PART 2
The next morning, my phone buzzed more than forty times.
Brandon.
Brenda.
Patrick.
Even Brandon’s cousins were calling.
I ignored every call until a voicemail finally came through.
“Melanie,” Brandon’s voice said, sounding very different from the arrogant man who had ordered me around the day before. “Stop acting childish. We need to talk about the money.”
I laughed.
Not because it was funny.
Because less than twenty-four hours after our wedding, he wasn’t asking about me.
He wasn’t asking if I was safe.
He wasn’t asking if our marriage could be saved.
He wanted the money.
I called my lawyer instead.
“I need to begin divorce proceedings immediately.”
By noon, Brandon finally reached me using a different phone.
“Where are you?”
“Somewhere peaceful.”
“Enough games. Dad went to the bank.”
“And?”
“The account is frozen!”
“No,” I corrected him.
“It isn’t frozen.”
“It simply isn’t yours.”
Silence.
Then came the shouting.
“You tricked us!”
“I did no such thing.”
“My parents gave us that wedding gift!”
“Actually,” I replied calmly, “they gave it to me.”
“And my parents added another $200,000.”
“The account has always been under my name.”
His breathing became heavier.
“You have to transfer half.”
“I don’t have to transfer anything.”
“You owe me!”
“I owe you?”
“You tried to make me your family’s unpaid servant before we had even been married for twenty-four hours.”
He had no answer.
Instead, Brenda grabbed the phone.
“Young lady, in our family, wives respect their husbands.”
“I do respect myself.”
“You’ll regret embarrassing us.”
“I think you’re confusing embarrassment with consequences.”
Click.
I ended the call.
That afternoon my lawyer smiled after reading every text Brandon had sent.
“You may want to keep these.”
There were dozens of them.
“You’re nothing without me.”
“You’ll come crawling back.”
“That money belongs to my family.”
Every message became evidence.
Meanwhile, Brandon’s family had another problem.
Without me there…
Nobody cooked.
Nobody cleaned.
Nobody washed Brandon’s shirts.
The sink was still full of dishes.
Brenda finally looked at her son.
“Well?”
He frowned.
“What?”
“Aren’t you going to wash them?”
“I don’t know how.”
For the first time…
The silence inside that house became louder than any argument.
