A year after she stole my husband, my former best friend mailed me an invitation to her baby shower. “Come celebrate our little miracle,” she wrote,

“Now you do.”
He stared at me.
I stepped closer. “You have two choices. Keep lying for them and go down with them, or tell the truth when the room asks you to.”
“She’ll destroy me.”

“No,” I said. “She already did. I’m just giving you the microphone.”
From the ballroom, Camille’s voice rang out.
“Gift time!”
Alistair looked like he might vomit.
I touched his sleeve.
“Wrong person,” I said quietly.
“What?”
“She thought she stole from a weak woman.”

A year after stealing my husband, my former best friend mailed me an invitation to her baby shower. “Come celebrate our little miracle,” she wrote with a cheerful smiley face beneath it. “Sorry you couldn’t give him a son.” I froze in my kitchen, staring at the open envelope from the DNA clinic lying beside it on the counter. The lab results clearly confirmed my ex-husband had been completely sterile since birth. Then my eyes drifted to the positive paternity test belonging to his younger brother, and a soft laugh escaped my lips. “I’ll be there,” I whispered into the empty room. She has absolutely no idea what gift I’m bringing. And when she opens it in front of everyone… her perfect little fairytale will go up in flames.
The invitation arrived inside a cream-colored envelope heavy with perfume and malice. My former best friend had written my name across the front in the same elegant looping handwriting she once used on birthday cards, apology notes, and even the guest list for my wedding.

Rain scratched softly against the kitchen windows while I stared at the gold lettering.

Come celebrate our little miracle.

Below it, in pink ink, she had added: Sorry you couldn’t give him a son. 🙂

For a moment, the room spun slightly around me.

Then my gaze shifted toward the second envelope already opened on the counter. White. Plain. Clinical.