“I told you... I don’t do drama, Ava. I don’t have time or space for it in my life. I’m too old for this shit.”
“And I told you I don’t do lies.”
His expression sharpened. Defensive. Dismissive. “You’re always looking for the cracks, aren’t you? Always assuming the worst.”
There it is. The flip. The turning of the mirror.
Make me the problem. Easier that way, right?
“No,” I said. “Not always. Just when the silence starts to feel like excuses and betrayal.”
He scoffed. “You try to come across like a woman who knows it all. But really, you’re just a jaded girl looking for reasons to burn down anything good.”
I went still.
And then I smiled.
Not soft. Not sweet.
Sharp.
“Maybe,” I said. “But at least I’m not so full of myself, I think I can lie with a straight face to the woman who trusted me with her fucking heart.”
He flinched. Just barely. But I saw it.
“You said you trust me.”
“I thought I did.”
The silence stretched. The heater clicked on. Outside, a siren wailedand faded. Inside, we stood like strangers on opposite sides of a line that couldn’t be erased.
He shook his head, dragged his hand down his face and laughed bitterly. “You’re going to throw all this away because you saw Erin leaving? Leaving a building with more apartments than just mine. Because of your jealousy?”
No. I’m throwing this away because you gave me nothing to hold onto.
Because you could have said no. You could’ve said you’d never.
But you didn’t.
I let the weight of the picture Erin had sent me anchor me in my rage.
“I wanted to believe you were different,” I said. “I wanted to believe someone like you could love someone like me and not use it against her the second it got hard.”
“I haven’t done anything wrong.”
“But you won’t deny it either.” I stepped back. "You won't give me the words I need, and with how you have been behaving since then... well, speaks for itself."
His face twisted. “Jesus, Ava. Do you think this is easy for me? Do you think being with you comes with a fucking manual of landmines? One wrong move and you explode. One wrong silence and you assume the worst.”
And there it is.
Every fear I whispered in the dark was handed back to me like proof.
Weaponized.
“You said you’d stay,” I said, barely above a whisper. “You said I didn’t have to earn your love. That you’d show up even when I pushed. You made me believe you were safe.”
“And you said you weren’t ready. That you needed time. Maybe I should have believed you. Maybe I needed something, too, Ava. But we don’t talk about that, do we? Because it’s always about what you’ve survived. What you need. What you expect.”
