My Boyfriend’s Weekend Escape Was With My Best Friend Chapter 09
I pulled my arm away. “If you like him so much, you marry him. Or adopt him as your son. Pretend you don’t have a daughter.”
“What kind of talk is that?” she sputtered. “I’ve been around. I know what I’m talking about.”
I cut her off. “You spent my whole life teaching me to be good to my partner. To give everything for the family. And did he appreciate it? No. He just took it for granted. Ask him if he would ever dare treat Chloe that way.”
The way he treated Chloe was the way I treated him.
Because my love came too easily, it seemed cheap to him, worthless.
Chloe had a bad temper and acted like a spoiled princess, but Jason gave her his best. He spoiled her. He chased her.
I was never the one in the wrong, but somehow everyone made me feel like I wasn’t doing enough.
Jason jumped in, like he was trying to prove his loyalty. “I’ll be good to you from now on. I’ll change everything I did wrong.”
“You said you were planning the wedding. When can we get married?”
Jason went quiet. After a long moment, he said, “Just give me more time. I’m still working on it.”
I saw right through him. “You said once we saved up five thousand dollars, we would get married. But you spent our wedding money on another woman. You don’t have anything left. I’m done waiting.”
I’d rather earn my own money than wait for him to save up.
Jason looked hurt. “So just because I don’t have money, you won’t give me another chance? Stella, since when did you become so practical?”
I had given him so many chances over the past five years. I always let the small things slide. I told myself that as long as he was ambitious and focused on our future, everything else was minor.
But this was not minor. I couldn’t let this slide.
“You and Chloe spent over a year trying to escape from me. Now you’re back because you think I’m the most cost-effective option for marriage. You’re allowed to be practical, but I’m not?”
I’d hit the mark. Jason’s face burned red.
He’d snuck around with Chloe every week. Now his money was gone and he couldn’t work, so he suddenly remembered how good I was to him.
Five years together, and he never saw my efforts until I stopped making them.
How ironic.
Chloe never gave him anything, and she got all his devotion.
Seeing that my expression was still cold and unmoved, Jason slumped down against the wall and sat on the floor.
“I promise I’ll be good to you. I’ll work hard, and we’ll get married soon.”
His leg was already injured. The sudden movement made him wince, sweat beading on his forehead.
My mother shifted uncomfortably. “Okay, okay. He’s already apologizing. What more do you want? Just go back to normal and be happy.”
She reached down to help him up. But Jason refused to move. He just looked at me.
I remembered his proposal. He knelt then too. He said he wouldn’t get up until I said yes. He knew I couldn’t stand to see him like that. He had mastered threatening me that way.
I grabbed my keys off the table. “If you like sitting on the floor so much, stay there. I’m going to work.”
Every time Jason was upset with me, he used to leave without looking back. “I’m going to the office. Think about what you did.”
That was his favorite form of cold treatment, and now I was giving it right back to him.
Every time he left, I would spiral into self-doubt. I never understood what I was supposed to reflect on, but he always said I was the one in the wrong, so I looked for the problem in myself.
Now I understood. The problem was never me.
He just couldn’t win an argument, so he ran away.