The Mark of Chance••√•• Pure Love

chapitre : 6

The return to her studio felt like a shipwreck. Marina dropped her suitcase in the middle of the room and collapsed onto the sofa, drained. The walls she once found suffocating now offered a sad familiarity. Here, at least, the lies were her own. The pain was personal, not an ambient toxin breathed in against her will.

Léna's revelation played on a loop in her head, a nightmare film in which she was, despite herself, a central character. Her sister's jealousy was no longer the childish, annoying sentiment she had always known; it was a destructive, methodical force that had built a marriage like one builds a prison. And Chris… Chris was both the warden and the prisoner, too weak to break his chains.

A feeling of anger mixed with pity rose within her. Anger at Léna, of course, for her manipulation and cruelty. But also a new, simmering anger at Chris. He knew. He had known from the beginning about the feelings he had for her, and he had let Léna trap him. Worse, he had bound himself to her, casting Marina in the unbearable role of the object of a forbidden, unspoken love. His passivity was cowardice. A cowardice that had poisoned three lives.

Her phone vibrated. A message from Chris.

"Marina, I'm sorry for what happened. I'd like to see you. Talk to you. I need to explain."

Marina's heart gave a painful leap. Finally. Finally, he was going to break the silence. Finally, he was going to put words to the unspoken thing that was suffocating them. She felt a mix of apprehension and insane hope. Maybe…

She tapped out a quick reply, her thumb trembling.

"Okay. Where and when?"

The reply took a long time to come. Too long. The three little dots blinked, stopped, then started again. Finally, the answer came, dry and disappointing.

"It's not the right time. Léna is… fragile. I can't leave her now. But we must. Soon."

Disappointment was a bitter taste in her mouth. Fragile. Always Léna. Always her dramas, her blackmail. And Chris, giving in. As he had always given in. The anger swelled in her, stronger than the pity. He wasn't just a victim; he was complicit in his own misery. And in hers.

"As you wish," she replied coldly, before turning off her phone.

She didn't have the strength for this game. She didn't want to be the secret in the shadows, the forbidden consolation, the outlet for his remorse.

••√••

Across the city, Chris read Marina's terse message. Every word was a stab. He was sitting in his car, parked outside his office, but unable to get out. Marina's words, "As you wish," echoed like a farewell.

"Coward," he whispered into the silence of the car.

The word burned his tongue. It was the truth. He was a coward. He had been a coward three years ago, when Léna had threatened to destroy the image Marina had of him. The idea that Marina could see him as a harasser, an obsessed man, had paralyzed him. Better to marry the devil than risk the contempt of the woman he loved.

And he had been a coward that morning, letting Marina leave without a word, without a gesture to stop her. He had watched her luggage disappear into a taxi, his heart in pieces, his feet nailed to the floor by the crushing weight of his responsibility towards Léna. A responsibility he had never desired, but had accepted.

He started the car and began to drive aimlessly, his hands clenched on the wheel. He headed mechanically towards Marina's neighborhood. Parking his car across the street, his gaze lifted to the window of her studio. The light was on. He imagined her, hurt, confused, perhaps crying because of him. Because of his weakness.

He stayed there for an hour, maybe two, watching her, the inaccessible star around which his miserable existence revolved. Every time he picked up his phone to call her, to shout "I'm coming down!", an image of Léna, distraught and hysterical, flashed through his mind. The implicit threats, the scenes, the chaos. The poisoned comfort of his tidy life was a prison, but it was his prison. He had the keys, but he was too afraid to use them.

Finally, he started the car and drove home. Their home. The house was silent, cold as a tomb. Léna was slumped on the living room sofa, eyes red, a glass of wine in her hand.

"Did you go see her?" she asked in a hoarse voice, without even looking at him.

"No."

"You're lying. I can feel it. You reek of remorse and frustration."

He didn't answer. He went straight upstairs to their bedroom, their bed, and lay down, staring at the ceiling. He could smell Léna's perfume on the pillow next to him, a scent that made him nauseous. He thought of the simple smell of Marina's shampoo, that night in the bathroom. A trivial detail that had changed everything, and yet, had changed nothing at all.

The days that followed were a long torment for Marina. She went back to work, to her routines, but everything seemed faded, unreal. She avoided calls from her family, using a heavy workload as an excuse. She knew her mother would eventually ask about Léna, and she wouldn't have the strength to lie.

One evening, as she was sorting through mail, an envelope with no return address caught her attention. Inside, a single USB key.

Her heart pounding, she plugged it into her computer. There was only one audio file. She clicked on it, and Chris's voice, filled with infinite weariness, filled the room.

"Marina… If you're listening to this, it means I didn't find the courage to tell you to your face. I'm sorry. Sorry for everything. For my silence, for my cowardice, for this absurd situation I let happen."

She closed her eyes, hugging herself to keep it together.

"Léna told you the truth. I've loved you from the first day. That summer, at your parents' house, three years ago. You were laughing, you had sunshine in your hair. I was lost. And when Léna came to me… I thought it was a way to get closer to you. Stupid, I know. Then the threats came. The idea that you might be afraid of me, hate me… I couldn't bear it. I capitulated. I married your sister while thinking of you. Every day in this house is torture, because every detail reminds me of your absence. The towel… that night… it was the worst and the best torture. Smelling your scent on it after you left. Knowing you had been there, so close."

His voice broke.

"I am a coward. I don't deserve your forgiveness. I don't even deserve your attention. But I needed you to know. You were never a fantasy, Marina. You were always the great love. The one I should have fought for. And for whom I didn't know how to fight."

The message stopped there.

Marina sat in the dark for a long time, her cheeks streaked with silent tears. This was not a joyful declaration. It was an admission of failure, a goodbye. The ball was in her court, but the game horrified her.

What could she do? Run to him? It would confirm all of Léna's delusions, shatter a family—even a sick one—and place her in the detestable position of the mistress, the homewrecker.

Or else, turn the page? Erase Chris from her heart like tearing out a soiled page? It was impossible. His love, however twisted and impossible, was there, real, nourished by this painful confession.

She looked out the window. Night had fallen. Somewhere, across the city, Chris was in the arms of a woman he didn't love, and Léna was holding in hers a man whose heart belonged to her sister.

And she, Marina, was alone with the truth. A truth that, instead of freeing her, chained her more than ever to a love born in shame and nourished by silence. The story of her life had become a contemporary tragedy, and she had no idea how to write the next chapter.