58. Dean
Dean
Dean stood in front of the bathroom mirror, adjusting his tie. The charcoal suit fit perfectly—tailored, expensive, the kind that made him look like he belonged in boardrooms and corner offices. His hair was styled just right.
He looked successful. Polished. Like a man who had his shit together.
It was all a fucking lie.
The real Dean was dying inside. The real Dean couldn't sleep.
The real Dean was desperately, pathetically in love with a woman he didn’t deserve. Had never deserved.
He loosened his tie with shaking fingers.
This costume—this performance—felt like a betrayal of everything he actually was underneath.
Every morning he put on this armor and pretended to be someone worth respecting, when the truth was he was just a broken man who'd destroyed the only good thing in his life.
"Fuck this," he muttered, yanking off the tie completely.
Dean ripped the dress shirt over his head, buttons popping, and threw it across the bathroom. He stood there in his undershirt, chest heaving, looking at himself in the mirror.
This was closer to the truth. Disheveled. Raw. Wrecked.
He walked to his bag and started digging through, pushing aside the carefully folded work clothes, the pressed khakis.
At the bottom, he found it.
The concert t-shirt. Faded black cotton with the logo of the aging boyband Fiona loved—the kind of music he'd never admit to enjoying in front of his colleagues. The shirt was soft from too many washes, stretched out from wear.
He pulled it on.
The memory hit him immediately: Fiona dancing beside him at the concert, completely unselfconscious, singing every word with tears in her eyes because she was so happy. How she'd grabbed his hand during the slow songs and looked at him like he'd personally arranged the stars for her entertainment.
He'd bought the shirt at her insistence, rolled his eyes when she insisted they take a selfie together both wearing them. But later, when she wasn't looking, he'd caught himself humming one of their songs in the shower.
The concert had been... fun. Christ, he could admit that now, when there was no one left to impress. It had been pure, ridiculous, joyful fun. The kind of night that made his chest feel light and his face hurt from smiling.
The kind of night where he got to be himself instead of the version of himself that belonged in conference rooms.
Dean looked at himself in the mirror again. The boyband shirt was wrinkled, the logo cracked with age.
For the first time in too long, he looked like someone Fiona might have recognized.
Someone she might have loved.
On the bed behind him sat the folder—the strategy he’d built for her over the last 72 hours. It wasn’t a presentation. It wasn’t a pitch. It was a tribute. A blueprint for the world to see what he now saw so clearly.
He grabbed it and tucked it under his arm like something sacred.
He was nervous, yes. But more than that—he was excited. To see her. To show her. To say: I see you. I believe in you.
Dean grabbed his keys and headed for the door, not caring who saw him dressed like this. Not caring what anyone thought.
He wasn’t trying to impress anymore. He was just trying to be real.
The real Dean was finally showing up.
The bar was only three blocks from their apartment—Fiona’s apartment now. She’d agreed to meet him here tonight, just for a few minutes. Just to hear him out.
The folder rested neatly on the table beside his whiskey. He'd reviewed its contents too many times already, but still opened it again. Inside: the strategy. Pages of notes and visuals and careful thought, all laid out like offerings at an altar.
This wasn't a pitch. This was a gift.
He checked the time again. He was twenty minutes early.
Of course he was early.
He'd get to see her. The woman he loved. The woman he wished he could be worthy of. The folder in front of him wasn't a ploy or a proof of worth—it was simply the best way he knew how to say: I see you. I believe in you. You deserve the world.
The heavy wooden door swung open, bringing with it a gust of evening air. Dean looked up, hoping to see Fiona and heart lifting in anticipation—only to feel it plummet.
Roxanne in an impossibly stylish leather jacket. Ava trailing beside her in designer jeans. Cam and Jared bringing up the rear.
Their eyes lit up when they spotted him, and without invitation, Roxanne and Jared slid into the seats across from him while Ava claimed the spot beside him. Cam dragged over a chair from the neighboring table, the legs scraping against the floor.
"Well, well," Roxanne said, looking delighted. “The ex-hubby. Tell me, how is our favorite sock-wearing, sticker-collecting Pollyanna doing these days? Still saving the children one glitter glue stick at a time?"
