Chapter 2Divorced Three Years Ago

Looking back, our divorce felt inevitable.

There was no proposal, no wedding ceremony, not even a single wedding photo.

The year we graduated from college, his mother was diagnosed with cancer. I had just visited her in the hospital, my arms aching from a heavy basket of fruit. As I was leaving, Caleb grabbed my hand in the sterile hallway.

"Carol," he said, his voice flat. "Let's get married."

The words, completely out of the blue, were like a winning lottery ticket dropping into my lap. I was stunned. Terrified he might change his mind, I blurted out "yes" before he could take it back.

We got our marriage license on a perfectly ordinary weekend. City Hall was quiet.

The clerk motioned for us to get closer for the photo. "Okay, groom, a little closer to the bride. And groom, lose the poker face. Try to smile like she is. Good."

That small, red-backed photo on our marriage certificate became our first picture together. After a brief, sterile ceremony, I’d skipped the role of girlfriend and gone straight to being Caleb's wife.

He was in the grueling start-up phase of his company back then. To avoid a long-distance relationship, I turned down a good teaching position at a private school out of state. On his advice, I started studying for the state teaching certification exams instead.

He must have known he was asking a lot of me. When we went to buy rings, he promised we’d have a real wedding once things settled down. Wanting to be the supportive, understanding wife, I picked out a simple, unadorned band that didn’t cost much. It was never about the money; it was about his heart.

After we were married, we rented a tiny 400-square-foot apartment. It was small, but our life was sweet. We were like any other young couple, holding hands at the grocery store on weekends, losing ourselves in each other's arms late at night.

A year later, his mother passed away.

He held me and cried for the first time. "Carol," he whispered, his voice cracking, "I don't have a family anymore."

His parents had divorced when he was young, and his mother, fiercely ambitious for him, had always been controlling. People saw Caleb as cold and distant, but I knew that deep down, he was just a man desperate to be loved.

I held him tighter, murmuring again and again, "You have me. I'm your family now."

To cope with his grief, Caleb threw himself into his work, spending every waking hour at the office. The long hours and irregular meals took their toll, and soon he was hospitalized with a stomach ulcer.

From that day on, I started bringing him home-cooked meals at his office.

And that was the first time I met Vivian Chen.