Sin's Obsession

Whitney POV I wasn’t looking for Derek. I had decided to take a day to myself and treat myself. I was looking for chocolates and a dress I probably wouldn’t wear, because Valentine’s Day felt pointless without him. He was supposed to be in Dubai. He’d sworn the dates were inflexible. "Seven days, Whit. Work is brutal. I’ll make it up to you." I believed him—because I always believed him. There had never been any reason for me to doubt him. Which is why my brain stalled when I saw him first. I blinked and looked again. Tall. Familiar. Moving with that same careless stride that drove me stupid the first night we met. Wearing his favourite Nike Golf t-shirt with his cargo pants and white sneakers l. For a second I thought I’d conjured him. Maybe I was hallucinating. Something like that. Then my eyes dragged to the woman beside him. And the baby. A baby. They looked to be so familiar with each other. She said something and he threw back his head and laughed. The universe didn’t explode or shatter or scream. It just…paused. Like even time was embarrassed for me. “Derek?” I said, barely above a whisper. He froze. Dead stop. His hand tightened on the trolley handle, like holding it steady would keep the world from tipping over. His eyes said everything—panic, guilt, calculation. I waited for him to say something—a joke, an excuse, even a hello. He gave me nothing. The woman turned, that bored little smile I hated instantly stretching across her lips. Ona. I recognized her with a dread that curled cold in my stomach. Derek never mentioned her—not by name—but she’d been a ghost hovering around the edges of his stories. The ghost suddenly had flesh and a child. “Baby, are we still checking the formula aisle?” she asked him, casual like she was discussing weather. Baby. It hit harder than a slap. I looked at Derek, stupidly, like maybe I’d misheard. “Why is she calling you that?” He opened his mouth, but before he could lie, dismiss, or pretend, Ona handed the baby to him. Not fumbling, not awkward. Smooth. Practiced. The little boy buried his face in Derek’s shoulder like he’d done it a thousand times. “Go to Daddy,” she said. Daddy. There went the Earth’s axis—tilting too far, too fast. I felt tears before I felt emotion. Silent, stupid, hot. “Derek…?” I could barely form the words. “What is going on?” He looked at me like I was the problem. Like I’d done something wrong by being there. “It’s not what it looks like,” he muttered, voice low, as if people might hear that his double life was unraveling. Then Ona came back, tossed diapers into the trolley, and asked, “What’s for dinner, babe?” Not even glancing at me. I didn’t exist to her. Or worse—I existed and she had already won. Dinner so they were going home together. Or living together. My throat closed up. I wanted to scream. I wanted to hit him. I wanted to tear the stupid shopping aisle apart until someone told me how to breathe again. Instead, I just stood there crying like a fool. Derek didn’t comfort me. Didn’t deny. Didn’t fight for me. He grabbed Ona’s arm, dragged her toward the exit, baby and all. “Derek—stop! Talk to me!” I called after him. My voice cracked so loudly people turned. He didn’t. I followed them outside barefoot—lost one shoe to the escalator steps and didn’t even notice. The sun felt harsh, like punishment. Derek opened the passenger door for her, handed her the baby, and for one tiny moment he looked at me. One second. Two. That was all the dignity I got. Then he got in the car and drove away. I ran after them—wild, desperate, bleeding pride all over the pavement. People stared. Some whispered. No one helped. I stopped running only when the car became taillights and fumes. My chest hurt. My face was sticky. I clutched my bags like an i***t with one shoe missing and a heart that finally believed what it never wanted to see. Derek had left me at a shopping mall with his woman and a child. He had chosen her over me. I didn’t remember deciding to walk. My feet just moved—one bare, one in a broken heel—carrying me out of the mall and across the parking lot like I was following after the life that just peeled away from me. I decided to go to his house to check if it was truely him I had seen and not a figment of my own imagination. People stared, but no one stopped. I kept walking even after the shock turned numb and the numb turned acidic. My own breathing sounded foreign, jagged, and pathetic. The city blurred around me, neon lights smearing through tears. At some point, rain started—not soft, not romantic, just mean. Cold needles against skin. My blouse clung to me like a second skin and humiliation. My remaining heel cracked on the pavement and gave out. I didn’t bother taking it off; I just kept going lopsided, barefoot on one side, heel screaming on the other. I didn’t think about time. I didn’t think about dignity. I didn’t think about how insane I must’ve looked, soaked and limping through the city like some sad, abandoned ghost. I just thought of him. Of us. Of every stupid promise. By the time I reached his neighborhood the rain had washed my mascara completely off. I could taste bitterness and salt. My hands shook, not from the cold, but from anger too big for my body to hold. The small side gate was still never locked—just like always. I pushed it open with a wet hand and walked inside the yard. His car sat in the driveway like a punchline. Like.it was waiting for him to go out. I remember it exactly the way it was parked before we left for an outing or as soon as we came back from somewhere. It was not only then that I realised it has been very long since we had been normal. I remember him making excuses for us to be together and the late night ght visits. I should have trusted my gut. I questioned him but he blamed me. Said I was insecure had trust issues I was nagging. The same car he’d picked me up in a hundred times. The same car we had picked together and planned would take us on