Cam snorted. "Remember when she used to pack you those little lunch notes?” He pitched his voice higher, mocking. “‘You're exactly where you're supposed to be.' Like you were in kindergarten."
Dean's hands clenched into fists under the table. Those notes had been the best part of his day. Fiona's careful handwriting, her unwavering belief that he was good even when he didn't feel it. She'd written them because she loved him, because she wanted to lift him up.
And he'd turned even that into a joke for these parasites.
Roxanne's grin sharpened. "It's giving content, if you ask me. If you ever want to revive the account?—"
"Stop," Dean said loudly.
They blinked at him, like they couldn't believe he'd interrupted their fun.
"Don't say another word about her."
Roxanne raised an eyebrow, amused. "Dean?—"
"I'm serious." His voice cut through the bar's ambient noise, sharp enough that a couple at the next table glanced over. "You don't get to laugh at her. Not to me. Not anymore."
Roxanne scoffed, but there was something watchful in her eyes now. "Oh, come on. You made her the joke. We just joined in."
"I know." His voice was getting louder, and he could feel other patrons starting to stare. Good. Let them stare. "And it's the worst thing I've ever done."
Ava's smirk grew wider, but it looked more forced now. "The whole 'tortured ex-husband' thing is a bit pathetic, don't you think?"
People were watching now. The old Dean would’ve shut up, laughed it off, tried to look cool. He’d lost Fiona. He didn’t care about looking cool anymore.
Dean stood up so abruptly his chair scraped against the floor. The sound echoed through the suddenly quieter bar.
"Pathetic?" His voice carried now, filling the space. The bartender paused mid-pour. A woman at the bar turned around completely. "You want to know what's pathetic?"
Jared shifted uncomfortably. "Dude, maybe keep it down?—"
Dean's voice got louder. "What's pathetic is a grown man who was so insecure he needed strangers to validate his ego by mocking his wife. What's pathetic is taking the kindest, most sincere woman I've ever met and offering her up to a pack of wolves so I could feel clever."
He thought about Fiona's face that night at the awards dinner. The confusion, then the dawning horror as she realized what had been done to her. How small she'd looked, how betrayed.
"What's pathetic," Dean continued, his voice cracking slightly, "is being so desperate to be liked by people like you that I made her think being earnest was something to be ashamed of."
The entire bar was watching now. Roxanne's cheeks were flushed, but she was trying to maintain her composure, looking at her nails like Dean's breakdown was beneath her notice.
"She packs lunches for kids who can't afford them," Dean said, his voice breaking. "She stays late every day tutoring students who need extra help. She cries over nature documentaries because she thinks the world is beautiful, and I let you mock her for it."
She wasn’t even here, and still the room tilted toward her. Like her goodness filled in the places these people left hollow.
Ava laughed, but it sounded hollow. "I'm worried about you, Dean. This obsession isn't healthy. She's moved on—shouldn't you?"
“I’m never moving on.” Dean's voice was raw now, and he didn't care who heard.
"Look," Ava’s voice dropped to what she probably thought was sweet, “the whole small-town-teacher thing was cute for a while. But that’s not someone for the long-term.”
Dean stared at her, seeing clearly now who she really was. Who they all were. The people he'd thought were his friends, who'd laughed at Fiona's expense while she sat at their dinner tables trying to belong.
"Fiona was never the problem,” Dean said firmly. “I was. You were."
He grabbed the folder from the table, holding it against his chest like armor.
"She's meeting me here in five minutes," he said, his voice steady now. "So you can leave, or you can sit here and watch me try to become the man she deserves. Your call. But if any of you says one more word about her—if you even look at her wrong—I will stand up for her. It’ll be too late, but I understand now what a husband is supposed to be.”
Cam was already standing, throwing money on the table. "This is fucked up, man."
"No," Dean said quietly, watching them gather their things with undisguised relief. "What I did to her was fucked up. This is just me finally being honest about it."
Roxanne stood last, her composure cracking just enough to show the embarrassment underneath. "You're making a mistake."
"I made my mistake two years ago," Dean said. "This is me trying to fix it."