Bow Down To Your New Aunt

At twenty-two, I married Nathaniel Cross. His grandfather had practically used his final breaths to blackmail him into it, and Neil, ever the dutiful heir to the Cross empire, had folded.

But everyone in the Manhattan elite knew the truth: inside the biometric safe in the CEOs office at Cross Holdings, Neil didnt keep gold or bonds. He kept a pair of worn-out ballet slippers belonging to Isla Sinclair.

At twenty-five, I slid the divorce papers across his mahogany desk.

He didn't look at me. He stared out the floor-to-ceiling windows at the skyline, burning through half a pack of cigarettes in silence. Finally, he signed with a cold, jagged flourish. "Margot Bennett," he sneered, the smoke curling around his handsome, bitter face. "Once you walk out that door, don't you dare come back crying to me."

At twenty-eight, I returned to the city for the Cross Holdings Anniversary Gala.

His eyes weren't on the stage or the champagne towers. They were pinned, with lethal intensity, on the man standing at my side.

"Is this why you were in such a hurry to leave?" Neil hissed, cornering us near the balcony. "To crawl into his bed?"

Sebastian Beaumontthe man who held my handleisurely twisted the wedding band on his finger. With a casual, terrifying grace, he kicked a decorative marble side table aside, the crash silencing the nearby guests.

"Neil," Sebastian said, his voice a low, dangerous rumble. "Watch your tone when you're speaking to your aunt."

"Did you hear? Margot Bennett is back in town."

"The one who walked away from the Cross fortune three years ago with nothing but her dignity?"

"Who else? Isla Sinclair is finally about to marry into the family. Margot coming back now... she must be desperate. Regret is a hell of a drug."

"Regret won't help her now. She only got that ring because the old man was superstitious and obsessed with her 'bloodline energy.' She stole her best friends life for three years. Now, things are finally back where they belong."

Three years.

Apparently, this circle was just as suffocatingly bored as ever. To them, I was the loser of the centurythe woman who failed at being a trophy wife and got discarded.

Even my parents shared that sentiment.

The afternoon I signed those papers three years ago, my mother summoned me to the family estate in Greenwich. The moment I stepped into the foyer, a porcelain teacup shattered at my feet. A shard jumped up, slicing a thin red line across my ankle.

"Since youve humiliated us with this divorce, don't stay in New York and be an eyesore," my mother said, standing in the center of the living room, her hand still frozen in the throwing position.

I didnt look at the blood. I didnt bend down to clean the mess. I just looked at her.

She flinched under my gaze, but her voice remained sharp. "Isla lost her career because of you. She went to Paris in a fit of grief because you stole the man she loved, and she broke her ankle on stage. Shell never dance again. Now that Neil is finally ready to make it right, dont you dare come back and ruin it for her."

I wanted to ask her: Mom, Im the one you carried for nine months. When you scream at me, does your heart ache? Even for a second?

But I knew the answer. From the day Isla Sinclair moved into our house as a foster child, I had been the "extra."

Isla was the daughter of my parents' late friends. Orphaned at three, she was the perfect ward. She danced; she pouted; she called my mother "Mama" with a sweetness I could never mimic. She would curl into my mothers lap and recount her ballet lessons while I stood in the doorway, a quiet, unremarkable shadow.

I was the "wooden" child. Average grades, no special talents, a personality like a closed book.

Slowly, Isla took over my life. My bedroom moved from the master suite on the second floor to the drafty guest room on the third because Isla "needed to be closer to the home studio."

On my sixteenth birthday, my family went out to celebrate Islas lead role in a recital. They forgot to come home. I lit the candles on a grocery store cupcake by myself. I don't even remember what I wished for.

I never told anyone. No one would have believed me anyway. In everyones eyes, Isla was the tragic orphan, and I was the ungrateful, lucky daughter.

My mother saw my silence and twisted the knife. "That marriage belonged to Isla. If it weren't for Neils grandfather and his obsession with your 'compatibility'saying your presence was the only thing that could stabilize the Cross family's luckyou wouldn't have even been a footnote in Neils life."

I didnt argue. I just turned and walked out.

