Chapter Fifteen
Hayden
He gives me an incredulous look, rolls his eyes, then shoves the door open.
Not being a complete caveman, he holds the door open for me to walk through first. I stare at him and wonder where the soft, vulnerable, raw man that I sat on the floor in my wedding dress with went.
The man who suggested ramen instead of the spread that the reception party offered. Where did he go? Why is Killjoy back?
Be patient with him, I remind myself, Ruth’s words floating through my head.
As I walk through the door, Darcy makes sure to stand as far away from me as humanly possible. I step across the threshold into my new home.
I’ve walked through this house a million times, but this time…
It doesn't feel different like I expected. This is a job, and I am only here to fulfill my newfound duties as his campaign manager.
But still, it feels like I'm supposed to be here.
Surely time will bring about the feeling of change, like I don’t belong here. Ophelia Estate isn’t truly my home.
Home is a concept that doesn’t exist for me. Until Heaven. Yes, that’s the only place I’ll completely belong.
But can I be honest? When Darcy met me halfway down the aisle and looped his arm with mine, it felt like home. It was a moment of undoubted safety and belonging.
It’s all a ruse, I remind myself. He did it for the cameras.
My intuition, however, gnaws at me, arguing that it wasn’t an act at all.
“Do you plan to stand there all night?”
Shaken from my thoughts, I turn to face Darcy, who is standing a few feet behind me. “Where is my room?” Looking around the entryway, I take small steps forward.
A small-framed woman wearing a black dress approaches me. “I’ll show you to your room, Mrs. Marshall.”
I stop in my tracks. Mrs. Marshall. I heard the new name when the priest pronounced us husband and wife. But that was just the priest saying those words, and I was too wrapped up in my thoughts for it to fully process.
But hearing it roll passively off the tongue of the maid of the house I’m now living in…
That makes everything real.
Darcy sighs and runs a hand through his styled hair. “I’ll call for you when the ramen is ready. Go get settled and comfortable.”
I swallow, not sparing another glance at Darcy in favor of hiding my face from him. I don’t know what I need to process, but there’s something I need to think over, and I can’t do it in his presence.
“Thank you,” I squeak, and I quickly follow the lady wearing rolled long sleeves, slacks, and an apron.
She leads me through the halls until we finally arrive at a plain-looking door. Plain for the mansion, I should say. When she opens it, I realize it is the colorful room Darcy brought me to when I had the unfortunate coffee incident. Was that only a few weeks ago?
What was that Tolstoy quote I learned in one of my college classes? Something about true life only being lived when small changes happen.
Change has hallmarked my life recently. Moving here isn’t a small change, but maybe it’s a sign that I can really start living?
I don’t have to let the suffocating pressure of this new role or Darcy’s continuously sour attitude hold me back.
I can choose to continue to live. Truly live.
Regardless of Darcy’s reactions to me. He chose this just as much as I did.
Might as well embrace the change and have some fun. He signed a marriage and business contract, after all.
“Thank you,” I say to the maid again. “What’s your name?”
“Janice.” She shifts her eyes away from me as if she shouldn’t be interacting with me on such an informal level.
“Janice, you’re my new best friend here.” I pat her shoulders and her mouth forms an “o” shape. “Seriously,” I continue. “You know how Mr. Marshall is. I need a lady confidant in this place.”
She snickers and covers her mouth.
“Thank you again, Janice.” I give her a hug, while she awkwardly stands shocked and frozen. Then she leaves me with a click of the door closing, and I take in the wonderful, chaotic hues of yellow, orange, and pink swirling around my new room.
Exhausted from the day, I vow to unpack the boxes that are stacked against the walls tomorrow. I also make a mental note to tell the staff thank you for getting my things in here so quickly after I left all the boxes that I decided to keep in the lobby yesterday.
Stripping off my clothes and makeup, and wrapping my hair into my durag, I slither into the cozy bed and try not to fall asleep. Ultimately, I fail, drifting off to the memory of Darcy’s genuinely concerned eyes when he ran to meet me in the middle of the aisle.
“Mrs. Marshall.”
I stir, aware someone is calling for Darcy’s mom.
“Mrs. Marshall. Wake up. Your food is ready.”
My eyes snap open as I remember that I am Mrs. Marshall.
