BENEATH THE SAME SKY

The days that followed were nothing short of a living hell.

I locked myself inside the room, refusing to eat, refusing to speak. The image of Gavin holding Selina, protecting her like she was his treasure, kept replaying in my mind like a broken record. The way they looked at each other... the intimacy... it was burned into my retinas, haunting me every second of the day.

Gavin didn’t come home that night.

Or the next night.

Or the night after that.

He didn’t call. He didn’t text. It was as if I had suddenly ceased to exist in his world. And the silence was louder than any scream. It was suffocating. It was killing me slowly.

I tried to tell myself that maybe I was overreacting. Maybe it was just a close friendship. Maybe Selina was right—I was just paranoid and jealous.

But deep down, my heart knew the truth. My heart was bleeding, screaming that something was very, very wrong.

I needed answers. I needed concrete proof. Not just suspicions, not just feelings. I needed to see it with my own eyes so that I could finally accept that the man I loved was gone forever.

On the fourth day, Gavin came home.

It was early in the morning. He looked tired, his eyes were sunken, and there was a dark stubble on his jaw. He walked in, threw his bag on the floor, and headed straight for the bedroom, not even glancing in my direction.

He was avoiding me.

He walked into the bathroom and turned on the shower. The sound of running water filled the room.

His phone, which he had left carelessly on the bedside table, suddenly lit up.

Buzz. Buzz.

A notification appeared on the screen.

My heart stopped.

My hands started shaking uncontrollably. My mind was fighting a war. Don't do it, Aria. Don't look. It’s private. But another voice screamed, LOOK! HE IS HIDING SOMETHING! YOU DESERVE TO KNOW THE TRUTH!

I walked closer, step by step, as if I was approaching a dangerous beast.

The screen was still glowing.

The message preview was visible, even from a distance.

From: Lina

"Good morning, my love. Did you sleep well? I miss you already Come over soon, okay? I made your favorite breakfast."

My blood ran cold.

Lina?

My love?

Heart emoji?

That was enough to shatter what little sanity I had left.

With trembling fingers, I reached out and took the phone. I knew his password. It was our anniversary date. Something that was supposed to be special, something that was supposed to be only ours.

I unlocked it.

And I opened the chat.

I didn't expect what I was about to see. I prepared myself for cheating, for lies, for romance. But I wasn't prepared for this level of cruelty, this level of deception.

The chat history between Gavin and Selina went back months. Even years.

I scrolled up, and with every swipe, my heart broke a little more.

[One year ago]

Selina: "Babe, when are you going to leave her? I can't wait anymore. I want to be your wife, not just your secret."

Gavin: "Soon, baby. I just need to wait for the right time. She is still useful to me for now. She takes care of the house, she handles my parents. You know how it is. But my heart and body are only yours."

[Six months ago]

Selina: "I hate her! She wore that dress you bought her! It looks ugly on her! I want it!."

Gavin: "Don't worry, darling. Next time I will take it and give it to you. You are the only one who deserves beautiful things. She is just a shadow compared to you."

[Last week]

Selina: "Last night was amazing You are so wild, baby. I love it when you hold me like that. She didn't suspect anything, right?"

Gavin: "Of course not. She is too naive and stupid. She thinks I'm working hard. Hahaha. She actually believed me when I said I loved her. So easy to manipulate."

[Yesterday]

Selina: "I love you so much, Gavin Soon we will be together forever. And she will be nothing. Just trash we throw away."

Gavin: "I love you too, my queen. You are my real soulmate. She was just a mistake I made in the past."

I couldn't breathe.

The words were dancing in front of my eyes, mocking me, stabbing me repeatedly.

"She is still useful to me."

"She is stupid."

"She is just trash."

All the love, all the care, all the promises... it was all acting! He was using me! He saw me as nothing more than a servant, a tool to keep his life organized while he fucked my best friend!

And Selina... my best friend... she was calling me stupid, ugly, and useless behind my back! She was planning to take my place!

My hands were shaking so hard I almost dropped the phone. But I forced myself to keep looking. I wanted to see everything. I wanted to see how ugly the truth really was.

I opened the gallery folder that was named "Work Files".

It was not work files.

It was hell.

There were hundreds of photos.

Photos of them together in restaurants, in malls, in vacations places I had never even been to.

But then... I saw photos that made my knees buckle and my stomach churn violently.

