Chapter 8
SADIE
It was past eight at night when my phone finally buzzed with his name on the screen.
Patrick. I almost let it go to voicemail again.
It had been almost three weeks since I moved out, and every day had become a series of decisions designed to protect my fragile sense of peace.
I couldn’t face him yet. Not until I was ready to believe he actually understood.
But tonight, something made me hesitate.
The tiny icon indicating a video call caught my eye.
I hadn’t spoken to him face-to-face since I’d left, and despite everything, part of me missed him.
Curiosity got the best of me. I swiped to answer, the screen brightening with his familiar face staring back at me.
He was in his office at Holbrook, the polished space looking thrown against the dim hangar I sat in, surrounded by dismantled aircraft parts.
“Hey,” Patrick said softly, as though afraid to startle me. “Can we talk? Please?”
I sighed, leaning back against the cold concrete wall of the museum restoration room, my phone propped against a stack of tools.
Is this what I really wanted? Was I ready to talk?
And was Patrick ready to listen? The last time we had spoken, it had ended in another argument, his voice filled with that same mix of guilt and confusion that only made me feel worse.
I was tired of arguing, tired of repeating myself, but it was also exhausting trying to maintain the distance I needed.
“Okay,” I finally relented. “Let’s talk.” My words felt heavy in the silence, like the ticking of an antique clock in an empty room, a rhythm that both comforted and unnerved.
He gave me a half-smile, laced with relief and something I couldn’t quite place. “Sadie... I’ve been thinking about what you said, about how I’ve been treating you. You’re right, I haven’t been fair. And I want to fix that.”
My heart tightened, longing warring with apprehension, the familiar ache of wanting to believe him at odds with the hard-won caution that had kept me going these past weeks.
I could feel the grease under my fingernails, the physical evidence of where my real work lay, while Patrick’s background was a world of glass and chrome where decisions were made without understanding the weight behind them.
“Go on,” I said cautiously, my fingers unconsciously tracing a rust-colored stain on my jeans, a grounding sensation amid the emotional uncertainty of this call.
I wanted to hope, to find some sign that he truly understood, but experience had taught me that words were just air without meaningful action behind them.
Patrick leaned forward, his elbows on his desk, the crease in his brow deepening. “I know the press release was a mistake. But it was just that, a mistake, a misstep. We can move past it.” His tone was earnest, almost pleading.
“A mistake?” I echoed, bitterness creeping into my voice. “Is that what you call letting the person who has tried to undermine me at every step of the way steal my spotlight? Three times in one week?”
He winced slightly, his jaw tensing at my words. “I know, I know. It was wrong. But I can fix it. We can rewrite the release, give you equal billing. Make it a joint announcement.”
I closed my eyes briefly, the frustration of the past weeks welling up again.
“You still don’t get it, Patrick. This isn’t about a press release.
It’s about how you let her take my place, right in front of you, without batting an eye.
It’s about you allowing her to diminish me, to treat me like I was invisible.
” The anger in my voice surprised me, sharp and hot, cutting through the quiet of the museum.
Patrick’s eyes flashed with something that looked like anger, but it was gone as quickly as it appeared.
“I didn’t...” he started, then stopped, taking a deep breath.
“You’re right. I didn’t see what was happening.
I was too caught up in the launch, in keeping everything on schedule.
But Sadie, this is a huge opportunity for Holbrook, for us.
We can’t throw it all away over one mistake. ”
The weariness in his voice, that familiar slight gravel at the edges when he was truly tired, almost made me soften, almost made me want to reach through the cold glass of my phone and touch his face, to trace the lines etched around his eyes from too many late nights, to remind him that we were in this together, once.
My own breath caught in my throat, a traitorous response from a heart that still remembered the comfort of his presence.
But the distance between us, the literal miles separating the pristine boardroom where he sat from this grease-stained hangar, and the much deeper, metaphorical space that had grown between our hearts over the past months, felt like a chasm I wasn’t ready to cross, not yet.
Not until he truly saw what lay at the bottom of that divide: the years of my work he’d allowed to be trampled, the trust he’d carelessly broken.
