Chapter 4

Ethan faced Olivia' s tirade with a stillness that seemed to unnerve her more than any shouting match would have. He didn' t raise his voice, he didn' t defend himself. He just watched her, his expression unreadable. The anger and hurt from the night before had cooled into a solid, unshakeable calm. The fight was over because, in his heart, he had already left.

"Are you even listening to me, Ethan?" she demanded, her anger slowly turning into frustrated confusion. "Say something!"

"There' s nothing to say, Olivia," he said, his voice even. "You' ve made your feelings clear."

His lack of reaction was new. He was usually the one to smooth things over, to apologize even when he wasn' t wrong, just to keep the peace. This quiet detachment was alien, and it frightened her. She finally seemed to notice the packed boxes stacked against the wall.

"What is all this? Are you re-organizing?" she asked, a note of unease creeping into her voice. She couldn' t connect the dots, or perhaps she refused to. Her self-absorption was a shield against the unpleasant truth.

"Something like that," he replied, turning away from her to tape another box shut. The sound echoed in the tense silence.

She watched him for a moment longer, then huffed in frustration. "Fine. Be like that. I' m going to go see how Alex is doing." She grabbed her purse and slammed the door behind her, leaving Ethan alone in the quiet echo of their broken relationship.

He spent the rest of the day in a blur of quiet activity. He called the international moving company to confirm the pickup for his belongings. He booked a one-way flight to Germany for the end of the week. He arranged to have his mail forwarded to his parents' address, a temporary measure until he had a permanent one. He was systematically erasing himself, planning to disappear from her life so completely that it would be as if he were never there.

Later that evening, there was a knock on the door. It was his best friend, Mark Davis. Mark' s eyes immediately fell on the boxes, and a look of understanding crossed his face.

"It' s about damn time," Mark said, stepping inside and clapping a hand on Ethan' s shoulder. "I was wondering how much longer you were going to put up with it."

Ethan managed a small, tired smile. "I guess I reached my limit."

Mark looked around the room, his expression hardening. "Where is she?"

"She went to check on Alex," Ethan said, the words tasting like poison.

Mark shook his head in disgust. "Unbelievable. She has no idea, does she?"

"No. And I don' t think she' s capable of understanding," Ethan admitted. He finally felt the weight of his decision settle on him, and he sank onto the sofa.

Mark grabbed two beers from the fridge and sat down next to him. "Listen to me. You did the right thing. You gave that woman everything, man. You deserved someone who appreciated it, someone who actually saw you. Not... this."

They sat in comfortable silence for a while, drinking their beers. Then, Mark spoke again. "Remember that time in college you stayed up for three nights straight to finish that engine prototype for the competition?"

Ethan nodded, a faint memory stirring. "Yeah. We won second place."

"And what did Olivia do?" Mark pressed. "She complained that you missed her friend' s birthday party. She never once said she was proud of you. I saw it then, man. I knew she didn't get it. She never saw what you were building, she just saw what you weren' t doing for her."

Hearing it from someone else, from his best friend, solidified the rightness of his choice. The memories were no longer tinged with romantic nostalgia, they were evidence in a long, one-sided trial.

"I' m not going back, Mark," Ethan said, looking his friend in the eye. "This time, it' s over. For good."

"Good," Mark said, raising his bottle. "To Germany. To a new start. To finally putting yourself first."

Ethan clinked his bottle against Mark' s. The sound was a small, definitive punctuation mark at the end of a long, painful sentence.