Exit wounds

SEVEN : WHAT WE REMEMBER

He noticed.

Of course he did.

It was subtle, just a glance too long when I passed the mirror without flinching. A pause when I laughed too freely at something on my phone. A shift in his jaw when he came home to find me in silk and solitude, not in the kitchen reheating food he never ate.

Tavish had always been good at reading rooms.

He just forgot I was in them too.

“You look different,” he said that evening, his tone too careful to sound casual.

I shrugged, barely looking up from my book.

“Maybe I am.”

That made him pause.

The silence stretched between us, thick, curious, almost amused.

Then came the smile.

The charming one. The one I once would’ve done anything for.

He crossed the room, slow and sure, and sat beside me on the couch, close enough to touch.

“I miss this,” he murmured, brushing a loose curl behind my ear. “You. Us. Being like this.”

I let him.

But I didn’t lean in.

He cupped my cheek.

“Let me take you out tomorrow. Just you and me. No meetings. No phones. Just… us. Like before.”

Before.

That word used to hurt.

Now it just sounded like a place we’d never get back to.

I smiled, soft and unreadable.

“Sure.”

His eyes searched mine, looking for something.

I let him look.

But I didn’t give it to him.

He fell asleep fast that night, one arm flung across my waist like a claim.

I lay awake beside him.

His scent filled the pillows, familiar, suffocating, almost sweet.

I reached for my phone and opened Serena’s last message:

“You don’t owe him your silence just because he once loved your voice.”

I typed back:

“I think I’m starting to hear myself again.”