“This isn’t about the company, Patrick. It’s about us. It’s about you choosing to stand with someone who has spent her whole life making me feel insignificant.” The words hung in the air, heavier than the weight of the engines I had spent hours working on.
He looked down, his fingers tapping nervously on his desk.
When he spoke again, his voice was softer, more controlled.
“I know, Sadie. I messed up. I’m sorry. I’m trying to fix this, but you have to meet me halfway.
Alyssa’s part of the team now, and we need to keep things moving forward.
If you’ll just let me handle things, I can make sure you get the recognition you deserve.
The Eco-Turbine is just the beginning. We’ll have more wins. ”
I stared at him, disbelief swirling inside me like the dust motes drifting lazily through the air above the engine parts. “Handle things?” The laugh that escaped me was sharp and humorless. “That’s what you think this is? A problem you can just manage like another project?”
He shifted, the frustration evident despite his effort to stay calm. “It’s not like that. It’s just business. I’m doing the best I can. You know how these things work.”
“Exactly. That’s the problem.” I ran a hand through my hair, grease stains catching in the strands. “You think I’m just another part of the equation. Someone who will fall into line when the numbers look right. But I’m not. I’m your wife.”
“You think I don’t know that?” The anger in his voice was unmistakable now.
“I’ve done everything I can to support you, to give you room to shine, but this constant fighting over Alyssa is killing us!
And yes, maybe I haven’t been as aware as I should have been, but do you really think I’d intentionally let her push you out?
” His eyes searched mine, desperately. “This was my fault, but you’re making it bigger than it has to be. ”
“Maybe if you listened to me before, we wouldn’t be here!” My voice rose, echoing faintly in the empty hangar. I hated how much it shook.
Patrick exhaled, visibly trying to steady himself. “I’ve tried apologizing, Sadie. What else do you want from me? Should I fire Alyssa? Will that make you happy?”
The question hung between us like a grenade. The answer was no, it wouldn’t, but not for the reasons he probably assumed. “This isn’t about her, Patrick! It’s about you never hearing me. Not when I needed you to see how she’s been taking over, not when I needed you to believe me.”
“So what are you saying?” He looked at me, his expression tight with restrained frustration. “You want me to choose between you two? That’s what this is about? You’re giving me an ultimatum?”
“I’m not giving you anything, Patrick,” I said, my chest tightening. “I’m telling you what it feels like to watch you let someone else erase me. That’s all.”
For a moment, neither of us spoke. Hurt and defiance warred on his face, but something else was there too, a look that told me he was as lost as I was.
I almost gave in, almost said we could figure it out if he just promised to do better.
But the words wouldn’t come. Because the truth was, he couldn’t fix this just like that.
Not until he really, truly understood why I had left in the first place.
“I love you.” His voice cracked slightly, breaking through the wall I had built around myself. “And I don’t want to lose you over this. But we both have careers, Sadie. We have to work together on this.”
The words landed wrong, stirring up the resentment I’d been trying so hard to keep in check. “We do have careers,” I agreed. “But right now, it doesn’t feel like I’m allowed to have one. Not without you giving away my success to someone else, because it’s more convenient for you.”
“That’s not fair,” he shot back, his calm finally crumbling. “You know how hard I’m working to make sure you have your place at Holbrook. This was supposed to be our launchpad, Sadie, for both of us.”
I swallowed the lump in my throat, pushing down the urge to cry. “It was, until Alyssa decided to stand on top of it and shove me out of the way, while you held her hand the entire time.”
“You’re not giving me a chance to fix it,” he insisted, leaning in closer to the screen. “All I hear from you is blame. You’re not hearing me when I say I’m sorry.”
“I’ve heard every apology, Patrick,” I said quietly. “But I don’t see anything changing.”
He closed his eyes briefly, running his hands over his face as though trying to erase the tension between us. “I don’t know what else you want me to do.” The exhaustion in his voice mirrored my own. “Do you want to separate? Is that it? Because I feel like that’s what you’re pushing toward.”
