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“No.”

Vadim’s voice, little more than a hoarse whisper by now, cuts right through me. My heart pounds in my chest. I’m starting to feel dizzy.

“We lost the baby before we even got to meet it. But I’m sure our tragic story will make you very happy,” my ex continues.

“Raphaël, what kind of game are you playing?!”

“Let me finish, Alma! You and I were happy! You still haven’t mourned our child—that’s why you refuse to open your eyes! That’s why you run away from me, instead of letting yourself love me! The truth is, we should be together. You only got back together with him to forget me. That’s the only reason. He’s nothing but a distraction, a Band-Aid!”

“Stop it! Shut up!” I yell.

Tears are streaming down my face. I don’t know how long I’ve been crying.

“Alma told me everything—about your teenage romance and how it was ruined by your bullshit about being some poor, abandoned boy when you were actually just a nasty, little brat who liked to rebel!! The two of you were never going to work. You came from different worlds, and that hasn’t changed. She was going to build a life with me. The two of us are family; you’re nothing but a ghost from the past.”

Vadim’s expression turns dark. His jaw clenches, and I start to worry that he won’t be able to control himself much longer.

“Raphaël, you need to leave, or I swear I’ll call the cops! I never want to see or hear from you again. You no longer exist to me. And vice versa!”

Raphaël holds my gaze for a few long seconds, his silence echoing with all the painful memories that have been left unsaid. Then, finally, he turns and heads down the stairs. I watch him go, just to make sure he is well and truly gone.

Out of my life.

“So, that’s what you were hiding from me. A baby,” Vadim whispers, as if thinking out loud. He seems torn between compassion and anger. But it isn’t long before he makes a choice. “You kept this to yourself, even when I told you everything about my past? You call that love, Alma?”

“I didn’t know how to tell you,” I say. “It’s a painful subject. I have a hard time talking about it.”

“You haven’t changed, and you never will. You don’t trust me.”

“Vadim…”

Tears blind me again.

“You’ll never love me the way I love you,” he blurts out.

“You have no idea what I’m capable of doing for you! You don’t know how much I love you, Vadim! You’re all I have, all that matters to me…”

My voice cracks as I try to convince him, but he’s already somewhere else. Far away from me.

I rush at him and, in my desperation, try to kiss him, but he gently pushes me away.

“Alma, listen to me. I’m sorry that you suffered. Sorry that you lost that baby and the perfect life that went with it.”

“Perfect? No, you don’t understand, Vadim. You need to understand,” I gasp. “My life won’t be perfect if I’m not sharing it with you. I only want you!”

“That child should have been ours,” he says, his voice trembling slightly. “I didn’t have a real family, but that can change. It will change. For twelve years, I never stopped hoping. I wanted it to be you, Alma. Only you.”

I’m no longer simply crying; I collapse into sobs. My heart feels like it has been trampled on. No matter how many words I say, no matter how hard I try to make him understand, the man I love more than life itself doesn’t hear any of it. It’s as if I’m not really here. As if I’m invisible. As if I don’t exist.

“We might as well leave it here,” he mutters despondently, before leaving me alone in the stairwell.

I wander the streets of Paris all night, unable to show my face again at the party being held in my honor. Clémentine, who thinks I’m in Vadim’s arms, comes up with some excuse or other to explain my disappearance.

For a week, I try to contact Vadim by every means possible, but each attempt is met with silence. I go into autopilot, forcing myself not to feel anything, and above all, not to cry in public. My nights are restless, starved of sleep and filled with nightmares.

This time, he won’t come back.

***