Chapter 2 #3
I was exhausted from making myself understandable to the person who should have known me best. Exhausted from turning my pain into words, laying it out piece by piece, only to watch him decide whether each part was justified.
He shouldn’t have needed an explanation. He should’ve cared enough to see what he was doing to me.
A sickening doubt crept through me, turning every certainty I’d held about us inside out.
Had he ever?
The memory of our first meeting, once a cherished story, now played back in a horrifying new light. Had he stayed that day because he wanted to? Or had I made him stay?
I had been the one keeping us moving forward. The one who proposed. The one who planned the dates, the vacations, the future I had been so certain we’d share. I was the one who said I love you first, months into our relationship, with my whole heart exposed and nothing held back.
He never said it.
All those years I’d spent translating his silence into love suddenly felt unbearable. I’d convinced myself his actions were his way of saying what he couldn’t put into words.
What if I’d been wrong?
What if the words had never been difficult?
What if he simply didn’t feel them?
Not for me.
The thought kept circling through my head when Cassian caught my wrist and turned me toward him.
My gaze stayed fixed on his chest, refusing to climb any higher. His fingers slipped beneath my chin, gently lifting my face until our eyes met.
“Alessia.” He swallowed, his voice softer now. “Can we please not do this tonight? Can we talk tomorrow? Please.” His eyes held mine, pleading.
I tilted my head, staring at him.
That damn tomorrow again.
We’ll go tomorrow.
I’ll be there tomorrow.
Let’s do it tomorrow.
Every promise had been pushed into another day until tomorrow had become the place where everything between us went to disappear.
Our marriage had become a collection of tomorrows that never came.
And now, with my suitcase packed and my heart already breaking apart, he was asking me to give him another one.
A disappointed shake of my head was all he got before I tore my wrist from his grasp and walked down the stairs.
I snatched the car keys from the ceramic bowl by the door. My fingers had barely curled around the cold brass of the knob when his hand caught my wrist again, stopping me cold.
“Alessia, you’re being ridiculous.”
I turned to him.
The anger I’d been fighting all evening had burned itself down to a dull ache beneath my ribs. I looked at his hand around my wrist, at his face, and felt the last thread holding me to this house strain.
“No,” I said, my voice eerily calm. “What’s ridiculous is me finding reasons to stay with you when you’ve given me thousands not to.”
His grip loosened.
I pulled my wrist free before he could say another word and stepped outside. Cold air hit my face, but it didn’t clear my head the way I needed it to. I made it one step onto the porch before stopping.
My feet refused to carry me any farther.
I wanted to leave. Every part of me wanted to put distance between myself and the man who had just shattered everything I thought I knew about our marriage. Yet some stubborn piece of me refused to let this be the end while doubt still had room to whisper.
I had to know. I couldn’t make this final, shattering decision based on assumptions. I owed myself the truth, even if hearing it would destroy me.
I looked back at him. He stood exactly where I’d left him, his gaze lowered to the floor. The instant he realized I’d turned around, his eyes lifted to mine. Hope flickered there, fragile and desperate. He took a hurried step toward me, but froze when he heard my question.
“Do you love me?”
He stilled. “W-what?”
Every ounce of courage I had left was being spent just standing there, waiting for him to answer. I forced myself to hold his gaze, even while panic clawed through me.
“Just answer this one question.” The words trembled despite every effort to keep them from breaking. “Do you love me?”
I waited.
His eyes stayed on mine, and for one fleeting instant, I thought he might finally say it. His lips parted, but whatever words had risen there never made it past them.
The silence lingered between us, growing heavier with every second that passed.
His eyes moved over my face, searching, hesitating, refusing to give me the answer I had asked for.
His lips remained parted, then slowly closed, leaving me standing there with the hope I’d foolishly allowed to rise still hanging between us.
He looked away, then back at me, pain flickering across his face, but still nothing came. My eyes stung, and I blinked rapidly, fighting the wetness gathering along my lashes.
My heart felt ruined beyond repair, every fragile piece scattered somewhere I could never reach again. The pain ran through me with every breath, dragging memories behind it, forcing me to remember every time I had looked at him and believed I had finally found the place where I belonged.
Every night I’d fallen asleep beside him believing I was wanted there suddenly felt like evidence of how badly I’d misunderstood our life.
Every morning I had woken beside him and felt grateful for the life we had built together now seemed painfully naive.
I had trusted those moments. I had allowed myself to build a future around them.
One question had torn through all of that.
Tears gathered in my eyes and spilled down my cheeks before I could hold them back.
I wiped them away with the heel of my hand, hurriedly, almost desperately, yet fresh tears followed.
My vision blurred. I blinked them away and tried to breathe through the ache, tried to gather enough composure to stand there with some dignity left.
Whatever composure I had left was slipping further out of reach.