My son emptied my entire bank account and flew to Rome with his wife and mother-in-law.
I stayed silent and smiled. Three days later, he called me in tears.
“Mom, what did you do?”
That was the moment I knew my revenge was complete.
The day I needed to breathe the most was the day my son took every dollar I had saved throughout my life and didn’t even leave a note behind.
I sat still in the old fabric-covered chair I’d bought when Julian was seven, with the first money I ever earned washing clothes for other people. In front of me, my phone lit up with a message that froze my blood.
Available balance: $0.
I read it again and again. My hands trembled, not from age, though I was sixty-eight, but from the kind of pain that crushes you from within, when your mind already knows the truth but your heart refuses to accept it.
I called the bank. First a machine, then a real employee came on the line. They said the transactions were made online, multiple transfers totaling over eighty thousand dollars.
My life’s work. My safety. My only stability. Gone.
“Where did all that money go?” I asked, my voice rough, as if I already knew but needed to hear it out loud.
“To an account under the name Julian Vargas, ma’am,” the employee replied flatly. “Would you like to report it as fraud?”
I didn’t answer. I hung up.
The house fell into silence. Only the ticking of the kitchen clock and the flicker of the old ceiling light remained. Outside, a street vendor shouted about snacks, unaware of the storm raging inside me.
Then the landline rang.
“Hello,” I said softly.
“Donna, have you seen Julian’s Instagram?” came my neighbor Martha’s cheerful voice. “He’s in Rome, honey, eating pasta with his wife and her mother. My goodness. Living like a movie star.”
I swallowed hard, my chest tightening. I walked to my room, opened the drawer, grabbed my old cell phone, and found my son’s profile. I’m not good with social media, but I followed him from afar, like someone peeking through a window at a life that no longer belonged to her.
And there he was.
Julian, the only son I bore in pain and raised alone after his father left with another woman. The same boy I once gave everything for, even the land my parents had left me, so he could study.
In the pictures, he wore a white shirt, holding a glass of wine, smiling brightly with his wife Pamela and her mother Sophia, who had always looked at me with disdain.
The caption read: Rome, new beginnings.
Pamela commented, “Good things are worth the wait. Thanks, my sweet mother-in-law,” followed by a dollar-sign emoji.
I didn’t cry. I didn’t scream. I didn’t break anything.
I just stood there, phone in hand, hot as a burning coal, and smiled faintly. A strange smile, as if I had just understood something I’d been avoiding for years.
Across the ocean, under Rome’s cloudy sky, Julian raised a glass of expensive wine and laughed without guilt.
“See?” Pamela said. “I told you taking her money was a great idea. She’s old anyway. Better we use it before she wastes it on hospital bills.”
Sophia laughed bitterly. “That hillbilly woman probably doesn’t even know what an airplane is. That money was useless in her hands.”
Julian said nothing, staring toward the Colosseum, a knot twisting in his chest.
Still, he stayed quiet, the same way he did as a child when he was hungry, and I used to whisper, “Hold on, son. Tomorrow I’ll find a way.”
That night, my house looked older than ever. Everything was in its place, but warmth had left.
On the shelf were Julian’s childhood photos. The day he started preschool. His first school uniform. His college graduation.
My entire life revolved around him.
When he turned eighteen, I sold my engagement ring to pay his tuition. At twenty-three, I gave him my inherited land. At thirty, I helped fund his wedding, even though Pamela never liked me. I cooked for him, washed his clothes, cleaned his home, and watched him drift further away.
“Mom, you don’t understand this world,” he once said. “Things are different now. Pamela and I have big plans. Don’t worry. You’re always in my heart, but you can’t hold on to me forever.”
A week before I found out about the betrayal, I brought him cornbread. I rang the doorbell. No one answered.
I waited two hours under the blazing sun until the security guard came over.
“I’m looking for Julian Vargas. I’m his mother.”
He hesitated. “I’m sorry, ma’am, but I was told not to let you in without an appointment.”
I froze. “Why?”
“I don’t know, ma’am. Just following orders.”
I walked home. I wanted the hot, dusty wind to slap my face awake. I thought about every meal I skipped to save money. Every night I stayed up working. Every penny I’d set aside for my son.
That evening, Martha brought me cake and coffee.
“Donna, you’re strong. Don’t let this break you. Julian’s young. One day he’ll regret it.”
