It was one in the morning when I sent the message to the brilliant programmer my husband had referred for a job. “What’s the difference between a programmer and a non-programmer?” Liam, my husband, was overseas. But the new hire, a woman named Lorraine, replied almost instantly. “The programmer thinks a kilobyte is 1024 bytes.” She followed it up with a smug little emoji of a finger tapping a head, as if calling me an idiot. It was a subtle, precise little jab, an inside joke I wasn't supposed to get. But this time, I didn't scream or cry. I didn't make a scene. I just took a screenshot and showed it to my husband on our next video call. "Get rid of her," I said, my voice flat, "and we can pretend this never happened." Soon after, his young, brilliant secretary was replaced by a woman who looked old enough to be his mother. I thought that was the end of it. I thought I could finally breathe. Then, on our anniversary, a package arrived from overseas. Inside was a nine-carat diamond ring. My friends cooed and gushed, telling me how lucky I was. But I took one look at the magnificent diamond and calmly dialed Liam’s number. "I'm sending the ring back," I said, my voice devoid of emotion. "Make sure you sign for it. When you get back to the States, we're getting a divorce." 1 The room fell silent. On the other end of the line, I could hear the tremor in Liam’s voice. "What? Stella, why? What did I do wrong? I fly back on red-eyes every other week just to see you. I send you gifts constantly." His voice rose, thick with disbelief. "You were feeling insecure, so I replaced a secretary I'd worked with for years with an old woman, just to make you comfortable! And this ring… it's one of a kind. How is that not enough for you?" I stared out the window, my expression a mask of indifference. "Give the ring to whoever you want. We're done." That night, Liam boarded a fourteen-hour flight and came straight from the airport to the hospital where I was on bed rest for my high-risk pregnancy. The moment he walked in, I pulled the divorce papers from my bag and laid them on the bedside table. "Since you're here," I said quietly, "you might as well sign these." The color drained from his face. "Stella, come on," he whispered, his voice hoarse. "You just did this to get me to come home, right? I'm here now. You can stop." The other patients in the shared ward started whispering. "Fighting again? What a shame. And look at her, she’s about to pop!" "I know her. Her husband works abroad but sends her flowers and gifts here almost every day. He treats her like a queen." "She’s just being dramatic. I heard he sent her a nine-carat diamond yesterday and she wasn’t happy with it!" The murmurs grew louder, the accusing glares more frequent. In their eyes, I was the spoiled, ungrateful wife, and Liam was the long-suffering saint. And why wouldn't they think that? For years, Liam had been the perfect husband. We were high school sweethearts, each other's first everything. When his company needed someone to manage the new European branch, I was nervous. He volunteered immediately, promising it wouldn't change a thing. And for years, it hadn't. He shuttled back and forth across the Atlantic, collecting hundreds of boarding passes, all just to spend a day or two with me. When I got pregnant and my hormones went wild, he fired his beautiful, competent assistant and hired a sixty-year-old woman without my even asking. Everyone, our friends, our family, they all said I’d hit the jackpot. But that was all in the past. I turned my head away, my voice hard as stone. "I don't care what you think. We are getting a divorce. Today." Liam's eyes reddened. He grabbed my hand, his grip desperate. "Stella, please, don't do this. If you don't like the ring, I'll buy you something else. I'll quit my job. I'll move back home right now and we can have this baby together. Okay?" "No." I pulled my hand from his. "I just want a divorce." Just then, his new secretary, Lorraine, burst into the room. "Mrs. Archer, how can you do this to him!" she shrieked, her face a mask of righteous indignation. "He dropped a multi-million-dollar contract and flew for fourteen hours just because you threw a little tantrum! And this ring! He commissioned it from a world-famous designer! Do you have any idea how much his devotion is worth? You've thrown it all away!" I shot her a look of pure disgust. "You're his secretary. What gives you the right to open your mouth?" I said, my voice dangerously low. "Since you feel so strongly for him, why don't you marry him instead?" Lorraine’s face flushed a blotchy red. "Mrs. Archer, what are you saying? I'm an old woman! You can't be jealous of me!" Liam frowned, his brow furrowed with concern. "Stella, darling, I think your pregnancy hormones are making you paranoid. Me