18. Olivia
Olivia
The house had become a waiting room.
They moved through it like strangers who had memorized each other's schedules out of necessity rather than interest—passing in hallways, occupying separate rooms, the occasional offer of coffee or food that meant nothing, and both of them knew it.
Mark would hold up whatever he was eating sometimes, a wordless gesture toward normalcy that neither of them had the energy to perform convincingly.
Olivia kept to the guest room when he was home.
It had become her sanctuary—small and plain and entirely hers. She filled it with her laptop, the television, and her books. Anything that occupied enough mental space to drown out the awareness of him on the other side of the wall.
Work helped. Mostly.
But Nicholas was always there underneath it—a current she couldn't switch off, pulling at her attention in the gaps between tasks, between calls, between one sentence and the next.
She wanted to hear his voice. The wanting was specific and persistent and impossible to act on, held in place by the particular paralysis of a woman still legally bound to the wrong man.
It didn't feel right to reach across that distance until she had actually crossed it.
So she stayed still, and she waited, and her sister and Lauren held her together at the edges.
They let her talk. They let her unravel and then helped her wind herself back up. Without them, she wasn't sure she would have made it through the week intact.
On Wednesday, she asked Lauren about a divorce attorney.
"I only know one," Lauren said. "But she's young—just twenty-eight. Only a few years out of law school."
"Maybe I could just get her opinion," Olivia said.
By Friday, she was standing a few blocks from the office, steadying herself outside the attorney's building before going in.
Sylvia Brohn was petite and blonde—younger-looking than Olivia had expected, though only a year separated them. She had a friendly manner, and Olivia hoped, fiercely, that it was matched by something sharper underneath.
After they shook hands and sat down, Olivia laid it out cleanly: five years of marriage, the house in Mark's name, and a prenup that Mark's father had insisted upon before they could marry.
Mark had claimed it didn't matter to him—that his father was the one driving it—and Olivia had been young and had nothing and hadn't thought much about it at the time.
She handed Sylvia the document and watched her scan it. The office went quiet. The only sound was the faint rustle of pages.
"Were any of the bank or stock accounts in your name with Mark?" Sylvia asked without looking up.
"No. I have my own account, just in my name. But there's not much in it."
Sylvia set the papers down and sighed—a small, controlled sound that carried a lot of weight.
"He seems to have covered all his bases.
I'd like to review this more closely, but at first glance, he made this very difficult for you.
It looks like if you file for divorce, you'll walk away with very little.
" She looked at Olivia steadily. "Are you sure this is what you want? "
Olivia took a breath. It felt like lead moving through her lungs.
"Even if I walk away with nothing, I'll still have my dignity. I can't live another day married to him."
Sylvia's expression shifted—something like respect moving through it briefly. "If that's what you want, I'd be glad to handle the case. My fee is $3,000 plus expenses."
She walked back to the office through the afternoon heat, the weight of it settling into her bones with every block. Not second-guessing. Just absorbing. There was a difference.
Lauren was waiting.
"How did it go?"
"Not so great. I'll get nothing if I walk away."
Lauren's face fell. "I'm sorry, Olivia. But it's what you thought." She paused, and something shifted in her expression. "Hey—I have some good news for you."
Olivia looked up.
"The apartment?"
Lauren beamed. "Yes. The price started a little higher than you wanted—she was asking $2,500 a month.
I told her I wasn't sure that would work for you, that $2,000 was your limit.
We went back and forth, and she finally said it was worth $500 less a month to have someone she trusted taking care of the place.
She agreed to $2,000." She paused for effect.
"She's sending the lease today. You can move in next Saturday.
No security deposit required. I vouched for you. "
"Oh, my God!" Olivia's arms were around her before she'd finished processing it. "I don't know how to thank you."
"I have a dinner date, but want to grab a quick drink after work?"
"Absolutely."
Back at her desk, Olivia noticed something she hadn't felt all week.
Her shoulders had dropped.
The prenup news was brutal, and she knew it—the financial reality of leaving was stark and unambiguous. But the apartment existed. A date existed. Next Saturday exists. The end now had a shape, and knowing its shape made it real in a way that hope alone never quite managed.
She thought about calling Nicholas. Wanted to—wanted to tell him there was movement, that the life she was dismantling was actually coming apart in the right direction.
But she held back. She would tell him when she was truly free.
When she could offer him something clean rather than something still tangled up in the mess of where she was.
She waited. She saved it.
The bar across the street was dim and easy, exactly what the end of a week like this one required. Olivia and Lauren settled in with their drinks and let the noise of a Friday evening move around them.
"Are you at least feeling a little better?" Lauren asked.
"Yes. A lot."
"When are you going to tell Mark you're leaving?"
Olivia turned her glass slowly. "I've been thinking about it. Maybe I should wait until next week—so I don't have to deal with the stress and his insults for too long before I actually go."
"Maybe that's a good idea."
The bartender reappeared, tilting his head discreetly toward a man across the room. Well-dressed. Suit and tie. Reasonably good-looking. He raised his glass in their direction with a small, practiced smile.
"That gentleman would like to buy you two ladies a round."
