How a Dying Woman Rewrote Her Epilogue

Elodie stood rooted to the spot, her feet as heavy as stone. The absurdity of it all left her breathless.

Those casual, dismissive remarks-

They were nothing short of arrogance, treating her like a commodity on display.

Even the most basic act of having a child had become a matter of whether she was "qualified" enough.

In everyone's eyes, compared to someone like Sylvie a doctorate freshly returned from one of the world's top universities-Elodie simply didn't matter.

No one realized that these words were just another wound, piling atop her old

ones.

The truth was, once her treatment and surgery began, she'd lose the right to ever be a mother...

No wonder, she thought bitterly, even before the divorce, Jarrod had always been so indifferent when they shared a bed. Perhaps, even back then, he'd already decided-

She wasn't worthy of bearing his child.

Elodie didn't want to know how Jarrod had answered Lucinda's question.

His half-hearted replies to his grandmother over dinner told her everything: he had

no interest in having a child with her, and he must have agreed with Lucinda's opinion.

Clutching her bottle of pills, Elodie turned and made her way back to the bedroom.

Her breaths came shallow and shaky, her lips losing their color.

She unscrewed the pill bottle with numb, mechanical motions and swallowed a tablet dry. The bitterness spread, sharp and unforgiving, across her tongue.

She couldn't tell which was worse: the bitterness in her mouth, or the ache in her heart.

Closing her eyes for a moment, Elodie forced herself to regain composure.

the project details on her laptop-there was still

she returned to bed

few technical volumes on aerospace engineering,

The door creaked open.

the woman sitting in the soft, amber glow of the lamp her silhouette delicate and solitary. She looked up at the sound, surprised to

He hadn't left?

at the book in

read it himself. It was dense, highly technical-a modern classic in the field. He'd even recommended it to Sylvie

asked, pulling a set of clothes from the closet. His tone

condescending, but the question itself made Elodie

kept her eyes on the

it cover to cover years ago-tonight, she was just revisiting it, searching

narrowing his eyes as if seeing his quiet, even-tempered wife for the

working hard

the undertone. Was he implying she

her, desperate

she didn't bother to

the sofa. That's when he paused,

a split second, he

changed instantly. She swung out of bed, snapping the laptop shut

looked at her-really looked. She so rarely showed this sharp, defensive edge,

her computer hid

was on the screen. But Elodie's reaction reminded him of the time he'd

same secret she

lips curling with a cold,

his clothes and

realized she was probably overreacting-she'd already closed the file with the VistaLink

was no way

memory of that strange look in his

it off, turned off the