Jeaolusy 2
The question sliced through the air like lightning, sharp and merciless. Arsene’s chest tightened as if invisible fingers had clenched around his ribs. His grip on the steering wheel faltered, and for a fleeting second, the rhythm of the world outside the car seemed to blur. He couldn’t answer. Not immediately. His mind went blank, his throat dry. A thousand excuses and explanations scattered like leaves in a storm, none strong enough to shield him from the raw truth embedded in her words.
Instinct took over. Without a word, he guided the car to the shoulder of the road, the tires crunching against gravel. He killed the engine, leaving only the soft ticking of cooling metal and the faint hum of night outside. He knew he couldn’t keep driving, not with this weight pressing down on his chest, not with that question burning a hole in the space between them.
Talking while driving was dangerous, he understood that. But this conversation wasn’t just dangerous. It was lethal to the fragile balance of his marriage. Sylvia deserved his full attention, and he couldn’t afford to divide it between her eyes and the winding road ahead. Arsene’s hands fell into his lap, trembling ever so slightly. The interior of the car felt suffocating, filled with tension that pressed in from every side. He turned to face his wife fully for the first time since they left Arnav’s house, and the sight of her nearly undid him. Sylvia was too calm. Her posture was elegant, her expression composed, but in her eyes, there was a quiet storm, a demand for truth he couldn’t escape.
“Why are we pulling over?” Sylvia’s voice trembled, not with fear but with a sharp edge of wounded pride. Her eyes, glistening beneath the dim interior light of the car, burned into him. “Are you going to confess now?”
For the briefest second, Arsene caught a flash in her gaze. Anger, yes, but beneath it, a raw and unhealed sorrow. He could see it in the tightness of her jaw, in the way her fingers curled against her lap as though she needed to anchor herself. This wasn’t a wound that time had fully closed. He knew, with a sinking certainty, that even if the memory had dulled, the scar still ached.
A quiet breath escaped him, and he forced the words out, heavy and halting. “I did meet Raellyn that night… but I swear to God, I never touched her. Not once. Sylvia, the first woman I ever touched was you. My wife. I have never slept with anyone but you.”
For a heartbeat, silence consumed the car, broken only by the faint hum of distant traffic and the ticking engine as it cooled in the night air. Arsene could feel the weight of his own heartbeat in his throat, each thud a desperate plea for her to believe him.
Sylvia’s lashes trembled as she turned to him, her voice soft but laced with ice. “That’s all you have to say? You pulled the car over, made me think you were ready to bare your soul… for that?”
“Sylvia,” Arsene’s voice was low, fraying at the edges with exhaustion and desperation. “I… I don’t even know what else to say to you. But I swear, I’m speaking nothing but the truth right now. Please… don’t turn this moment between us into something darker than it has to be. You’re pregnant. You need to stay strong, to stay healthy. For now, don’t weigh yourself down with thoughts that… don’t matter.”
“Don’t matter?” Sylvia’s voice cracked like glass. Her hands curled into fists on her lap, her knuckles pale. “Are you telling me that my husband’s mistress becoming my sister-in-law… is something that doesn’t matter?”
Arsene shut his eyes for a heartbeat, the tension in his chest threatening to suffocate him. “She’s with my brother now. Just… let it go.”
“Let it go?” Sylvia’s laugh was brittle, a sound that made his stomach knot. Her voice rose with a tremor of fury and hurt that echoed in the confined space of the car. “That’s the problem, Arsene! That woman is pretending. She’s crawling her way into your family, pretending she belongs, marrying your brother because she couldn’t have you! And don’t think I don’t notice she’s not from our world. She doesn’t belong to our circle, to our name. Are you planning to betray me again with her through this filthy, convenient arrangement?”
Her last words hung in the air like shards of ice, slicing through the fragile silence. Arsene’s fingers tightened on the steering wheel, though the car was already still, his knuckles aching under the strain. He could hear the faint hitch in her breathing, see the faint shimmer of tears in her eyes that she refused to let fall.
“What are you even implying, Sylvia? What’s going on in that head of yours?” Arsene’s voice cracked with disbelief as he gripped the steering wheel tightly. “I love you. You are the woman I chose. That’s why I married you. She is with my brother now. I said let it go. We don’t need to drag the past into this again. You met her yourself. I even gave you time to speak with her privately, and after that, I saw you two… at least looking more civil. So what is the problem now?”
“She’s a snake!” Sylvia spat, her voice trembling with venom and wounded pride. “Don’t you dare expect me to accept being in the same family as a woman like that, much less call her my sister-in-law!”
“Sylvia!” His voice rose, raw with the edge of frustration. “I don’t want to talk about this anymore!”
“Oh?” Her eyes glittered like shards of ice under the dim light. “So you’re taking the side of your mistress now?”
“For God’s sake! That’s not what I meant!”
“Then what, Arsene? Tell me!” Sylvia’s chest heaved, her hands trembling on her lap. “I’m only speaking the truth. Men like you will never understand how a woman thinks, how we feel. That’s why you could fall for her even when you already had me.”
“Yes, it was my mistake,” he said through gritted teeth, pain lacing his words. “But it’s over now. We have nothing to do with each other anymore. It’s the past, Sylvia. Can’t we let the past stay where it belongs?”
“Is it?” Her voice turned sharp, almost breaking. “What if that child of hers… is yours?”
“What?!”
The word burst from his throat like an explosion. Arsene froze, his fingers numb on the wheel. A chill ran down his spine, and for a moment, the only sound inside the car was Sylvia’s unsteady breathing, heavy with accusation, and the faint hum of the engine. His pulse roared in his ears as the world seemed to tilt, the weight of her suspicion suffocating him