5. Chapter Five
Chapter Five
Ophelia
Juliet’s kitchen smelled like coffee and burned toast.
“It isn’t burned,” Juliet said as she scraped a black edge over the sink. “It’s crisp.”
Ophelia sat at the table with both hands around a blue mug. “That’s what people say when they burn toast.”
“You’ve been in my home for one night, and already you’re criticizing the food.”
“I feel safe here.”
Juliet looked over her shoulder. The joke faded between them.
Morning light fell across the crowded table, a stack of school papers, and Ophelia’s bare left hand.
She noticed the missing weight of her rings every time she moved.
Washing her face earlier, reaching for the mug, brushing her hair behind her ear.
Each small movement reminded her of what she’d done.
Juliet set down a plate of toast and eggs, then took the chair across from her.
“Tell me,” she said.
Ophelia stared into her coffee. “I already told you the short version.”
“You said Gideon brought Simone home, sent you to bed, and didn’t notice you leave.”
“That is the short version, yes.”
“It’s also the version that kept you from crying until you fell asleep.” Juliet pushed the plate closer. “Eat, then give me the rest.”
“Very gentle.”
“I can be gentler if you eat.”
Ophelia picked up a piece of toast. “Still burned.”
“I’m withdrawing the offer.”
The corner of Ophelia’s mouth moved. It felt strange, almost wrong, but Juliet waited without pressing.
So, Ophelia told her. She told her sister about the cold dinner and the light under the office door.
She repeated Simone’s joke and Gideon’s order that she stay.
She explained how he had called the expansion work real, then failed to name one person waiting for Canal Works.
She told her sister about asking what he remembered from her speech.
“Nothing?” Juliet asked.
“He didn’t know what I said.”
“Of course he didn’t. He wasn’t there.”
“He could have watched the recording.”
“He could have asked you.”
That hurt more because it was so simple. Ophelia set down the toast.
“I told him I wasn’t accusing him of sleeping with Simone. I told him he was present for her in every way he refused to be present for me.”
“What did he say?”
“That I was jealous and exhausted. Then he told me to go to bed.”
Juliet’s fingers tightened around her mug. “I’m going to need better toast. There are several things I’d like to do with this piece.”
“Don’t make me laugh.”
“Why?”
“Because I left my husband last night.”
“You can leave him and still laugh.”
The permission almost broke her. Ophelia looked toward the shelves crowded with cookbooks, framed school photographs, and jars that didn’t match. Juliet’s home held the marks of a person who lived in it. Nothing had been arranged for public approval.
“I’m not asking for a divorce,” Ophelia said.
Juliet’s expression stayed careful. “All right.”
“I don’t know what I’m asking for.”
“You asked to stay here.”
“Because I can’t stay there.”
“Then that’s enough for today.”
Ophelia rubbed the pale strip of skin where her rings had been. “I’ve imagined leaving before.”
Juliet went still. “You never told me that.”
“I never let myself finish the thought. I’d get as far as wondering where I would go, and then Gideon would come home. Or he’d remember something small. He’d touch my back when he walked past me, and I’d think I was making everything worse than it was.”
“You weren’t.”
“I know that now.” She swallowed. “I think I knew it before. I just didn’t want to know.”
Juliet reached across the table but stopped short of taking her hand. “There’s something else, I can feel it. You’re not telling me everything.”
Ophelia gave a weak laugh. “You always did cheat at guessing games.”
“You’re rubbing your ring finger hard enough to remove the skin.”
Ophelia lowered her hand. She’d kept the whole truth inside for years. Saying it made her feel both lighter and sick.
“I want children,” she whispered.
Juliet’s eyes softened. “I know.”
“No, you think I might want them. I’ve always wanted them. With Gideon.”
“Then why…” Juliet stopped herself. “Sorry. Go on.”
“Because I’ve watched Rebecca all these years.” Ophelia’s voice dropped. She felt bad talking like this about her sister-in-law. “She’s married, and she’s still alone. She takes care of the children while Kyle appears when it suits him. Everyone acts as if the money should make that acceptable.”
Juliet said nothing.
“Gideon isn’t Kyle,” Ophelia continued. “He doesn’t cheat. He doesn’t party and forget where he lives. But absence is absence when a child is sick, or frightened, or waiting for someone who promised to come.”
The fear felt more real once she said it. Ophelia had pictured a baby in the Astor Street house more times than she could count. She had also pictured eating dinner alone while a highchair sat beside her while Gideon’s place remained empty.
“I was afraid I’d become a married single mother,” she whispered. “I was afraid I’d love our child, resent my husband, and teach the child to excuse him the way I did.”
Juliet came around the table and crouched next to her chair. “You shouldn’t have carried that alone.”
“I chose not to tell anyone.”
“That doesn’t mean you deserved to carry it.”
Ophelia pressed her lips together. Relief came first, then terror. She’d finally said the thing that made her marriage feel too lonely for the future she wanted.
Her phone lay dark near the sugar bowl.
“I have to turn it on,” she said.
“Do you?”
“He needs to know I’m safe. And Threshold may need me.”
Juliet rose. “Those are two different reasons.”
“I know.”
Ophelia turned on the phone. The screen filled with missed calls and messages from Gideon.
Where are you?
Call me now.
Ophelia, this is not acceptable.
Then, later: Please call me.
Her chest tightened at the last one. Before she could figure out how she wanted to reply, his name filled the screen as her phone started vibrating.
Juliet returned to her chair. “You don’t have to answer.”
“I know.” But she answered anyway. “Hello.”
“Where are you?” Gideon’s voice was rough.
“At Juliet’s.”
