Chapter 1

At 11:03 PM, Vivian Hurst received two gifts for her silver wedding anniversary.

One was from her doctor: "Late-stage pancreatic cancer. Two months left, at most."

The other was from her husband: "An invitation to Sienna Vance's birthday party. Oceanfront villa in Miami. The day after tomorrow."

The medical diagnosis trembled slightly in her hand.

Across the coffee table, Sylvester Hurst had just arrived home, still carrying that familiar scent of perfume.

It was "Midnight Rose," Sienna's favorite fragrance, one Vivian had smelled countless times before.

"Not asleep yet?"

Without so much as a glance at her, he walked straight to the liquor cabinet and poured himself a glass of whiskey.

"Or are you... playing the victim again?"

Vivian sat in the darkness, watching the man she had been married to for twenty-five years.

The light hit him from the side, casting his tall, upright figure into a long shadow, yet it failed to reach the corner where she sat.

"Sylvester, if I told you I was dying, would you believe me?"

The whiskey glass froze in midair.

Sylvester finally turned his head, his gaze landing on her face as if inspecting a piece of old property that had lost its value.

Then, he smiled.

It was a careless, mocking smile.

"Vivian," he said, setting the glass down and loosening his tie, his voice laced with derision, "you are fifty-one this year, not a fifteen-year-old girl."

"This playing-the-victim act—you've been doing it for twenty-five years. Aren't you tired of it yet?"

The "act" he spoke of referred to the only three times she had ever resisted him during their twenty-five years of marriage.

The first time was on their fifth anniversary, when she ran into him walking Sienna home on a rainy night; the woman had been leaning into his chest, clutching a necklace that was clearly the anniversary edition he had promised to give Vivian.

The second time was on their tenth anniversary, when Sienna showed up at their door with a forged pregnancy belly, pulling Vivian's hand with tearful eyes: "Sister Vivian, Sylvester and I are truly in love... the child can't grow up without a father."

On their twentieth anniversary, Sienna's business failed, and without a second thought, he brought the woman into their home and settled her into the guest room.

He had said, "Sienna has nowhere else to go. I can't just leave her."

Every time Vivian mentioned divorce, he thought she was just throwing a tantrum.

Every time she wanted to leave, he thought she was just playing mind games.

Vivian suddenly found it hilarious.

She smoothed out the medical report and pushed it to the center of the coffee table.

The words "Late-Stage Pancreatic Cancer" stood exposed under the lamp.

This morning, right after she finished her last literature class for the children, her head began to spin. When she woke up, she was already lying in a hospital bed.

The doctor held up the scans and told her, "The cancer cells have already metastasized to your liver. You have two months left, at most."

"You've dragged this illness out for at least five years. The early symptoms weren't obvious, but it should have been caught during your annual physicals. Why are you only coming in now?"

Why only now?

She remembered the abnormal physical report from five years ago. He had glanced at it and said, "Making a mountain out of a molehill."

She remembered coughing up blood three years ago. He had said, "Just choked on chalkboard dust."

She remembered becoming skin and bones a year ago. He had said, "Everyone gets like this when they grow old."

It turned out that when a person was determined to play blind, you could hold the light of the entire world right before his eyes, and he would still claim the sky was black.

Sylvester's gaze swept over the paper, pausing for less than a second.

"Tch," he scoffed, pulling an invitation card from his suit's inner pocket and tossing it carelessly onto the coffee table, right on top of the medical report.

"Vivian, your methods are getting truly sophisticated now. You even managed to forge a diagnosis?!"

The invitation card read: "Cordially invites you to celebrate the thirty-fifth birthday of Ms. Sienna Vance," located at the "Biscayne Bay Oceanfront Villa, Miami," with a small line of handwritten text at the bottom: "To my dearest Sylvester — Sienna."

Those words pierced her eyes like dripping blood.

Vivian looked at the invitation, then raised her head to look at the calendar on the wall.

Tomorrow was her twenty-fifth silver wedding anniversary with Sylvester.

It was also Sienna's birthday.

Sylvester's phone screen suddenly lit up. The preview banner wasn't locked, leaving the message completely visible.

It was from Sienna:

[Sylvester, the birthday venue is all set! We're using the terrace of that house in Miami, it has a beautiful view of the ocean~]

Sylvester picked up his phone and replied instantly:

[Great, I'll arrive tomorrow afternoon.]

Watching that single word, Vivian felt her heart sink bit by bit into an abyss of ice.

"Sylvester," Vivian stood up, her voice entirely calm, "let's get a divorce."

Sylvester caught himself for a moment, then burst out laughing, "Here we go again. What do you want this time? A car? A house? Or what?"

He stepped up to her, reaching out to touch her face, but she turned her head away to avoid his hand.

His hand froze in midair, his expression turning cold, "Vivian, know when to stop."

"I don't want a car, and I don't want a house."

She walked over to the window, staring into the heavy night outside, "Do you still remember our wedding day? In front of everyone, you said that Sylvester Hurst would be responsible for Vivian Hurst for the rest of his life."

Sylvester frowned, "That's ancient history. Why bring it up now?"

"Yes, ancient history." Vivian turned around, the moonlight casting a thin layer of frost over her pale face, "But I've remembered it for twenty-five years."

"Sylvester, I don't want to wait for you anymore."

With that, she walked toward the front door.

"Vivian! Stand right there! Where do you think you're going in the middle of the night?!"

She didn't look back.

The living room door opened and closed. Her footsteps grew distant in the silent night, fading until they vanished entirely.

Sylvester stared at the door, his chest heaving a few times before he angrily slammed his tie onto the sofa.

At 2:00 AM, Vivian stood on the beach of the coastal park.

As the seawater washed over her ankles, she suddenly realized one thing.

Her past twenty-five years had been a total joke.

Sylvester had never held a place for her in his heart.

She was merely a "suitable" wife: a clean family background, a respectable profession, capable of maintaining appearances, taking care of the elders and their child, and never crying or making a scene.

Meanwhile, Sienna, the woman who had wedged herself into their lives using the shadow of her deceased older sister, was the true recipient of all his favoritism.

When her business failed, he gave her five million.

Because she loved the ocean, he bought a house in Miami and put it under her name.

When it was her birthday, he cared more than anyone else.

A love triangle? It didn't even exist.

Sylvester's heart had been biased from the very beginning. She was just the fool standing in place, watching him spoil someone else while being expected to be "understanding and magnanimous."

The seawater rose past her knees, then over her waist.

Cold, piercingly cold.

Yet, she somehow felt a strange warmth, as if for the first time in twenty-five years, someone was holding her this tightly.

She remembered the message her son, Harvey, had sent her last month:

"Mom, I got my offer from MIT! As soon as I graduate, I'll bring you over to live with me, and we'll never be apart again."

I'm sorry, Little Harvey. Mom can't wait that long.

She remembered her parents holding her hands before they passed away: "Vivian, you have to live well. You have to be happy."

I'm sorry, Mom and Dad. Your daughter has disappointed you.

The water reached her chest. Breathing became difficult.

Vivian tilted her head up, looking at the night sky. The stars were so bright, just like their wedding night many years ago when Sylvester held her on the roof and said, "From now on, every star belongs to you."

Later, the stars all went dark.

She closed her eyes, letting her body sink downward.

The salty seawater rushed in, causing a loud ringing in her ears. In her fading consciousness, she seemed to hear someone calling her name frantically—it sounded like Sylvester, yet it didn't.

But none of it mattered anymore.

She was truly too tired.

This lesson had lasted twenty-five years, and now, finally, the class was dismissed.

Chapter 2

When Sylvester woke up on the sofa, the morning light was already bright outside.