32. Dean
Dean
Dean rubbed his empty wrist. The donation from selling his watch had gone to Fiona's classroom—enough to cover supplies, field trips, whatever her students needed for the rest of the year.
It should have felt like enough. Like absolution.
It didn't.
Because Fiona deserved more. Fiona deserved a husband who respected her, respected her career. A husband who looked out for her. And even if she was divorcing him, Dean was going to be there for her. At long last.
Dean opened a new browser tab. The school district's website looked like it had been designed a decade ago. The "About Us" section was full of stock photos and vague mission statements. The "News" page hadn't been updated since last Christmas.
This was Fiona's professional world. The place where she spent her days performing miracles with twenty-three ten-year-olds and a shoestring budget. And their public face looked like they'd given up trying.
Dean's fingers moved without conscious thought, clicking through pages, cataloging problems. Broken links. Outdated teacher bios. A fundraising section that looked like an afterthought.
He could fix this. All of it.
The thought hit him with a clarity that felt almost chemical.
Not the hollow satisfaction of landing a luxury car account or crafting copy that convinced people they needed things they didn't want.
This was different. This was about making Fiona's world—the world that mattered to her—shine the way it deserved to.
He imagined her seeing the new website for the first time. That little gasp she made when something surprised her. The way her eyes would light up when she realized her district finally looked as professional as the work they did.
His pulse quickened. It was pathetic, probably—getting high off the idea of making his estranged wife happy from a distance. But God, it felt better than anything he'd done at his actual job in years.
Dean scrolled to the district's contact page. The superintendent's email was buried at the bottom, probably to discourage exactly this kind of unsolicited outreach.
He started typing before he could second-guess himself, offering his services, pro bono.
Dean paused, cursor blinking. He’d added that his wife taught in the district. Technically true. But she didn’t want to be his wife anymore, and he’d lost the right to call her that.
He deleted the sentence, aggressively tapping the backspace until it was gone.
He could feel sorry for himself later.
Right now, he would concentrate on whatever he could do to make Fiona happy and safe. Everything he had failed to do up until now.
He hit send and sat back, something settling in his chest that felt suspiciously like purpose.
Dean stood by the espresso machine in the break room, watching from a distance as the usual crowd clustered at the high-top table near the window. Cam, Roxanne, Ava, Jared—all glossy voices and too loud laughter. A slice of the agency’s social elite.
They didn’t look over.
Not once.
He hadn’t been invited to their rooftop drinks last week. Dean wasn’t stupid—he knew what was happening.
He was radioactive now.
There’d been a time when Dean would’ve cared—when being cut out of that table would’ve burned like hell.
Now? It just made his coffee taste stronger.
“Got any extra cream?” came a voice beside him.
Dean turned. It was Russell—the senior copywriter who worked mostly on government briefs and low-level education clients. The kind of guy most people overlooked unless they needed help with a union contract or a printer jam.
The guy who’d already retired and was just working through the notice period. The guy Dean didn’t need to be associating with, not if he didn’t want to risk losing office standing.
Dean handed over the little plastic cup. “Here you go.”
Russell grinned. “You’re a gentleman.”
They ended up sitting in the side break room together. Dean hadn’t meant to stay, but Russell had cracked a joke about the food truck line and suddenly they were unwrapping sandwiches and talking about the Dodgers.
Russell pulled out his wallet at one point—paper-thin from use—and fished for something. A receipt maybe. But when he flipped it open, Dean caught sight of a photograph tucked in behind his bus pass.
A small, sun-faded photo. A woman. Laughing, holding a beer at what looked like a backyard party. Crow’s feet. Wind-tossed hair. A real smile.
Dean couldn’t help but ask. “Is that your wife?”
Russell glanced down, and his face softened in a way Dean wasn’t used to seeing in this building.
“Yeah,” he said. “That’s June.”
Russell smiled down at the photo. “We met when I was still in college. I was working retail. She came in to return a rice cooker she didn’t need. I upsold her to the extended warranty, told myself I’d marry her by the time it expired.”
Dean felt something tight in his chest. “Did you?”
Russell grinned. “Beat it by two weeks.”
Dean looked at his sandwich.
He’d imagined himself and Fiona growing older together.
Laughter in tiny kitchens. Long drives with her feet on the dash. Her cardigans turning into shawls. Her strawberry socks replaced by orthopedic ones with even dumber fruit on them.
In his dreams, they were still together .
He was still hers.
Dean stared down at his phone on the table. His lock screen was still a picture of Fiona.
Dean rubbed a hand over his face.
He could’ve been listening to people like Russell. Instead, he’d been trying to keep up with Cam and Ava and Roxanne. He'd laughed at their sarcasm, mirrored their detachment, mistook their clever cruelty for intelligence. For power.
He’d joined their table, thinking it made him someone.
But the truth was, the best person in his life had never needed to sit at the cool table to prove her worth.
He thought about how she’d looked that night at the awards dinner, her smile so bright before it broke. And how he’d stood on that stage, basking in applause, while she sat in the crowd—bleeding in silence.
