The Contract Next Door

The Encounter

Sienna’s POV

I wake up after barely sleeping.

For a second I don’t know where I am because that room isn’t where I usually sleep. Then everything from the previous night comes rushing back.

My eyes are aching from all the crying last night as well.

I get out of bed with the intention of going to our room hoping to not meet Ryan.

But he fell asleep on the couch so I just pass by and enter the room.

I look around the bedroom.

I can’t stay here.

I realize then that there was actually nothing keeping me here. My life has become something I can’t recognize.

Now, I’m ready to leave.

I pull my suitcase out of the closet and start packing.

I don’t fold neatly. I just grab my clothes and shove them in there.

I grab anything I saw which is actually mine: my books, toiletries, jewellery, devices, and so much more.

Anything else that isn’t mine could stay I really do not care.

I’m halfway through my second drawer when I hear a soft knock, then Maya’s voice.

“Sienna? it’s me.”

I open the bedroom door. She’s standing there with two coffees and muffins, like she knows I haven’t have eaten.

She takes a look at the suitcase and nods.

“I see you’ve made your decision.”

“I’m leaving Maplewood. I’m going to Belmont with you that is if the offer still stands.” I say.

“Of course it still stands. We’re figuring out everything when we get there. Together.” She says while putting the coffees down.

We start packing together. She takes the closet, I take the drawers. We work quietly.

Then I find some little things at the bottom of my sock drawer.

The silver necklace Ryan gave me for our second anniversary. The Polaroid he took of me sleeping that he thought was cute and I pretended to hate, the ticket from the first movie we ever saw together.

For a moment, I hesitate. My fingers close around the necklace. I remember when he gave it to me, how he’d saved up for it.

I put it back in the drawer. I’m leaving it all behind. I do not want memories right now. I want space.

Ryan comes in while we’re taping up the third box. He’d been in the living room giving us space, but I guess he can’t take it anymore. He stands in the doorway. He looks terrible: hair messy, eyes red, wearing the same shirt from yesterday.

“Can we talk?” he asks, looking at me.

Maya glances at me. “I’ll be in the living room.”

She leaves, pulling the door halfway closed.

Ryan takes a step into the room. “Sienna, I know you said you needed space last night, but please listen to me for a minute. I still love you. What happened with Natalie was a mistake.”

Then he looks at me, expecting that to change something.

“I don’t want to lose you,” he says quietly.

I listen. I really do. I let him finish.

But loving me doesn’t undo what he did.

“I know you love me,” I say, my voice is tired. “I’m not saying you don’t, but loving me doesn’t undo it, Ryan. You lied to me for months. You let me apologize to you.”

“I know,” he says. “I know I did and I hate myself for it, but please give me another chance, one more chance to prove…”

I shake my head.

“I can’t.”

It isn’t because I’ve stopped loving him. God, I wish it was that simple.

“I don’t trust you anymore,” I say, “and I can’t be with someone I don’t trust. I can’t go back to questioning every text and every receipt, wondering if I’m crazy. I can’t do that to myself.”

That’s the important distinction. It isn’t about love, it is about trust. And once trust is broken like that, it doesn’t come back because you want it to.

He stares at me for a long moment, then nods slowly, like he finally understands I’m not going to change my mind.

“Where are you going?” he asks.

“Belmont.”

He blinks. “You’re really leaving Maplewood, leaving me?”

“Yes.”

I don’t get into an argument. I don’t have it in me. I pick up my bag. Maya comes in and picks up the other one.

We walk past him. He doesn’t try to stop us this time. He just stands in the doorway of the bedroom and watches us go.

We come back to pick the rest of the boxes and finally leave.

Maya drives. I watch Maplewood disappear through the passenger window.

A few days ago, I thought I knew exactly what my life was going to look like. I thought I’d be in Maplewood for the rest of my life. I thought Ryan and I would figure out the next step. Maybe move into a bigger space, maybe even get engaged and married someday.

I had the whole picture in my head.

Now I’m going to start over.

I have no boyfriend. I have no job. I’m leaving my home, and I don’t really know what comes next.

But I know I can’t go back.

There is no going back to that apartment after last night.

Halfway through the drive, we have been on the highway for a long time. When we finally reach Belmont, the sun is starting to lower.

The city looks bigger than Maplewood, busier and more alive. New buildings, new streets, new people who don’t know my name or my history.

Our new apartment is on the fifth floor of a very fancy apartment block. It has an elevator. The walls everywhere are very sleek and clean.

Maya is excited the whole way up, talking about where we’d put the couch, how we’d finally have a balcony.

I’m more cautious and actually nervous.

I get out of the car and look up at the building. Everything is unfamiliar. I’m relieved to finally be away from Ryan, away from that hallway and everything else.

But I’m nervous because I do not know what I’m going to do next.

I don’t have a boyfriend, a job or a plan.

I have two suitcases, a box, and Maya.

We carry our bags and everything upstairs. Three trips.

After all of our things are inside, we collapse in the middle of the living room together, surrounded by boxes, both breathing hard.

Maya looks at me and smiled, tired but genuine.

“We’re going to be okay,” she says.

I look around the apartment: bare walls, cardboard boxes, a window that looked out onto a different street I’d never seen before.

For the first time since last night, I allow myself to believe it just a little bit.

“There’s another thing worrying me,” I say to Maya.

“What?” she says.

“I still don’t have a job. I’ve sent out so many applications, Maya, so many cover letters. I don’t even know what I’m doing wrong anymore. I’ve had three rejections so far and the rest haven’t even answered. I feel like I’m shouting into a void.”

I have been applying for months, even before anything with Ryan. But nothing was landing.

Maya reaches over and squeezes my hand for a second.

“You will,” she says firmly. “You’re not going to be unemployed forever. Someone is going to read one of those application letters and realize you’re exactly what they need.”

I laugh weakly. “I hope so, because Right now, I feel very hopeless.”

Maya says, “You’ve moved to a new city to start over. The job will come. I know it will.”

I want to believe her. I really d.

Later that night, after Maya has gone to bed, I get ready for bed in my new room. I sit on the edge of the mattress on the floor. We haven’t set up the bed frame yet, and look at my phone.

Several unanswered emails from job I’d applied for. Two rejections that had come in while we were driving.

Nothing promising.

I sigh and put the phone face down on the floor, and I look around my new room at the empty closet waiting to be filled, at the window with no curtains yet.

I think about everything I left behind in Maplewood, the good and the bad.

I don’t know what Belmont had waiting for me. I don’t have a job, a plan, or any idea where my life was going.

But for the first time in a long time, I have the chance to decide what comes next.