Shattered Portrait (Jack Gilinsky)

Chapter One

"If you're willing to give me another chance, I'd like to take it and use it wisely. No more messing around. Just you and me forever as a couple. No more Kelly unless it involves Emmaline. I need you in my life, Hailee. You and the boys are the best things that ever happened to me and I would die if you all walked out. Will you marry me?"

From my spot on the window, my eyes widened. He finally asked the question I had been waiting for. He had asked the question that I dreamed of in high school, the question that I thought would fix everything.

I turned to look at him and then to the ring in his hand that sat in its little velvet box, eyes wide. I recovered quickly and cleared my throat and asked, "do you think this will solve all of our problems?"

I was trying hard to sound bitter, but the happiness was building inside me. It was like the sunshine coming through the window in the early morning, slowly creeping up the side of the house and spilling into the window, sprawling across the floor and crawling up the side of the bed.

A smile grew on Jack's face and he shook his head, "it won't even come close to fixing our problems, but it'll be a step towards it."

He was right. Him making this promise to me, making this promise that we would be bound together for all of eternity was a big step in the correct direction.

"You giving me this is a promise that you will be faithful forever, do you think you can do that?" I questioned, stalling before answering the question because I wanted to watch him squirm. He was supposed to be faithful to me anyways, but this was serious, and I could tell the question was getting to him. He adjusted in his seat.

"I think I'll be fine with just you."

"Me taking that would mean that you'd have to stick with me through thick and thin. Even when I get crazy and chase you with knives, trying to kill you."

I couldn't help it, I cracked a smile as I said this to him. We both knew I could get pretty crazy, but we knew I would never get that crazy. Tears came to my eyes as I thought about the future we could have had together, our kids growing up in a happy and healthy home with Emmaline and maybe another one of our own.

Jack laughed and held the case closer to me, "shut up and put the ring on."

I eagerly took the case with the ring on it from him and put the ring on my finger, gasping at the beauty of it. It glistened even in the light of the tail lights of the car in front of us.

"It's so beautiful. Thank you so much, Jack, I love you so much!"

I leaned over and pressed a kiss to the side of his lips, which made him stop the car and put it in park. The cars behind us beeped their horns, but Jack and I weren't paying attention because his hands were already on my cheeks, bringing me in for a kiss that we hadn't had in years. Every time we disconnected our lips he would mutter different sentences, telling me how much he loved me and that he didn't want to lose me.

We were supposed to drive off happily. We were supposed to go back to the house and break the news to my parents and our kids and finally be happy without worrying about when things will change.

But that didn't happen. Because I didn't say yes.

---rewind---

"You giving me this is a promise that you will be faithful forever, do you think you can do that?"

"I think I'll be fine with just you."

He thought he'd be just fine with me. He thought. He thought he'd be fine with just me years ago, and the product of that is the child in the backseat that did not belong to me, but instead to my worst enemy. Emmaline belonged to the woman who tried her hardest keep me and Jack apart, the woman who could not stand to see me happy with Jack, the woman who was just at my house for Thanksgiving and caused me to be in this very situation.