Dean swallowed hard.
Russell was saying something about the next Dodgers series, but it blurred into background noise.
He wasn’t thinking about baseball anymore.
He was thinking about Fiona, alone in Emma’s guest room, pulling a blanket over her knees and writing words for strangers who actually listened. He was thinking about how she’d asked him, “Do you even like me?”
But he’d always liked her. It had been himself he hadn’t liked.
Dean stood abruptly.
Russell blinked. “Everything alright?”
Dean shook his head slowly. “No.”
He left the break room and headed straight back to his desk.
There was work to do—real work.
For Fiona. For the classroom that shaped her. For the kids she believed in. For the version of himself that might, someday, be worthy of her again.
Even if she never knew.
Even if he never got her back.
Because loving someone meant you didn’t get to make them a punchline.
And if he’d finally learned that too late?
Then he’d damn well make sure the lesson wasn’t wasted.
Dean stared at the bank app for a long time before he moved.
Eight thousand seventy-two dollars and eighteen cents. That’s what he'd earned from @shitfionasays. Sponsored posts. Affiliate links. Monetized mockery. Eight thousand and change for turning the best person he'd ever known into a character that strangers laughed at.
He’d told himself the jokes were harmless. That Fiona didn’t mind. That people loved her.
He hadn’t asked.
Dean opened a new tab and typed in the name of the anti-bullying fund Fiona had once mentioned after a school event. He remembered how she'd glowed when she talked about how one of her students had raised $27 in nickels and dimes because he "wanted school to feel safer."
At the time, Dean had made a joke about the logo. Something snide.
Now, he clicked through the site slowly. Read the mission statement. The donation tiers. The testimonials. His stomach twisted.
This was where the money belonged. Not in his account. Not tied to his name.
He typed the full amount into the custom donation field. $8,072.18.
He didn’t check the box for a receipt. Didn’t want the tax credit. Didn’t want his name on the donor wall. He checked “anonymous” and hit submit.
The confirmation screen flashed up, green and crisp and final.
Dean sat back.
There was no applause. No redemption music. No Fiona suddenly walking through the door and forgiving him.
@missfionasays had posted something new.
His thumb moved before his brain could stop it, tapping on her profile like he'd been doing obsessively for weeks now.
Kindness is not consent. Professionalism is not flirting. You are allowed to say no—clearly, and without apology.
The fury hit him like a freight train. White-hot rage that made his vision blur at the edges. Had someone put their hands on her? Some piece of shit had looked at Fiona—sweet, trusting Fiona—and seen an opportunity instead of a person.
Dean was on his feet before he realized he'd moved, chair rolling backward, jacket in his hands. He needed to go to her. He needed to drive to her school and?—
And what?
The reality crashed over him like ice water.
Someone had crossed her line. Someone had made her feel unsafe. Someone had cornered his wife and made her uncomfortable enough that she needed to post about boundaries and consent.
And he couldn’t be there for her.
He wasn't her protector anymore. He wasn't her safe place.
The impotence was almost worse than the rage. This helpless, useless fury that had nowhere to go. She was out there dealing with jerks and he was sitting in his climate-controlled office, completely fucking powerless to do anything about it.
She'd never needed his protection anyway. That was the thing that made his chest feel like it was caving in. Fiona had been handling herself just fine before he came along. She was handling herself just fine now.
She didn't need him.
And she didn't need his help.
Dean felt lightheaded for a moment. Well, fuck that , he thought.
She was getting it anyway.
But first—first he needed to do something with his hands before he put his fist through a wall.
The apartment smelled like vanilla, and desperation.
Dean stood at the counter, sleeves rolled up, flour dusted across the front of his shirt like battle scars. The mixer whirred too loudly in the quiet, but he let it run—like noise could fill the spaces she'd once occupied.
He wasn’t good at this. Not baking. Not living without her.
He reached for the chocolate chips, dumping them in.
Fiona had always said baked goods solved everything.
She’d said it with a laugh in her voice, handing him a cookie too hot to touch and grinning like she was delivering a sacred truth.
He remembered the exact moment. A year ago? Maybe more. She’d heard the neighbor yelling—one of those late-night arguments that crawled through the walls and made everyone feel too close. Fiona had stood at the door with a plate of cookies the next day, soft smile and awkward knock.
Dean had asked her why.
She’d smiled. “Baked goods solve everything.”
He remembered thinking it was naive.
And later that night—he remembered this part too well—he'd posted about it.
Dean had liked the comments.
He’d laughed at them.
He looked down at the cookie dough in the bowl now. It didn’t look like healing. It looked like mess—too sticky, uneven, a little lumpy.
He grabbed a baking sheet and began scooping.
He slid the tray into the oven and leaned against the counter, arms crossed, the heat of it warming his skin.
He didn’t know if she’d ever eat one of these.
But he was doing it anyway.
Because Fiona believed kindness counted.
He set a timer, wiped the counter clean, and sat down at the table with the smell of butter and shame wrapping around him like memory.