I looked up, voice rough. “Do you think children ever really regret?”
“Yes. When they lose their mother. That’s when they finally do.”
I pressed my lips together. “I just hope when he realizes it, it’s not too late.”
“What are you going to do?” Martha asked.
I met her eyes. There was something new in mine.
“I’ll smile. Just like they taught me.”
“Smile?” she said, surprised.
“Yes. I’ve cried enough. Now I’ll smile in silence, because I have nothing left to lose.”
And when a woman has nothing left to lose, she becomes dangerous.
Meanwhile, in Rome, Julian had just stepped out of the shower when he heard Pamela on the balcony whispering into her phone.
“Yes, it’s done. The old lady doesn’t suspect a thing. The money’s here. Tomorrow we’ll open an account in Spain and dump Julian. He thinks we’re on his side. Idiot.”
Julian froze, cold water running down his shoulders, his chest tightening. He said nothing, went back to bed, and lay beside Pamela, who was pretending to sleep.
In my little house in Chicago, I made a cup of chamomile tea and opened my old notebook, the one where I used to write recipes I never got to try.
My hand trembled as I wrote: This isn’t the end. It’s the beginning of silence, and this silence will hurt more than any scream.
I closed the notebook and slept peacefully, without tears.
And somewhere across the ocean, in a luxury hotel room in Rome, Julian got a message.
Account locked due to suspicious activity.
He stared at the screen in disbelief. That was the first crack.
And he didn’t yet know that in silence, I had already begun to act.
Sometimes pain doesn’t scream. It just waits, watching quietly for the right moment to strike back.
At sunrise, I woke up to the usual stiffness in my hands. But inside, I felt younger. Not because of anger or sadness, but because of something stronger.
Resolve.
I boiled water, watching the blue flame on the stove, remembering being fourteen, cleaning houses to survive, my hands raw from detergent, my hair tied messily, no one waiting for me at home.
My father had left with another woman. I didn’t cry. I swallowed my tears and went back to work the next morning.
At seventeen, I got pregnant with Julian. His father promised to marry me, then vanished the moment he learned it was a boy.
I bit my lip, put on my coat, and looked for extra work. I carried my baby on my back while washing other people’s clothes, teaching him to play with bottle caps because we couldn’t afford real toys. No television. Only my lullabies.
Julian was my whole world.
When he was six, one of my clients offered to pay his school tuition if I agreed to work full-time. I accepted. I lived in my employer’s small room, crossed the city every weekend to visit my son, bringing notebooks or a mango.
I learned to read and write just to sign his school forms. I didn’t have much education, but I knew enough to protect myself.
Or so I thought.
At sixteen, Julian said, “Mom, when I make it, I’ll buy you a house where the wind can’t blow through the walls.”
I smiled. “Don’t buy me anything. Just don’t forget me.”
Later, for college, I sold the only piece of land my father left me, the one I dreamed of building a small wooden house on, so my son could study.
I proudly told the neighbors, “My boy is going to be an accountant.”
And he did escape poverty, but not in the way I hoped.
In his third year of college, he met Pamela, a girl with sleek hair, long nails, and a magazine-cover smile. From the first day, I was uneasy. Not out of jealousy, but because I saw in her eyes the look of someone who only knows how to take, never to give.
Pamela came from a family that pretended to have more than they did. Her mother, Sophia, wore fake designer clothes and spoke as if she had studied in Europe.
The first time they visited my house, both gave polite little smirks.
“Nice wall color,” Sophia said, her tone dripping sarcasm.
Then, glancing at my small kitchen, Pamela whispered words I would never forget.
“I can’t believe Julian grew up here. This place looks more like a shelter than a home.”
I smiled, as always, but something broke inside me.
Years passed, and Pamela took over more of our lives. First, she asked me not to visit too often. Then she said I shouldn’t comment on their decisions. Finally, she told me I shouldn’t attend family gatherings because I didn’t fit the vibe.
Julian, confused and in love, slowly drifted away.
One evening, after they had moved out, he came by. It was the last time he visited unannounced.
I made stuffed peppers, his favorite.
“Mom, Pamela says you’re too involved in our lives. You’re keeping us from growing as a couple,” Julian said.
I watched the food go cold and answered softly, “I just want you to be happy, son.”
He replied coldly, “I’m a man now. You don’t need to take care of me anymore.”
Men often forget who made them men.
