Updated Feb 23, 2026 • ~7 min read
POV: Celeste
They’re gone.
Dominic and that woman—Aurora, Rory, whatever—are gone.
And I’m alone in this hospital room screaming until my throat is raw.
A nurse tries to calm me.
I throw a water cup at the wall.
“Mrs. Ashford, please—”
“GET OUT!”
She leaves.
Dr. Hayes arrives five minutes later.
“Celeste. You need to calm down. Your heart rate is dangerously elevated.”
“My husband MARRIED SOMEONE ELSE. While I was in a COMA. And you want me to calm down?”
“I understand you’re upset—”
“Upset? I’m not UPSET. I’m DESTROYED.”
I’m crying again. Can’t stop crying.
Five years.
I lost five years of my life and my husband moved on with someone else.
Someone younger. Prettier. Not broken.
“He loves her,” I sob. “He actually loves her.”
“I’m sorry.”
“You KNEW. Didn’t you? When I woke up, you knew he’d moved on.”
Dr. Hayes doesn’t deny it.
“We were trying to protect you. Ease you into the truth.”
“By lying?”
“By not overwhelming you immediately. You’d just woken up from five years unconscious. Learning everything at once—”
“Would have hurt less than THIS. Finding out from HER. Seeing her wearing a wedding ring. MY ring. The same style I have.”
I look at my left hand.
The ring is still there. Thinner. Looser after five years of weight loss.
But still there.
Still proof that I’m his wife.
“I want to see a lawyer,” I say.
“What?”
“A lawyer. I have legal rights. That marriage—his marriage to her—it’s not valid. Right? We never divorced. I’m still his wife.”
Dr. Hayes hesitates.
“That’s a question for a lawyer, not a doctor.”
“Then get me one.”
“Celeste—”
“GET ME A LAWYER.”
Nina arrives two hours later.
My best friend. The woman who’s been visiting me every week for five years even when I couldn’t respond.
She rushes in and hugs me carefully.
“I heard. Oh my God, I heard. Are you okay?”
“No.”
She pulls up a chair.
“Tell me everything.”
I do. The whole awful story.
Dominic moving on. Marrying Aurora. Building a life while I was unconscious.
Nina’s face goes through shock, rage, sympathy.
“That bastard,” she finally says.
“He thought I was dead.”
“You WEREN’T dead. You were HERE. And he just—he gave up on you.”
“The doctors said I’d never wake up.”
“But you DID wake up. Which means they were WRONG. And he should have waited. Should have believed.”
“Two years, Nina. He waited two years before dating. Is that reasonable?”
“No. You wait FOREVER. You made VOWS.”
Part of me agrees.
Part of me knows two years is actually a long time to grieve.
But I don’t want to be reasonable. I want to be angry.
Anger is easier than grief.
“I want to fight,” I tell Nina. “Legally. I want my marriage back.”
“Good. You should fight. He’s YOUR husband.”
“But he loves her.”
“So what? Love isn’t permanent. He loved YOU first. He married YOU first. She’s just… a placeholder. A rebound who got too serious.”
“She’s been with him for three years. For more than half my coma.”
“Doesn’t matter. You have legal standing. You’re the real wife.”
Real wife.
The words should feel empowering.
Instead, they feel hollow.
Because being the “real wife” doesn’t mean Dominic loves me.
It just means I have paperwork.
“What if I can’t win him back?” I whisper.
Nina takes my hand.
“Then you make him regret losing you. You fight for what’s yours. And if he chooses her, you make sure everyone knows what kind of man abandons his wife when she’s vulnerable.”
“That’s vindictive.”
“He was unfaithful. He deserves vindictive.”
“He thought I was dead.”
“Stop defending him!”
She’s right. I keep making excuses for him.
The doctors said there was no hope.
He grieved for two years.
He thought he’d lost me forever.
All valid excuses.
But they don’t change the fact that I’m his WIFE and he married someone else.