and Lorraine? How could you even think that?" The other patients glanced at Lorraine's wrinkled face and graying hair, and a few snickers broke out. "Is she crazy? She's jealous of a grandma?" "That woman has to be sixty, at least. Her husband is young, handsome, and rich. If he wanted to cheat, he could have his pick of models. Why would he go for someone old enough to be his mother?" "Exactly! He'd have to be pretty desperate to go after that!" The laughter grew. Liam looked at me, his eyes full of weary helplessness. He squeezed my hand, his voice a low, pleading whisper. "I hired an older secretary specifically so you wouldn't worry. How can you still imagine things?" "We have so much history. Please, stop this. We can't get divorced." I looked at him, a cold, humorless smile touching my lips. "Fine. Then fire her." Liam froze. For just a second, a flicker of hesitation crossed his face. "Mrs. Archer!" Lorraine cried out, and then she threw herself to her knees in front of me, a theatrical display for the entire room. Tears streamed down her face. "My son has a terminal illness, and my husband is dead! Mr. Archer took pity on me and gave me this job! You can't ask him to fire me!" Her voice rose to a hysterical wail. "My life doesn't matter, but my son is in the ICU! He needs this money to live! Please, I'm begging you!" She was putting on the performance of a lifetime. The audience ate it up. A chorus of sympathetic sighs filled the room. "She's been through so much. How can you be so cruel?" "This is your paranoia talking. The poor woman has enough to deal with without you taking away her livelihood!" "You're eight months pregnant! Don't you have a shred of compassion?" Seeing she had the room on her side, Lorraine crawled forward and clutched at the hem of my hospital gown. "Mrs. Archer, I promise I'll stay away from him. I'll only do my work… Please, just let me keep my job…" When I remained unmoved, Liam’s face hardened. "Stella, you've gone too far this time. Lorraine is a desperate woman." "I've gone too far?" I laughed, a sharp, bitter sound. I met his eyes. "Liam, the disgusting things you've done are far worse than anything I could imagine. Don't make me say them out loud." A flash of panic crossed his face before he masked it with outrage. "What have I done? Stella, everything I do is for you! To make you happy, to give you a better life!" Lorraine, wiping her tears, jumped to her feet. "How can you say that to him?" she accused. "You sit here in the hospital being waited on hand and foot, while he works himself to the bone, skipping meals and sleeping in his office! What could he possibly have done? He's a fool, that's what, for loving a woman like you!" My gaze flickered between the two of them. "Sleeping in the office? Or are you two just getting your stories straight about what filthy things you've been up to?" I threw the divorce papers onto his chest and turned to leave. Just then, my mother-in-law rushed in, breathless. "Stella, what's going on? I heard you were talking about divorce. What happened?" She grabbed my arm, her face etched with concern. "Did that idiot son of mine do something to hurt you? You tell me, and I'll handle him!" I looked at Eleanor, my mother-in-law, and took a deep breath. For years, she had treated me like her own daughter. When I got pregnant, she doted on me, catering to my every whim. Between a loving husband and a caring mother-in-law, I had been blinded by my own good fortune. I thought I was the luckiest woman in the world. What a fool I’d been. I didn't have all the proof yet, so I couldn't tell her the whole truth. I remained silent. Seeing my silence, Eleanor grew more anxious and turned on her son. "Liam, what did you do?" He opened his mouth, then closed it, sighing deeply. The peanut gallery chimed in to defend him. "It's not his fault! Your daughter-in-law is being completely unreasonable!" "She wants him to fire his secretary. It's a misunderstanding. The woman is ancient!" Eleanor looked at Lorraine, then back at me, a helpless expression on her face. "Stella, honey, is the stress of the pregnancy getting to you? You've always been so level-headed. Why would you get so upset over this old woman?" "She's my age, for heaven's sake," she added with a sigh. "Are you just upset that Liam's been away so much? I'll make him stay. The baby's due soon anyway. He can stay here with you until it's born." My face was a stone mask. "No. I want a divorce." "Stella!" Liam's voice cracked. He fell to his knees in front of me, his eyes red-rimmed and desperate. "If I did something wrong, just tell me. Please, don't threaten me with divorce." "I know I haven't been here for you enough, but it was all for the company! To provide for you and our child!" he sobbed, tears streaming down his face. The