On the Ruins of His Regret I Soar novel Chapter 220

Lance threw an arm over his eyes, blocking out the dim light of the room. After a long moment, he abruptly stood up and went back to The Kensington.

Susan Lane’s back had just started to feel better. Leaning on Stella for support, she shuffled slowly across the room. “Amy hasn’t come to see me. I miss her and Jessica so much. Now that they’re divorced, I suppose they’ve forgotten all about me.”

“Amy has started kindergarten,” Stella said with a comforting smile. “And Ms. Brown is probably busy with her new job.”

Susan sighed. “It must be so tiring for someone who hasn’t worked in years to suddenly start.”

Just then, Lance walked in, bringing a heavy smell of alcohol with him.

Susan pinched her nose in disgust. “Have you been drinking? How much did you have?”

Lance collapsed onto the sofa. Susan signaled for Stella to leave, then hobbled over and sat beside him, feeling his forehead. “What’s wrong?”

Lance didn’t speak until Stella had left the room. “She’s gone. You can talk now.”

He opened his eyes and looked at his grandmother. “Grandma.”

“Yes?”

His voice was raw, his eyes red-rimmed. “I don’t want to get a divorce.”

Susan looked at him steadily. “That was just the final straw, Lance. Before that, you never once stood by her side. Her mother had just passed away, and Isabella Charles moved in with her daughter. Jessica was heartbroken, and you were out celebrating the return of your old friend.”

Lance’s gaze fell. After a long pause, he said, “Sometimes Jessica was the one being unreasonable. Catherine never did anything wrong. Even if her mother was the other woman, Catherine was innocent. I know Jessica loved her mother, but wasn’t she overreacting?”

“If you had ever tried to see things from your wife’s perspective, you would never say something like that,” Susan said. “But you always took Catherine’s side.”

Her words hit him like a punch to the gut, leaving him feeling hollow. He looked at his grandmother’s unwavering expression and thought about what Dylan had said, what Eugene had said, and what she was saying now. The emptiness inside him grew.

Susan sighed and shook her head. “Lance, sometimes I think you don’t know how to love someone. It frustrates me. It’s like you’re emotionally stunted. But then I see how you indulge Catherine, and I get confused. Is it that you don’t know how to love, or is it that you just don’t know how to love Jessica?”