“I need some time.”
“Time?”
I look at my engagement ring sitting next to the sink, and I realize that I have no desire to put it back on. It felt heavy on my hand.
“I just need a few days.”
“For what? You ran out of our wedding. You need a few days to process that? Or do you need a few days to figure out what story you’re going to tell people?”
My chest hollows. “That’s not what I—”
“Because there are things I could say right now,” he says, quiet as anything. “About the way you’ve been lately. About the conversations we’ve had. The things I’ve been patient about.”
The things he’s beenpatientabout?
The solo. The career I put on pause. The family dinners I missed. The version of myself I kept editing because the current draft wasn’t quite right. All of it, arranged in a ledger I never consented to, being held somewhere just out of view for exactly this kind of moment.
I hear him exhale. When he speaks again, the warmth is back. “I love you. You know that. But you need to come home, and we need to talk about this properly. Face to face.”
Something in me wants to fold. Old habit, old pattern, the deep groove of three years of learning that it’s easier to move toward him than to hold ground, because holding ground costs something, and I’ve never been entirely sure what.
“Come home, Piper.”
Jesus, just say no. It’s one word. A small word.
“Not right now,” I say instead.
“Why are you doing this? What are you trying to prove?”
“I’m not trying to prove anything.”
“This is not who you are. Running away like this. Embarrassing both of us.” I open my mouth and close it again when he continues. “And whatever you’ve told that family of yours—”
“I haven’t told them anything.”
“Right. Fine. Just come home. We’ll sort it out. We can reschedule if you want. If you need more time before the ceremony, we can—”
“Ezra.”
“What?”
The words sit in my throat for me to turn it over. “I don’t think I’m coming home.”
The silence this time is different.
“Excuse me?”
“I… I can’t do this. Me. Us. We haven’t worked for a long time.”
He ignores all of it. “Okay, Piper. Do what you need to do. I’ll be here when you’re ready.”
I know what that means.
I’ll be heremeansthis conversation isn’t over.It meansI’m building a file.It means every day I’m gone is a day that gets added to the ledger, the same ledger that already has the solo in it and the missed dinners and the conversations he’s beenpatientabout.
It meanswhen you come back, you will owe me.
“Goodbye, Ezra.” The words get caught in a silent sob.
