Phoenix ✔️

Chapter 25: No Excuses

Thankfully, I'm not the only one that's itching to be told the truth. Ash looks like he is dying to tell me Colin's motives, as if it's the only way that he can make up for his lack of involvement in my life during my marriage.

I'm just staring at Ash, as I'm waiting for him to open his mouth and tell me the tale of Colin's life. I put my hands on the table, and look at him. Right when Ash opens his mouth, the smell of hot, Middle Eastern food wafts throughout the work place, and into our nostrils. I relax a little bit at the comforting smell, while Ash sighs.

"Well, that interrupts this whole process. I'll tell you it as we get some food," Ash promises as we get up. I nod, as we walk towards the smell of hot, spicy, welcoming food that is just calling my name.

As we walk, Ash starts to tell me the story like a grandmother telling her young granddaughter a cute little fairy tale. "Okay, we'll go back to when Colin and I were kids. We were best friends, and literally attached to each other since day 1, which makes sense, because Colin's my twin," Ash starts off, and already, I'm surprised. I didn't expect for Colin and Ash to be so close as kids, considering that Colin always treated him like the murderer of his child.

"You guys were close?" I ask, and he nods.

"Yeah. We were attached to the hip as kids. But anyways, we always did everything together. We were so close, especially with our two sisters." We reach the table with the food laid out. This time, I'm really surprised. Colin has sisters? Since when?

I've never even heard the mention of a sister from either Colin, Ash, or Mark, as a matter of fact. Plus, considering Colin's misogynistic tendencies, how did he even treat his sisters? I don't want to even know. They're probably hiding from the monster I used to call my husband.

"Wait, hold it. You have sisters? Since when? I've never heard about a sister from you, Colin, or his friends. You never brought them up in our conversations. This is all news to me." I put a few pieces of manakeesh on my plate.

Ash chuckles a little bit, as he spoons some ful meddamas on his plate. "Yeah, I know it's a shock, considering everything you told me about him being incredibly sexist. But yes, I do have sisters. I have two sisters, Emily and Isabella, but we call her Isa at home. Colin is incredibly estranged from them, however. I think the last time they spoke was when Colin was 16, and he's 24 now. Mind you, that wasn't even a full fledged conversation. It was just some small talk. If I brought them up during our conversations, my dad or Colin would've overheard, and it would've gotten messy either way, because of their relationship."

I serve myself some tabbouleh and kofta. Ash serves himself some tabbouleh and quwarma al dajaj. "But anyways, back to the story. We were all really close, until our parents divorced. My dad took the custody of my sisters, and my mom took custody of us. Colin and I just turned 11, and Emily and Isa were 8 and 6, respectively. Not even one and a half years after that, my mom died from glioblastoma multiforme, which is a really aggressive form of brain cancer. Three months before she died, she found out it was too far gone to do anything, and we all knew she was going to die. The divorce drove the first crack in the family relationship, and her death was the final crack that changed Colin forever. My parents barely spoke to each other after the divorce, and Colin was angry at my dad because he did nothing to try and help our mom when she was dying of cancer. He hated my sisters a little bit because of the fact that my dad took custody of them. Colin was absolutely devoted to our mother. We loved her a lot, and after her death, Colin became angry and bitter. He hated everyone in the family, but he made a small exception for me. It was a hard blow on the family. Everyone was affected deeply by my mom's death," Ash tells me, and slowly, my heart breaks.