Then she whispered, “I really loved him.”
“I know.”
“Maybe I still do.”
“That’s possible.”
She looked at me.
“Then why does ending it feel right?”
“Because loving someone and trusting them aren’t always the same thing.”
Over the following weeks, Emma struggled.
She missed Tyler and the future she’d imagined with him. Sometimes she wondered whether she’d been too harsh.
I listened without reminding her why she’d ended things.
Before Thanksgiving, Tyler sent her a short letter.
He didn’t ask her to reconsider.
He admitted he’d been so afraid of losing her that he’d repeatedly denied her the chance to make informed decisions.
Emma read it three times.
“I appreciate that he understands,” she said. “But I don’t want to start over.”
That Thanksgiving, she stayed home with me.
We cooked together, watched an old movie, and played cards.
Later, Emma scrolled through photographs from Halloween.
She stopped at one showing Tyler in his clown costume, smiling beside her.
