{"id":255215,"date":"2026-07-13T04:07:31","date_gmt":"2026-07-13T01:07:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/1kitap1.com\/en\/breaking-us-sue-ellen-bailey\/"},"modified":"2026-07-13T04:07:31","modified_gmt":"2026-07-13T01:07:31","slug":"breaking-us-sue-ellen-bailey","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/1kitap1.com\/en\/breaking-us-sue-ellen-bailey\/","title":{"rendered":"Breaking Us – Sue Ellen Bailey"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The image stopped Mark cold. Chrissy, all grown, in a white dress, smiling at some young man waiting at the altar. “Now imagine a few years later,” Jeremy continued. “They have children, a home, a life together. But the young man\u2014your son-in-law\u2014decides it’s too much. He feels married life is cramping his style. He decides he’s fallen out of love with your daughter and begins to share the best parts of himself with someone else. Chrissy is left to pick up the pieces.”<\/p>\n

A bitter tang crept up Mark’s that. Against his will, he saw Chrissy’s face streaked with tears, her shoulders shaking while that fool\u2014her husband\u2014tore her heart apart. He saw the imbecile standing across the kitchen from his beautiful daughter, the vile words spewing from his mouth, I don’t know if I love you anymore…I have feelings for someone else… His face burned, ears buzzing. He dug his fingernails into the paper coffee cup just to keep his hands from shaking.<\/p>\n

Mark stared into space, “I messed up so bad. What do I do now? How do I fix it?” Jeremy let the question hang a moment before answering. “Fix it? What do you mean by that\u2014wishing you could rewind, pretend the affair never happened?” Mark flinched at the bluntness. “Yeah, I guess. I want to go back to before I blew up my marriage.”<\/p>\n

Jeremy gave a small, knowing smile. “You realize that’s a childish wish, right? Like shattering your mother’s vase and hoping it will magically piece itself back together so you don’t have to face the consequences.” When Mark only looked down at his cup, Jeremy went on. “Saving your marriage is a worthy goal, but that’s not entirely up to you.<\/p>\n

What is up to you is who you’re going to be from here forward. You said it’s over with the other woman. Then end it completely. Don’t slip away quietly\u2014face it like a man. And then start the harder work\u2014becoming the kind of man you’d want for your daughter.” Mark sat frozen, the coffee cooling between his hands. Jeremy rose and slipped a card from his pocket, placing it on the table. “I do some counseling here.<\/p>\n

If you ever want to talk more, call me.”<\/p>\n

\n

Tessa finally sank into a chair, her legs aching after the blur of the morning. She had packed lunches, signed permission slips, braided Chrissy’s hair, found Michael’s missing shoes, and coaxed Luke into eating more than two bites of toast. Now the aftermath was scattered around her–Luke’s backpack forgotten by the back door, Chrissy’s hairbrush abandoned beside the cereal box, Michael’s jacket hanging crooked on a chair.<\/p>\n

The rush was over, but it had left its debris\u2014and a silence that felt heavier than the house itself. Mark had left before she was even out of bed. She’d heard the low murmur of his voice in the hallway \u2014 a quick phone call, probably to his office \u2014 and then the click of the front door.<\/p>\n

No kiss, no “Have a good day.” Not anymore. She stared into her coffee, trying to remember the last time they’d really talked about something that wasn’t bills, school schedules, or what time he’d be home. Even the nights when he did come home before the kids were asleep, he seemed half somewhere else, eyes on his phone or still carrying the day’s work in his shoulders. She knew that work had been stressful for him lately, that there was a big project that had been keeping him late. She loved him with all her heart, and knew he loved her too.<\/p>\n

They would get through this, as they had so many other obstacles. She felt so lucky to have built this life together. Her mind drifted back to seventeen, to a sticky July night when she and Mark had sat on the hood of his beat-up Ford in the empty school parking lot, their fingers tangled, the stars sharp above them.<\/p>\n

He’d told her then \u2014 with that lopsided grin that used to undo her completely \u2014 that someday, they’d get married. “Not right away,” he’d said. “We’ll finish school, travel a little, figure out what we want to be. But it’ll always be you, Tessa. Always.” They hadn’t planned on the two pink lines that showed up a year later.<\/p>\n

She was barely eighteen, he’d just turned nineteen, and suddenly “someday” became a courthouse wedding and a rented one-bedroom apartment.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

This is a short excerpt from the opening of “” by Unknown, quoted for review and introduction purposes. All rights belong to the copyright holders.<\/em><\/p>\n

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