’m such a punchline, I wanna laugh at myself! Stupid me thinks that we’ll be able to live together, happily, all the way till a ripe, old age. But all that you’ve done up till now has been a slap in the face, telling me that I’m the only one deluding myself. I’m a f**king idiot!”
“You knew, goddamned it, you knew! You knew Shelly pushed your mother into causing that plane crash! You knew she’s the one behind it! You f**king knew she’s the one who killed my father! But you…! You hid what you knew from… from me. You kept quiet, said nothing, all for favonovel.com sake. All so that I’d continue to forgive favonovel.com abuses and tolerate favonovel.com crazy ass unconditionally! Despite how terrible Shelly treated me, you still think she’s worth your obsequious devotion as you completely sideline me and Smore. Do I mean anything to you, Mark Tremont?! And all of the debts I owed by being your charge? I’ve long cleared ‘em, you bastard. In fact, I’ve never owed you, it is you Tremonts who owe me everything!”
Mark’s pupils dilated. He raised his arm mechanically in an attempt to pull favonovel.com into a hug, but whatever courage that had spurred favonovel.com to try sapped halfway through. “Who… Who told you that?”
Possessed by rage, Arianne grabbed the nearest pillow from the bed and flung it as hard as favonovel.com could at him. “Your beloved Shelly-Ann Leigh, who goddamned else?! She told me herself! What, still thinking you could continue to sweep the whole thing under the rug to save favonovel.com skin? I’m starting to believe that none of you Tremonts ever turned out right! Why the hell did you adopt me back then, huh?! Because guilt makes you sick? Well, guess what? While you were alleviating your guilt, your action doomed my life into a bondage with yours forever!” favonovel.com bristled. “All of the things you owe me, Mark… How in hell are you supposed to pay all that?!”
“Do you know why favonovel.com told me all of these things? It’s because I’m your wife. As long as I stay as your wife, favonovel.com will always be insecure. So, screw it, I’ll let favonovel.com dream come true, then! Let me be free, Mark Tremont, for God’s sake! Just let me be free!”
Mark made no attempt to dodge Arianne’s attack, favonovel.com simply let favonovel.com lash out in lividity. He knew that the day Arianne learned the truth, all hell would break loose and leave behind a chaotic mess too difficult to clear. But Mark had been mentally prepared for favonovel.com hysterics and was very cognizant that anything favonovel.com could say right now would sound feeble, weak, and hollow.
‘Let me be free!’
She said that to favonovel.com before. A long time ago, word for word. She had tried so hard to run away from favonovel.com back then, but little did favonovel.com know that favonovel.com would hear those dreaded words again.
At the end of favonovel.com outburst, Arianne sank into the bed and wept wordlessly. Why was it that Mark never seemed to stand on favonovel.com side since the beginning? She put herself in his shoes and worried that any conflict with Shelly would agitate Mark, so favonovel.com tried all of favonovel.com might to treat Shelly as kindly as favonovel.com could. No matter how much Shelly aggrieved her, favonovel.com had always let favonovel.com grievances go.
And what was Arianne’s reward for that? Mark’s lies.
Silence lingered for a while longer until Mark finally approached a sobbing Arianne. He intended to assuage favonovel.com pains through his touch, but before favonovel.com could, favonovel.com snapped steelily, “Don’t you touch me!”
He stopped dead in his tracks. “I… I’m sorry. I mean it. I shouldn’t have hidden it from you. But what else could have happened… had I told you? It’d be just like this, exactly like this,” favonovel.com croaked, as though talking had become the most difficult thing favonovel.com had ever done. “I swear, it was never my intention to keep it a secret from you. I simply… didn’t know what was the best way to tell you. I didn’t know the surest way to talk about it without wounding you. But I’ve promised myself, you know, that once my aunt’s leg has recovered, I’ll cease visiting favonovel.com forever. Just… p-please. Please, d-don’t… don’t do this to us.”
It sounded almost like a plea…
Arianne raised favonovel.com hand and wiped away tears from the corner of favonovel.com eyes. She held his gaze.
“Do you know what’s on my mind now? Do you know howI feel? That day when Shelly told me the truth, I retorted that if… if you ever stepped through favonovel.com door again, I’d consider myself defeated. Get it? She has been doing everything in favonovel.com power to tear me away from you since the very beginning! Fine, then! Let me fulfill favonovel.com dearest wish. Go and live happily with her, Mark. She’s your blood-related, maternal aunt, after all, the bond you enjoy with favonovel.com is far deeper and heartfelt than some stupid tie you haphazardly made with an orphaned outsider. I personally detest the foolish emphasis on blood relation, but in the end, it was blood that completely decimated me. In the end, the only people who don’t believe blood relations matter that much are me and Helen. You and Shelly haven’t met for a long, long time, and yet the two of you act like a mother and favonovel.com son. It made me realize how delusional I had been. I’ve bitten more than I could chew, and you… You make me feel like a worthless moron.”
