Part 4 — My wife told me she stayed with a friend, but after her one short answer, the smile immediately disappeared from my face

When Colin’s call ended, I turned the phone in my hand for several seconds. Only the low sound of the refrigerator could be heard in the apartment.

Then I called Lisa.

“Colin said that there is another document in my name.”

“Do not meet him alone,” she told me. “Where did he tell you to come?”

“At the old ferry terminal.”

“I will notify the police too.”

“No, first we need to see the document.”

Lisa was silent for several seconds.

“Niki, you must not lose control now.”

“I was losing it for four years. I am not going to anymore.”

The terminal was wrapped in fog. It was six o’clock in the evening. The smell of the sea clung to the iron railings. Colin stood there, by the empty platform, holding a brown folder.

He did not look as I had imagined. An expensive coat, polished shoes, an excessively calm face.

“Niki,” he said to me.

“The document.”

“First you have to listen to me.”

“No. First the document.”

He smiled bitterly and held the folder out to me.

Inside was an old power of attorney. The date was five years earlier — from the period when my father was lying in the hospital.

My signature was visible at the bottom.

But I had never signed it.

“This is forged,” I said.

“Marta signed it.”

“Why do you have it?”

“Because your wife thought this power of attorney would allow her to transfer money from your father’s account. She could not do it then. Now she repeated the same plan in another form.”

There was another sheet in the folder. A bank statement. Five years earlier, during my father’s treatment, a large amount had been withdrawn from the account.

“Where did this money go?” I asked.

Colin shifted his gaze toward the sea.

“Marta took it. I helped.”

“Why are you telling me this now?”

“Because she hid all the money from me too. When she realized the account would remain in your name, she began meeting other men and making other plans. And I do not want to carry the entire burden of the crime alone.”

I noticed a small recorder in his bag. I remembered Lisa’s words: “Do not lose control.”

“Did you record all this?” I asked.

Colin’s face darkened.

“I want a deal.”

“It is already too late.”

“If I am arrested, Marta will be punished too.”

“That is not my goal. I want the truth.”

Just then Lisa appeared from the other side of the terminal with two investigators. Colin stepped back.

“You promised me you would not tell the police!”

“I promised you nothing,” I answered.

For the first time, real fear appeared on his face.

That same night investigators went to Marta’s apartment. I was not there. Lisa told me that Marta opened the door and at first again tried to act as if everything were a misunderstanding.

“Niki understood it incorrectly,” she had said.

But then the investigator turned on the recording.

Marta’s own voice sounded.

“Niki must not find out.”

Then her second voice.

“If he signs, we will transfer the money within a week.”

Marta sat down in the armchair.

“Is that my voice?” she asked.

“Yes,” the investigator answered.

“I did not say it like that.”

“The recording says otherwise.”

She covered her ears with her hands, but escape from her own words was impossible. For the first time she heard what her voice sounded like when she spoke about me as an obstacle and not as a person.

The next day the bank froze the account. On the third day Colin changed lawyers. His first lawyer refused the case because he discovered that Colin had also hidden an old financial fraud from him.

Marta called me ten times.

The first time with anger.

“You ruined my life!”

The second time crying.

“Niki, please come home.”

The third time in a whisper.

“Do not leave me alone in this.”

I answered none of the calls.

Lisa filed the divorce papers in court. The financial documents and the camera recording were attached to the case. The investigation established that Marta had indeed transferred money from my father’s account. My hand had been forged on the document, while the bank records left no room for a lie.

On the morning of the court day, Marta met me in the hallway. Her face was pale. In her hand she still held the silver earring that had hung down that morning.

“You can withdraw everything,” she told me.

“What do you mean?”

“Say it was a mistake. Say the recording was taken out of context.”

“I cannot.”

“You cannot, or you do not want to?”

I looked at her.

“For four years I wanted you to tell the truth. Now I simply want you to stop saving yourself from the consequences.”

Tears gathered in her eyes.

“Did you ever love me?”

“Yes.”

“Then why are you leaving?”

“Because love does not mean abandoning yourself.”

The court ended our marriage. The financial case continued separately. Colin confessed to the crime and handed over all the accounts to the investigators. Marta was given a suspended sentence, ordered to return the money, and assigned community service. I was not happy about her downfall.

I simply was no longer trying to save her for the first time.

A week later I went to the old house to take my things. The house was empty. In the living room, only one photograph remained on the wall — the day of our wedding.

In the kitchen I saw the place where I had found the black plastic bracelet. A thin layer of dust lay on the surface.

But I had the bracelet with me.

I kept it in a drawer in the small apartment, where my father’s watch and old keys lay. It was no longer evidence of betrayal. It was a reminder that the truth sometimes comes into your hand like a cold piece of plastic, but still sets you free.

Three months later I moved to a small town near the waterfront. I worked for a renovation company and made wooden furniture in the evenings. In the morning I went into the same café. I drank coffee without sugar. Before, I prepared it for Marta’s taste; now I was learning my own.

My niece, Elene, came to me every Saturday. Once she drew a house on the floor with colored pencils.

“This is your new house,” she told me.

There were two windows in the drawing, and a small black strip in front.

“What is this?” I asked.

“A door. So you can let in whoever you want.”

Her answer affected me more strongly than any words in court.

On the first day of winter, snow began to fall. Wooden boards lay by the workshop door, and a kettle quietly hissed on the stove. I stood by the window and watched the street become covered with white peace.

Then I received the last message from Marta.

“I will be in the city tomorrow. I only want ten minutes. I am not asking you to come back. I simply want you to listen to me at least once.”

I looked at the message for a long time.

Then I answered:

“I listened to you that day too, when you did not tell the truth. Now I will not come. I wish you to find peace in your own life.”

I deleted the conversation.

I put the phone on the table.

I took the black bracelet from the drawer and hung it on the workshop door, not as a sign of the old night, but as a warning to myself: never to return to a place where my truth disturbed someone else.

I attached Elene’s drawing beside it.

It was snowing outside.

Inside, for the first time, I was no longer afraid.

I left the door open, but I did not turn back.