I didn’t cry. I stood up, cleared the table, and handed him the leftovers.
The following months were a parade of subtle humiliations. Pamela took over Julian’s finances, convinced him to switch bank accounts, and told him to keep things from me. According to her, I was a simple woman who didn’t understand the modern world.
Julian, tangled between ambition and emotional manipulation, believed her.
Then I started noticing things. A mismatched statement. A bill I didn’t remember signing. A life insurance policy I’d never approved.
I decided to talk to Benjamin, my old neighbor, my first love. He had been a lawyer for decades and now lived alone in an apartment filled with old papers and memories.
“Ben,” I asked quietly, “how can you tell if someone’s using your name for something shady?”
He studied me. “Donna, what’s going on?”
“Nothing,” I said. “But I feel like my son isn’t my son anymore.”
Benjamin asked for whatever documents I had left. For weeks, he combed through every detail, every transaction.
One evening, he called me over.
“Donna, your son opened a joint account listing you as guarantor. You never signed anything, but the signatures are there.”
I froze. “Ben, I only know how to write my own name.”
He nodded. “They forged your signature and have been withdrawing money little by little for six months.”
I said nothing. I took the papers, put them in my purse, and left.
That night, I couldn’t sleep. Not because of the money, but because of the truth.
My son hadn’t just been manipulated. He had joined the betrayal. He had stolen from the woman who gave him life.
Days later, Pamela and Sophia planned a trip to Rome.
Julian, still unemployed, sold his car and suggested using my savings.
“It’s family money,” Pamela said. “Your mom won’t need it. Don’t be stupid.”
Julian hesitated. “But that’s all she has.”
“And what’s she saving it for? You’re her son. You’re not stealing. You’re just taking it early.”
So he did.
One night, from his laptop, he transferred everything. He did it quickly, like pulling out a tooth without anesthesia. When it was done, he took a deep breath, shut the computer, and never looked back.
The next morning, I discovered the betrayal.
I didn’t cry or shout. I just wrote in my notebook: My son is still alive, but the mother in me is dead.
From that day on, everything changed. My body kept aging, but my spirit hardened. I began walking differently, straighter. I made phone calls, sent emails, visited offices.
Something was forming in the quiet.
While Julian strolled through Rome’s cobblestone streets, believing he had won, I was in Chicago weaving a net to take back everything they had stolen.
Pamela was already planning to disappear without a trace, but she didn’t know I was no longer the fragile mother they had used.
That woman was gone.
In her place stood a wounded but awakened mother.
And when such a mother awakens, there is no hell she won’t walk through.
The betrayal no longer hurt. What ached now was the certainty of having been erased, as if I had never mattered.
But I refused to vanish quietly, because a mother’s silence can be deadly.
I didn’t speak. Not then, not later. My silence had changed. It was no longer the silence of despair, but of focus, of calculation.
Words no longer held meaning. When a mother realizes she has been replaced by a mask, she doesn’t scream.
She transforms.
Julian didn’t notice. Or maybe he chose not to. He was too busy living the glamorous life he had always dreamed of. A life with no scent of freshly washed clothes, no soft my son in the morning, but instead a polite sir. A life clean, elegant, and utterly empty.
Pamela slipped into his world as if she had always belonged there. Julian was enchanted by the way she spoke, the way she walked in her high heels, and the way she carried herself as though the world was hers.
But behind the dazzling smile and carefully edited photos was a cold and ruthless mind.
Pamela knew exactly what she wanted, and she wanted it immediately. A name. A title. An account. And a man to sustain her deception.
At first, her jabs were disguised as jokes.
“Honey, why does your mother have to meddle in everything? I don’t want our kids growing up in a mentally poor environment,” she said while painting her nails.
Julian forced a smile. “Mom just has trouble letting go, that’s all.”
Pamela gave a thin smile. “That’s not love. It’s pity disguised as virtue. Women like your mother think they’re saints for raising children alone, but their past doesn’t give them the right to drag others down. I won’t let that happen to you or our children.”
Gradually, Pamela decided when they could visit me, then used busyness as an excuse, then insisted on meeting only in public places, and finally refused to step into my house, saying she didn’t feel comfortable because of the musty smell.
Julian obeyed.
Whenever I asked why they rarely visited, he just bowed his head. “You know how it is, Mom. Work, weddings, so much going on.”
