CHAPTER 8- THE FIRST INSULT
829 Words
The office door opened, and my heart jumped into my throat.
Dominic stepped into the hallway — shirt sleeves rolled up, tie loosened, exactly as he always looked. For one ridiculous second, just seeing him standing there normally felt like relief.
Then I remembered why I was in this hallway at half past midnight. He looked from my face to the closed door behind him. His expression barely shifted.
"What are you doing awake at this time?"
Not hello. Not an explanation. Just a question with an edge underneath it, like I was the one who needed to explain myself.
I folded my arms. "Well…I could ask you the same thing."
His jaw tightened. "We were working, Amara."
We? The word landed wrong — not because it was inappropriate, but because of how easily it came out. Comfortable and practiced.
"We?" I said.
"Celeste and I." The mild patience of someone explaining something obvious. "There's a merger happening, Amara."
"I know there's a merger happening."
"Then what's the problem? Why so many questions if you know?"
He asked what the problem was. Not my concern, not my feelings. The problem — like I'd become something to manage around.
Something in me just went tiring. Not the kind sleep fixes. The kind built from weeks of swallowing things that hurt and immediately wondering if you had any right to be hurt at all.
"Nothing, I was just curious" I said.
He sighed — quiet, barely audible. But I heard it. And somehow that small sound hurt more than the conversation itself.
"You should get some sleep. It's late"
I laughed softly. Not a real laugh. "Right."
He walked straight past me toward the bedroom.
No touch. No glance back.
I stood there long after his footsteps disappeared, the office behind me and the bedroom ahead, feeling like I had wandered into the wrong story.
Morning began at six-thirteen, announced loudly by Luca.
I walked into the nursery and his whole face lit up — arms out, legs kicking, the kind of joy that has no filter and no conditions attached. He was looking at me like I was the best thing that had ever walked through a door.
I held him close and let myself be important to at least one person for a few minutes.
The kitchen smelled like coffee when we got downstairs.
Dominic was already at the island — laptop open, phone beside his mug, somewhere between three different things and none of them were us.
"Morning," I said.
"Morning." A glance toward Luca. "How did he sleep?"
"Better."
"Good."
Back to the screen.
I started on Luca's bottle, moving through the routine while the silence spread around us — not hostile, just empty. The kind that's harder to argue with than anger because there's nothing to push back against.
The sound of heels on marble.
Celeste walked in — blouse, dark hair, the unhurried confidence of a woman who never seems to question whether she belongs somewhere.
"Good morning."
Dominic looked up immediately. And there it was — that shift. Subtle, fast, the kind most people would miss.
But I had been watching his face my whole marriage. I knew what “present” looked like on him. I just hadn't seen it directed at me in a long time.
Celeste settled on the stool beside him, close enough to be comfortable, far enough that nothing could be said about it.
The conversation went straight to work. Deadlines, investors, projections. It flowed easily between them while I stood at the counter with Luca, feeling, as I increasingly did, like a guest in my own kitchen.
Then Luca grabbed the bottle and milk splashed across my shirt.
"Oh my God — Luca." I laughed despite myself. He stared at me, completely delighted.
Celeste smiled. "Honestly, I don't know how mothers do it."
"We mostly figure it out as we go," I said, reaching for the kitchen roll.
"I suppose you have to." She tilted her head, studying me with that particular quality of attention that felt more like evaluation than interest. Then she smiled, warm and certain.
"You actually look amazing Amara."
I looked up. "Oh really — thank you."
"No, seriously." Her eyes moved over me — slow, deliberate. "You had a baby four months ago and you've already lost most of the weight."
The words landed somewhere soft and unguarded. It sounded like a compliment. From a distance, in the right light, it sounded exactly like one.
But now everyone at that table was thinking about my body. About what it looked like. About before and after and the gap between.
I was already thinking about it. I never stopped thinking about it.
She had just made sure everyone else was too — with a smile on her face and warmth in her voice and absolutely nothing anyone could point to.
I smiled back. "Thanks, Celeste."
Dominic said nothing.
He did not even look up.
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