Vows Beneath The Moon Clown Chapter 08
Half a year later, I resigned from my old job.
Lucia Bennett introduced me to a security intelligence company, where I worked in evidence preservation operations.
She said that because I had been hurt, I understood better than anyone how helpless ordinary people could be when facing power.
I started from zero.
Overtime. Business trips. Client meetings.
Once I became busy, many things stopped coming back so often.
Sometimes, late at night, when I passed near Luna Park, I would still remember the smell of hot chocolate and the heat of the asphalt that day.
But it was only memory.
It no longer hurt.
A year later, my father’s condition stabilized, and my brother entered graduate school successfully.
I finally moved out of that old cheap apartment.
On moving day, I found an old photo album deep in a drawer.
There was only one photo of Adrian and me.
It was taken on the day we registered our marriage.
He stood far away from me, smiling politely and distantly.
Back then, I thought he was merely afraid.
Now I understood that whether someone loves you is often written in the distance between you from the very beginning.
I tore the photo apart and threw it into a trash bag.
I was not sad.
I only felt it was finally over.
Later, I heard Adrian was not doing well.
Before Veronica went to federal prison, she had a paternity test done.
The child was indeed biologically hers.
But the De Luca family refused to acknowledge her.
Adrian carried a huge burden of compensation and rented a place on the outskirts of the city with the child. He survived by working as an assistant for psychology courses at a training center.
He used to fear anyone mentioning “intimacy trauma.”
Now he had to stand in classrooms every day and teach trust, boundaries, and honesty.
How ironic.
Once, after work, I saw him downstairs from my company.
He wore a faded coat and held the child’s hand.
The girl had grown taller. When she saw me, she timidly hid behind him.
Adrian’s eyes reddened the moment he saw me.
“Ava.”
I stopped.
He asked carefully, “Can we talk for a minute?”
I looked at the time.
“No.”
His face stiffened.
“I just wanted to apologize. I used to think you would never leave me, so I hurt you again and again. Later, I realized the only person who was truly good to me was you.”
I looked at him calmly.
If those words had come five years earlier, one sorry from him might have kept me awake all night.
But now, I only found them noisy.
“Adrian, you haven’t realized you were wrong.”
I said, “You only discovered that Veronica can’t be relied on, while I used to be easy to hurt.”
Tears fell from his eyes.
“No, that’s not true. I really…”
“Stop.”
I interrupted him.
“Whether your life is good or bad from now on has nothing to do with me.”
The child suddenly tugged his hand.
“Daddy, let’s go home.”
Adrian looked down at her, then back up at me.
In that instant, he seemed to finally understand that I would never turn back.
He choked out, “Ava, I hope you’ll be happy.”
I nodded.
“I will.”
Then I walked past him.
I did not stop.
I did not look back.