IN HIS BROTHER’S BED

CHAPTER 4:”The Polite Distance”

Olivia woke up the next morning, half-asleep. She had not really had enough rest; she spent most of the night soaked in tears and thoughts of what had happened earlier at the family meeting.

“Nine o’clock already?” Olivia said and reached for her phone.

Quickly, she got up from the bed, slowly, like she had been forced to wake up. Thoughts of Daniel ran through her mind.

“He’s not even home yet.”

It was a very cloudy day. The sun looked dim, as though it was about to rain the entire day. After rolling the curtains open, she peered outside the window, looking to see if Daniel’s car was parked.

“Nothing’s there,” she said to herself, with a hint of confusion and discomfort in her voice.

“I think I have to text him.” She thought something might have happened to him. Quickly, she grabbed the phone from the bed.

“When are you going to be home, darling?”

With a sigh of disbelief, Olivia hit the send button, longing for a response. Minutes passed — no response yet. She couldn’t take her eyes off the phone. She wanted to hear from Daniel so badly. Hours passed, still no response. Meanwhile, the message showed “delivered and read,” yet there was no reply.

Olivia put the phone down and quietly tiptoed into the bathroom. She had waited a long time for a response from Daniel, but to no avail. She had to get her day started.

In the bathroom, she looked at herself in the mirror, rubbing her hands through her long hair, with tears running down her face.

“How far would I go to silence this pain?”

Olivia said this to herself as she hurriedly stepped into the shower.

Out of the shower, she walked slowly to the room to get dressed. As she was about to apply lotion to her face, she heard the sound of a car horn. Quickly, Olivia peered through the window. She realized it was Daniel — her husband’s car, a black Toyota Camry.

“I need to look fresh and smell good. Perhaps he would give me a hug.”

Saying this, Olivia grabbed a long comb, brushed her hair downward, making it look neat and smooth. She applied sweet-scented lotion to make herself more appealing.

“I think I need to apply lip gloss.”

She reached for the lip gloss in her wardrobe, looked in the mirror, and carefully painted her lips, making them look shiny and sweet.

Following this, she looked out the window again to see if her husband was heading toward the door.

“Oh hell, he’s almost here. I’ve got to finish fast.”

She opened her luggage and looked for a sexy, attractive dress. She quickly put it on, rolled her hair backward, and walked slowly into the living room. She sat comfortably on the sofa with her legs crossed.

“Oh God, hope this works,” she said, as she grabbed her phone, scrolling through it and pretentiously turning her back while reaching for the TV remote.

Daniel walked slowly into the living room. Seeing Olivia, he walked past her without greeting her.

Olivia got confused.

“Why didn’t he even greet me? Am I not looking good enough?”

She thought maybe Daniel was tired and hadn’t seen her clearly. Without hesitation, she followed him majestically into the room, moving her hands slowly over her body and down her stomach.

“Good morning, darling,” she said, trying to get Daniel’s attention.

“Get me coffee, I’m tired,” Daniel said as he put the car keys on the table and headed straight for the shower.

Once again, she had been ignored by her husband. This weighed heavily on her. Olivia felt so bad that words almost slipped out of her mouth. But then she swallowed them and covered it with a smile. She still refused to believe that the Daniel she once knew had totally changed.

“Okay,” she said, as she walked out of the room, heading toward the kitchen.

Everything she did seemed to not please Daniel — not even when she had worked so hard to build the property, which had now been entrusted to his brother, Ethan, without her consent.

In the kitchen, tears ran down Olivia’s face as she prepared coffee for Daniel. “I wish I had never gotten into this mess.”

She had been married to Daniel for a couple of years now, but he seemed to have completely changed over time. The fact that he didn’t get intimate with her anymore made her start having the feeling that he was cheating on her. But she had no evidence to back that up — just the signs. This hurt her badly, but as always, she chose peace over conflict. She looked okay on the outside, but inside was a heart full of rage, anger, and sadness.

Done with the coffee, Olivia walked to the room to give it to Daniel.

“I am done with your coffee, darling.”

No response. “Oh well,” she said, turning and heading toward the door.

Reaching the door, Olivia heard a message notification from Daniel’s phone. Her curiosity grew. She wanted to see what the message was and who it was from. She was hesitant, afraid to find out if her husband was cheating.

What she saw was even more dumbfounding.

It was a message from her husband’s brother. She knew because Daniel had always saved Ethan’s number as “Lovely Bruh.”

With tension and a little anxiety, she turned the phone on and tried to put in Daniel’s old password.

“Gosh, he changed it.”

Unsure of what to do, she pressed the message Ethan had sent, which appeared as a notification for a few seconds before the message popped up: “You really wish you were single, bro?”

What was the meaning of this message? Had Daniel told Ethan he wished he was single?

“He doesn’t love me?” Olivia asked herself. She was so curious to read the full conversation but didn’t know the password. She tried putting in different passwords Daniel had used in the past when they first met, but none worked.

“He’s done showering, I guess.”

She heard footsteps in the bathroom and quickly put the phone right where she picked it from. She turned her back and pretended as if she had just brought the coffee.