Chương 4
She typed:
Saturday is fine.
She deleted that too.
Finally, she wrote:
I’ll be there.
She sent it.
Then she immediately regretted the period at the end.
It looked too final.
That night, she barely slept.
Not because she wanted him back.
She kept telling herself that.
Not because she wanted him back.
But because seeing someone leave was different from watching the empty space they created.
The empty space could be ignored.
A person standing inside it could not.
Saturday morning arrived with rain.
Maren stood in the kitchen making coffee when she heard the elevator stop outside her apartment.
She froze.
The sound was ridiculous.
A normal elevator.
A normal hallway.
A normal morning.
Yet her body reacted as if something dangerous had entered the building.
The knock came three times.
Not four.
Evan always knocked three times.
She hated that she still knew that.
When she opened the door, he looked different.
Not dramatically.
Just slightly.
His hair was less carefully arranged.
His suit was replaced by jeans and a dark sweater.
There were shadows beneath his eyes.
For a moment, they looked like two people who had once belonged to each other.
Then Maren remembered.
“Hi,” he said.
“Hi.”
Neither moved.
The hallway smelled like someone’s breakfast cooking downstairs.
A child laughed somewhere near the stairs.
The world continued being ordinary again.
“I’ll just get my things,” Evan said.
Maren stepped aside.
He walked in slowly.
His eyes moved around the apartment.
She saw the moment he noticed the missing candles.
The empty space where his photographs had been.
The absence of his shoes near the door.
Small changes.
Permanent ones.
“I packed most of it already,” he said.
“Okay.”
He looked at her.
“You don’t have to be like this.”
Maren frowned.
“Like what?”
“Cold.”
The word surprised her.
She almost laughed.
“Cold?”
“I didn’t mean—”
“No, I want to hear this.”
Evan looked uncomfortable.
That was new.
Usually, he was good with words.
That was one of the things she loved about him.
Evan could walk into a room full of angry people and make them believe he was listening.
He knew how to calm clients.
He knew how to negotiate.
He knew how to make difficult things sound reasonable.
But standing in front of her, he suddenly looked like someone who had lost the ability to explain himself.
“You left,” she said.
“I know.”
“You brought another woman into my home.”
“I know.”
“You packed before telling me.”
His face tightened.
“I know.”
“Then what exactly do you want from me?”
He looked away.
“I don’t know.”
That answer stopped her.
Because it was honest.
And honesty was something she had wanted from him for months.
She just never expected it to arrive after everything was already broken.
Evan walked toward the bedroom.
Maren followed at a distance.
She watched him open drawers and collect the remaining pieces of his life.
A belt.
A watch charger.
A few books.
A photograph from their first apartment.
He held the photograph longer than the other things.
It showed them sitting on a cheap sofa they bought from a neighbor.
Maren’s hair was shorter.
Her face was untouched by scars.
Evan was laughing at something outside the frame.
“You kept this,” he said.
Maren crossed her arms.
“It was in the drawer.”
He looked at it again.
“I remember that day.”
“Of course you do.”
His expression changed.
Not anger.
Pain.
“I’m not trying to pretend nothing happened.”
“Then what are you trying to do?”
He placed the photograph down carefully.
“I’m trying to understand how we got here.”
Maren looked at him.
“You really don’t know?”
“No.”
The answer was quiet.
She walked to the window.
Rain traced lines down the glass.
“You started disappearing before you left.”
Evan said nothing.
“You stopped asking about my appointments.”
His face changed.
“You stopped touching me because you were afraid I’d notice you were looking away.”
“Maren.”
“You stopped telling me things because you said you didn’t want to worry me.”
She turned.
“But really, you just didn’t want me close enough to see what was happening.”
Evan sat on the edge of the bed.
For the first time, he looked older.
Not physically.
Emotionally.
“I was scared.”
The words were so unexpected that she did not respond.
“After the fire,” he continued, “everyone looked at you like you were fragile.”
Maren’s expression hardened.
“I wasn’t.”
“I know.”
“No, you don’t.”
He nodded slowly.
“I know now.”
That angered her more.
Now.
After.
Always after.
“I was scared because I couldn’t fix it,” he said.
“You weren’t supposed to fix it.”
“I know.”
“You were supposed to stay.”
He looked down.
“I tried.”
The sentence hurt because she knew he believed it.
Maybe that was the worst part.
Maybe people could fail you while still thinking they were trying.
Maren sat in the chair near the doorway.
“You tried for how long?”
Evan did not answer.
She waited.
He did not need to.
The silence answered.
A few minutes later, he carried the last box toward the door.
Before leaving, he stopped.
“There’s something you should know.”
Maren looked up.
His hand tightened around the box.
“What?”
He hesitated.
A familiar hesitation.
The same one from the night he arrived with Lydia.
“There’s a reason Lydia was there.”
Maren felt her stomach tighten.
“What does that mean?”
Evan looked toward the floor.
“It’s not what you think.”
She almost smiled.
Everyone said that.
Every person caught in a situation they created always wanted to begin with those words.
“I don’t know what I think anymore,” she said.
He nodded.
“Lydia works with me.”
“I figured.”
“She knows about the accident.”
Maren went still.
“How?”
Evan looked uncomfortable.
“She was involved with a project at the firm.”
“What project?”
He did not answer immediately.
And that hesitation told her more than the words could.
May you like
“Maren,” he said softly, “there are things I didn’t tell you.”
The room changed.
