Love and Hate Are Gone - Chapter 3

“What happened to our baby? I want to see him.” Three months, my baby was fully formed, but he never had a chance. I got the same reply as the last seven times: “I had him properly buried. You’re not in a good place right now, I’m worried it will upset you.”

“My parents are so upset about the miscarriage too, maybe we should go back to my family’s place for dinner tonight and see them?”

As soon as we walked into his family’s place, Ashley was all smiles, practically clinging to his mother’s arm. When she saw me, she held out her belly as if showing off a prize.

“Oh, Kate, there you are! It’s been too long, sit down. I heard about the miscarriage, honey, don’t overdo it.”

Since the wedding incident, things were so bad between me, Mark, and Ashley that I always went to the family’s place when they weren’t around. I couldn’t believe how wrong that timing was.

Looking at her six–month belly, I remembered it was Greg’s child. He’d never let one of mine live more than three months. His mother’s face hardened as soon as she saw me.

“Useless. Can’t even hold onto a kid, what is this, the tenth time? How is it my son got stuck with you?”

She was Greg’s biological mother, but Mark’s step–grandmother. At 50, she was a sharp woman. She was angry that the CEO title had been taken away from her son.

Greg used to stand up for me, but now his eyes were glued on Ashley, and he was lost in a daze of longing and infatuation. He didn’t even hear what anyone was saying.

“Grandma, you need to calm down. Kate just doesn’t have the luck to be a mother. It’s not like she wants all those babies to die.”

His mother scoffed, “You’re a bad omen for my son.”

Ashley chimed in with her fake concern, and then reached to take my arm, then immediately steadied herself. Even though she recovered, Greg pushed me aside to catch her.

He scooped her up, completely ignoring his parents, and asked, “Ashley, are you okay? You shouldn’t be out of bed, where’s Mark?”

Ashley giggled. “Mark had to go to the States for work. He’s taking over as CEO soon, so he’s just too busy!”

She shot me a look of victory and said to Greg in a sweet voice: “Honey, I think I twisted my ankle, it hurts!”

Without another word, Greg was already carrying her towards the bedrooms upstairs, and didn’t even look back at me.

His mother gave me a knowing look, and then sneered, “Not only are you useless, but you can’t even keep a man. If Mark hadn’t married Ashley first, why would my son have even looked at you? Go upstairs. You make me sick to look at.”

I knew my mother–in–law didn’t like me. She thought I was just a woman Mark didn’t want, latching onto her son and embarrassing him.

Because of the miscarriages, she hated me even more. I always thought I was just unable to carry a child and so felt guilty.

Greg usually spoke up for me, but this time, he was too busy with Ashley to even notice me. For a split second, I wanted to scream, to yell the truth at them. But what was the point?

I already made the decision to leave, there was no point to keep fighting. I walked upstairs, seeing Ashley’s door slightly ajar. I don’t know why, but I stepped closer.

And there I saw Greg, on the bed with Ashley, his clothes all messed up.