She brought her hand down on the table with a loud slam and shot to her feet. “I’m saying this loud and clear now. Marcus is a wimp!”
Not only were we taken aback, but even Tobias froze upon witnessing his mother’s burst of temper for the first time.
Everyone’s attention was riveted on Camelia, and time seemed to have stopped for a moment.
However, her menacing attitude faded away almost as quickly as it manifested. Immediately after, her shoulders sagged, and tears welled up in her red-rimmed eyes. As she tried to get a hold of her unraveling emotions, her mouth pressed into a thin line.
Alas, she lost the battle, and the dam broke.
She used to be a sheltered, naive girl. However, her world was turned upside down since she met Marcus, and she had been torn apart in the name of love.
Now that Marcus fell ill, she thought that he would need to rely on her, and she could stay with him forever. However, he chose death instead. What a sick joke.
She knew he had given up, and that was the last straw that broke her composure.
A wave of emotion assailed me, and the back of my eyes prickled with tears.
Tobias’ voice trembled, sounding scared and pained. “Mom, are you okay?”
The sight of the mother who was on the verge of breaking down and her visibly upset child was chipping away at my empathy. If I didn’t come apart at the seams, I would definitely be affected by my surroundings.
Ashton’s hand tightened on mine, pulling it forward and placing it on his chest.
“Cry if you want to. You don’t have to pretend to be strong when one of your family members is sick.” His voice was soft yet clear, and every word emanated a sense of security.
As I steadied my nerves, I suddenly heard a woman’s wailing reverberating across the room. Camelia slumped onto a chair and hid her face behind her palms, her body wracked with sobs.
Tobias dissolved into tears, too as he stood up and came to his mother’s side, rubbing her back comfortingly. It was the only thing he could do at that moment.
Tears streamed down my face quietly, and Ashton wiped them away with his fingers. I didn’t crumble under the weight of emotions with him being the pillar of support for us. Instead, I was able to stand on the sidelines, sharing in Camelia and Tobias’ pain but not interrupting them.
Silence blanketed the room again after some time. Camelia had calmed down, but her nose was runny while her eyes were red and swollen. She squinted, barely able to see through her bleary vision.
After consoling Tobias, she glanced at us and lowered her head sheepishly. “Sorry for that. I must have shocked both of you.”
“Not a problem. You needed to vent. If you bottle your emotions up, you’ll get sick,” I reassured.
She gave a wan smile and didn’t say anything else, only tousling Tobias’ head with an affectionate expression, as if she could overlook the messier parts in life. At that moment, she was a completely different person from the one who had just sobbed uncontrollably.
Camelia was exhausted down to the marrow of her bones from caring for Marcus who was terminally ill.
“How about this? Leave Marcus’ next treatment to Ashton and me. You should take Tobias home and rest for a bit.” We had hit it off since our first meeting, and I wanted to do something for her, no matter how small it was.
“It’s fine.” Camelia smiled, her gaze bouncing between us and Tobias. She joked, “I don’t want to wash my hands of Marcus. He’s stuck with me for the rest of his life. I want him to be indebted to me so much that he wouldn’t be able to repay me in this lifetime.”
Then she expelled a long sigh, caressing Tobias’ arms as she murmured, “Tobias, you can love a person too much. Don’t do it, okay?”
Camelia felt better after crying, and her muscles didn’t feel as stiff. Before she returned to the hospital, she heeded our suggestion to take a hot shower at a nearby hotel and changed into a set of clean clothes, looking so much more refreshed.
