Given the traffic, it would only take him a little over ten minutes to get there from his office.
I waited for half an hour, pacing nervously and checking my watch. Finally, Jeremiah's BMW appeared, cutting through the honking cars. To my surprise, Monica was sitting in the passenger seat—the one that used to be mine. Jeremiah got out and unlocked the rear door. When he saw me standing there unmoving, his face hardened into a scowl. He rolled down the window and said impatiently, "What are you doing standing there? Get in the car!"
I glanced coldly at Monica, who was sitting in the front with a self-satisfied smirk. Jeremiah's irritation was palpable. "I just dropped Monica off. She’s not feeling well, so I let her sit in the front. Does that bother you?"
Monica, with exaggerated politeness, reached for her seatbelt but didn’t actually unfasten it. "Oh, sorry Joanna, I forgot this is your seat. I’ll move to the back," she said, her tone dripping with insincerity. I sneered at her pretense and opened the back door.
"No need. If you want to stay in the front, go ahead. And if you like Jeremiah, I can step aside for you."
Jeremiah’s frustration was evident as he scolded from the front. "Joanna, are you out of your mind? I went out of my way to pick you up and this is how you act? It’s disgusting!"
"Oh, disgusting? You bring your mistress along to pick me up and I’m the one being called disgusting?" I retorted, my voice sharp.
Jeremiah, likely trying to avoid upsetting Monica, reined in his anger and slammed the accelerator. The engine roared to life and I could feel the tension radiating from him. Watching his frustration gave me a strange sense of satisfaction.
Despite being married for ten years, he rarely picked me up from work—no more than five times. Yet, that didn’t mean the passenger seat was open to other women. I glanced at his angry reflection in the rearview mirror and asked coldly, "What’s with the sudden interest in picking me up today?"
Jeremiah took a deep breath, trying to regain his composure. His hand reached for his cigarette box, but his fingers hesitated when he remembered Monica was in the car. It was a small gesture, but it spoke volumes. My heart was filled with a bitter self-mockery—he used to smoke without a second thought when he was with me, but now he seemed so self-conscious.