21-HOURS COUNTDOWN ; BEFORE I DIED, I SET HIM FREE

“I don’t love Selena anymore. Now that I see her, all I see is her broken shell. A barren woman who can't conceive after ten miscarriages and five failed IVFs.”

The words were a jagged blade, slicing through the thin veil of my reality. I stood frozen in the hallway, the shadows of our home suddenly feeling like a tomb. Those were the exact words I had overheard Franklin say to his friend in the study.

I had stumbled backward, my hand flying to my mouth to stifle a sob. My knees buckled, nearly meeting the floor.

“I’m so sick and tired of playing the doting, understanding husband,” he continued, his voice heavy with a resentment I never knew he possessed. “When all I want is to be free of her. I want a divorce.”

I had crumbled then, sinking into a heap on the floor, my heart shattering like a dropped crystal. For days, I had lived in a state of mourning, trying to convince myself I had misheard him, that the man I loved wasn't a stranger wearing my husband's face.

I closed my eyes, and for a moment, I was back at the beginning.

I remembered the awkward nerd I used to be, an intern at the Bieber Company's R&D department.

Back then, I’d been a complete disaster—clumsy, breaking equipment, and constantly red-faced. My supervisor yelled, but he never mistreated me even when I deserved it. We'd work late trying to fix what I destroyed and nothing wrong happened.

Well not until I got cornered by some thugs and got almost raped. I was shivering from terror when he stepped in.

Franklin.

He had appeared like a knight from a storybook, saving me, and when he saw how scared I was, he offered to take me home. That was the first time I met him and even then he was so gentle with me.

When he joined the company as an intern the next day to learn the ropes of his family's empire, we clicked.

He became my anchor. He taught me and shielded me

I became less clumsy and more profiled and along the line, I caught feelings for him.

I’d thought it was one-sided until he got down on his knees on my last day of internship and asked me to be his girlfriend.

I'd be over the moon as I screamed yes and a year later on my graduation, he proposed marriage.

I grew up in an orphanage and never had a real family of my own. So, when I screamed "yes" on my graduation day, I knew I wasn't just marrying a man; I was gaining a family. And even though I was scared at first, his family loved me and treated me like they'd treat their daughter.

On our wedding night, I gave him my virginity and weeks later, I conceived.

Everything was going fine, life was perfect, well…not until my first miscarriage. Then the second…third, by the tenth, the light in our home had dimmed to a flicker.

We tried IVF five times—five cycles of hope followed by the crushing weight of failure. Four good years of trying to make a baby and through it all, Franklin never raised his voice. He never looked at me with anything but pity.

I thought it was love.

I was wrong.

Two months ago, I had gone to the hospital to inquire if we could try other options. The doctor hadn't given me a response but Instead, he gave me a death sentence.

“You've got two months left to live, you got stage four cancer. I'm sorry, but there's no cure for it, we can only offer meds to suppress the pain.”

My legs felt so weak, I requested another test. I'd cried my lungs out, scared of death.

I rushed home that day, desperate to collapse into Franklin’s arms and tell him I was dying, only to hear him confessing that he wished I was gone.

The door suddenly creaked open, the sound dragging me back to the present as my gaze moved to the ticking clock.

1:00am

Franklin walked into the bedroom, his expression grim and exhausted. For the past week, he had come home late with the faint, floral scent of a woman’s cologne always clinging to his skin. I never asked him about it.

If he was seeing someone else, perhaps it was a mercy. He would have someone to hold him when I was in the ground.

"You're late," I whispered, my voice sounding hollow even to my own ears.

He tensed, his shoulders locking as he avoided my gaze.

He didn't reply.

I stood up, my body aching with the secret of the tumors growing inside me, and reached for his suitcase and moved to help him with his jacket afterwards,like I did normally.

"I'll microwave some dinner for you," I said softly.

"Let's get a divorce, Selena."

I stopped dead.

The jacket slipped from my fingers, hitting the floor with a soft thud. My chest constricted, a familiar, agonizing pressure building behind my ribs.

I had practiced this moment in my head for sixty days. I had imagined him saying the words, and had prepared my heart for the impact, yet I was still tearing apart from the inside out.

Franklin moved toward me, his hands shaking as he reached out to wipe the tears I didn't even realize were falling.

"I'm sorry," he choked out, his voice cracking. "It’s not you, Selena. You aren’t the problem…I am.”

"I’ve hurt you, and I deserve your wrath, but I’m doing what’s best for…for both of us."

He looked at me with such feigned remorse that I almost laughed.

I forced a nod, swallowing the taste of grief. "Okay," I muttered. "I agree with the divorce."

His relief was palpable, a sickening wave of it rolling off him.

"But," I added, grabbing the lapels of his shirt, looking into the eyes of the boy who had once saved me from a monster.

"Before I sign... I want to relieve our life together. One last time.”

"Spend the next twenty-one hours with me…Just be my boyfriend again. The boy who loved me to death."

Franklin’s eyes welled with real tears this time, a flash of the man I used to know flickering in the depths. He nodded slowly, his forehead resting against mine.

"Okay, let's do it," he croaked. I closed my eyes, leaning into his warmth.

He didn't know that in twenty-four hours,

I wouldn't just be leaving the marriage. I would be leaving this word.

I would be leaving everything.