Janice stands at the foot of my bed with a tray. The intoxicating smell of ramen reaches my nose and I inhale, immediately transported back to my childhood.
Ramen and anime were staples of surviving within the foster care system.
“I thought Darcy and I would be eating together?”
Janice turns her head away from me and says, “He asked me if I would deliver your food to your room. He took his bowl to his office.”
What is with him? We connected at the wedding. It was as if we were actually friends. And now he has the food that he said he would make me delivered to my room like this is a hotel?
No. That isn’t how things are going to operate around here. I can be patient all day, but that doesn’t mean I’m not going to insert myself into his life. It can be a loveless marriage, but it will not be a companionless marriage.
“Janice, could you return the tray and food to the kitchen? I’ll take my meal there.”
Janice nods, but I don’t miss the upward pull of the corner of her lip.
I march out of the room on Janice’s heels and stalk forward toward Darcy’s office—a place in this house I’ve been many times—instead of the kitchen.
After winding hallways come to a halt, I stand outside his office door.
I twist the knob before I talk myself out of standing my ground with the man who gives me whiplash.
He’s mid-chopsticks to mouth when I barge through the door.
The noodles plunk back into the bowl, splashing the soup broth onto him and the desk. Darcy hisses a curse before rolling his chair away from his desk.
“To what do I owe this pleasure?” His tone and false smile indicate this encounter is nothing close to pleasurable for him. He yanks a tissue from the wooden box on his organized desk and dabs at the splashes covering his face and white button up.
“I was under the presumption that we would eat ramen together.” I cross my arms, only feeling a wee bit bad about the soup on his shirt. He has plenty of other button-ups to choose from.
“You were incorrect.”
He begins wiping soup splashes from his desk, and I notice the way his sleeves are rolled and cuffed on his forearms. My eyes are drawn to his flexing muscles as he wipes the desk, but then I deflect my eyes because I don’t need those muscles burned into my brain when this marriage is a sham.
My fists clench, and I drop my arms and anchor my fists into my hips. “Look. We need to set ground rules for living together. Rules that are not outlined in the contract. Basic human decency rules.”
Darcy mutters under his breath and tosses the tissue in the nearby trash can. He turns to me, and we engage in a battle of the silent game. The darts we fire through our gazes speak volumes.
Finally, he breaks the intense silence, scrunching his brows together as if the words on his tongue taste sour.
“You live here. During non-working hours, you stay on your side of the house and I will stay on mine. We will eat at separate times or at least in separate locations. For no reason should we enter each other’s bedroom or use the other’s bathroom.
” He pauses, then adds, “We will be like two ghosts in the night who never meet.”
Somewhere through his statement, my hands fall to my side. Sadness grips my heart at his words, and I can’t decide if it’s because of the twinge of loneliness in his voice or if it’s because I don’t want to live like a ghost in my dwelling place. Nor do I want to live with a ghost.
“You met me in the aisle,” I blurt. Realizing too late I can’t take the words back, I drop my eyes to my feet and chew on the inside of my cheek.
The new silence in the room settles in awkwardly, and I want to bolt.
I was so vulnerable walking down the aisle alone.
He heard the rescue call in my heart and saw the pleading in my eyes.
No man has ever read me like that before, and I thought… I just thought… “Never mind.”
I turn to rush out of the room, vaguely hearing the scrape of a chair behind me, but before I make it through the door, he grabs my wrist, and I freeze.
Different anime scenes float through my mind of the man grabbing the woman’s wrist as she tries to walk away from him. My heart always fluttered, but I never thought it was something men did in real life.
No, in real life, they let you walk away.
But Darcy isn’t letting me go. And I can’t bring myself to turn around.
“Trust,” he says in a low tone. He clears his throat. “I trust you to be by my side in the capacity that I need you to be. And you,” he clears his throat again, “you can trust me to be by your side.”
“Then eat ramen with me tonight. And have dinner with me every night moving forward.” Should I tell him the meaning of that statement in Asian countries?
It is our wedding night. I fight the urge to laugh hysterically at the absurdity of this entire situation.
How did I end up here, God? Is this what you want?
I once again question His will, though admittedly, there is a peace within my soul.
Another heavy silence hovers over us. But then he releases my wrist and nods. “Okay.”