“Maybe someday I will believe you. But today I just hope you find your way, as we all have to do.”
I walked away from her stall. I didn’t buy the necklace out of pity. I bought it because I saw something in her eyes I hadn’t seen before—something akin to real regret. Not the regret of being caught, but the regret of having caused harm.
Maybe it was real. Maybe not. But it was no longer my problem to decide.
Robert, on the other hand, did not have the same awakening. According to Gerald, he continued to blame everyone but himself. He blamed the economy, his suppliers, his bad luck, me for having “stolen” his company, Brenda for having abandoned him when he “needed her most.” He never took responsibility for anything.
He worked in several places during those two years. He never lasted long. He always had problems with his bosses, with his colleagues. There was always someone else to blame for his failures.
His mother could no longer help him. She was struggling with her own survival. And Valerie, the mistress, had disappeared a long time ago. She had married a successful businessman and was living in Miami.
Robert lived alone in a one-bedroom apartment in Brooklyn. It wasn’t a bad place, but it was very far from the Beverly Hills mansion. Very far from the life he had known.
I saw him once. It was accidental. I was at a coffee shop near my work when he walked in. He didn’t recognize me immediately. He was distracted, looking at his phone.
He had changed a lot. He had aged quickly. His hair, once always perfectly styled, was unkempt and graying. He had gained weight. His clothes were ordinary, wrinkled. He no longer wore that expensive watch. He no longer smelled of designer cologne.
When he finally saw me, he stopped short. For a moment, I thought he would approach, that he would say something. But he just looked at me with a mixture of shame and resentment. Then he looked away and left the coffee shop without ordering anything.
That night, I told Brenda.
“And how did you feel seeing him?” she asked.
“Sad. Not for him, but for what could have been. He had everything—a wife who loved him, a company his father built with effort, opportunities that many people never have—and he wasted it all.”
“You know he tried to contact me again, right?”
“Yes. You hadn’t told me.”
“It was a month ago. He wrote to me on social media. He said he had seen my design work, that he was impressed, that he wanted me to know he was proud of me.”
“And what did you say?”
“Nothing. I blocked his account. Because I understood something, Mommy. Robert wasn’t proud of me. He was jealous. Jealous that I rebuilt my life while he was still sinking into his.”
“You’re right.”
“For a long time, I thought my success would be my revenge against him—that he would see how well I was doing and regret it. But the truth is, my success has nothing to do with him. It’s only mine. And his failure has nothing to do with me. It’s only his.”
My daughter had matured in ways I never imagined possible.
Three years after the separation, something happened that neither of us expected. Brenda met someone.
His name was Andrew. He was an architect. Calm, kind, with a genuine smile and eyes that truly saw her.