I stared at him, feeling the weight of his words settle like lead in my stomach.
The thought had crossed my mind more than once, but hearing him say it felt like an admission we might be too broken to fix.
I hated how right it felt in that moment, how much it scared me.
“I don’t know what I want anymore.” The words slipped out before I could stop them, the truth too heavy to hold back.
“But I can’t come home and pretend nothing happened. ”
His face hardened, as though my words had crystallized something he’d been trying not to see. “So this is it, then? You’re just done? You’re not even going to try?”
Tears stung the corners of my eyes, and I fought to keep them from falling. “I have tried, Patrick. I’ve tried to make you understand what was happening, but it feels like I’ve just been talking to a wall. I can’t keep pretending this isn’t killing me.”
The silence returned, cold and unforgiving.
And this time, I knew there was nothing left to say.
Not tonight. I felt the crack widening, the fragile bridge between us splintering with each breath we took apart from each other.
Patrick looked at me as though he were waiting for a lifeline, something to hold on to, but I had nothing to give.
“I’ll call you when I’m ready,” I said, my voice hollow. I couldn’t say anything more without breaking entirely, and I wasn’t sure he’d even hear me if I tried.
Before he could reply, I ended the call.
My screen went black, and all I was left with was the quiet of the museum, the steady hum of machines in the distance, and the feeling that I was finally standing on the edge of something irrevocable.
My thumb hovered over the screen where his face had just been, the ghost of his expression still imprinted on my mind.
The grease under my fingernails felt more real than ever, a tangible reminder of who I was without him.
For the first time since walking out on him, the separation didn’t feel temporary.
It felt final, as permanent as the cold concrete beneath my feet and the unyielding metal surrounding me in this hangar.
The tears came then, quiet and slow, sliding down my cheeks in the dim light of the empty hangar.
I wiped them away with the back of my hand, smearing more grease on my face, showing how my marriage had fallen apart.
It wasn’t what I wanted, not really. I had never wanted us to come to this.
But I wasn’t willing to settle anymore, to watch him hand my life away while he tried to smooth everything over with half-hearted apologies. That wasn’t love. Not anymore.
I sat there a while longer, my back pressed against the cold concrete wall of the museum, watching the lights blink rhythmically on the control panel of the partially restored aircraft beside me.
Each steady pulse was a reminder that I could still fix something, even if I couldn’t fix us.
I closed my eyes against the dim glow of the hangar, the lingering scent of oil and metal filling my lungs as I tried not to imagine what my life would look like tomorrow, or next week, without him, and without his familiar presence filling the spaces I now realized I’d been leaving empty for years.
When I finally left the hangar, the air outside was heavy with the coming storm, and the sky had turned an ominous gray.
I wrapped my jacket tighter around my body as I stepped into the parking lot, feeling the first drops of rain fall against my skin.
Just like my marriage, the weather had become unpredictable, turbulent, and cold.
There was no going back. And as the rain began to pour, I realized I had to figure out how to move forward alone.
The rain intensified from a drizzle to a downpour, each drop striking the asphalt with a sound that echoed my own heartbreak.
I stood motionless for a moment, letting the water soak through my jacket, the cold seeping into my skin as if to match the chill that had settled deep in my bones.
The streetlights reflected on the wet pavement, creating wavering golden ribbons that stretched into the distance, a path forward that was both beautiful and terrifying in its uncertainty.
I had spent years building a life with Patrick, intertwining my ambitions with his, compromising where necessary but never expecting that my very identity would be the price of our partnership.
Now, standing alone in this storm, I understood that moving forward meant accepting the painful truth that some bridges, once crossed and then burned, could never be rebuilt.
The museum would be my refuge in the coming days, but it couldn’t shelter me from the lonely nights or the difficult decisions ahead.
Taking a deep breath, tasting the rain on my lips, I walked toward my car, each step a small declaration of independence, a quiet acknowledgment that from this moment on, my future would be crafted by my own hands, without the compromises that had slowly chipped away at who I was meant to be.