Once the door to my room clicked shut, the carefully constructed dam finally broke. The tears didn't come in a soft stream; they came as a violent, suffocating wave. I collapsed onto my bed, burying my face in my pillow to muffle the sounds of my own heartbreak.
How could he?
It had barely been a year and a half. My mother who had built this family, loved him for decades—was gone, and in the span of a few months, he had erased her. Was their marriage nothing more than a temporary arrangement to him? Did years of shared history, two children, and a lifetime of promises evaporate the moment she passed away?
I thought of the times he had spoken of love, of how he claimed he would always cherish her memory. Is this what he meant by love? I wondered, the bitterness rising in my throat like bile. Is it this easy to discard the past? To pack up a life and trade it in for a new one before the dust has even settled on her grave?
I hated it. I hated the fragility of the vows he had once held so dear, and I hated the way he could walk through the house as if he weren't stepping over the ghosts of the life we used to have.
Suddenly, I sat up, my breath hitching in the silence. I caught my reflection in the mirror—red-eyed, trembling, fragile.
Stop it, Iris, I hissed to myself, my voice sharp and unforgiving. Just stop it.
I pressed my palms against my cheeks, forcing the tears back. You are always doing this. Always looking for things that aren't there. I took a ragged, uneven breath. It is his life. His actions. He is the one who has to live with his conscience, not you. You have no right to judge, and no time to waste.
I forced myself to stand, pacing the small confines of my room. My mother's dreams—the promises I had made to her—felt like a beacon in the dark. Focus on the job. Fulfill the promises. That was the only thing that mattered. Anything else was just noise, a distraction designed to pull me away from the only person who actually cared about my future: myself.
I put on my headphones, cranking the volume until the music drowned out the sound of my own thoughts, and turned back to my textbooks. I would bury this. I would bury it under layers of logic, study, and routine.
The next morning, I returned to the campus. I went to the library. I sat in the front row of the lecture hall. I acted as though the world hadn't tilted on its axis, as though my home hadn't become a graveyard of memories. I kept my head down, burying myself in equations and literature, refusing to let the sorrow pull me under.
But I was human, and my heart was not a machine.
In the quiet moments—when the library went silent, or when the train rattled between stations—the questions would creep back in. They were unbidden, unwanted, and uncontrollable. I didn't want to wonder, but I did. I didn't want to remember, but I felt the echo of her voice, the warmth of her hand, and the sharp, jagged ache of betrayal.
I was learning, slowly and painfully, that you can lock your heart in a fortress, but the shadows of memory will always find a way to slip through the cracks.
The weight of the last few days had turned me into a ghost. I moved through the campus like a shadow, my mind so cluttered with the bitterness of my father's 'declaration' that the world around me blurred into a gray haze. I sat through lectures, I took notes, and I walked to the library, but I still couldn't able to stop thinking.
It wasn't until the end of the day, as I was packing my bag, that a sudden realization pricked at the back of my mind. Someone was not there.
Luca.
I frowned, pulling out my phone as I stepped onto the train. Had he been there? Had I just been so lost in my internal monologue that I hadn't even noticed his absence? When I got home, I opened my notebook, intending to prepare the notes he'd asked for, but the sight of the blank page for today's lecture stopped me.
I hesitated, my thumb hovering over the screen, before typing a short message: "Did you attend the class today?"
It took a while for the bubbles to appear. "No. I had some business at home. I couldn't make it."
"Oh", I replied. "I see. The professor gave out some assignments today. I have the notes, if you need them."
"Thanks", Iris, he replied quickly. "I'll get them from you."
We exchanged the details of the assignment and a brief update on the lecture. It was a normal, textbook conversation—polite, academic, and entirely lacking in the tension that usually defined our interactions. Once I sent the final piece of information, I retreated to my room.
My father was out, the house finally free of his looming presence. I paced the hallway until I heard the familiar, gentle knock at the back door. It was her—the woman who still came to cook, the only person left in this house who saw me as more than a quiet, passing ghost.
She came into the kitchen, and as soon as the door closed, I felt the dam inside me begin to buckle. Yesterday, the air had been too thick with Father's presence to speak, but today, the silence was mine to fill.
"He told me," I whispered, my voice barely audible.
She paused, her hands stopping their work. She looked at me with those kind, understanding eyes, and I poured it all out. I told her about the lunch, the 'ten-day' countdown, the way he spoke as if my life were just an item on a checklist. I told her how he treated my mother's memory like a garment to be discarded.
"He doesn't care," I said, a tear finally escaping and tracking down my cheek. "He didn't ask me. He didn't even wonder if I would be okay. He just... declared it."
She listened. She didn't offer empty platitudes or tell me to be strong. She just stood there, a witness to the wreckage, and for the first time in days, the crushing weight in my chest felt just a fraction lighter.
"Iris is managing to keep her academic life steady with Luca while finding an outlet for her grief with the only person she trusts at home. But she is leading a double life, and the secret of the wedding is eating away at her. Now that she has finally voiced her pain to someone, will Iris find the courage to confront her father again, or will she continue to 'perform' the role of the dutiful daughter until the ten days are up?
The gap between her home and her college life is growing. How long she can hold herself?
She has shared her secret, but the clock is still ticking. Only nine days left. Let's stay with us to find out how the story unfolds.