章節 2: Hopes? No More

"Did I make a mistake in proposing to her in the first place? Should I have gone for..Shirley..?" He mumbled to himself as he scratched his scalp and ruined his styled hair.

Meanwhile, outside his office, Selina walked away from the closed doors. Brick by brick, she could see the walls tumbling in her world as she made her way to the elevator lift. For some reason, the elevator seemed to function much faster than regular days. As soon as the down button was pressed, the doors spread open. Bringing herself into the small space, she utilized the last seconds by staring at the closed doors to his office.

'This is the last time..' She told herself as she captured the last seconds of his office before the elevator door closed its gap. Her trembling hands pressed on the ground level button where the parking lot was located.

As her vision grew blurrier from the heavy mist in her eyes, her nose tickled from holding back her sniffles. It took her god knows how much effort to hold everything in until she reached her car. The moment she was alone in her tinted BMW, she hurled in a protective position with her knees close to her chest. Locking the doors from the inside, she could finally breathe.

Swallowing the heavy lump down the wrong pipe of her throat, her lips quivered like a high school student facing anxiety from entrance exams. After a drip of tears trailed down her cheeks, more tears followed and burst forth like water from a dam; spilling down her face. Her sobs were stifled at first, before everything fell out of control miserably. Now, it was impossible to stop.

The muscles of her chin shuddered like a small child as she lifted her gaze towards the elevator door. That elevator was the only exit Peter Sin would use. 'What are you looking at Selina Gu? Are you expecting or hoping he would come after you? Who are you kidding?'

As she lowered her head between her knees, her cries echoed into her ears. Each drip of tears that drained out from her eyes were essences of her shattered heart. It was theft of pieces of her soul that nobody could see nor heal. With her right hand clutching on the crimson stained section of her chest, the wrinkles on that area only deepened.

Tears drenched her moist, rose colored cheeks and traveled down her neck. The dried blood spots were soaked by her tears, leaving it wet again. Deep breathing only worsened as the minutes of sobbing broke down to small pauses for panting breaths.

Her world has lost its vibrant colors as her sight hazed. The heart wrenching pain came crashing in waves during her cries; releasing statics to her head once more. Fear? She had none. Love? She lost him. Hope? She couldn't afford to have any.

As she calmed down, her wet lashes blinked with leftover tears on it. She whispered to herself as she inhaled and exhaled slowly. "Everything is fine. Everything will be alright. There's nothing to cry about. People come and go anyways, right? Besides, I have many things I have to do."

"That's right..I have to go home and cook for mom. It's chilly today, so her leg must be hurting. I can't let her do housework by herself. And..And.." She hissed the minute she separated her knees from her chest. Lowering her gaze, the broken smile from earlier appeared once again.

Applying pressure to the wound, she bit her lips and wiped away the incoming army of tears. She looked up this time and tried persuading herself to not let tears flow out anymore. Shutting her eyes tightly while leaning back on her leather seat, she said to herself that he was not worth it.

"Seven years..It's been seven years since we've been together. I should have noticed when he introduced his childhood friend as his personal secretary, Shirley Han. When she was shameless enough to move in to his place knowing he had a girlfriend and was living by himself..."

"I should have known when I asked him to not let it happen as his girlfriend, but he rejected by saying it was not my position to say much. He was right because I was only his girlfriend at that time. Having a woman dressed in his shirt as pajamas was not a problem. Seeing her in only a towel while walking around his house was also not a problem..."

"And having this stupid woman who smiled like an idiot for a month straight after hearing his proposal was also not a problem, right? I believed in your words, despite my envy. I told myself it was alright because they were friends for almost seventeen years. Because at the end, I am the fiancée. I will be his wife, not her."

Laughing at her own stupidity, she continued speaking her mind. "From the very first step of the way, I've stayed with you. Starting from the zero starting line to your company's current achievements, I've been there all along. I took care of every little thing you might worry about and tried my best to support you..."

"At the end? All it took was your childhood friend's few words to snatch all my credit away. I've spent weeks typing up the proposal for upcoming projects for you and left it as a gift on your desk. Yet..you didn't even bother looking at it. It was my gift to turn your company around from its financial crisis. Peter Sin, I've loved you, but this pain will remind me every second from now on that you don't deserve it."

Breathing in deeply, she controlled the heaviness in her heart. Releasing another exhalation, she whispered, "I don't need to feel the same pain twice." She started her car and drove straight home. It took her half an hour to arrive.

Immediately, she ran into her house where she heard her mom speaking to someone from the entrance. Since Peter had previously assumed he would win the auction today, she had told her mother, Katrina Gu about not coming home for dinner. With the sudden change of plans, she came home earlier than expected.

Katrina was too concentrated on her call that she failed to notice someone had come home. Since the wound wasn't too deep, she didn't bother going to the hospital. At first, Selina had wanted to change her clothes and deal with her wound. When she made the first step up the stairs, she heard her mom mention her name and changed her mind.

As the saying goes, 'Curiosity killed the cat'

Just when she thought her day couldn't get any worse, this conversation proved otherwise.