A Call That Changed Her Entire Life

Magee had never triumphed over Jacob in their long-running rivalry, be it business or private life. Now he had been gifted with an opportunity of a lifetime. For the very first time in his life, he had the chance to best Jacob and he would be a fool to let go of this golden chance.

Magee knew that he was taking advantage of his privilege as Jacob was in an unfavorable position. But he couldn't allow such a great opportunity to slip through his fingers. If he didn't take his revenge now for all the humiliation Jacob had subjected him to, he would regret it for the rest of his life when Jacob would regain his memory.

The commotion in the front yard caught Emily's attention. She rushed out from her room when she sensed that something was wrong. What she saw when she entered shocked her: overturned table, broken teapots, water spilled all over the floor and broken fragments scattered around.

"What the hell happened here? Did you two have a fight?" Emily was desperately scrambling to make sense of it all.

Meanwhile, Jacob and Magee had their eyes locked at each other, desperately demanding a release in the form of a fight. Silence enveloped the room, as neither uttered a word to Emily.

Their eyes fashioned like sharp knives, begging to draw first blood.

Emily walked to Jacob's side and held his hands, hoping to ease his anger. She asked Jacob gently, "What happened? Tell me. I am worried about you."

"It's not a big deal." Jacob stopped short. His eyes were still spitting flames of fury, but his tone softened when he spoke to Emily.

Having realized Emily's disquiet at their dispute, Magee shrugged his shoulders and said to her, "Well, I am afraid Jacob and I will have to call an end to our personal squabble. Don't worry, Emily. It's really nothing. I just rubbed him the wrong way."

"Get out of the house now!" Jacob said to Magee coldly.

Although Emily had no idea of how things ended up this way, she was going to be on Jacob's side no matter what had happened. "Maybe this isn't the right time for you two to continue talking. Why not give each other some time to calm down and talk it out another day?" she said to Magee, trying to mediate the dispute between them.

Magee regretted the fact that he wasn't able to seize the opportunity to settle the score with Jacob, but he knew it well that he was the first to instigate the fight and overdoing it could come back to bite him someday. He nodded in agreement to Emily and said, "Okay. We will talk it out later."

Then Magee turned around and walked out of the room.

Jacob looked at the mess around him and then bent down to clean the broken fragments on the ground silently, falling into his own thoughts. Suddenly, a sharp pain shot up his hand. All the while, he failed to notice that a broken shard of porcelain had left a big cut in his palm from which blood was gushing out profusely.

Looking at the blood dripping down Jacob's hand, Emily turned to him with a frown and persuaded him, "Jacob, that's a big cut. Leave these fragments now. I will help you to clean the cut."

bleeding hand as though he hadn't heard what she

to stop him by holding his wounded hand. "Can't you hear me? I am asking you to stop. If you carry on

didn't want Emily to get hurt by the

about his wound, but on the other, she was frustrated by his stubborn attitude and carelessness. "Come here. Let me clean the cut for you," she insisted.

tightly and didn't respond to her. He picked up a piece of cloth from the floor and roughly wrapped it around his cut and then went on to decoct the

was giving her

a "cold war"

to deserve such a treatment. Any misunderstanding between them could

everything bottled inside and refused to speak his mind which made things harder for the

Jacob would handle things in the past. Had this been in the past, he would have

with their conflicts in his own way: direct, quick and decisive.

It was the source of a potential difficulty and discord between them, which far from solving

behind him behaving like that was that he didn't know how to

had left, but his words were still lingering in Jacob's mind, haunting

Jacob felt insecure about the fact that every time Emily looked at him she was looking at his past

though the man

a relationship with Emily, he was more envious of the man

to know which one Emily loved now. His inner demons had created an identity crisis and an inferiority complex vis-a-vis to himself.

facing Emily, ergo the root cause of the "cold

in the room silently. No word. No eye contact. They were both

day passed slowly and dreadfully.

lay in bed sleeplessly, tossing and turning, unable to keep out the thoughts

the

we can't talk this out like we used to! This feels so silly.'

memory loss? Or did he fall