onlookers were moved. "You have to be understanding, dear. You can't just throw away a marriage." "He's a good man. We've all seen how much he loves you." "And you need a real reason for a divorce. You can't do it just because of an old lady…" At that, Lorraine shuffled closer again, her voice thick with manufactured sorrow. "If I'm the reason you're leaving him, then I'll go! Maybe this is just my fate… to lose my husband, and then my son. When my boy dies, I'll just follow him…" That did it. The room erupted in condemnation, all of it directed at me. "See what you've done? Now you're going to drive this poor woman to suicide!" "You rich people have no hearts! Her son is her whole world! Do you really think she has the time or energy to seduce your husband?" "Exactly! And frankly, he's not that desperate!" The accusations flew. Liam and Lorraine were a sobbing, tragic mess on the floor. I watched them, unmoved, and simply held out the divorce papers again. "If you want to be a saint and save her and her son, that's your business," I said to Liam. "It has nothing to do with me. Sign these papers, we get divorced, and I don't care what you do." I added one last thing. "And you leave with nothing." The room gasped. Liam's face went white. "Stella! You have to stop this!" he roared. I said nothing, just stared back at him. The air was thick with tension. Eleanor looked from me to Liam and back again. Finally, she sat on the edge of my bed. "Stella," she said softly. "I'm not playing favorites, and I know you're not the type to make things up. Just tell me what's wrong. Don't be afraid." She sighed. "But this secretary… it must be your pregnancy hormones making you overthink things. And the baby is due any day now. You can't let him be born without a father." At the mention of the baby, my hand instinctively went to my belly. A pang of regret shot through me. Liam saw it and pressed his advantage. "She's right, Stella. You can't let our child grow up without a father just because of some crazy jealous fantasy. Please, stop this, okay?" he begged, his voice cracking. Just then, a doctor knocked and entered the room. He scanned the scene, his eyes landing on me. "Stella Archer," he said sternly. "Regarding the question you asked me last week, I need to emphasize this again: at this stage of your pregnancy, a termination is absolutely not an option." A collective shockwave went through the room. Liam froze, the blood draining from his face. The doctor then turned to him. "You're the husband, correct? Your wife is under extreme emotional distress. You need to be here for her. She's been to a dozen prenatal appointments, and this is the first time I've seen you. That's a dereliction of your duty." Liam, looking ashamed, could only nod. As the doctor left, Liam's face contorted with a rage that finally boiled over. "Stella, what the hell is wrong with you!" he bellowed. "This baby is eight months along, and you were trying to get an abortion? Are you trying to kill yourself?!" Eleanor's eyes welled with tears. "Stella," she sobbed, "we tried for years to have this child! What could possibly be so bad that you would even consider such a thing?" A knot of grief tightened in my chest. Of course, I knew how precious this baby was. And I knew how dangerous an abortion would be now. But I grew up in a single-parent home. I knew the whispers, the pity, the feeling of being different. I was terrified of my child suffering the same fate. I took a shaky breath and looked at Liam. "I will keep the baby. But we are getting divorced. You will go back to Europe, and you will never see us again." As the words left my mouth, Liam’s knees hit the floor with a sickening thud. He lunged for the fruit basket on the table, grabbing a small knife and pressing it against his own wrist. "If you divorce me," he rasped, his eyes wild, "I'll kill myself right here!" The room descended into chaos. The onlookers finally lost all restraint. "Just agree with him! Do you want a death on your conscience?" "She wants to abort her baby and divorce her husband over an old woman! I've never seen such a heartless monster!" "She's throwing away a perfect man! What a waste!" Eleanor was on her knees now, too, begging me. "Please, Stella, I'm begging you… What did he do that was so wrong? Are you trying to destroy our family?" The insults rained down on me, a torrent of vile, hateful words. "Fine." My voice, when it came, was shockingly calm. The room fell instantly silent. Every single person turned to look at me. I slowly scanned their angry, judgmental faces, my gaze finally landing on Liam. "You all want a reason," I said, my voice as cold and clear as ice. "I'll give you one. I'll tell you exactly why I have to get this divorce."
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