“Are you safe?”
The fear beneath the question pulled at every old instinct she had. She wanted to tell him she was sorry for frightening him. She wanted to make her leaving easier for the man who had made staying impossible.
“Yes.”
He let out a breath. “Why did you turn off your phone?”
“Because I didn’t want you to reach me.”
“You left without telling me.”
“I told you I couldn’t keep living like that.”
“You didn’t tell me you were walking out of our home.”
“You told me to go to bed and turned back to your plans.”
“And when I went upstairs, you were gone. Your rings were on your proposal.” His voice sharpened. “Do you have any idea what that looked like?”
“Yes.”
Silence.
“Come home,” he said. “We’ll talk.”
“No.”
“Ophelia.”
“I spent years trying to talk to you in that house. Leaving it is the first thing that made you call me.”
“You are taking one terrible night and turning it into the whole marriage.”
Her guilt vanished under a rush of anger. “It isn’t one night out of proportion. It’s six years in proportion.”
“That’s not fair.”
“No. It isn’t.”
“I have worked for six years to give you everything.”
“You gave me a beautiful house and no husband inside it.”
Gideon breathed out through his nose. She could picture the hard line of his jaw and the scar through his left eyebrow.
“What do you want me to do?” he asked, calmer now.
“Listen.”
“I am listening.”
“Then stop planning your answer.”
He went quiet.
Ophelia held the phone tighter. “I’m staying with Juliet. Don’t come here without asking.”
“I’m your husband. I shouldn’t need an appointment to see you.”
“I’m your wife, and I needed an appointment to see you.”
He had no answer for that.
“You can call,” she continued, “but we agree on the time first. We can meet if I choose to. I’m not returning to Astor Street because you demand it.”
“I’m not demanding.”
“You told me to come home.”
“Because we can’t fix a marriage from separate houses.”
“We couldn’t fix it from the same one.”
“Then we’ll go away. Anywhere you want. No office. No Simone. Just us. We’ll go on a trip, talk, fix this.”
“A vacation won’t make you value me.”
“I’ll change my schedule. I’ll protect our evenings.”
“You promised me one dinner.”
“I can do better.”
“You could have done better before I left.”
His voice softened. “Ophelia, I know what this is about. I’ll find another property for Threshold. I’ll make sure it’s better than Canal Works.”
Pain pressed against her ribs, but her voice stayed steady. “You’re still trying to buy a solution.”
“I’m trying to repair the damage.”
“Then start by hearing what the damage is.”
“Tell me.”
“I have.” She closed her eyes. “I won’t sleep with you because you miss me. I won’t appear beside you at Hale events and help everyone pretend we’re fine. Don’t send me jewelry or flowers. And don’t treat every call or meeting as progress toward an outcome I haven’t promised.”
His silence felt hurt. She almost took the words back.
“Are you ending our marriage?” he asked.
“I don’t know.”
“You just listed every way I’m not allowed to be your husband.”
“No. I listed the benefits you don’t get while refusing to act like one.”
“So, I’m supposed to wait until you decide?”
“I waited for you for six years.”
“That isn’t an answer.”
“It’s the only one I have.”
He said her name, frightened now instead of angry.
She still loved him, and the feeling hurt.
She wanted to promise that she would come back if he tried.
She wanted to give him a map through her pain because Gideon trusted maps.
But then he would follow directions, reach the end, and expect her as the reward.
“We’ll arrange another call,” she said. “Not now.”
“Ophelia, wait.”
She ended the call. Her whole body shook. She had hurt him. That didn’t make the boundary wrong, but it didn’t make the guilt smaller. Gideon had never denied her comfort or safety. He believed that was love. Maybe it was one part of love. It still wasn’t the part she had begged him to give.
Juliet moved closer. “Do you want me to say you did the right thing?”
“No.”
“Good, because I was going to say it anyway.”
Ophelia laughed once, then covered her face and cried. Juliet stayed beside her without asking her to stop.
So many things were going through her head.
She couldn’t believe what she’d just done.
She’d actually left her husband the night before, and she wasn’t going to go back to him.
Not easily. Not before she figured out what she wanted from her future.
Ophelia’s personal savings were enough for a modest life while she worked out what came next.
She was going to be fine, and her sister was there to help.
***
Later, the doorbell rang. A delivery filled the doorway: white orchids arranged in a heavy crystal bowl – perfect, cold, and far too expensive. A small card carried Gideon’s handwriting: I’m sorry. Let me fix this. Ophelia read it twice.
“You told him not to send gifts,” Juliet said.
“Yes.”
“And he heard ‘send a large one.’”
Ophelia looked at the flawless flowers. Once, they would have made her feel loved. Now they proved Gideon had listened only for something he could purchase. She sent the arrangement back with one message: I don’t want presents.
When the doorway was empty again, Juliet leaned against the wall. “You need independent advice.”
Ophelia’s stomach tightened. “I’m not filing for divorce.”
“I didn’t say you were. But your home, your money, your work… everything has been arranged through Gideon or Hale. You should know where you stand before someone else tells you.”
“Calling a lawyer makes this real.”
“It was real when you arrived at my door with a bag.”
Ophelia hated that. She also knew Juliet was right.
She opened her laptop at the kitchen table and found an attorney who had no connection to the Hale family. The blank message on the screen frightened her more than Gideon’s anger had.
“This doesn’t mean I’m choosing divorce,” she said.
Juliet sat beside her. “It means you’re choosing to know your own position.”
Ophelia typed a brief request for independent advice. She read it until the words blurred, then placed one finger over the trackpad. She pressed send without knowing what the answer would cost her.