I nodded, but the innocence in my eyes was gone. I started piecing things together, like stitching a torn bag with bare hands.
Then Sophia, Pamela’s mother, began to interfere, never directly, always with polite words sharp enough to cut.
“Mrs. Donna, I hope you don’t mind me saying this, but have you thought about moving to a better neighborhood? This place isn’t safe for someone your age. With the money you have, you could buy something more decent.”
I looked straight into her eyes, silent and unblinking.
In that moment, I understood they didn’t want me far out of concern. They just never wanted me near.
One Sunday, during a lunch Pamela hosted, I decided to speak privately with my son. When Sophia went to the bathroom and Pamela was absorbed in her phone, I looked at Julian with a familiar gaze, though my voice was different.
“Are you sure this woman is right for you? Do you see the way she looks at you when you’re not watching? Or the way she talks about me?”
Julian swallowed hard.
Pamela lifted her head.
Sophia stepped out of the bathroom.
The air changed completely.
Then Julian shouted, “Enough. You’re just jealous because I have another woman in my life now. You won’t say it, but you think it. You can’t stand that someone else matters to me.”
I didn’t react. I set down my fork, lowered my head, and in that moment, I knew I had lost my son.
When I left, no one hugged me.
When I got home, I took off my shoes quietly, as if afraid to disturb someone, even though I was alone. I sat on the edge of my bed, trying to remember the last time my son said, I love you, Mom, without me having to remind him.
But I couldn’t.
The following weeks were a nightmare disguised as ordinary life.
Pamela and Sophia frequently visited Julian’s office, bringing him lunch, talking about investments, and advising him to manage his finances more efficiently.
One day, Pamela demanded access to his accounts.
“Trust me,” she said, slipping off her blouse in front of him. “We’re a team, aren’t we?”
Julian, naive and weak-hearted, nodded.
Meanwhile, I didn’t stay still. I sensed something was wrong, though I didn’t yet know how to prove it.
I went to my neighbor Louise, a retired accountant, and she patiently showed me how to check my online bank statements.
On the screen, I saw the same transfers Benjamin had warned me about, each dollar taken without my consent, lined up in cold, merciless numbers.
Meanwhile, in Rome, Julian began to feel something was off. Not guilt. Just discomfort.
Pamela had changed. She no longer looked at him with affection. Her kisses were cold. She spent hours on her phone, laughing to herself, while Sophia no longer even pretended to be polite.
One night, as Julian pretended to sleep, he heard them talking.
“It’s all done. Why keep pretending? Once we’re back in the States, we’ll sell everything and disappear. If he finds out, so what? And if he does, even better. Serves him right.”
They snickered.
“That old woman’s as good as dead. Who’s going to protect her?”
Back in Chicago, I began to act carefully.
I went to the bank, requested full statements, printed them, and sealed them in an envelope. Then I visited the notary office to check if there were any assets under my name I didn’t remember signing for.
That’s when I discovered something worse.
Julian had tried to register my house as joint investment property using forged documents. The procedure failed due to a technical error, but the intention was clear.
That day, I didn’t go straight home. I walked to an old church at the end of the block, not to pray, but to sit on the wooden pew and look at the altar.
I whispered, “God, give me strength not to forgive, but to keep myself from destroying him.”
When I got home, I turned on the radio, played an old song, and took out my knitting.
But what I was weaving wasn’t a sweater.
It was retribution.
The seeds of betrayal had been planted, and now I was just waiting for harvest.
I felt it in my bones, in the wind slipping through the cracks, whispering that everything buried was about to rise. I no longer felt lonely at night. The cold didn’t scare me anymore.
I just counted the days, not in fear, but in calm calculation, like someone sharpening a knife she knows she will use at the right moment.
One morning, while cleaning the living room, I pulled the sofa away to sweep behind it. There was dust, scraps of paper, a dried pen, and a torn white envelope stuffed in an old plastic bag.
I almost threw it away, but something told me to look inside.
There was a stack of papers. I read them twice before I understood.
My name. My address. A signature identical to mine.
The title read: Last Will and Testament.
I sat down on the floor, the papers resting on my lap.
It stated that I left my house and savings entirely to Julian after my death. At the bottom was a forged signature.
The house fell into suffocating silence. I could hear the ticking clock and a dog barking in the distance.
I didn’t cry or even feel shocked, but something inside me collapsed. Not because of the betrayal, but because the truth had finally taken shape.
