Chapter 3
I felt angrier the more I thought about it after I went home.
I looked around the house that Desmond and I had rented together.
Back then, he told me that we had to save money together to buy a house. So, we did not have to put a lot of effort into decorating our rental home.
Apart from some essential furniture, there was nothing else in this house. It felt really empty.
On top of that, the dining table was uneven. We had to put an additional block of wood to balance it out. The curtains from Desmond’s hometown were drab, as the pilling fabric was faded.
The metal money box under the table caught my attention.
Even though most of our transactions were done through phones, Desmond liked the feeling of saving cash. He bought this money box, which allowed us to put money in but made it more difficult to take it out.
He said that it would be our year-end reward. We made a deal to put in three hundred dollars every month per person. Then, we would open the box at the end of the year and use the money. We could purchase gifts to reward ourselves for a year of hard work in saving.
However, it was really easy to make payments with our phone, so we did not open the money box last year when we bought our year-end gifts.
We just left the box there and kept putting in money every month. We did not open it at all.
I picked up the box and knocked on my neighbor’s door.
The old man living next to us used to be a carpenter when he was younger. So, he had all the tools I needed.
His granddaughter was in middle school. She knew that I had requested his help to open the box and found it interesting. So, she started to record a video of the process.
After he opened the box, green papers flew out.
“Huh? Is this fake money?” The young girl gasped.
I picked them up and discovered that there was indeed some fake money in there.
“Paige, more than half of the money here is fake. Your boyfriend’s been lying to you!” the young girl said sympathetically.
I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. I laughed at myself. “Yeah. I’m such a fool, aren’t I?”
It turned out that Desmond had lied to me from the start. I was the only one living a pitiful life and thinking about our future together.
When Desmond returned, he saw the opened money box and the fake money scattered all across the floor.
He felt guilty so he carefully said, “Paige, I just wanted to have a bit more money on me. I didn’t mean to lie to you. If I don’t have some money on me as a man, how would others view me, right?
“Besides, my mother said that their house is big enough for us to stay with them. There’s no need for us to buy another house.
“Just think about it. If we stay with our parents, we can take care of each other. My parents will make dinner for us after we return home from work, so you don’t have to trouble yourself to buy groceries and cook. We can just give them some money to cover our expenses. It’s better than paying a mortgage.”
As the disappointment built up in me, I looked at Desmond, who kept talking.
“If you didn’t want to save money, you could’ve just told me instead of putting in fake money to lie to me. You could’ve also told me if you didn’t want to share your salary with me. You don’t have to secretly give it to Nova. Do you find it amusing to see Nova doll herself up with your money, while I look like a hag just because I’m being frugal for our future?”
Desmond shook his head anxiously. “No, you’ve gotten it wrong. I’m just worried that you’d be unhappy. That’s why I didn’t tell you. You know that I’m family friends with Nova’s family, so I have to take good care of her. Nova’s been unstable since her divorce, and her father’s passed away. She only has her mother now. I only agreed to give her eight thousand dollars every month because I pitied her.”
Shortly after, Desmond pulled out a small gift box from his pocket. “I know I was wrong. I’ll tell you everything in the future. Please don’t be mad anymore. See, I even bought you a present.”
I opened the gift box and saw a necklace. It looked very similar to the one Nova was wearing.
“You bought two identical necklaces, right? Did you give Nova the other one?”
Desmond was stunned. “How did you know? I got two necklaces for twenty percent off, so I…”
I laughed in anger and threw a pillow at him.
Then, I chased him out of the house. “Get out right now! I don’t want to see you.”
I looked at the fake money on the floor and suddenly recalled the joint account that Desmond and I had.
I checked it, and the three hundred thousand dollars in the account was gone.
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