Part 2Weeds Toward the Sun

Ten years of memories flooded my soul, a salty, bitter torrent of pain.

At twenty, Jena had just won the national collegiate photography award, the golden trophy gleaming in her hands. An offer from the Paris College of Art sat on her desk. Back then, I stood in the spotlight, radiant and confident. Curtis was just one of many admirers in the crowd.

After my graduation ceremony at twenty-two, a runaway truck had barreled towards me. It was Curtis who shoved me out of the way, without a thought for his own safety.

His love felt so immense, so selfless. At twenty-two, I thought I had found my salvation. I believed, for the first time, that someone in this world truly loved me. I made peace with the world, with my past. I clipped my own wings, gave up my dream of studying abroad, and at twenty-four, I became Mrs. Thorne.

For the first two years of our marriage, Curtis had treated me like a precious treasure, convincing me with a thousand sweet reasons to give up my career.

But slowly, that love had soured.

Just as the thirty-year-old Jena had betrayed the twenty-year-old me.

But when did it all change?

Was it after my third miscarriage, when he brought a young woman named Ava home, introducing her as the sister of the man who had died saving him?

A man who hadn't saved him at all, but one of his close friends. With that as his excuse, he began a flirtatious, ambiguous relationship with her, and the thirty-year-old Jena was expected to just accept it.

“What a joke,” I muttered, my fingers scrolling uncontrollably through the phone. My bank account balance was pitifully low; Curtis only gave me a basic living allowance. The chat history with my parents was filled with their requests for money.

But what shocked me the most was the memo app, filled with pathetic little notes:

“Remember Curtis hates cilantro.”

“Pick up suit from dry cleaner’s.”

“Mother-in-law’s birthday, prepare gift.”

…

Smack! I slammed my hand against the mirror.

A web of cracks radiated from the point of impact, shattering the reflection of the thirty-year-old Jena into a thousand pieces. In every shard, the twenty-year-old me glared back in fury.

“How could you let yourself become this?”

The tears finally broke free.

At twenty, I had sworn in my diary to become one of the world's greatest architects and photographers.

And now?

My camera was collecting dust, my dreams were molding in a dark corner, and my self-respect was being trampled under Curtis’s feet.

The thirty-year-old me had become the very person I had always despised.

My heart ached for her, but I hated her even more for betraying all my hard work, all my ambition.

This was not the life I was meant to live.