Shattered Illusions: Love, Lies, and Redemption

Her laugh in the car that day, light and breezy, has been a melody in his heart these past few days, making him feel uplifted, filled with hopeful ambition.

He had mapped out the time, plotting how to woo her, to start fresh, to love like teenagers falling for the first time.

He even planned on being there for her after the birth, to support her through the postpartum period, to take care of her and the baby...

But he hadn't anticipated it all crumbling down so suddenly, turning into nothing but wishful thinking.

What he least expected was to hear from her own lips that she was willing to give him another chance. Yet, that chance slipped through his fingers in the most brutal way imaginable, piercing his heart with profound pain.

"Liz, I..."

He wanted to say, give me another chance, we're still so young, we can have more children.

But such words choked in his throat, unsaid.

He knew how tender her heart was towards him.

Time and again, she approached him, bleeding, crying.

It was his fault, again. How could he ask for yet another chance?

against the burning

by the bed and

I

silently down her

it away, leaving no

leave. Later, we'll finalize the paperwork and then... let's never see

as he

does it have to be this way? Is

slightly. "Unless Daisy

no hope left

at her, his

however, had already closed her eyes. Moments later,

man closed the hospital room door behind

deep in the blankets, barely

applied to the doorknob was almost enough

he saw two figures rushing towards him from the other end of the hallway, Yolanda and Cassius. Cassius had taken Yolanda to Windale for an audition for a lead role in a period drama at a director's recommendation. Yolanda had ditched the director's dinner immediately after the audition upon hearing the news about

it together, vomiting several times by the roadside from the rough ride. Yolanda stormed straight at Remington, her face a mask of

"Stand down."