ANGELA

“Hello? Mom! Mom, please talk to me!” I screamed into the phone as Ethan and his family gathered around me with concerned looks on their faces.

“Angela, I think your father just had a heart attack!” she screamed out, instructing someone to carry him into the car.

“Oh, my God!” The tears of happiness that were in my eyes came falling, horror enveloping me. “Which hospital are you taking him to?”

“Lucia Hospital, the usual one for our family.” She hung up before I could make further enquiries.

Everything started to come down as I looked at Ethan, and he looked back at me. I had just been a main factor to my father having a heart attack, and I didn’t think I would forgive myself if it escalated to something way worse or if he didn’t survive it.

“What’s going on? Who’s being taken to the hospital?” Ethan asked as I pushed my way through them and ran out of the chapel to get a taxi.

“Angela, please talk to us,” Reuben said calmly.

“My father… He had a heart attack after I told him that I was married to Ethan,” I cried, my frustration shooting through the sky as I couldn’t find a taxi that wasn’t occupied.

“Oh, that’s terrible. Let’s all go, then,” Natalia suggested.

“No!” I yelled as I turned to them, shaking my head.

They couldn’t afford to go with me to the hospital. If anything, it would only make things worse, and I feared that there would be no reconciliation between both families if an ugly encounter happened.

“I’ll go by myself. I’ll be fine,” I assured, finally flagging down a taxi and getting into the backseat.

I saw Ethan approach the taxi as if he wanted to join me in the backseat, but I shook my head at him, and he took the hint, stopping and letting me go alone.

~

“What were you thinking?!” Mom grabbed me by the arms and shook me back and forth with aggression and a wild look in her bloodshot eyes.

“How did you think this would work out for you, Angela? What did you think you were doing when you made that stupid call and told your father something like that after he had been going through a lot of stress the night before while looking for you?!”

“I didn’t know, Mom, you’re hurting me,” I informed her, causing her to let me go.

“Please just tell me you didn’t do it. When I heard you over the phone, I didn’t believe that you could…” She paused, looking down at the white sundress I was wearing and shaking her head in disbelief. “You wouldn’t, Angela. Not after what he said he would do if you ever got married to that man.”

“He wouldn’t disown his own daughter, Mom.” I waved her off, hoping that I was right about that, especially with a father that kept his word ninety-nine percent of the time.

Mom shook her head, mumbling something I couldn’t catch to herself and sitting down with me in the waiting room.

Sometimes, I would text Ethan to let him know that nothing much was happening. Other times, I would catch my mother looking at me when she thought I wasn’t looking, and she had a worried expression on her face.

“Mrs. Diaz,” the doctor called as he got to the waiting room, making me and my mother to stand up and walk up to him.

“How is he?” Mom enquired.

“He’s awake now, stabilized. He wants to see you,” the doctor said.

I followed behind my mother, not quite sure about going into the room where Dad was. I took a deep breath as Mom opened the door, and I walked in with her to find Dad sitting up on the bed.

His eyes hardened as he saw me.

“I thought you wouldn’t come,” he said to me.

“How couldn’t I? I was worried,” I admitted.

“Let me know that what you said over the phone was not true. You wouldn’t go behind our backs to get married to that boy.”

I didn’t want to get into an argument with him, especially when he was sitting on a hospital bed, but I really wanted to know what he held against Ethan and his family, aside the fact that they didn’t have a solid reputation.

“Ethan loves me,” I simply told him, taking fistfuls of my dress and trying to control my tears. “I will do anything for him, and he will do the same.”

Dad only shook his head.

“I want you out of here,” he said. “Since you’re already married and have decided to have it your way, just leave.”

I wanted to protest and tell him that he was being unfair.

“Dad, this isn’t right,” I told him, clenching my fists. “You can’t just leave me all alone in this.”

“You got married alone, so face it alone. From now on, I have ceased being your father. You are no longer my heir, and I have no connections with you unless you decide to get divorced before it’s too late.”

I looked at my mother, expecting her to stand up for me this one time and tell him that his decision was unfair to everyone involved, but she looked at me with her tear-stricken face and broke my heart to a million more pieces than it already was.

“Just do it, Angela. Go. If you want to come back, get a divorce,” she said.

I shook my head, hesitantly leaving the hospital and taking a taxi to the house, where I started to pack my bags with thoughts of disbelief clouding my mind every minute. How could he just toss me aside because I got married to the man I loved? That made no sense whatsoever!

I sighed, taking the two bags I had managed to pack and head for the Ambroses’. Whenever I could, and if I wanted to, I would go back and take the rest of my stuff, but I needed to be out of that house as soon as possible.

“Are you alright, my love?” Ethan asked me as soon as he saw me in the living room, pulling me to his chest in a hug.

The dam finally broke and tears flooded my face as I cried in his arms, holding on to his shirt.

“I… I really thought this would work out, Ethan,” I sobbed as his parents joined us, asking what was happening and if my father was doing okay.

“What does that mean, Angela? Tell me what went wrong. Maybe we can do something to help. Just tell us your father is okay, at least,” Ethan said.

“He is. My father is fine. It’s just… He disowned me because of this, and now, there’s nothing left of our relationship but fragments.”

I felt Ethan stiffen against me at my announcement, and I pulled away to see that he was staring at me with a frown that I didn’t know how to interpret. I looked at his parents, and they all had the same looks on their faces.

Right then, my stomach lurched, and I almost puked.

Something had just changed, but I didn’t want to know what it was.

Just when I was about to ask what was wrong, Ethan took two steps and stared at me with a cold expression on his face as he asked: “What do you mean by that?”