“You weren’t exactly cheating,” she says. “You and Hannah were on a break.” I laugh, but there’s no humor in it. “Does that even matter?” She stays silent, and weboth know the answer. Of course, it doesn’t matter. Hannah knows I was with Olivia. But that doesn’t change the truth. I messed this up for both of them.
“Do you still love Hannah?” she asks. I hesitate. Too long. “I love that she’s the mother of my girls. I love what we used to have. But I’m not in love with her anymore. Haven’t been in a long time. Way before seeing Liv again.” She sighs. I know she wants to yell at me, and she’s not doing it just because I’m losing it. “The worst part is that I’m not even happy about this baby. Isn’t that fucked? I love my girls, I live and breathe for them, but I don’t feel that way about this child. What kind of man am I?
“All I know is that you’re not a bad one, Ethan,” she says. “You are conflicted, frustrated, sad, but this doesn’t mean you’re not going to love that child. You are a great father.” I close my eyes and try not to cry.
We ended the call, and I started driving. I don’t even remember half of it. My hands are shaking; my heart is pounding in my chest as I walk towards her door. I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing here. But I need to talk to her. I knock once. No response. I knock again. She opens the door, looking me dead in the eyes, arms crossed.
“Liv,” I whisper.
She takes a step back, silent. She lets me in, but I can see it on her face; I’m the last person she wants to see. I stay standing even though my legs feel like they’re going to give up on me. “I’m sorry,” I say. “I know it’s not enough, and nothing right now will be, but I am sorry.”
“I talked to Hannah. It’s over between us. I should’ve ended it a long time ago, but I didn’t. I was trying to be decent. Trying to do the right thing. But I screwed everything up instead.” She stares at me. “So now you end your marriage?” she finally says. “Now that she’s pregnant? Wow, classy!”
“No, I’m ending it because it should’ve ended years ago. Not just because of you. Because I’ve been lying to her, to myself, but this doesn’t change how I feel about you.” Her jaw tightens. She turns away, as if looking at me is too much. “I love you,” I say. “I’ve loved you since we were kids. That hasn’t changed.”
She turns back, eyes glassy. But there’s no softness in them. Just pain. “You think saying that fixes this?”
“No, I know this doesn’t fix shit,” I say. “But we need to be honest and say our truths.”
“Oh, you want the truth?” Her voice cracks open. “Here’s the truth. I loved you, Ethan, for years. I thought about you, fuck, I even dreamt about you. I stalked you on social media, and I saw that you were happy. I followed along with your wedding, the baby showers, and the birth of your girls, and I was proud of you. Jealous of her, but happy for you. I saw the man you turned out to be. And while I wanted that with you, I settled for my life.”
She sighs and takes another step back. “When your mother died, I suffered, and I hesitated on coming because I didn’t want to see you. Because I knew this could happen. I knew I’d fall for you all over again. And I did. I even became the other woman, for fucks sake, wehad an affair for weeks. And even after my divorce, I was still ‘the other one’. I gave you everything, and you still broke me.” She looks exhausted.
“I didn’t mean to?—”
“You didn’t mean to get her pregnant either, right?”
“No,” I say. “I didn’t.”
“But it still happened.” I nod. Because what else can I do? “I won’t be the reason your marriage ends. I won’t be the villain in your daughter’s story. I won’t do that. Not to them, not to her, and not to myself.”
“You’re not the villain,” I say, stepping forward. “You didn’t ruin anything. It was already broken.” She laughs, bitter.
“I’m not asking you to forgive me. I just needed you to know I’m not walking away from you. I never wanted to.” She stares at me like she’s trying to remember who I used to be.
“Then why did you?” she says. “I didn’t mean to.”
“Don’t,” she says, holding up a hand. “You said we’d take it moment by moment, that we’d figure it out. And I believed you. I was building something again—for me, for my kids, for us. And now…” Her voice breaks. “Now I feel like a goddamn idiot.”
“You’re not,” I say, voice hoarse. “You’re everything.” She closes her eyes. Breath shaky. “Then why does it feel like I’m the one who lost everything—again?” She walks towards the end table and grabs an envelope and the box my mom left her. We haven’t talked about this in a while, and we never discussed what was in that box.
She grabs it and hands it to me.
The room goes quiet; all I can hear is my heart pounding. When I opened the box, my world shattered. It was my mom’s engagement ring. She wanted Olivia to have it, no matter whether I ever gave it to her or not. She deserves it, she always did, and now I lost the opportunity to give it to her.
“Never not yours,” I whispered.
Her eyes snap open. “Ethan, don’t.”
“I still mean it, and this ring is supposed to be yours,” I say. “You can hate me. You can shut the door. But I’ve never not been yours. And nothing will change that.” And that’s when she breaks. The tears fall fast. Her whole body shakes. And I hate myself more than I ever have because I did this.
“I don’t know what you want me to do with that, or with the ring. I wanted it sixteen years ago. And when she left it to me, for a second, I thought maybe it would finally be mine and mean something. But now, I can’t have it,” she chokes out. I swallow hard because it’s true. That ring belongs to her, but I can’t force her to keep it.
“You need to go.”
“Please, just don’t forget I love you, I always will.” She wipes her face with the back of her hand.
“I’ll fix this,” I say as a promise.
