May My Heart Turn to Dawn, Not Wait for the Dusk Clouds

Gillian came striding over, her face dark. "Job, stop this nonsense." "I gave him that money. I gave him the card too. If you've got a problem, take it up with me." She saw Hal tied there, and her face went darker still. I gripped the fruit knife, then swung it flat against her slender, pale throat. "Oh, I intend to." "Gillian, the mess you made playing around, and everything you owe me—can you ever pay it back?" Gillian looked at me in silence. The standoff dragged on a long time before she finally sighed. "All this trouble, and it still comes down to you refusing the divorce?" She let out a soft laugh and closed her hand over mine, sure of herself. "If you don't want to divorce, then we won't." "After all, I was only informing you about splitting our expenses. Only reminding you." "Stop interfering in what's between me and him." "That way, when we go home, we're still a loving, devoted couple." I watched Gillian's mouth open and close. I couldn't wrap my head around it—how did she say something so shameless? Through gritted teeth I said, "In your dreams." The tip of the knife pressed a little closer to her throat, and a bead of red welled up. "Gillian, have you climbed so high you've forgotten where you came from?" The smile on Gillian's face faded a little. Of course she hadn't forgotten. Back then she was the poor girl everyone pushed around, who couldn't even afford a meal. Who couldn't afford a uniform. It was me. I went soft over that whole cold, broken look of hers. The uniform she couldn't buy, I bought. The meals she couldn't afford, I paid for. She wanted to start a company and had no money, so I gave it to her. Later I threw in my whole self too, and became her husband. She knew perfectly well how much it took to get where she is today. That's why, more than once, she knelt in front of me with red eyes and swore to heaven. "With my good husband lifting me toward my ambitions, I will never fail you in this life." But she forgot her roots, and she forgot what I did for her. She turned around and found herself a young little assistant. And she had the nerve to say, "He isn't domineering like you. Only he can bring out the urge in me to protect someone." "Job, you're too strong." "You've never needed my protection." In that moment, I might as well have been a joke. My best friend's warning came back to me, right in my ear. "Job, you idiot! I told you long ago—don't go soft over a woman. Have your fun and leave it there, don't give her your real heart, don't hold her hand and build a career for her, or you'll pay for it." "Look at everything you've given her. Do you think she'll spare you a single thought?" "You're the cane a blind person leans on, and the second she gets her sight back, the first thing she does is throw the cane away—she might even be ashamed she ever needed it." I didn't believe it before. I even argued back. "Gillian isn't that kind of person." "I have faith in her." But now she shoves me off, hurries anxiously over to her little assistant, and gently unties him. She checks him over carefully, making sure he isn't hurt, before pulling him tenderly into her arms. "Gillian, you finally came. I thought I was going to die at this old man's hands and never see you again!" Hal sniveled against her, crying. The next second, Gillian lifted her eyes, cold. "Job, after all these years, you still haven't learned to turn a blind eye?" "I told you last time—no more stopping cards to threaten me." "And stop digging into Hal's affairs. You're the one who started this." I only felt a helplessness I'd never known before. My mother only ever told me to keep the upper hand, to never let the mistress climb up and dump on your head. But my mother never told me. If my own wife stands on the mistress's side too. Then what am I supposed to do? I don't want to turn myself into a madman. So the silence stretched on and on. But this time, Gillian was truly angry. "Job, however willful you want to be at home, I've always indulged you." "But the one thing you should never have done." "You should never have tied Hal up behind my back." She said hurting the little assistant she loved came with a price. So she called the police without a second's hesitation. She was going to put me behind bars. "Gillian, what did you say?" The fruit knife dropped from my hand and clattered to the floor. Bright red blood ran down her throat and into her collar. Gillian didn't so much as blink. "Job, I didn't want to make things hard for you, but you just won't listen." "This time, consider it a lesson."

