Footsteps. Soft across the hardwood floor.
I didn’t need to look to know it was him.
Monte.
Of course, it was Monte.
He was always the one who came when I unraveled. Always the one who found the thread and followed it, even when I swore there wasn’t one to find.
“Hey,” he said gently. “What happened?”
I laughed, brittle and sharp. “I cried.”
A pause.
“Okay,” he said. Like it didn’t scare him. Like it wasn’t a bomb going off in the middle of my professional cathedral.
I finally turned to look at him.
His eyes were steady, dark with worry but not pity. That was the difference with Monte—he never made me feel weak for breaking. He just stood there, a steady pillar in the middle of the collapse.
“I didn’t mean to,” I said.
He tilted his head. “You mean you didn’t want to. There’s a difference.”
I opened my mouth. Closed it again.
There were tears on my cheek. I hadn’t even realized they’d spilled.
Monte stepped forward. No sudden movements. No swooping gestures. Just quiet gravity, pulling me into his orbit. He reached up, brushed his thumb across my cheekbone, slow and soft. Like I was something worth saving.
“I’m fine,” I whispered.
“Sure, you are.”
Another tear fell. And then another.
It wasn’t a storm. It wasn’t a flood. It was quieter than that—grief on tiptoe. The kind of ache that didn’t scream. The kind that whispered,You were supposed to be enough.
“I don’t do this,” I said, my voice breaking. “I don’t cry over men. I don’t wait for them. I don’t?—”
“You don’t let yourself want them,” Monte finished, his voice barely audible. “Not really.”
I looked away.
He sighed, stepping closer until there was barely a breath between us. “You gave him something. That’s not weakness. That’s brave.”
I shook my head. “It was a mistake.”
“Maybe,” he said. “But it was yours to make. And if it left a mark …” He reached out, tucked a piece of hair behind my ear. “That just means it mattered.”
I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t move.
“Portia,” he said, softer now. “You’re allowed to want more than perfect weddings and smooth timelines. You’re allowed to want something messy. Something real.”
My lip trembled.
And that was when I broke.