I called Benjamin.
“Come to my house.”
“What’s going on?”
“I just found something you need to see.”
Two hours later, Benjamin sat in my kitchen with the document in his hands. He read carefully and shook his head.
“This isn’t just fraud, Donna. It’s dangerous. If he had filed this in time, you could have lost your house without even knowing.”
“Do you think he did this himself?”
Benjamin hesitated, setting the paper down.
“This isn’t your handwriting, and you don’t know how to draft a will. It’s clearly fake. But this looks like a draft. If there’s a draft, there’s intent.”
I looked at my hands, wrinkled, calloused from years of labor, but still steady.
I remembered the day I made the final payment on this house. Thirty years of sacrifice, cold meals, worn shoes, stifling heat, cleaning other people’s homes just to have a place of my own.
I whispered, “He wants to erase me, but with paperwork.”
Benjamin looked up, unsure whether I was speaking literally or not. The only sound was the bubbling pot on the stove.
“What will you do now?” he asked.
I smiled a smile Julian would never understand.
“I’ll bury his lies while he’s still alive to see it.”
Less than three days later, I got a call from Dr. Phillips, the physician who handled my annual checkups.
“Mrs. Donna, please come to the clinic today.”
My knees weakened, but I walked to the medical center with all the calm I had left. I wore simple clothes and carried my little notebook of medications.
The doctor greeted me with kind but sorrowful eyes.
“We received your latest test results, and they’re not good. You have late-stage leukemia. I’m sorry to say this, but time is short. Your immune system is deteriorating rapidly. You probably have about six months left.”
I sat still, staring at a stain on the wall shaped like a bird.
No tears. No questions.
“Do you understand what I’m saying?” he asked.
I answered quietly, “I understand it’ll be expensive to die with dignity.”
He hesitated. “We can begin chemotherapy. It might not cure you, but it could prolong your life.”
“Will it make me die faster?”
“Not necessarily.”
“Then no. I don’t want death to find me wearing a hospital gown.”
The doctor stiffened. He had never seen someone take bad news so calmly.
I stood, picked up my purse, and before leaving, said, “Six months is enough. More than enough for what I need to do.”
I walked home not to save on cab fare, but to feel every step on the streets I’d lived on my whole life.
I crossed the intersection where I was once nearly hit by a car while walking Julian to preschool, passed the market where I used to scrub bathrooms for ten dollars a day, waved to Mister Theodore at the orange juice stand, now toothless, not remembering who I was.
When I got home, I went to my room and pulled out the old wooden box from under the bed. It held my notebook, bills, unsent letters, and the only photo of Julian as a child, sleeping with his head on my lap.
I stared at it for a long time, then lit the stove, boiled water, watched the steam rise, and whispered, “Prayers are done. Now it’s time for work.”
The first thing I did was meet with Benjamin to file an official complaint, not as a mother, but as a citizen.
We reported forgery, attempted property theft, and attached the evidence. Then we requested a freeze on the account Julian had drained. Benjamin used an elder financial abuse protection clause to trigger the process.
It wasn’t easy, but he knew how to navigate it.
“When this starts, are you ready?” he asked.
I answered, “I was born ready. I just didn’t know it until now.”
Afterward, I went to the market and bought a new red notebook. I began writing my final journal, not to grieve, but to bear witness.
On the first page, I wrote:
To my son, Julian,
I gave you life in pain, raised you in love, and you stole my dignity without hesitation. This is not revenge. This is justice, and justice is all I need to leave this world in peace.
Meanwhile, in Rome, Julian and Pamela continued their act of happiness. They posted pictures every day, filmed glittering videos, flaunted Italian dishes they couldn’t even pronounce.
But the distance between them grew clearer.
Pamela no longer shared a bed with him, and Sophia was always on her phone. Julian began to feel uneasy, as if an alarm bell were ringing somewhere deep inside.
One night, while searching his inbox for plane tickets, he found a hidden folder, a backup of messages between Pamela and another man.
At first, he thought it was spam.
Then he read:
Almost done. That fool suspects nothing. The contact is ready. The account’s ready. Once we’re back, I’ll leave him. And if he finds out, who cares? I’m not staying with a man who still smells like his poor single mother.
Julian felt a hollow pit in his stomach. He closed the laptop, said nothing, and lay down pretending to sleep.
