SHAYLA TELL HER MOM ABOUT ANTHONY AFFAIR WITH PIARRY

 The rain hadn’t stopped for hours.

It tapped against the windows of Shayla’s childhood home like a soft warning, like the universe knew what was coming and was begging her to stop. But Shayla couldn’t stop now. She had to say it. She had to get it out of her chest before it consumed her completely.

Her hands trembled as she stirred the tea her mother had made—chamomile, like always, because that’s what Mama Diane thought could fix anything. But even the warmth of the mug between Shayla’s palms couldn’t thaw the chill sitting deep in her bones.

Her mother sat across from her, still in her church dress, earrings gleaming under the light. The house smelled like lavender and lemon, but none of it could calm the storm that was about to be released.

“You’ve been quiet all afternoon,” Diane said, eyeing her daughter carefully. “And your eyes… they tell on you. What is it, Shayla?”

Shayla didn’t look up right away. She focused on the tiny swirl of steam rising from her cup. Then, finally, she exhaled and said the words she’d been choking on for weeks.

“Anthony had an affair.”

Diane blinked once. Slowly. “What?”

Shayla’s voice cracked. “He cheated on me. With someone I thought was a friend.”

Diane’s fingers curled around her tea cup like she might crush it.

“Who?”

Shayla hesitated. Then: “Piarry.”

The name dropped like glass on concrete. Sharp. Shattering.

Diane set her cup down gently, but her body went stiff.

“Piarry? That loud girl who came to the cookout last summer? The one with the red curls and the fake laugh?”

Shayla gave a small, broken laugh of her own. “Yeah. That’s her.”

Her mother stood up slowly and began to pace, as she always did when something deeply unsettled her. “Wait a minute… wasn’t she just at your birthday dinner two months ago? Sitting there smiling in my face, hugging you like a sister?”

“Yeah,” Shayla whispered. “Because that’s how deep the betrayal runs.”

Diane stopped pacing. Her voice was low and fierce. “How long?”

“Five months. Maybe more. He says it started when we were going through that rough patch. When he was sleeping in the guest room.”

“And he couldn’t keep his hands to himself for five minutes?” Diane snapped. “Couldn’t keep his pants zipped while y’all were trying to figure it out?”

Tears filled Shayla’s eyes, but she kept blinking them back.

“I kept seeing little signs,” she said. “The late nights. The weird excuses. He suddenly got real protective of his phone. I tried to believe the best in him. I wanted to. But then I saw the messages.”

She reached into her purse and pulled out her phone. Scrolled. Held it up.

Diane read them in silence—words no mother wants to see her daughter be forced to live through. Flirty jokes. “Can’t wait to see you again.” Mentions of times and places Shayla now realized weren’t business meetings after all.

“And the worst part?” Shayla’s voice broke. “He didn’t even tell me. I had to confront him. He stood there lying to my face until I showed him the screenshots. And even then, he had the nerve to say it didn’t mean anything. That it was just a mistake.”

“A mistake that lasted almost half a year?” Diane snapped. “With your friend?”

Shayla nodded. “Piarry knew exactly what she was doing. She smiled at me, joked with me, even helped me plan Anthony’s last birthday. And all that time, she was sneaking around behind my back with him.”

Diane’s face hardened in a way Shayla had only seen a few times in her life—once when her father got arrested, once when Shayla was bullied in middle school, and now… now this.

“Baby,” she said, her voice trembling, “you don’t deserve that. You never have. That man looked me in my eyes and told me he loved you. Sat at our table. Ate my food. Played house. And all that time, he was out here disrespecting you?”

Shayla wiped her eyes. “I don’t even know who I’m angrier at—him for doing it, or myself for not trusting my gut sooner.”

“No,” Diane said firmly, coming to sit beside her. “Don’t you dare blame yourself. You loved him. You gave him grace. That’s not weakness—that’s strength. He’s the fool who took your love and treated it like it was disposable.”

They sat in silence for a long moment. Just the rain and the weight of the truth hanging between them.

“What are you going to do?” Diane finally asked.

“I already told him to leave,” Shayla said. “He’s staying with his cousin now. Says he wants to fix it. Says it was a wake-up call.”

Diane scoffed. “Too little, too late.”

Shayla nodded. “That’s what I said. But now I have to figure out what healing looks like. How to rebuild after this kind of betrayal. And Mama…” Her voice cracked again. “It hurts so bad. I feel like my soul’s been scraped raw.”

Her mother pulled her into a hug then. Held her tightly like she was a child again, rocking her gently as Shayla finally let the tears fall.

“You’ll heal, baby,” Diane whispered. “It’ll take time. But you’ll rise out of this. Stronger. Wiser. Softer where it matters and steel where it doesn’t.”

Shayla clung to her mother like the anchor she’d always been.

And for the first time since the betrayal, she didn’t feel alone.

Because now the truth was out.

Now the healing could begin