During the hottest summer on record, Ashton\u2019s husband, Alex, starts acting oddly\u2014wearing long sleeves despite the sweltering heat, flinching at her touch, locking doors, and spending excessive time at his mother Angela\u2019s house. Their five-year-old daughter, Carlie, innocently reveals the secret: Alex got a tattoo reading, \u201cMy mommy Angela is my only love forever,\u201d in Angela\u2019s handwriting.<\/p>\n
Alex confesses Angela claimed she was dying of a heart condition and begged for this \u201cpermanent gift\u201d to give her strength. He hid it, ashamed and conflicted. Ashton, stunned by the bizarre declaration\u2014especially from a woman who\u2019s always undermined her\u2014visits Angela with groceries. Perfectly healthy and smug, Angela admits it was a lie to assert her primacy in Alex\u2019s life.<\/p>\n
Furious at the manipulation and Alex\u2019s gullibility, Ashton realizes she\u2019s lost herself in the marriage. She gets her own tattoo on her collarbone: \u201cSelf-respect, my only love forever.\u201d<\/p>\n
Three weeks later, Alex regrets his ink, plans a cover-up (Carlie suggests a giraffe named Larry), and avoids his mother. He still wears long sleeves; Ashton wears tank tops proudly. She\u2019s done excusing, apologizing, or competing. The heat broke eventually\u2014but Ashton\u2019s resolve didn\u2019t.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
During the hottest summer on record, Ashton\u2019s husband, Alex, starts acting oddly\u2014wearing long sleeves despite the sweltering heat, flinching at her touch, locking doors, and spending excessive time at his mother Angela\u2019s house. Their five-year-old daughter, Carlie, innocently reveals the secret: Alex got a tattoo reading, \u201cMy mommy Angela is my only love forever,\u201d in …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1058,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1057","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/storypulls.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1057","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/storypulls.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/storypulls.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storypulls.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storypulls.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1057"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/storypulls.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1057\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1059,"href":"https:\/\/storypulls.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1057\/revisions\/1059"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storypulls.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1058"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/storypulls.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1057"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storypulls.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1057"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storypulls.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1057"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}