But that night, he couldn’t close his eyes.
For the first time in years, he thought of his mother. My voice. The rice pudding I used to make. The old shows we laughed at together. My hand on his forehead when he had a fever. And the words I always said:
No one will ever love you like your mother does.
He wanted to call me, but he didn’t.
As for me, I no longer begged for anything. I wasn’t waiting for affection, only preparing the plan.
I visited offices, made calls, and set the next phase in motion. I reported all of Julian’s transactions as suspicious. The system was slow, but it finally went through.
An international alert was issued, requiring him to be checked upon reentry into the United States. It wasn’t enough to arrest him, but it would force him to face the consequences.
In the red notebook, I wrote:
There’s no punishment more just than the one carried out in silence. I will watch him lose everything without lifting a finger. Karma doesn’t need violence. It only needs patience.
The second betrayal no longer broke me. It made me stronger, colder, and freer.
The mother in me was gone, but the woman had awakened.
In just a few days, Julian would return home, unaware of the earthquake waiting for him. He always thought hell was a place of fire and screams.
He never realized hell could be as cold as the cobblestone streets of Rome.
And as humiliating as a declined credit card in a crowded restaurant.
It started when his card failed to scan. Then again. And again.
In less than two days, he lost everything.
No cash. No accounts. Standing between two women, looking at him like he was a beggar.
Pamela screamed in the middle of the street in front of everyone.
“Idiot. What did you do with the money? I told you not to trust that poor old woman. Now you’ve ruined everything.”
Julian stammered, unable to explain what he himself didn’t understand. He knew all his accounts had been frozen, that his name was now tied to an international financial investigation, and that he had to appear at the consulate the next day.
That night, Sophia looked at him with disgust.
“I told you, Pamela. This fool can’t do anything right. He can’t even wash a dish properly.”
She grabbed her bag and left.
Pamela walked out too.
Without a word, Julian sat alone in the hotel room beside an empty suitcase and the echo of betrayal.
Meanwhile, in Chicago, I was knitting the final threads of my plan, each detail fitting perfectly as if preordained.
Benjamin helped me complete the paperwork to initiate the international asset freeze, citing elder financial fraud. He also contacted Ernesto, an old acquaintance at the immigration office, and arranged for a mandatory entry check when Julian returned to the United States.
This wasn’t revenge. There was no hatred.
Only justice.
In the red notebook, I wrote:
Sometimes a mother’s love must hurt her child, not out of hate, but out of necessity. What we allow repeats, and what repeats rots. I didn’t give birth to a thief, but life turned my son into one, and if I must be the one to stop him, so be it.
Louise quietly accompanied me through many days of paperwork. She was no longer just a neighbor. She had become an ally.
“Doesn’t it hurt, Donna?” she asked.
“Of course it does. It hurts like being burned from the inside. But some wounds are necessary to heal.”
The appointment at the consulate was a long chain of humiliation for Julian. They placed him in a windowless cold room with a young lawyer and an interpreter who read each clause mechanically.
He was told there was a pending fraud allegation in the United States. His accounts were frozen, and he would have to explain himself upon return.
Julian walked out pale, shattered like a lost child.
He called.
“Mom.”
I heard his voice while sitting in the kitchen, sifting beans in my old basket. My hands trembled slightly, but I stayed calm.
“Mom, what did you do? They took everything. Pamela left. Sophia too. They said you did this.”
I took a deep breath and answered, steady and clear, from a place he could no longer reach.
“I didn’t take anything, son. I just stopped what you were taking from me.”
“Mom, they said they might arrest me. You said you’d always be by my side.”
“I was. Until you stopped being by your own.”
“Please help me. I don’t know what to do.”
“Learn.”
I hung up.
No tears. No apologies. No explanations.
I allowed myself to believe that my son needed to hurt in order to understand, because some lessons only pain can teach.
That night, I didn’t sleep, not from worry, but because I was writing him a letter. Not a goodbye, but a testament, the final page of the red notebook.
My dearest Julian,
You are the reason I woke up every morning. You were my pride, my strength. I gave you everything, even what I didn’t have. I sacrificed meals, rest, and my own loneliness for you. I regret nothing. I did it out of love.
But you forgot who you were.
You surrounded yourself with shadows that smelled of expensive perfume. And in your effort to kill me with your indifference, you forced me to wake up.
I don’t hate you. I can’t.
