I froze.
Marriage?
The thought made my skin crawl. Not because of Amanda, she deserved to be married. But the idea of me standing at an altar, promising forever to someone who didn’t know the real me? It felt like a lie.
“I don’t know,” I stuttered. “It’s only been a year.”
“But they say men know within the first six months,” Shannon, my stepmom, chimed in as she walked past. “If you don’t know by now, Si, you’re wasting her time.”
I looked back out into the living room. Amanda looked up and caught my eye. She smiled, a bright, hopeful thing. I tried to smile back, but my face crumpled.
I felt absolutely nothing.
My phone buzzed in my pocket. I pulled it out instinctively.
Instagram Notification:
UWFOfficial:@DeadlockUWFMain Events the 47 Arena in London! Sold out crowd!
I swiped it open. There he was. Cal. Standing on the turnbuckle, looking out at a sea of eighty thousand people. He didn’t have the title yet, he was still chasing it, but he was undeniably the biggest star in the company. He looked like a god. He looked lonely.
“Silas?”
I snapped my head up. Amanda was standing there.
“You okay?” she asked, touching my arm. “You zoned out.”
I looked at her hand on my arm. Then I looked at the phone in my other hand.
“I’m fine,” I lied, sliding the phone back into my pocket, burning against my thigh. “Just… tired.”
I was trying to build a life with a perfect woman in North Carolina. But I was haunting the Instagram feed of a man currently on a European tour.
How pathetic is that?I thought, downing the rest of the beer. Almost thirty and still pining for a ghost.
YEAR SEVEN - THE REED LAND, NORTH CAROLINA
Now playing: BAILE INoVIDABLE - Bad Bunny
Webrokeuptwodays after our second anniversary.
Amanda wanted the ring. She wanted the babies. She wanted the future. I couldn’t give it to her. I told her I “didn’t fit” that life. She cried. I didn’t. That was the worst part.
I turned twenty-nine in silence.
My dad kept hinting about training again. He pointed out that my body had changed; I wasn’t the lanky kid anymore. I had filled out. My shoulder was healed, reinforced with anchors. Scott swore I’d be more efficient now.
I refused. I wasn’t going back to the thing that broke me.
Then Evan called.
“I’m sorry about Amanda,” Evan said over the line. “And for missing your birthday. But… maybe the breakup was a good thing, Si. Maybe it’s time you kind of go for someone that’s, you know… your type?”
I gripped the phone, sitting on the porch in the dark. “I think I’m better served alone, honestly.”
“You’re not gonna sit on that fucking haunted ass plot of land in your old ass house and die, Silas!” Evan shouted, losing his patience. “Get over yourself! It’s been like seven years, dude! And I’m not trying to be insensitive, but you can’t tell me fucking Cal was so good you can’t get past it.”
I gritted my teeth so hard my jaw ached.
