My father was on the subway when he was falsely accused of taking obscene photos of a woman.

In the commotion, my father was shoved to the ground.

He was rushed to the hospital, but they couldn't save him.

I was drowning in grief, but my husband was nowhere to be found.

Later, I sued the woman for slander, defamation, and manslaughter.

My long-lost husband, however, appeared at the defendant's table.

He was her defense attorney.

He argued that his client had acted in self-defense.

The next time I saw my husband, Ryan, was in the courtroom for my father’s case.

He was wearing a sharp, black suit, sitting beside the defendant like her guardian angel.

Maybe it was a guilty conscience, but he wouldn't look at me.

My colleague sitting next to me saw Ryan and frowned.

"Isn't that Ryan Goldman? What is he…"

"Hannah…"

My colleague glanced at my face and then shut his mouth.

My eyes were bloodshot, and under my own suit, my hands were clenched so tight my nails dug into my palms.

How ironic.

My own husband, defending the person who killed my father, arguing for her acquittal.

The pain in my palms brought a cold clarity to my mind.

I heard my own voice, calm and detached.

"Get ready, court is about to be in session."

"We're probably not going to win this."

A little over a month ago, my retired father had been asked to come back and teach a few university seminars.

On the subway, he was looking at his phone when a woman named Chloe accused him of secretly filming her.

My father tried to explain, even showing her his camera roll to prove his innocence.

But the girl was relentless, yelling for people to stop him, demanding compensation.

In the ensuing scuffle, my father was pushed down, his head cracking against the floor.

He was pronounced dead at the hospital.

From organizing my father's funeral until now, almost a month had passed, and Ryan, my husband, had been completely absent.

And now, here he was, standing in a courtroom as the defense attorney for the defendant, Chloe.

I thought defending the person responsible for my father's death was shameless enough.

I never imagined he would have the audacity to frame her actions as self-defense.

Ryan requested that the video evidence be played.

In a bystander's phone footage, the woman was crying, her voice thick with tears.

"But you were just pointing your camera right at me, and you… you did that to me…"

The camera zoomed in on a white stain on her floral-print sundress.

It then panned to a similar white mark near the zipper of my father's pants.

The implication was obvious.

Next was the subway's security footage, showing my father being jostled and shoved by the crowd inside the car.

As he was trying to get off, someone bumped his shoulder hard.

He stumbled back, tripped over something, and fell hard to the ground.

Blood spread from the back of his head like a garish, blooming flower.

I had watched these videos countless times over the past few weeks.

My heart felt like it was being sliced apart with every viewing.

But what Ryan said next set a new low for his shamelessness and depravity.

"My client, after being secretly filmed and sexually harassed, reacted in a way that falls under the category of self-defense."

"Objection!" my colleague shot to his feet. "We have evidence showing the stain on the defendant's dress was not semen."

"Where is this evidence?"

"The evidence…"

My colleague frantically shuffled through our files but couldn't find the lab report.

Beads of sweat dripped from his forehead as he turned to me in a panic.

"What do we do?"

A sickening sense of clarity washed over me.

Ryan never went into a fight he wasn't prepared for.

To take this case, knowing the accusation was a lie, and still argue for an acquittal… it meant he had all his bases covered.

The verdict came as no surprise.

I lost.

Walking out of the courthouse, I came face-to-face with Chloe.

I finally got a good look at her.

She was a very delicate, beautiful woman.

In the shaky phone videos and grainy security footage, she looked especially vulnerable and pitiful.

I thought she looked familiar, like I’d seen her somewhere before.

She saw me too and gave me a triumphant smirk.

"Tough break, Ms. Kane."

She looped her arm through Ryan's, her voice turning syrupy.

"Ryan, honey, I'm hungry~"

My colleague rolled his eyes and muttered under his breath.

"What a snake."

Ryan’s eyes met mine, and he instinctively tried to pull his arm away from Chloe’s grasp.

"Hannah, Chloe didn't mean for it to happen. She’s… she’s just a young woman, if this kind of thing got out…"

My gaze was like a nail, pinning him to the spot.

Ryan stammered, his eyes shifting uncomfortably. "You're a woman too. You know how important a reputation is."

"Dad was a teacher. If he knew, he would have made the same choice."

"So… so can you please just drop this?"

His voice trailed off, becoming quieter and quieter until it disappeared completely. He looked at me with a mix of anxiety and fear.

I laughed, a bitter, angry sound.

"Ryan, you are unbelievable."

"Hannah…"

He reached for me, but Chloe grabbed his hand. "Ryan, there are so many people…"

In an instant, a swarm of reporters, microphones out and cameras flashing, rushed toward us, surrounding me.