29 days

Favoritism At Breakfast

Elowen's POV

He told me about the folder that night, the way he'd promised, except it wasn't really telling me anything at all.

"It's just paperwork about my grandfather's trust getting renewed," he said, sitting on the edge of the bed while I brushed out my hair at the vanity, not quite looking at me through the mirror. "Standard stuff. Lawyers make everything sound scarier than it is. It doesn't change anything for us."

"Continuity of marital status," I repeated, watching his reflection instead of turning around. "That doesn't sound like standard stuff, Stellan."

"It's just legal language." He rubbed the back of his neck, a habit I used to find endearing and now just read as a tell. "I'll show you the whole thing once it's finalized. I promise."

I didn't believe him. But I was tired and I let it go because pushing further felt like it would cost more than I had left to spend that night. So I nodded, set my brush down, and got into bed, and neither of us brought it up again.

That was two days ago now. The folder had gone quiet, tucked wherever he'd hidden it this time, and I'd stopped asking, though I hadn't stopped wondering.

This morning, I decided to try something different.

I came down to the kitchen already dressed instead of still in my robe, hair actually done, and I made the coffee myself for once instead of waiting for him to have it ready. Small things. I don't know why they felt important, only that they did like proof I could still choose to show up as a person instead of a patient.

Stellan came in a few minutes later, tie half-knotted, phone already in his hand.

"You're up early," he said, setting the phone face-down on the counter out of habit now, which told me everything about how normal that gesture had become.

"Couldn't sleep." I slid a mug toward him. "I was thinking about Marcus and Lena's engagement party. It's in three weeks, right?"

He paused with the mug halfway to his mouth. "I think so. Why?"

"I want to go." I said it plainly, watching his face for a reaction. "I haven't been to anything like that in almost a year. I was thinking maybe we could get something new for it. You always liked that navy dress I wore to your cousin's wedding, remember?"

Something flickered behind his eyes, gone as fast as it came. "I remember the dress."

"Do you remember dancing in it?" I pressed softer this time, because this was the part I actually cared about; not the dress, not the party, but him. "You spun me around so hard I almost lost a shoe. You laughed so loud that people at the next table turned around."

He didn't answer right away. He set the mug down instead, both hands flat on the counter, and I watched him search for something to say the way you search a room for your keys when you already suspect they're not there.

"I don't really remember that," he said finally. "I mean…I remember the wedding. I don't know if I remember the dancing part like that."

"You don't remember spinning me around so hard I almost fell?"

"Elowen, that was years ago."

"Four years ago." My voice came out quieter than I meant it to. "I remember it like it happened last week."

He rubbed his jaw, and for a second he looked almost embarrassed, caught out at something he didn't even understand the shape of yet. "I'm sorry. I just… I don't know. I don't remember it the way you do."

I wanted to ask him something bigger then. Not about a party four years ago, but about him, what he was actually looking forward to these days, what scared him at work, whether he still wanted the same things he used to want before all of this. A real question. A question with no Isolde in it at all.

"What are you looking forward to about the party?" I asked instead, keeping it simple. "Not what you think I want to hear. Just…what part of it do you want?"

He looked at me like I'd asked him something in a language he used to speak fluently and had somehow forgotten.

"I don't know," he said slowly. "I hadn't really thought about it."

"You haven't thought about a party you're going to in three weeks?"

"I've had a lot going on." He said it fast, defensive, and I watched him retreat somewhere behind his own eyes even while he stood right in front of me. "Work's been a lot. And with everything between us right now, I guess I just… I haven't been thinking about parties."

"I'm not asking about the party, Stellan." My hands had gone still around my mug. "I'm asking about you. What do you want? Just you. Not me, not the marriage, not any of it. You."

He opened his mouth then closed it. Opened it again, and I actually held my breath for a second, some small stubborn hope flickering that maybe this time he'd reach for something real.

"Actually," he said, "Isolde mentioned something about this, that maybe we shouldn't be putting energy into events like that right now. She said you're still in a fragile place with your recovery, and adding social pressure on top of everything else we're working through could set you back. She thinks we should keep things low-key for a while longer."

The kitchen went very quiet.

I set my mug down carefully, like it might shatter if I didn't. "I asked you what you wanted, Stellan. Not what Isolde thinks I can handle."

"I know, I just…" He stopped himself, ran a hand through his hair, and for once he actually looked like he heard how that sounded coming out of his mouth. "I'm not saying I agree with her on everything. I just think she has a point about pacing things."

"You didn't answer my question."

"What question?"

"What you want." I said it slower this time, like maybe if I gave him more room he'd find something to say that belonged only to him. "Not her opinion of my recovery. Not what's good for pacing. What you actually want for yourself, standing right here, right now."

He was quiet for a long moment. Long enough that something in my chest, some small and foolish thing, actually let itself hope.

"I want things to be okay between us," he said finally.

"That's not an answer. That's a wish."

"Elowen…"

"Forget it." I picked my mug back up, more to give my hands something to do than because I actually wanted the coffee anymore. "Forget I asked."

He watched me for a second like he wanted to say something else, something better, but nothing came. His phone buzzed against the counter, and out of some old, tired reflex I didn't even glance at it this time. I already knew.

"That's probably Isolde," he said, reaching for it. "She said she'd call later today, actually. Just to check in on how we're doing. Progress-wise."

Progress-wise.

I didn't say anything. I picked up my own phone instead, mostly just to have something to look at that wasn't his face, and that's when I saw it; a small red notification sitting at the top of my screen, a name I hadn't seen light up my phone in over a year.

*Priya Patel wants to connect.*

My old research partner. The one person from my old life who used to know exactly what I wanted, back when I still knew it myself.