A Nameless Chapter

As soon as Oriel came inside the living room of her small house, she found Bella to be sitting on a couch, having a slice of cake along with wine in a plastic cup. Bella saw her standing at the door and raised her glass in the air.

"Celebration! the day has brought my heart to peace when an arrogant fish is choking on its own little bone." She got up all tipsy from the couch and went closer to Oriel while dancing and singing in glee.

"What is all this?" demanded Oriel.

"I just felt like celebrating this wonderful day with a little wine, I know you can't tell it through this plastic cup but it is filled with some premium stuff inside. I couldn't help myself but spend all my money to buy this when I heard from our neighbors about what happened at school today," Bella ridiculed her.

"Your money? you mean the money that I give you as allowance from the salary that I work hard for... you spend that money to buy premium wine, just to celebrate the day I almost went to jail?" asked Oriel.

Bella put the glass in her down on the top of the shoe cabinet near the main door. "Wait a minute! you just made it sound like I am leeching off you. But in reality it's just something that you must do in order to make up for what you did to my son. His life was completely ruined by you... not just his, my whole family was ruined when your feet fell in my family. What you have taken from me can never be compensated by that petty allowance."

"I have similar words to use but I am too tired to reason with you right now. I would rather spare you some money till the day you die. Enjoy your party!" she said and brushed her shoulder with Bella's as she stormed inside her room.

Bella picked up the glass again. She turned some music on and started dancing and singing along with the music. "La la la la..."

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Mr. Bruce's residence.

The car driven by Collin stopped at the entrance of the colossal mansion that Mr. Bruce lived in with his wife. "No need to create a scene over this. You guys should talk it out with peace," Collin advised him.

"I just can't have a normal talk with her. She is a psycho. How am a I supposed to reason with that delusional crazy person?" said Mr. Bruce.

A moment of silent was observed inside the car. Mr. Bruce lifted his head and said, "since when did it turn it out like this?" He looked at the shiny platinum ring that he had on his ring finger. He gently grazed the surface of the ring and stared in at it morosely. "We used be in love. So much that we couldn't stay away even for a day. And now I just hate to be around her."

Collin was exhausted and couldn't spend another second listening to him lamenting about his life. It was a part of his work and he despised doing it the most. "It's going to be fine. Just go inside and talk to her," said Collin.

"Alright, I will go. You must be tired of listening to the same story everyday. Go ahead my boy, and there's no need to come tomorrow. It must have been a while since you slept in late. So..."

Collin didn't let him complete and raised the glass of the window, while mouthing something that clearly showed his frustration. He started the engine and left the place in no time. "That jerk, you better not be cursing me inside my car," Mr. Bruce shouted from behind.

He turned to the main door of the mansion, and a sigh departed his mouth. He was reluctant to step inside. Not because he was afraid of his wife but because he couldn't see this relationship deteriorating further. "Why did it have to be like this? he mouthed.

Mr. Bruce and Ursula had been an ideal couple. The love between the only daughter of a conglomerate and a drug mafia was the talk of the town some five years ago. They had everything... power, money and love. However what their little world lacked was a completed family, which was longed by Ursula the most.

Her withering youth and disappointed faces of numerous doctors played a part in increasing her insecurities. Bruce's indifference on the matter further created problems between them. Her changed behavior started to bother him and delusions about her husband started to rise. Now it had reached to a point where they couldn't be in a room without arguing with each other.

The moment he entered in, he found the hall to be empty. An unusual silence surrounded his place. Not even a maid was visibly present. He called out, "Ursula!"

Nothing came back. He again shouted in his voice, "Honey! where are you?"

He walked further and checked every room while continuously calling her name. "Looks like she isn't home!"

A huge window was right beside where he stood. The entire view of his backyard was visible. A burning bonfire in middle of his backyard during the night caught his attention. He found all the maids surrounding the fire and Ursula standing beside it, She was holding a photo album in her hands. She removed the photos from the album one by one and threw them in the fire.

Photographs of their grand wedding ceremony, their seventh marriage anniversary that they celebrated in Panama Hawaii and also the pictures from the time they were dating; Ursula didn't even look at them before putting them into burning fire.

Bruce saw all this and hurried downstairs to stop her from doing so. He rushed to the backyard. Meanwhile, the maids that surrounded the fire and Ursula started to whisper in the ears of one another. "I'm starting to get scared of her now. She is completely crazy. Before these photographs, she had burnt all the dresses and shoes that our master brought for her."

Bruce came running to her and took the remaining photographs from her hands. "What the hell are you doing? Have you gone crazy?"

Another maid came following him with a bucket filled water and poured it on the fire at the order of Mr. Bruce.

"How dare you?" yelled Ursula.

As the fire extinguished with a sudden release of vapor in the air, the photos that were half burnt lay on the ground with scorch marks on all four sides. "These just some waste pieces of paper and I felt like getting rid of the waste today. Why are you overreacting?"

"You call these waste?" Mr. Bruce emphasized.

"Yup! just useless sheets of glossy paper."

Mr. Bruce collected the pieces from the ground and put them back in the album, closing it with a loud thud. "Why are you acting this way?" he asked.

"Do you not know that yourself? you really want me to say it aloud to you?" she took a step closer to him. "My husband is having an affair outside, how would you have reacted if you were in my place?"