CHAPTER SIX
1758 Words
THE THINGS WE REGRET
By the middle of April, Daniel measured time differently.
Not by days.
Not by weeks.
But by deadlines.
Every completed dissertation chapter was another step toward graduation. Every mock interview, every revision seminar, every late night in the library promised a future he had spent four years working toward.
He never stopped loving Evelyn.
If anything, he loved her more fiercely because he felt guilty for asking her to share him with his ambitions.
“You’ll be rid of this version of me soon,” he joked one evening over the phone.
“I don’t want to be rid of any version of you,” Evelyn replied.
He smiled at the sound of her voice.
“I’ve got one more month.”
“I know.”
“Then I’m yours.”
“You’ve always been mine.”
Those words stayed with him long after the call ended.
⸻
Evelyn wished they stayed with her too.
Instead, another voice had begun finding its way into her thoughts.
Adrian never crossed her path by accident anymore.
He appeared with uncanny timing—outside the Humanities Building after lectures, in the café queue before lunch, on the riverside path when she walked back to her residence.
He never mentioned Daniel with bitterness.
Never criticised him outright.
Instead, he asked questions.
“Have you seen him this week?”
“Not much.”
“He must be incredibly busy.”
“He is.”
“You miss him.”
She smiled faintly.
“Of course I do.”
Adrian nodded.
“I would too.”
His responses were careful.
Measured.
Never enough to make her angry.
Always enough to leave her thinking after she walked away.
⸻
One afternoon, Adrian found her leaving the university archive with a stack of books.
“You look exhausted.”
“I feel exhausted.”
“Coffee?”
“I’m meeting Daniel later.”
“So have one with me now.”
She hesitated.
“It isn’t a date.”
“I know.”
“It’s just coffee.”
She should have said no.
Instead, she looked at her watch.
Daniel wouldn’t finish his supervisor meeting for another two hours.
“One coffee.”
Adrian smiled.
“One coffee.”
⸻
The café was busy enough that no one paid them any attention.
They spoke about history.
Books.
Travel.
The strange feeling of not knowing where life would lead after university.
For the first hour, the conversation remained harmless.
Then Adrian became quieter.
“I envy him.”
Evelyn looked up.
“Daniel?”
“He has someone who believes in him the way you do.”
She laughed awkwardly.
“He deserves it.”
“I’m sure he does.”
Adrian traced the rim of his coffee cup.
“I’ve never had anyone look at me the way you look at him.”
She frowned.
“Adrian…”
“I’m not asking you to leave him.”
“I’m glad.”
“I’m asking you not to disappear from my life.”
His honesty unsettled her.
“We’re barely friends.”
“I know.”
“I’d like us to be.”
Evelyn sighed.
“I don’t think that’s fair to Daniel.”
“Would he object to you having coffee with someone?”
“He wouldn’t.”
“Then why do you feel guilty?”
She didn’t answer.
Because the guilt had begun before she’d even sat down.
Not because she had done anything wrong.
But because she’d chosen not to tell Daniel she was there.
⸻
Over the following weeks, Adrian became a constant presence.
Not demanding.
Not forceful.
Simply… available.
Whenever Daniel had to cancel because of another dissertation meeting, Adrian seemed to appear with an easy smile and a simple suggestion.
“A walk?”
“A coffee?”
“Ten minutes by the river?”
Evelyn refused more often than she accepted.
But she accepted often enough to begin wondering why.
She told herself it was because he was easy to talk to.
Because he listened.
Because she felt sorry for him.
Never because her feelings for Daniel had changed.
They hadn’t.
That was the cruelest part.
She still loved Daniel with her whole heart.
Which made her inability to understand her own choices all the more frightening.
⸻
Near the end of term, Adrian asked if she would have dinner with him.
She shook her head immediately.
“I can’t.”
“Because it’s me?”
“Because it wouldn’t feel right.”
“So invite Daniel.”
“He’ll still be in the library.”
“I thought so.”
He smiled sadly.
“I only wanted to celebrate your presentation.”
“There are other people you can celebrate with.”
“There isn’t another you.”
She looked away.
“I shouldn’t go.”
“No.”
“You shouldn’t.”
He stood to leave, then paused.
“But if you change your mind…”
He placed a reservation card from a small restaurant on the table.
“…I’ll be there on Friday.”
He walked away without waiting for an answer.
Evelyn stared at the card for a long time before slipping it into the back of her notebook.
