I’m chafing, but… this is my ticket out.
“Got it,” I say, keeping my voice level. Then I hang up before he can say anything else.
NEW ME
ASHLEY
By the time we reach the beauty salon, I’ve just barely managed to shake off the effects of that kiss.
At least that’s what I tell myself.
Similar to the spa, there’s an entire wall of windows looking out over endless blue. The ocean rolls by like a living screensaver, sunlight bouncing off the water and ricocheting across the mirrors so that everything gleams.
No wonder the prices are twice what we’d pay on land. Apparently, you pay extra for the atmosphere.
Fair enough.
I’m guided over to one of the styling chairs and sink into it with a sigh, letting the cape settle around my shoulders as the stylist gently twists my long hair up and out of the way. After the initial polite greetings, the woman attending to me falls quiet, something I’m beyond grateful for.
Honestly, I couldn’t make small talk right now if my life depended on it.
On the flip side, not talking means thinking.
The problem with kissing your husband—or soon-to-be ex-husband, rather—is that your body doesn’t care about finaldecisions, or moving forward. It just remembers. Every spark, every sigh, every piece of history you thought you’d buried.
So, yeah. I like kissing Beckett.
But that doesn’t erase the last twelve months.
It doesn’t erase the way I’ve been slowly doubting myself, one unanswered question, one lonely night, at a time.
I stare at my reflection while the stylist is brushing out my hair, and see the same person I’ve seen all my life.
I am functional. Normal.
Except… okay, maybe I’m not quite at one hundred percent. Even though I feel like I’ve had to function at one hundred and ten percent recently.
Asking him to move out was supposed to take care of that. Because he…
He was the one breaking me.
My brain spirals and then rewinds.
“If it’s work, then explain it to me.” I remember reaching for him, my hands shaking. “Tell me something. Anything that makes sense. Make me understand what’s going on with you.”
“Nothing’s going on with me. I’m just… Everything feels like a trap.” He kept shaking his head, muttering half-answers, refusing to look me in the eye.
A trap? He feels trapped with me?
And somewhere between my pleading and his silence, that tiny flicker of hope went out.
Something inside me… broke.
“I want you out,” I’d whispered. “If you can’t talk to me. Then go.”
He’d gone still, stunned. “You can’t be serious.”
“I am.”
