Chapter 2

Ava' s reply came an hour later, as I sat alone in our silent loft.

"Got it. Will check later. Julian' s fine, just dramatic as usual. Don' t wait up. Xo."

The "Xo" felt like a twist of the knife.

My resignation deepened. Her focus was, as always, elsewhere.

She wouldn't check the papers. Not tonight. Maybe never, if I didn't push.

I opened my laptop.

Systematically, I started deleting.

Photos of us – the few where she looked genuinely happy, usually at some event where Julian was also present.

Our shared playlists, the calendar invites for anniversaries she often forgot.

It was a digital cleansing, each click a small act of letting go.

There was a dull ache with it, but mostly, a strange sense of relief.

Moving on.

A notification popped up. Instagram.

Julian Vance.

A new post: a blurry photo of him and Ava, heads close together in a dimly lit bar. The caption: "Some nights are just for old friends. #NYCNights #Connections."

He was taunting me. I knew it.

I looked at it, strangely detached. He was a caricature of an old money charlatan.

His manipulative nature was so obvious, yet Ava remained blind.

The loft door opened. Ava walked in, looking tired but also... something else.

She was holding a small, slightly squashed cupcake box.

"Ethan? You're still up?"

I was surprised. I hadn' t expected her.

"Happy birthday," she said, a small, hesitant smile on her face.

My actual birthday. She' d remembered.

It was a low-key affair I' d planned for myself, a quiet dinner she was supposed to be at before Julian' s "crisis."

A flicker of something warm, quickly extinguished by memory.

There were times, early on, when she' d shown these flashes of thoughtfulness.

A coffee brought to my desk when I was working late. A book she thought I' d like.

Little things that had fed my foolish hope.

Were they genuine? Or just reflexes of a person used to being charming?

I questioned it all now. The confusion was a bitter pill.

I remembered a charity auction last spring.

Julian got into a stupid, loud argument with another guest over some perceived slight.

Ava had leaped to his defense, fierce and protective.

"He didn't mean it like that! You're misunderstanding him!"

Her voice was sharp, her eyes flashing. It made the gossip columns – "Ava Chen, Banking Heiress, in Public Spat."

I' d watched from the sidelines, seeing that ferocity, that unwavering loyalty, all for him.

The disillusionment had been a cold wave washing over me.

This was the woman I married. This was the woman who defended another man with a passion she never showed me.

And then, last year, on this very day. My birthday.

She' d planned a quiet dinner. I was hopeful.

Then Julian called. A panic attack, he claimed.

Ava, torn, looked at me, her eyes pleading for understanding.

"I have to go, Ethan. He really needs me."

She left.

I sat alone with the birthday cake she' d bought.

I closed my eyes and made a wish.

I wish I didn' t love her anymore.

It was the most painful wish I' d ever made.

And as she stood there now, with another cupcake, offering another belated birthday wish, I knew that old wish was finally, blessedly, coming true.

The detachment was almost complete.