Photos taken inside a bedroom.

Our bedroom.

There were photos of Selina lying on my bed, wearing my silk robes, smiling at the camera.

Photos of Gavin hugging her from behind, kissing her neck, right on the mattress where he was supposed to sleep with me.

There were explicit photos too. Photos that showed their naked bodies, their intimacy, their passion. Photos that proved they didn't just love each other, they consumed each other. Right under my roof. Right where I slept.

They desecrated my marriage. They desecrated my home.

And the worst photo of all...

It was a photo taken exactly on our wedding anniversary night.

The night I waited for him with dinner.

The night he came home late smelling of perfume.

In the photo, Gavin and Selina were cuddling, holding glasses of wine, with a caption written on it:

"Happy Anniversary to US Finally free from that boring witch."

"AHHHHHHHHHHH!!!"

A scream tore out of my throat before I could stop it.

It wasn't a human sound. It was the sound of a soul being ripped apart.

The phone slipped from my hands and hit the floor with a loud THUD.

My vision turned red. Then black.

My body felt hot, then ice cold.

I couldn't stand it anymore. The weight of the betrayal was too heavy. It crushed my ribs, it crushed my lungs.

The bathroom door opened.

Gavin walked out, wearing only a towel around his waist, his skin still wet and steaming.

"What happened? Why are you screaming?" he asked, annoyed.

Then he saw me.

Standing in the middle of the room, pale as a sheet, tears streaming down like rivers, looking at him with eyes filled with horror and hatred.

Then he looked down at the phone on the floor, the screen still glowing, showing the sinful images.

His face changed instantly.

The tiredness disappeared, replaced by panic, then by coldness.

He didn't rush to pick it up. He didn't rush to explain.

He just stood there, looking at me, and slowly... a smirk started to form on his lips.

He stopped pretending.

"You saw it," he stated, not as a question, but as a fact. His voice was calm, terrifyingly calm.

"You... you..." I pointed at him, my body trembling violently, convulsing with pain. "How could you? How could you do this to me?!"

I fell to my knees on the floor, clutching my chest as if I was having a heart attack.

"Five years, Gavin! Five years I gave you my life! I loved you! I trusted you! And you called me stupid? You called me trash? You brought her into our bed?!"

Gavin bent down slowly, picked up his phone, and wiped the dust off it casually. He looked at the screen, then looked at me with eyes that held no emotion. No love. No guilt. Nothing.

"Well," he said coldly, straightening his body. "Since you know now, I don't have to lie anymore. It's tiring anyway, having to act like I care about you every single day."

He walked closer to me, towering over my kneeling form.

"Yes, Aria. It's all true. Selina and I have been lovers for a long time. Longer than you think."

He laughed, a dry, humorless laugh.

"You were so blind. So naive. You thought that because you cooked and cleaned, you were a good wife? You were boring, Aria. You were predictable. You were like a dead weight around my neck. Selina... she gives me life. She understands me. She is a real woman."

"Useful?" I sobbed, the word tearing my throat. "You said I was useful... what did you mean?"

Gavin looked down at me with pity. Fake pity.

"Come on, Aria. Be smart. You have a good reputation. My family likes you. You managed my assets well. While you were busy playing the perfect wife, I was building my empire. And now... now I don't need you anymore."

He crouched down so his face was level with mine. His eyes were dark, cruel, and beautiful.

"Selina is pregnant, Aria," he whispered softly.

BOOM.

The world stopped.

"She... she is pregnant?" I whispered, my voice gone.

"Yes. With my child," Gavin said, his face lighting up with a happiness I had never seen. "A son. Finally. I have an heir. And Selina is going to be the mother of my child. What place do you have left, huh?"

He patted my cheek lightly, but it felt like a slap. A hard, burning slap.

"You are redundant, Aria. You are finished. It's time for you to go."

I couldn't take it anymore.

The pain was too much. The humiliation was too great.

My vision blurred, the room spinning wildly. I felt like I was being sucked into a deep, dark hole.

"Monster..." I whispered, looking at the man I once worshipped. "You are a monster..."

"Maybe," he said, standing up and turning his back on me. "But I'm happy. And you... you are just sad and alone."

That was the last thing I heard before everything went black.

My legs gave up. My heart gave up.

I collapsed onto the cold hard floor, losing consciousness, escaping into the darkness because reality was too painful to bear.