“I need to talk to a lawyer,” I say. “Find out my legal options.”
“I’ll help you. We’ll figure this out.”
“Thank you. For being here. For not giving up on me.”
“Never. You’re my best friend. We’ve been through everything together. I’m not letting some art teacher homewrecker steal your life.”
Art teacher. That’s what Aurora said she was.
Of course she’s an art teacher. Creative. Interesting. Probably quirky and fun.
Everything I’m not.
I was a dancer. Professional. Disciplined. Driven.
Was.
Past tense.
Because I can’t dance anymore. Can barely walk.
Five years in a coma destroyed my body.
Who would want this version of me?
Not Dominic, apparently.
“I need to see him again,” I say. “Alone. Without her.”
“Are you sure that’s a good idea?”
“No. But I need answers. Real answers. About what happens now.”
Nina nods.
“I’ll call him. Set it up.”
She pulls out her phone.
While she’s texting, I stare at my wedding ring.
Five years of marriage. Five years of coma. Ten years total with Dominic.
That has to count for something.
It has to.
Dominic arrives the next morning.
Alone.
He looks terrible. Like he didn’t sleep.
Good.
“Celeste.”
“Sit.”
He sits in the visitor chair.
We stare at each other.
“I’m sorry,” he finally says. “For everything. For how you found out. For—”
“Don’t apologize. I don’t want apologies. I want answers.”
“Okay.”
“Do you love her?”
“Yes.”
The word is a knife.
“More than you love me?”
“I love you differently. What we had—what we have—it’s history. It’s real. But it’s also the past. Rory is my present. My future.”
“Unless I fight for you.”
“Fight for me?”
“Legally. Our marriage is still valid. Hers isn’t. I could force an annulment of your marriage to her.”
“You could. But do you really want me that way? Forced to stay with you by legal obligation instead of choice?”
“You CHOSE me once. When you married me. Those vows still stand.”
“I thought you were dead.”
“But I’m NOT. I’m here. I’m alive. And I’m your WIFE.”
“Celeste—”
“Do you know what it’s like? To wake up and find out five years are gone? That your career is destroyed, your body doesn’t work, and your husband has moved on with someone else?”
“I can’t imagine—”
“No, you CAN’T. Because you got to live those five years. You got to grieve and heal and fall in love and build a new life. I got NOTHING. Just a blank space where my life should be.”
Tears are streaming down my face.
“And now you want me to just… what? Accept that you’ve moved on? Let you divorce me so you can marry her properly? Give up the only thing I have left?”
“I’m not asking you to give up—”
“You ARE. You’re asking me to give up my marriage. My husband. My identity as your wife. Everything.”
“Celeste, I care about you. I always will. But I can’t be what you need. I can’t be your husband the way I was before.”
“Why not?”
“Because I’m different now. We both are. Five years changed me. And you’re not the woman I married either.”
“Because I was in a COMA. That’s not my fault.”
“I know. God, I know. None of this is fair. But we can’t go back. We can only move forward.”
“With her.”
“Yes.”
“So that’s it. You’ve decided. You choose her.”
“I choose honesty. And the honest truth is I love Rory. I’ve built a life with her. I can’t just erase that.”
“You erased me easy enough.”
“That’s not fair—”
“NONE OF THIS IS FAIR!”
I’m screaming again.
Dr. Hayes rushes in.
“Mr. Ashford, I think you should leave.”
“We’re not done—”
“You ARE done. This is too stressful for her. Leave. Now.”
Dominic looks at me one more time.
“I’m sorry, Celeste. For all of it.”
Then he’s gone.
And I’m alone again.
Dr. Hayes tries to give me a sedative.
I refuse.
“I don’t need drugs. I need my husband.”
“Mrs. Ashford—”
“He’s legally MY husband. Not hers. MINE. And I’m going to fight for him.”
Even if it destroys us all.
END OF CHAPTER 7
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