When I Stopped Loving Him, He Started to Care

Pain woke me. I tried to move, but every inch of me protested. I gasped. My throat burned, my chest felt tight, and when I blinked my eyes open, all I saw was white—white walls, white lights, white sheets.

“Don’t move,” a nurse said gently, placing a hand on my arm. “You’ve suffered multiple burns and broken ribs. You need to rest, Isabella.”

My lips parted, but I couldn’t speak.

“The stitches on your side are fresh. You’ve got deep bruises on your back and shoulders too,” she continued softly. “You were found outside, unconscious and burned. And from the bruising…” she hesitated, “someone hurt you badly.”

I knew who. My father.

I remembered the push. His fury. The fire roaring behind me. But it hadn’t ended there.

Even after I passed out, he’d dragged me back inside the house and beat me, yelling that Jasmine’s hands were too precious for me to hurt. He struck me across the ribs, again and again. Because of Jasmine. Always because of her.

I had come back to that house thinking I could find family again. After my mom died, my stepfather had offered to care for me, but I was forced to live with my biological father instead.

They took me in because of the insurance under my name from my mother. At first, they treated me kindly. Spoiled me even. But once the money came, once the signature was forged… everything changed. I was nothing again. Just the girl who took up space beside Jasmine—the perfect one. The favorite.

“Would you like to call someone?” the nurse asked, pulling me back to the present. “Family? A friend?”

I shook my head. There was no one.

Once I was alone, I reached for my phone on the bedside table. Notifications flooded the screen. I scrolled, and my chest sank.

Jasmine had posted a picture of her and Kevin. They were laughing under a sky full of fireworks, wine glasses in hand. Romantic night with my love, the caption read, with a heart emoji.

I turned off the screen and set the phone aside.

I shouldn’t be surprised. They had always been each other’s firsts. High school sweethearts, picture-perfect from the outside. Even before I met Kevin, his name was often tied to Jasmine’s. She had been his first love, the one he couldn't forget.

When she left for abroad, she shattered him. I still remember the way he stared at his phone every night, hoping she’d call. But weeks turned into months. Then years. She stopped writing. He stopped waiting.

And I was there. Quiet. Present. Picking up pieces she never even knew she broke.

He clung to me like a man drowning. He kissed me like I was his last hope. One night, as I handed him a mug of coffee and sat beside him on the porch, he said, “Let’s get married, Isabella. I need someone who won’t leave.”

And I believed him.

I said yes. We got married.

But then Jasmine came back.

It was six months after our wedding. She walked through the front door like she still owned the place, dressed in white, hair curled, eyes glistening with apology. Kevin froze.

I stood beside him. His hand slipped out of mine.

Jasmine rushed forward. “Kevin,” she whispered, “I made a mistake. I should’ve never left. I was scared, stupid… I’ve never stopped loving you.”

“He’s married now,” I said sharply. “To me.”

But Jasmine looked at me like I was a stain on her dress. She turned back to Kevin. “You know it’s always been me. You told me that. You wore my necklace when we were apart. You promised.”

My heart pounded. “Kevin?”

He finally looked at me—but there was guilt in his eyes.

“I never meant for this to happen,” he said. “But... maybe we rushed. Maybe I wasn’t over her.”

I stepped back like I’d been slapped.

And from that day, the affair began. Slowly. Secretly at first. But not for long. Eventually, they didn’t even bother hiding it.

My phone vibrated again. I picked it up, already exhausted, already broken.

A message from Jasmine: “Hope your burns are healing well! Don’t worry about Kevin. We’re having a great time on our business-date combo trip.”

Another message followed—a video. I shouldn’t have opened it. I knew what it was before it started. Kevin. Kissing her. Stripping her. Her moans. That wasn’t the first time she sent it to me, I lost count on how many sex video she sent to torture me.

The day passed quietly. When the doctor finally signed my discharge, I got dressed slowly, wrapping myself in the thick cardigan I’d left in the hospital locker.

When I got home, I walked inside quietly—only to see Jasmine and Kevin standing in the living room surrounded by shopping bags.

“We’re home!” Jasmine chirped with her usual sweetness. “And I brought you something!”

She tossed me a small gift bag.

Inside it was a cheap keychain—pink, sparkly, childish.

“No thanks,” I muttered, setting it aside.

Kevin narrowed his eyes. “Is that how you treat people who think of you? Where’s your gratitude?”

I looked him dead in the eye. “Thank you,” I said flatly, then walked past him.

“Ungrateful brat,” I heard him mumble under his breath.

I ignored it. My hands trembled as I lit a small candle in the hallway altar. It was my mother’s death anniversary. I kept her urn on the shelf—a reminder that someone had once truly loved me.

But when I looked at the altar, I froze.

The urn was there but then there were flowers. My heart stopped. I turned and ran into the living room, screaming, “Where are my mother’s ashes?! Why are there flowers in the urn?”

Jasmine looked up, casually sipping juice. “Oh, that. I emptied it. The urn matched the new living room set so I turned it into a vase.”

My vision blurred. “You what?!”

“I used a plastic bag to store the ashes for now,” she said, grinning. “You can find it in the trash, but don’t worry I’ll buy a new urn for your mother. What do you think?”

My scream shattered the silence.

“You bitch!” I lunged at her, yanking her by the hair, slapping her face again and again. “You’re going to pay for this!”

She shrieked. “You psycho! Get off me!”