She was still shouting something behind me, but I didn't turn back. Shards of porcelain were stuck in the soles of my shoes, and every step was a sharp, stinging reminder. But that pain was nothing compared to the hollow cavern in my chest.

The story of that marriage started five years ago.

Neil Cross and Isla Sinclair were the "Golden Couple" of the Upper East Side. He was the sole heir to a dynasty; she was the beautiful, tragic ballerina. It made sense. Everyone rooted for them.

Including me.

I had been hopelessly, secretly in love with Neil for three years. It started when I was fifteen, watching him at one of Islas performances. He was in the second row, clutching a bouquet of white roses, his eyes fixed on her with a tenderness so profound it felt like the rest of the world had ceased to exist.

I sat two rows behind him, staring at the back of his head for two hours. He never once looked back.

I knew then that my heart was a losing bet.

But then, the world tilted. Neils grandfather was diagnosed with terminal lung cancer. The old man believed in two things: hostile takeovers and destiny. He had a "legacy advisor" vet the charts of every eligible socialite in the city.

The advisor pointed to one name.

"This girl," the man had said, pointing at my file. "She is the anchor. Her energy is the only thing that can counter the volatility in your grandsons life. She is his 'Light.'"

It wasn't Isla. It was me. Margot Bennett.

The old man made the decree: "Her. Within the month."

My parents' first instinct was to refusenot for my sake, but for Islas. "Sir, Neil and Isla are already together," my father had pleaded over the phone.

The old mans response was a guillotine. "Fine. Then consider our joint venture in the downtown development project terminated by morning."

My father went silent. Thirty percent of our firm's revenue came from Cross Holdings. One word from the patriarch could bankrupt us.

That night, my parents sat me down. "Margot, will you do this for the family?"

I looked at their faces. I knew it wasn't a question. It was a command wrapped in a request to make them feel better about selling me.

But the person who actually pushed me into it was Isla.

The day we left the Cross estate after the "arrangement" was finalized, Isla grabbed my hand in the back of the car. Her skin was ice-cold.

"Margot, youve always loved him, haven't you?"

I flinched, my face heating up. I wanted to lie, but her eyes were too sharp.

She laughed. It wasn't a cruel laugh; it was weary. She pulled an email up on her phone. An invitation from the Paris Opera Ballet.

"Ive waited three years for this, Margot." Her voice was a low, fierce whisper. "I don't want to be a trophy wife. I don't want to be trapped in a penthouse raising heirs. I want to be a Prima. I want Paris."

She looked at me with a desperate, glittering intensity. "If the old man is forcing a marriage, take it. Replace me."

I stared at the screen for a long time. "What about Neil? Hell never agree."

Isla didn't look at me. "Don't worry about him. I'll handle it."

Three days later, on the night we were supposed to celebrate the engagement, Isla "attempted" to end it all in her bedroom. The cuts were shallow, horizontalthe kind that bleed a lot but don't hit anything vital.

My parents were hysterical. Neil got the call while the ink on our marriage license was still wet. He sprinted into the hospital and punched the wall outside her room until his knuckles were shattered.

Then he turned and looked at me.

His eyes were full of a loathing so pure it felt like a physical blow. To him, I wasn't his wife; I was the murderer of his happiness.

That same night, Isla boarded a private jet to Paris. She left a single text on my phone: Take care of him, Margot. I owe you one. I'll pay you back someday.

I stood in the center of our massive, empty New York apartment, clutching my phone. Outside, fireworks were going off over the park for some gala. The world was loud and celebratory, but inside, there was only the sound of my own breathing.

On my wedding night, my husband sat in a hospital hallway, mourning the woman who had just played us both.

For three years, Neil and I lived like ghosts under the same roof.

He deposited a fixed amount into my account every month. Not a penny more, not a penny less. It felt like a salary for a job I hated.

His study was a forbidden zone. I only saw inside once because a maid had left the door ajar.

The walls were covered in photos of Isla. Isla in the studio, Isla on stage, Isla in the wings. There was one photo of her in Swan Lake, frozen in a spotlight. In the corner of the frame, you could see the back of a mans head in the front row. Neil. Looking at her like she was the sun.