road trips someday. My chest squeezed until I couldn’t breathe. I scanned around blindly and my gaze landed on an iron bar propped against the durawall. Before I could think, before I could stop myself, before sanity could close its mouth and scream at me—I grabbed it. The first hit cracked the windshield. The second shattered it. By the third, the rain mixed with glittering glass and I didn’t care if I cut myself open. I didn’t care who heard. I didn’t care about consequences. The front door flew open. “Whitney!” Derek shouted, rushing out bare-armed, barefoot, hair still wet from a shower. He grabbed me from behind, trying to wrestle the bar from my grip. “Stop! Stop it—what the hell are you doing?” “What do you think?” I yelled, choking on the words. “Why, Derek? Why would you do this to me?” He pinned my wrists, the iron bar falling with a heavy clang on the driveway. "I never meant for you to find out this way."The windshield was a spiderweb of ruin, shimmering under the porch light. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw her. Ona stood in the doorway, baby balanced on her hip like some obscene trophy, watching with that same bored, victorious calm. Like she’d already won the war and now she got to enjoy the sight of the last soldier bleeding out. “Why?” I sobbed, louder this time. “What did I ever do to you? Why would you hurt me like this?” Derek didn’t answer—not with words that made sense. He pushed me backward, guiding me out of the driveway with hands that were gentle once and cruel now solely because they didn’t hold me when I needed him most. “This isn’t the place for this,” he muttered through clenched teeth. “Just—go home, Whitney. I will come to you.” “Explain it to me!” I pleaded, voice ripping open. “Look at me and say it. Say you never loved me. Say you didn’t cheat on me for a year while I planned a future for us. Say the baby—” “That’s enough,” he snapped, finally losing composure. The mask dropped. The guilt turned into fury. “You destroyed my car. You’ll pay for that—trust me.” Payback. He shut the gate behind me and locked it. I slid down its metal frame and sat there, legs shaking, hair plastered to my face, clothes sticking to my skin, sobbing until the rain ran out before I did. Eventually, when crying hurt more than silence, I forced myself up and walked again. Still barefoot. Still broken. I crossed half the city without remembering how. No wallet. No shopping bags. No phone. Just grief and rain and a pair of ruined shoes that didn’t belong to any future anymore. It was almost midnight when I reached my place. I found my spare keys in the vase by the door, hands trembling so badly I almost dropped them. The lock clicked open. The house smelled like vanilla candles and shampoo—like the life I thought I still had this morning. I closed the door, slid down against it, and broke all over again. I sat there remembering the last time we had been together—when he came to fetch me from a group discussion. “Baby, are we okay?” I had asked. We hadn’t spoken much lately, and the silence between us felt heavy. We were supposed to be going on a picnic. “Whit, we are okay. How many times must I tell you that?” he answered tensely. “I’ve been busy with work and stuff. I’m here, aren’t I?” “Yes, baby. I’m sorry. I just… felt something off.” “Are we back to that again?” His jaw tightened. “I told you I’m not cheating. What else do you want from me?” The conversation spiraled fast—like it always did—until it turned into another fight. “Can you drop me off here, please?” I asked, tears stinging my eyes. “Whitney, come on. I don’t have time for your childishness and drama.” “Drop me off here,” I shouted. He stopped the car abruptly, unlocked the doors. I stayed seated for a moment, stunned. “Get out,” he said. So I did. I watched him drive away, waiting—hoping—he would come back for me or at least call to ask if I got home safely. But he never did. In the end, I was the one who called and apologized. When things finally seemed like they were back on track, I asked him again, quietly: “Derek, promise me you’ll tell me if you ever stop loving me. Please. If you no longer want to be with me, just tell me.” “Whitney, not that again. Will you stop nagging, woman?” he snapped, pushing his plate aside. “I’ve suddenly lost my appetite,” he murmured—and then, like always, I apologized again. I had apologized again. I always apologized those days. It became my way of holding us together, patching cracks I hadn’t created, convincing myself that love meant endurance—even if it hurt. Looking back now, I wish I had listened to my gut. It had been screaming at me for months, whispering things I didn’t want to hear, tugging at the frayed edges of my heart. Something was wrong. I felt it in the silences, in the rushed calls, in the way he held me but never really reached for me. I told myself I was overthinking, being dramatic, being insecure—just like he said. So I stayed. I smoothed everything over. I made excuses for him and swallowed my own discomfort. If only I had trusted myself. Sometimes I replay those moments like a broken record—wondering what would have changed if I had walked away sooner. Maybe I would have saved myself the humiliation. Maybe I wouldn’t have felt so stupid for loving him harder than he ever loved me. I lay back in my chair and covered my face with my hands, the memories slamming into me harder than I expected. The tears came fast and hot. Not just for him—but for the version of me that begged to be chosen, that apologized for needing reassurance, that stayed even when the truth was right there, pressing against her ribs. I cried for the girl who thought love meant proving herself. I cried for the woman I became after he broke me without even looking back. And most of all, I cried over the relationship that failed long before it officially ended—because I knew deep down that love shouldn’t have felt like walking on glass and calling it devotion. ​