Lauren nudged her, grinning. "It's up to you, girl. You're going to be a free woman soon."
Olivia didn't hesitate. "Please tell him thank you, but we'll pass."
The bartender collected the empty glasses and moved away.
"He's cute!" Lauren said, turning to look. "Why are you sending him away?"
"Because my head isn't there right now."
"And where exactly is your head?"
"I don't know. But jumping right back into the pond isn't who I am."
Lauren's smirk was slow and knowing. "I'm sure this has nothing to do with Nicholas."
The heat moved into Olivia's cheeks before she could stop it. "I don't know. Nicholas is—" She stopped. Searched for the right word and couldn't find one that felt adequate. "Different."
"What you mean," Lauren said, "is that Nicholas has already captured you."
Olivia looked at her drink. "I'm sure he's not thinking about me."
"Don't be so sure," Lauren said simply. "I saw the way he looks at you."
She drove home quietly, stopping for a pizza on the way—the kind of simple, practical decision that filled the space where domestic life used to be. When she turned onto the street and saw Mark's car in the driveway, the familiar drop in her stomach moved through her on autopilot.
Of course, he's home.
She carried the box inside. Mark was at the refrigerator, looking for something. He turned at the sound of the door, his eyes landing on the pizza with genuine, uncomplicated pleasure—the first unguarded expression she'd seen from him in days.
"Oh wow, that's great. I was just looking for something to eat."
She set the box on the counter. "I guess it's a good thing I bought the whole pie."
They ate standing at the counter and then at the kitchen table, the silence between them carrying the specific weight of two people who had stopped pretending but hadn't yet finished the business of leaving. The pizza was good even cold. The only sound was crust against paper.
Mark set his slice down.
"Are you ready to have a civil conversation? We can't go on like this."
She felt the pressure build behind her eyes—slow and steady, not quite tears, more like the physical manifestation of five years of this. "You're right, we can't. That's why we're separating."
"We don't have to separate if we could talk it out."
"There's nothing to talk about, Mark. We've been over this enough times. We're different people with different ideas of what marriage is." She stood up. "I'm going upstairs to relax."
She didn't wait for a response.
She walked out and left him alone with the cold pizza and the quiet house, and whatever he intended to do with both.
Saturday morning arrived with bright, generous sunlight.
Olivia came downstairs in sleep shorts and a thin T-shirt, moving through the house with the easy assumption of a woman who believed she had it to herself. Mark should have been on a golf course by now. He was always on a golf course now.
He wasn't.
He was at the kitchen table with his iPad and a steaming cup of coffee, and his eyes moved over her legs the moment she appeared—slow and deliberate and making her skin crawl immediately.
She crossed her arms over her chest. The T-shirt was too thin. "I thought you'd be playing golf today."
"I thought maybe we could talk without any hostility."
She kept her arms where they were. "What is it you want to talk about, Mark?"
"I know you want a separation, but I thought we should discuss how this would work."
She studied him. He seemed calm—measured in a way that felt unfamiliar, like a version of him she didn't entirely trust. But she took a breath and let herself consider it.
"Fine. We can talk."
They moved to the living room. Olivia took the armchair and tucked her legs underneath her, arms still folded—less defensive posture, more practical coverage. Mark settled on the couch and watched her with that particular look she knew well. The one who was always assessing something.
"I know you have no interest," he said, "but even when you're upset, with no makeup on, you look very sexy sitting there."
She cut her gaze to his. "Now is not the time for compliments. You should have thought of that years ago."
"Okay. I understand."
He let it go, which surprised her. He was too calm. It made the back of her neck prickle.
"When do you plan to leave? Do you know where you'll live? Do you have enough money to make this move?"
"I'm working on it."
"Listen, Olivia. This doesn't have to be as hard as it feels right now. Maybe I can help you with a few things."
She waited. She didn't trust the offer. But she needed a way out that didn't detonate into another argument, and if this was the door, she would at least walk through it slowly.
"Why don't we go out to dinner tonight and discuss the whole thing? I'll do what I can for you—within reason."
Dinner. Another evening of managed performance. But if it bought her a clean exit without a war, it was worth one night.
"Okay. But I'm telling you now—we're only going to talk. That's it. Nothing more."
"I understand. Let's go to that Italian place we both always liked. I'll call and get a table off to the side so we can actually discuss this properly. Does 7:30 work?"
"Fine. 7:30. I'm shopping with Julia today. I'll be home in time to leave by 7."
"Perfect. Have a great day shopping."
The boutique smelled of expensive perfume and new fabric, and Olivia stood in front of a floor-length mirror while Julia watched her from the chair behind her.
She told her about the dinner. About the "new" Mark—the measured voice, the reasonable offer, the unsettling calm.
Julia's reflection met hers in the glass. "Do you really think he'll help you?"
Olivia looked at herself honestly. She looked tired. She looked like a woman who had been carrying something heavy for a very long time and was only now close enough to the exit to feel the difference.
"It's not really who he is," she said. "But maybe he will. If he does, it makes everything so much easier." She paused. "I guess I have to find out."