On his desk sat a pair of old, battered ballet slippers. The pink satin was frayed, the toes crushed. I later learned from his assistant that he used to keep them in the office safe. He brought them home because Isla told him she wanted him to "keep her dreams safe" for her.

I closed the door and went to my room. I sat in the dark for hours, tracing the timeline of my life.

He never touched me. We shared a bed for three years, and he would wrap himself in the duvet at the very edge of the mattress rather than risk even a brush of our skin.

I cooked; he didn't eat. He worked late, sometimes staying at the office for days. When he did come home, he disappeared behind the study door. I was a piece of furnitureuseful for the occasional corporate dinner where he needed a wife on his arm, but otherwise shoved into a corner to gather dust.

The decision to leave didn't happen all at once. It was like water seeping into the cracks of a stone. It froze, it thawed, it expanded. Until finally, the stone just split.

The day I decided, it was pouring rain. I was in the kitchen, and Neil was in the living room on a call. The apartment was so quiet that every word cut through the air.

"Get the car ready. Paris-JFK. Islas flight lands in thirty minutes. Her ankle is acting up; she can't be in the cold."

"Yes, have a wheelchair waiting at the gate."

"Book the VIP suite at the recovery center. Im not letting her wait for treatment."

He hung up and grabbed his coat from the closet. He ran right into me as I was coming out with dinner.

I looked at the table Id set. Roast chicken, mashed potatoes, the comfort food he used to like.

"Dinner is ready," I said, my voice strangely hollow. "Eat before you go."

He frowned, checking his watch with palpable impatience. "Eat it yourself. Don't wait up."

He reached for his keys. I stopped him.

"Neil."

He paused, but didn't turn around. "What now?"

I pulled an envelope from my apron pocket and held it out.

"I want a divorce."

He looked down at the document. I had circled the words Petition for Dissolution of Marriage in red ink.

He went still for two seconds. Then he looked at me, searching my face for a joke. I stood there, more peaceful than I had been in years.

He laughed. It wasn't a happy sound. It was sharp, condescending.

"Fine."

He tossed the papers onto the coffee table, sat down, and lit a cigarette. He smoked one after the other as the rain lashed against the windows. When the pack was empty, he crushed it, grabbed a pen, and signed his name in a jagged scrawl.

He stood up and shoved the papers back at me. "Margot, once you walk out that door, don't you dare come back crying to me."

He grabbed his keys and left without a backward glance. When the door slammed, the sound echoed through the empty hallway, leaving me in a silence that finally felt like freedom.

The legalities were quick. Twenty minutes at a lawyers office the next morning.

I refused the Cross family shares. I only took what was minemy personal pre-marital savings and the returns from a few investment projects Id managed on the side during the marriage. It totaled about fifty million dollars. Clean, fair, and untouchable.

But when the news reached my parents, it became a scandal. My father dragged me back to the house to scream at me.

"How dare you take fifty million from the Cross family? Youre telling the whole world we sold you!"

Isla was there, of course. She was wearing a white silk dress, a bandage visible beneath her hem where her "shattered" ankle was taped. She had returned from Paris six months ago after a fall ended her career. Now, her eyes were red and her voice trembled.

"Margot... are you still mad at me? Is this because I came back to see Neil?"

I looked at her. I knew that expression. It was her signature move: the tragic, innocent victim.

"Isla, stop," my mother snapped, turning her fury on me. "That ring belonged to Isla from the start! If it weren't for that crazy advisor, she and Neil would have a family by now."

I ignored my mother and looked Isla in the eye. "Is that what you think, too?"

Isla stiffened. She looked away, refusing to meet my gaze.

I smiled. I shouldn't have been surprised. Isla never did the dirty work; she just cried until someone else did it for her.

I walked out of that house and didn't look back. I stood on the sidewalk, pulled out my phone, and started blocking.

Neil. My mother. My father. Isla. Everyone who had ever made me feel like an interloper in my own life.

I hailed a cab, went to the station, and bought a one-way ticket to the coast. As I sat in the waiting area, the rain finally stopped. I watched the grey sky through the terminal windows.

I felt empty, like something had been carved out of me. But for the first time in twenty-five years, I felt light.

When my train was called, I picked up my suitcase and walked toward the platform. I didn't look back once.