Goodbye, Mr. Regret

"Love or not, I can't say for sure. But what I do know is-there's no way things will work out between you two."

The phone call left Timothy with a heavy heart.

He'd always thought Yates was on his side, speaking up for him, maybe even knowing Jessica was Salome, understanding that he didn't want a divorce, and trying to help him out.

Turns out, he'd gotten it all backwards.

"So," Timothy shot back, "if I can't be with her, you think you can?"

He might be miserable, but he wasn't about to lose his nerve.

His words hit Yates where it hurt, though to be fair, Yates hadn't exactly been a paragon of virtue himself. Back when he didn't know Jessica was Salome, he hadn't made Timothy's life hell the way Vince had.

That much, at least, was true.

"My chances are better than yours, Timothy. You're the one who burned this marriage to the ground. There's no going back."

"Spare me the lecture."

He knew. Of course he knew. But knowing didn't help he didn't want Jessica to leave, yet he couldn't find any way to make her stay.

"I'll say just one thing. There's one thing you did that's truly unforgivable, do you realize that? Today, she showed up in front of Mrs. Zimmerman, and Mrs. Zimmerman recognized her instantly. All I could think was—if you'd introduced her to people, just once in your seven years of marriage, the Zimmermans wouldn't have spent all these years not knowing she was Salome."

Yates' words cut deep.

She really was recognized at a glance?

He almost laughed at himself. All this time, he'd been fantasizing about removing her birthmark.

"What's worse," Yates pressed, "is that even after you found out, you kept it from the Zimmerman family. Tell me, Timothy-when did you know? Was it when Vince told you about the birthmark?"

The call ended abruptly.

snapped his phone

was a weight pressing down on his

when Vince first mentioned

and Jessica

But he hadn't.

himself it was

one year's difference meant

from his wounds was sharper, it could drown out the

found himself longing

for those quiet,

heir of the Lawson Group. His father, never particularly capable, had remarried and started a new family. His grandfather was eager to raise him, and his father was only too happy to

Timothy had lived under immense

endless schooling, then, as he grew

marrying Jessica that he learned what a home could

place he

their most intimate moments seemed to unravel every knot inside him. Sometimes,

if you let yourself get too comfortable,

understood something deeply: when you finally get what you've always longed for, you start to care, you start to

it, the pain

kept his distance, tried to run from it

now he was learning

been out on a mountainside with clients, negotiating a deal, and went for an early morning walk. As he wandered, he came upon an old chapel. They went

was giving a sermon on the first truth Christ preached after his

of three kinds of suffering: suffering from change, suffering from pain, and suffering from

of pain-he remembered. The priest listed eight great pains of human life: birth, aging, sickness, death, wanting and not having, separation from loved ones, dealing with resentment,

Everyone goes through birth, aging, sickness, and death. As for the rest-never. Those were things that happened to other

them-wanting and not having, and being separated from someone he

chapel, the priest had said all suffering could be