“You want it to be?”
“Maybe. I’m a fire poker player.”
“Oooo, what else are you good at?”
His replies are fast. Teasing. Flirty. Addictive.
This is the most I’ve heard from him in days. And I don’t want closure. I want him. I want his hands, his eyes, his lips. His arms around me.
Three dots.
Then,
“Oh, baby, I’m good at plenty of things. Maybe you should give this a go and find out.”
I smile.
But it aches.
Because he doesn’t know it’s me.
He doesn’t know I’m still here.
He’s sitting in our babies' garden, messaging Pandora, unknowingly, it’s me inside what was once his home. In a bath we had once shared, laughter, wine and memories.
And any day now, he’ll fall for someone new, someone who’ll kiss that freckle on his neck and make him forget I ever existed.
“Maybe I will. But Casanova, this damsel’s gotta work.”
I send it off, even though I don’t want the conversation to end.
Ping.
“Same. But hey, this was fun. Come back if you wanna see more than my poker face.??”
I giggle.
The morning after is always the hardest. Not the night, because at least the night hides the ache. Morning makes it visible. The light hits the truth.
The world tilts.
Not in the cinematic way, not slow or graceful. It just… falls sideways.
Blake’s words still echo in my head, venom threaded through honey, and no matter how many times I blink, I can’t shake the sound of his voice. That smug tone. That familiarity that feels like a bruise I keep pressing just to prove I can still feel it.
I thought I was done breaking. Turns out, there are always smaller pieces left to shatter into.
I make it as far as the bathroom before my hands start shaking.
The mirror is merciless, mascara smudged, lips pale, eyes wide and wrong. I look like the ghost of someone who used to believe in forever.
My chest tightens until I can’t breathe. My lungs forget how. My body forgets how. I grip the sink, knuckles white, the porcelain biting back. Mid panic attack, when I’m sure I might actually be dying, my phone starts pinging, pinging,pingingeach alert like a knife to the ribs.
Hey.
You.
Hi.
