“I’m not a creep, Susan.”
We left the station and rode in silence.
The hotel wasn’t far, a plain beige building with a glowing neon sign. His room smelled faintly like clean sheets and coconut soap. I sat stiffly on the edge of one bed, unsure where to put my hands or my thoughts.
Dean sat on the other bed and looked down at the floor. The silence stretched between us like a tight rope. Finally, he spoke.
“Why are you so angry with me?”
I let out a dry laugh. “Are you really asking that?”
“Yeah. I want to understand.”
“You left Jolene,” I snapped.
“She’s been sleeping in my guest room, crying into her pillow every night. You broke her.”
He looked up at me, his eyes softer now. “I didn’t leave without saying anything.
I told her the truth.”
I frowned. “What truth?”
Dean leaned forward, elbows on his knees. “That we were growing apart.
That we were holding on just because we used to love each other. But that wasn’t enough anymore. It hadn’t been for a while.”
I folded my arms.
“So you got bored. Decided to chase someone new.”
“No,” he said quietly. “I fell for someone else.”
That stopped me cold.
My chest tightened. “Who?” I whispered. He didn’t look away.
“You,” he said. And just like that, the air in the room turned still. The air between us felt thick, like it was pressing down on my shoulders, daring me to speak.
“You’re kidding,” I said, my voice sharp, like I was trying to cut through the weight hanging in the room. “I’m not,” Dean replied quietly. “It wasn’t planned.
I didn’t mean for it to happen. But every time I saw you… it was different. I felt seen.
I could breathe around you.”
I stood up so fast the bed creaked. “So what, Dean? You blow up your marriage and now you confess all this to me like it’s some kind of rom-com ending?”
He shook his head.
“I didn’t say it hoping for something. I told you because I needed to be honest. For once in my life, I wanted to say the truth.”
I turned away, staring at the beige hotel wall.
The silence pressed in again, thick and uncomfortable. But inside, I was shaking. Not just from anger.
From fear. From knowing that part of me wanted to believe him. Because the truth is, there had always been something.
Small sparks I never dared to feed. Little flickers when we talked too long at family dinners, or when our eyes met for a second too long. I hated it.
And I hated myself for not hating him enough. “I need to sleep,” I said quietly. “We’ll deal with this tomorrow.”
But there was no sleep.
Just the ceiling and the sound of the air conditioner buzzing. My heart thudded in my chest like a drum. In the morning, the police called.
They had my things. I packed up without speaking to Dean. I couldn’t look at him—not without wanting something I wasn’t ready to want.
Not yet. Not with Jolene still crying on my couch back home. Back home, the air felt colder.
Quieter. Jolene was still staying at my place. She asked nothing, only offered a cup of tea and a nod when I arrived.
Later, I opened my phone and scrolled to Dean’s contact. I stared at it for a long time. Then, against everything I thought I knew, I typed:
“How about coffee sometime?”
Maybe I was wrong.
Maybe it was selfish. But maybe it was honest. And right now, honesty was the only thing that didn’t feel like a lie.
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