When the police hauled me away, I was so furious I cursed her out. "Gillian, have you no shame at all?" "Back then you were at the end of your rope, couldn't even scrape together three thousand dollars in medical bills. I paid, I worked myself to the bone, and that's the only reason you're where you are today." "Now you think I'm too old, so you run off to some young thing and want to kick me to the curb!" "Dream on!" Even if I went down, I'd drag Gillian down with me. But she just let me rage, never once turning her head. She only played the part of a devoted wife. Dabbing the sweat off Hal Pruitt with her own sleeve. Every line of her face full of tenderness. "Hal, don't be scared. I promise nothing like this will ever happen again." "I'll make Job Mason suffer for it. He'll pay." Then she half-carried him into the passenger seat that should have been mine. As they shoved me into the police car, I caught one last glimpse. Hal, flashing me a smug little smile. They gave me a lecture in the interrogation room. "Why did you abduct him?" I kept my head down. "He stole my money." "Stole your money? Why didn't you report it?" I let out a bitter laugh. "Because my wife was his accomplice." By the end of the questioning, they'd ruled it a civil dispute born out of a relationship gone bad. "Mr. Mason, if you want to recover your marital assets, you can go through the legal channels." "But next time, don't resort to something this reckless and violent." The words went in one ear and out the other. In the end it was my buddy Grant Farley who bailed me out. "How did it blow up this bad?" Grant asked, curious, driving with one hand. "You used to say jump and Gillian would ask how high." "What happened this time?" I shook my head and slumped back against the seat. I didn't even have the will to explain. I couldn't understand where I'd lost. She was the one who'd promised we'd grow old together. She hadn't flinched even after my face was scarred. I worked out every single day. My body was in top shape. I didn't believe she'd suddenly stopped loving me just because I was getting older and losing my looks. That she'd just changed her heart overnight. "Grant, I can't figure out what that little assistant has that I don't." "Time and again she stayed out all night, threw money at people." "No matter how bad the fights got before, she never once said the word divorce." "But now she's grown a spine, and out of nowhere she's asking me for one." Grant glanced back at me, startled, his eyes full of pity. "Honestly? You'd be better off divorced." I said nothing. We'd been brothers too many years for him not to know I couldn't accept it. And how much I loved her. "I'm not saying this to defend Gillian." "But you two have already come this far. This marriage is a shell, husband and wife in name only. There's no point forcing it to keep going." "Besides, an ungrateful snake you could never tame, are you really sure you still want her?" Back home, I turned Grant's words over in my head. But before I could make sense of them, the private investigator I'd hired came back with news that blew everything apart. "What did you say? Gillian is... pregnant?" "It's Hal's child?!" I sank back down with a bitter smile. "Of course. That little assistant's got the healthy young body, all right." "No wonder Gillian wants a divorce so badly, just to be with him." The one thing Gillian hated most in this life was a child born out of wedlock. Because she herself was the product of some man's one careless night. She'd grown up living like an orphan. Even after that man claimed her back, she'd choked down her pride and refused, to the death, to acknowledge him and take his name. That was why, more than once, she'd held me and said, "Let's have a baby." "Let's give a child a whole, complete family." But later she forgot her own words. Fell for that little assistant like she'd lost her mind. And carried that man's child. That night, Gillian came home worn out and found me curled up in the dark on the couch. "Why didn't you turn the lights on?" I didn't look up. "Gillian, we need to talk." After she flicked the lights on. There was a property contract laid out in front of me. Twenty million dollars. The new gift Gillian had bought for Hal. "Tell me. Why?" Gillian was quiet for a long time. "Since you already know, there's no point hiding it from you." "Because Hal is worth it." I stared, dumbstruck, then, as it registered, I laughed in spite of myself. "So you live in my house, drive my car, spend my money—" "and all of it is because I'm not worth it? Is that it?" Six years of marriage, and I could count on my fingers the times Gillian had spent a cent on me. She always said I was too impressive, too strong, that I was her role model, the one who pointed her way. Always said that once she was worth a fortune, she'd shelter me from every storm. But she'd grown into a towering tree, and gone off to shelter another man instead. Faced with my demand for an answer, all she said, without a flicker of guilt, was that he was worth it. "Don't cry." She pulled out a tissue and, calm as anything, gently wiped away my tears. "It's not that you're not worth it. Job, you've always been good, always been remarkable, the successful man I've always admired." "It's just, I'm pregnant. It's Hal's child." As she spoke, she pushed the divorce papers back in front of me again. "So let's get divorced."

I stared at the divorce papers she'd prepared in advance, and for a moment I couldn't move. Gillian's voice came from above me. "Job, you and I have been married six years." "You know how much I wanted this baby." Her face twisted with pain. "You know I don't want this child born a bastard." I let out a cold laugh and slammed my fist into the wall behind her. "If you know that, then why bring this cursed thing into the world at all?" "Gillian, you make me sick." She turned her face aside. She didn't argue. "I'm keeping this child, no matter what." "Job, you're too domineering. Being with you, I never felt any warmth." "Haven't you noticed that this five-thousand-square-foot house of ours is like some big office building? It's never felt like a home at all." "It's only in Hal's little apartment." "That's the only place that ever felt like home to me." Six years I drank until my stomach bled at those business dinners, half killing myself to earn that big house. And Gillian told me it wasn't as warm as Hal's little apartment. I closed my eyes. "Fine. Have it your way." "We'll get divorced." Hearing that I'd finally given in and agreed to the divorce, Gillian froze. "Really?" She said it carefully, as if I might be faking, or playing some joke on her. Only when she saw how serious my face was did she finally let out a breath. "Job, I always knew you understood me. You've always known how to keep things clear-headed." "Divorcing you is only so my child with Hal can have a proper name." "Even without that certificate." "We're still husband and wife. And of course, if it bothers you, we can be friends." Before she left, she patted my shoulder and even added a considerate little reminder. "I know you've been lonely all these years." "If you can't stand it, you can always find someone else. Someone younger and more attentive." "I won't mind." I opened my eyes and leaned back, away from her touching hand. "That's none of your concern." Gillian knew exactly how much I'd sacrificed for the business. Apart from her, there had never been another woman in my eyes. It was precisely because she was so confident of that, that she could say something like this to sicken me. But what she didn't know was that this time. The Sanchez Group she'd built with her own hands. Had reached its end too. Gillian took the divorce papers with my signature on them and left, exactly as she'd wanted. From that day on, a clear change came over me too. I stopped clinging to Hal the way I always had. I stopped trying to make him suffer just to feel a little better myself. So when Gillian threw an opening celebration for the new flower shop she'd set Hal up with. I didn't go and trash the place the way I would have before. I didn't do what I'd sworn out loud I'd do. I didn't string up a banner reading something like "Hal Pruitt is the other man" and destroy every last shred of his dignity. I'd just made peace with it, and let Gillian go. I shut myself in my room for a whole day. Dropped that hard shell I always wore. Worked out like any ordinary man. Ordered the crawfish boil I loved, turned off my phone, and let myself enjoy one plain, ordinary day. I just didn't expect that by evening Gillian would come storming in, kicking my door open. "Job! I actually thought you'd really learned to change. Why would you go and wreck the event like that, humiliate Hal?"