She told herself she would throw it away.
She didn’t.
And for the first time since meeting Adrian Blackwood, she wondered whether the most dangerous decisions in life were not the ones made in a single moment—
—but the ones we postponed, hoping someone else would make them for us.
Evelyn threw the reservation card into the wastebasket twice.
Twice, she retrieved it.
By Friday afternoon, she still hadn’t decided whether she was going.
She spent nearly an hour convincing herself she wouldn’t.
Then Adrian sent a single message.
If you don’t come, I’ll understand. I just wanted one evening to say goodbye to the hope I never should have had.
She stared at the screen for a long time.
She should have ignored it.
Instead, she replied.
One hour.
Nothing more.
No smile.
No promise.
No expectation.
⸻
The restaurant overlooked the river that ran through Westbridge.
It was quieter than the cafés students usually visited, with soft piano music drifting through the room and candles glowing on each table.
“You came,” Adrian said as she approached.
“I said one hour.”
“I know.”
He smiled gently.
“And I’m grateful.”
For the first half of the evening, they barely spoke about themselves.
Instead, they discussed books, politics, travel, and the strange uncertainty of adulthood.
Adrian made her laugh.
She hated herself a little for enjoying the conversation.
Every few minutes, she glanced at her phone.
No messages from Daniel.
She knew why.
He had warned her that he would be in the postgraduate library preparing for one of his final examinations.
He was exactly where he said he would be.
Working toward the future they had imagined together.
The thought settled heavily in her chest.
“I should go,” she said.
“So soon?”
“I’ve already stayed longer than I intended.”
Adrian nodded.
“I won’t stop you.”
He signalled for the bill.
As they stood outside beneath the glow of the streetlamps, neither of them spoke immediately.
Finally, Adrian broke the silence.
“I know you love him.”
Evelyn looked up.
“I do.”
“I’ve never doubted it.”
“Then why couldn’t you leave me alone?”
His expression faltered.
“Because I kept hoping love could be persuaded.”
“It can’t.”
“I know that now.”
There was something weary in his voice that made him seem, for the first time, genuinely defeated.
“I’m sorry,” he said quietly.
“For everything.”
She nodded once.
“I hope you mean that.”
“I do.”
They walked in silence toward the town square.
When they reached the junction where their paths separated, Adrian stopped.
“This is goodbye.”
Evelyn believed him.
She wished him well and turned to leave.
⸻
The following morning, Evelyn woke with a crushing weight in her chest.
The previous night replayed in fragments—not because she couldn’t remember it, but because she wished she could.
At some point after leaving the restaurant, she had made a decision that contradicted everything she believed about herself.
No one had forced her.
No one had threatened her.
Yet she could not understand why she had ignored every instinct that had tried to lead her home.
She sat on the edge of her bed for a long time, staring at her hands.
They didn’t feel like her own.
Her phone buzzed.
Daniel.
Morning, beautiful. My exam starts in an hour. Wish me luck.
She burst into tears.
Her fingers hovered over the keyboard.
She typed:
Good luck. You’ll do brilliantly. I’m proud of you.
She deleted it.
Typed it again.
Sent it.
Seconds later, three dots appeared.
Thank you. Dinner after my exam next week? Just us. I miss you.
Evelyn lowered the phone into her lap.
She couldn’t answer.
Not because she didn’t miss him.
Because she did.
More than ever.
And that was precisely why she couldn’t bear the thought of seeing him.
And then she made the decision she felt was better at that moment,
“I’m sorry I can’t do this anymore, I’m done”
Then there was silence.
⸻
Days passed.
Adrian became increasingly distant.
His replies grew shorter.
Phone calls went unanswered.
Plans were cancelled.
The man who had once seemed determined to be part of her life now behaved as though he had somewhere more important to be.
At first, Evelyn assumed he regretted everything as much as she did.
Then she stopped making excuses for him.
One afternoon, while waiting outside the alumni office, she overheard two women talking.
“Is Adrian coming this weekend?”
“He has to. His wife would never forgive him if he missed Oliver’s birthday again.”
Evelyn froze.
“How old is the little one now?”
“Three.”
The words struck her with the force of a physical blow.
A wife.
A child.
She stood rooted to the spot as the conversation drifted away, her heartbeat roaring in her ears.
For several long moments, the world around her seemed to continue without her.
Then one thought surfaced above all the others.
Daniel.
She had lost Daniel…
for a man whose promises had never been real.
- Writer
