Page 48 of The Regrettable Mistake

If you don’t like it, you can tell Steve to bring it back and I’ll leave it with Mom.

I keep trying to imagine what you look like now. Has your stomach popped out? Have you felt our baby kick? There are so many things I’m missing out on and I have no one to blame but myself. I need you to know that I don’t blame you.

I went to the house the day you were taken to the hospital. I found your phone, and still have it. What’s worse is that I found everything else. The blood in the spot where you’d been sitting surrounded by our life together that you shredded… Jesus, Steph, it felt as though my heart were ripped out and shredded on the floor with all our pictures.

I don’t blame you.

I hate that I caused you those feelings.

I hate that I could be the man who drove you to that, who put you in the hospital because of my cruel behavior and the words I spoke, even though I didn’t mean them. And I didn’t. I tried to convince myself that they were still true. They weren’t.

Do you know what that video didn’t show? The next seconds that followed how it ended would have shown me throwing up violently and screaming at Jia to never contact me again. If you had to see that fucking video, I wish you had been able to see the aftermath.

I’m not proud of what I did. The guilt and immediate regret swamped me from that moment forward. It has only compounded in the passing months.

I am to blame for everything. I know that.

I respect your decisions, but it is my greatest wish to see you while your belly is swollen with my baby. To hear the heartbeat, see a foot stick out on your belly, to watch the joy in your eyes as you experience all those things. I am missing the best moments in this life because I screwed up so miserably.

I’m rambling because I have so much I want to convey to you, and these letters are the only way to communicate those things. I’ll stop here because it isn’t fair to dump all my thoughts and regrets at your feet.

Please know, and believe, that I love and miss you.

Loving you from a distance (until you’re ready),

Ollie

“Are you okay?” I stopped staring at the letter in my hands to look at my brother. As my head shook left to right I handed him the letters. He read them in order with a tight-lipped expression on his face the whole time, as if he was afraid to give away any reaction at all.

“That is a lot to take in,” Steve finally spoke and all I could do was nod in agreement. It was a lot to take in. There had been so much damage done to not only my trust but the foundation of our entire relationship. It hadn’t been real from the beginning. That was why I couldn’t remain married to the man. Even if he hadn’t cheated, I wouldn’t be able to stay married to him because our wedding had been a lie.

“Do you think he really means it?”

“I know he does. That doesn’t change his actions at all.”

“So, you think he really loves me?” I questioned again.

Steve sighed. “Steph, I think that man has loved you longer than either of you even realize. He was just too hung up on some false future he promised himself to see that things changed, his feelings grew, and you became the future he had been hoping for all along.”

“I don’t know.”

“I do because he wouldn’t have gone to the lengths he has to make sure you’re safe and healthy, he wouldn’t have stayed away when all he wanted was to hunt you down and be by your side.”

“No one will give him the information.”

“You don’t think he could hire a PI and find you in a quick minute? I guarantee the man already knows your address and probably your phone number too. The fact that he hasn’t used them speaks volumes about how he is trying to respect your choices.”

“Was this the last of the presents?”

“There is more, but this is all I brought today. I told him we could start with this and then I’d see what you wanted to do about the rest.”

“Okay.”

I didn’t answer Steve because Ollie and my brother had both given me a great deal to think about. No matter what, I had to stop being selfish with the pregnancy, and I had to be a grown up and come up with a plan to coparent peacefully with my soon-to-be ex-husband, if nothing else.

CHAPTER 18

Ollie

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