(William’s POV — Years Later)
Time doesn’t heal everything.
That’s a comforting lie people tell men like me.
Men who made choices they can’t undo. They say time dulls the pain, that guilt eventually fades, that life has a way of rearranging itself into something livable again.
Maybe that’s true for accidents.
But betrayal isn’t an accident.
It doesn’t disappear.
It settles.
Five years have passed since Elisse walked out of my life.
Five years since the sound of the door closing behind her carved itself into my memory with a permanence I never anticipated.
I still live in the same house.
People find that strange. They ask why I never moved, why I didn’t sell the place and start over somewhere new. I give them answers that sound reasonable—work, familiarity, convenience.
The tru
