"So, what was that supposed to mean?" Ryan blurted out in a sharp tone, glaring hard at Anne. "That you want a share in it as well?" Ryan thought he heard wrong, that supposed to be a statement from her at all? He doubts that she is in her right senses at the moment.
"You heard me right, Ryan." Anne fielded his question with a sarcastic reply, her arms folded across her chest as she dramatically moves her left leg, tapping it continuously on the hard marbled floor.
Ryan sighed under his breath, trying his possible best to tame his uprising anger. "You have all you want from me, Anne, even though."
Anne quickly cut him off abruptly, giving him no chance to complete his words. "No everything, I did not have of all the things I wanted from you, Ryan." She told him, returning the same vibe as his; her voice was as hard as his. "Stop making it look like you gave me your life span in the process of having all I want from you."
In as much as she sounded far from the kind of sensible person he knows her as, he still finds her words ridiculously funny, like she just cracked a lame joke.
Ryan couldn't help but gave out a sarcastic loud yet a short and quick laughter. "You want my lifespan as well?" He muttered, taming the urge to give out yet another sarcastic laughter of his. "Because you want all I ever have in possession, I should give you my life span as well, eh?"
"I wish I can as well take that from you." Her reply was quick and short, her tone was as hard as steel as well. "Too bad, it almost as useless to me as you are -I'll never make a good use out of it, and you know that, Ryan."
Ryan had tolerated all sort of ill-mannered attitude and pain stricken words from her, but not to this extent. Did she just classify him as useless, eh? Ryan felt like he just got smacked in his guts directly, it really hurt so hard to be called useless.
Ryan had been studying her for the past few months and realized she was far from the Anne he used to love -the word 'used to' is the perfect description of whatever he did feel for her, it was all in the past now.
"What do you want this time around, Anne?" He finally said after several moments of awkward silence between them. "As you can see, I'm sick and tired of your nonstop drama every day. I'm drained of whatever energy I have left in me."
"You know what I want, Ryan, just give it and quit this baseless talks of yours." She told him in reply, her voice far from friendly. "I'm also sick and tired of having a conversation with you, just so you don't know."
"You of all people know how broken I am currently, I can't give you that you've asked for." He muttered, almost not recognizing his voice. "I have no good amount on me to boast as mine, where do I get such a huge amount from for you?"
"Are you suddenly complaining now, Ryan?" Her voice was suddenly rising to it peak. "You dare not, you dare not complain -not when I'm trying to be considerate with you."
"How did you call this considerate? Extorting thousands of dollars from me daily is what you call considerate?" He questioned, flaring up in anger. "Is that how considerate is being defined to you?"
His business was collapsing and his company on multiple loans all for Anne, she has been extorting from him without thinking twice about and whatever effect it would have on him. He knew better than anyone that she never cared about it, he was the one to suffer the effects and not her.
Ryan was tempted by the idea of divorce, but was afraid to make the same lame as of the past that won't stop haunting him now. Even though Anne had proved to be a huge pain in his neck, he couldn't make the same mistake twice.
-in addition, his mother had warned him against such an idea. She had asked him to face whatever consequences that come with forcefully getting married to Anne without anyone's approval from the family.
"... You asked for this, the very day you decided it's the best you go against my words and teaching..." She had told him on that fateful evening. "I warned you enough, but you felt like you were old enough to make the right decision for yourself without me. Anne made it look like I'm the villain in your heroic love story, face it head on, Son -that is your cross, you have to carry it-"
"...But, mom, you can't watch your only son become the shadow of himself. Can you?" He protested in opposition to her theory, finding it unpleasing to him.
"I can't watch you drag the family's name into the mud all for your silly decisions you made when you had enough time to think it twice..." She told him. "Who would want to make a business proposal with a man who finds it hard to manage his family? Who felt facing little problem in his marriage could only be solved with the choice of multiple divorce?"
In as much as he hated to admit the bitter truth, he knew his mother was right. He had a divorce not more than three years before, should he have another one? Truly, such news would come out dirty in the public and ruin his business career.
That was his only source of sanity, he couldn't sacrifice it all for being free from Anne's nonstop escapades and drama. He had to sacrifice one for the other to be stable -his only best choice was sacrificing his happiness for his business reputation to survive...