The Scattering of Love

“Was he not doing it on purpose? Didn’t you see it just now?”

I took a deep breath, trying my best to suppress the fire burning in my chest, but my voice still trembled.

“Mike, he just called Melanie a bastard to her face—why don’t you tell him, is Melanie really a bastard?”

Mike paused for a second, a flicker of hesitation flashing across his face.

But within moments, he lowered his head again, gently coaxing Oliver in his arms, completely ignoring my question, with no intention of asking Oliver to apologize.

At that moment, Jennifer, who had been standing silently on the side, shifted her eyes and suddenly put on a gentle, gracious smile.

She spoke in a soft and delicate voice,

“Ms. Harvey, I truly apologize. Oliver grew up abroad—he’s a bit straightforward and rough around the edges, he just says whatever comes to his mind. Please don’t take it to heart.”

But just as those seemingly peacemaking words left her lips, the smug look on the little boy’s face didn’t diminish in the slightest—in fact, it became even more arrogant.

Oliver raised his chin and shouted at the top of his lungs, “I wasn’t making anything up! That’s what everyone at school says! Melanie is a bastard! She stole my dad!”

My fists clenched so tightly that my knuckles turned white.

I stared at Mike, my gaze burning.

I remembered how, in the past, he had used him being a neat freak as an excuse to show constant disdain toward me and Melanie—and we endured it all.

We tiptoed around him in everything.

I turned a blind eye when he claimed to be “working late”, while he was actually out sleeping with other women.

I swallowed the bitterness and carried on.

But today—I would not let anyone insult my daughter like that.

“Mike, I’ll ask you one last time—” I paused, took a deep breath, my eyes rimmed with red, and asked slowly and firmly, “Is Melanie your biological daughter or not?”

Mike’s expression darkened.

A cold, bone-cutting sneer curled at his lips.

“Don’t you already know that better than anyone how she became my daughter?”

“Enough. Oliver’s paying a visit today. Let’s stop making a fuss, no need to ruin everyone’s mood.”

Mike furrowed his brows slightly, his tone laced with irritation.

His eyes held a kind of blame, as if I were the one being unreasonable, ruining this so-called "harmonious" moment.

Next to him, Jennifer and her child exchanged subtle glances.

The corners of their mouths lifted ever so slightly, eyes gleaming with a kind of triumphant glee—as though they were the true victors of this farce, and Melanie and I were just the unwanted losers in the background.

Mike paid no mind to how I or Melanie felt.

He walked straight up to Oliver, bent down with heartache etched into his face, and scooped him up in his arms.

His voice was so gentle it almost dripped with honey.

“Daddy’s going to buy you lots and lots of toys, okay?

Even that limited-edition LEGO set you’ve been wanting—I’ll get it all for you.”

“Yay!”

Oliver clapped excitedly, his face lit up with pride and joy.

Mike’s gaze softened even more at the sight, filled with a kind of doting tenderness that neither Melanie nor I had ever received.

As I watched his figure grow smaller and smaller, a bitter cold crept up from the depths of my heart, as if I had been thrown into an ice cellar.

All the grievances, anger, and crushing disappointment I had been holding back finally surged through me like an unstoppable tide.

At last, I took a deep breath and said the words I had rehearsed countless times in my heart—the words I had hesitated over again and again, but never dared to speak aloud until now.