Some Things Are Just Meant To Be

From the back cover

The rain hammered against the window, mirroring the frantic beat of my heart as my mother clutched her chest, her breathing shallow.

I called 911, but the streets were flooded, and the ambulance was delayed.

Desperate, I called my wife, Sarah. Her voice, bright and cheerful over the noisy clatter of plates and loud music, promised to hurry, to be right there.

She never came.

An hour later, the paramedics arrived, their grim faces confirming what I already knew. She was gone.

Hours later, an unfamiliar text buzzed my phone. It was from my friend, Dave. Below his bewildered message was a screenshot that froze my blood: my wife, Sarah, laughing, head thrown back, a wine glass in hand, seated opposite her ex-boyfriend, Mark Wilson, his arm possessively draped around her chair.

The timestamp screamed betrayal: an hour after I' d called her, while my mother lay dying, Sarah was at a lavish restaurant with her past.

The caption, "Some things are just meant to be," shattered my world.

The distracted voice, the turned-off phone, the broken promise-it wasn' t an accident. It was a choice. My grief for my mother, a raw, open wound, was now burning from this fresh betrayal.

With trembling hands, I typed two sentences, fueled by pure, distilled pain: "It's over. Don't come home."