Back at the apartment, the air feels thick, heavy with all the things left unsaid. I sit on the couch, arms crossed over my chest, staring at Derek across the room. He moves fretfully about, collecting various things to put into a suitcase. He's not moving out, just heading to a friend's for the night. At least he said so when he got here, after I'd run off by myself.
I inhale deeply, feeling the dread as knot in my stomach, intertwined with the lump of sugar I've ingested in the form of fancy wedding cake samples. I can't keep letting this drag on. I can't ignore what he said, no matter how much I want to. I push my hair back from my face, the strands sticking to my tear-dampened cheeks, and finally break the silence.
"We need to talk," I venture, my voice quieter than I intended. It feels strange to even say it, because I know if we have The Talk now after what he admitted earlier, things will probably... well, end. For good. Derek's eyes dart toward me, then back to the shirt he's picked up from where he left it draped over the back of the couch like the slob he sometimes is.
"Yeah," he mutters, his voice flat. He doesn't look up, and the sight of him so disconnected, so *distant* from me, makes my sugar-filled insides constrict.
"I need to know where we're going," I begin, pressing forward, even though every word feels like walking barefoot on broken glass. "I mean, *really* know. Because I can't keep pretending this is a temporary little hitch when you've just admitted you have feelings for someone else."
Derek stills, but he keeps his gaze fixed on the shirt in his hands. He folds it sloppily, in a way that will leave it creased to Kingdom Come. "Skye, I never said I didn't care about you. I do. You know I do."
"Caring isn't enough," I reply sharply, my voice close to breaking. "We're supposed to be getting *married*. Do you even understand what that means? That it's not just—"
"I know what it means," he interrupts, his own voice suddenly defensive. He shoves the shirt into the suitcase and runs a hand over his face in frustration. "I know, okay?" He sounds annoyed by this, which is so fucking unfair I want to scream.
"Do you?" I ask, my heart racing. "Because from where I'm sitting, it doesn't seem like you do. It sounds like you're more interested in Emily—Emily who's 'fun' and 'easy' and all the things you apparently think I'm not. Like, why did you even propose? If you were already so done with me?"
Derek winces, his face flushing with guilt. "It's not that simple, Skye. I proposed to you because I wanted to marry you. But then... our relationship changed..."
I feel a bitter laugh bubbling up in my chest, but I swallow it down. The proposal happened six months ago, which was five months before the Emily-thing if Derek was to be believed. "So what? You think I can't hear the past tense? Why are we acting like the wedding might still happen? Because it's feeling a lot like you just don't want to be with me anymore. At least not in the way you used to."
His silence is telling. He doesn't deny it. He doesn't rush to reassure me. Instead, he just stands there, his eyes drifting toward the window, anything to avoid my gaze.
Emboldened by pure anger, I press on. "Did you even want to get married? Or were we just... going through the motions?"
Derek sighs heavily, finally looking up at me, his face contorted in discomfort. "I don't know, okay? I thought I did. I thought we were doing what we were supposed to, but now... now I'm not sure. Everything feels so complicated. So heavy."
"Heavy," I repeat, the word landing with a dull thud. I keep staring at him, really looking at him, taking in the unhappiness that seems to drag on his otherwise handsome features. His big brown eyes are filled with doubt and dread. I replay everything he just said in my head, my cruel mind highlighting all the telling little jabs.
My voice drops to a whisper. After all we've been through, I'm not sure I even get what made him stay with me until now. "Do you even like me, Derek?"
His face flickers with something—panic, maybe. Definitely more guilt. "Skye, of course I—"
"No." I cut him off, leaning forward, my eyes searching his. "Not love. I know you *love* me, in some way. But do you actually like me? Do you like who I am? Because I'm starting to feel like I'm just... not what you want." I was familiar and safe, I see that now. I was the one who held his hand through his dad's cancer diagnosis. I was sweet, dependable. In that way I was easy to love, like a comfy blanket. A comfy blanket that's worn thin now.
Derek's eyes dart to the floor, and the silence that follows is tense with all the things he's not saying.It's like a switch flipped in my head, revealing the true nature of our relationship to me. I'm not what he wants. Not really. He'd simply had an outline in his head, a blank space labelled wife and I had kind of fit in that spot. Not because there was anything special about me, more like the opposite. I was bland, generic, unexciting wife material. And that had been fine until he met someone much more exciting.I lean back, my heart aching with the realization. "You don't even know how to answer that, do you?"
Derek swallows, hands fidgeting now that they're empty. "Skye, it's not that simple. I don't... I don't know how to explain it. I do care about you. I do love you, but..."I wait for him to finish the sentence. He doesn't. The words hang in the air, incomplete and hollow."But it's not enough," I whisper, finishing it for him. Even now, I pick up his slack. Even when it comes to breaking up with me, he makes me do the work.
Derek's shoulders slump, and he looked at me with a mix of sadness and defeat. "Maybe it isn't."
There it is. The answer I've been dreading. I feel the tears well up again, but I hold them back, refusing to let them fall. Refusing to let him see how much this is breaking me. I want to be like him, already floating away to something new, but I can't even imagine anything new for me, not when I spent so much time dreaming up my future with this man. Secretly, I'd even picked out names for the kids we would have.I stand up slowly, wrapping my arms around myself. "I guess this is it."
Derek's face twists, like he wants to argue, like he wants to say something to fix it. But he doesn't. He can't. Because there's nothing left to say.I walk to the window, staring out at the darkening sky. It feels like the end. The sudden brutal end when I least expected it.
"You know what? I really wanted to marry you." I allow the truth of my own words to eviscerate me.
There is a long, painful silence, and then Derek stands up, grabbing his jacket and suitcase. "I'm sorry, Skye," he says softly, his voice thick with regret. "I really am."
I don't turn around, don't trust myself to look at him. "I know."
The door clicks softly as he leaves, and I remain where I am, staring out into the street, feeling empty.
*
I sit on the edge of my bed, bare feet planted on the carpet, staring blankly at the pile of crumpled tissues around me. The room feels too big, too quiet, the silence only broken by the distant hum of traffic outside. All the pictures of me and Derek seem to glare at me in judgement. I can't stand this false (?) evidence of our past happiness, but I also can't bear to take them down. It's like every thought I have about him now comes with a question mark. I pick up my phone, swipe furiously against the lock screen of my smiling now-ex, try not to pay any attention to the cute dimples in his cheeks, and open my contacts. After what's happened, I desperately need to talk to someone who still loves me. I find my best friend Kaylee's name and press call.
It rings twice before Kaylee picks up, her cheerful voice cutting through the quiet like a lifeline. I hate that she's across the country, but I love that she never leaves me hanging, no matter what time it is in California.
"Please tell me you're calling with good news. Like you finally picked a cake flavor or you found a way to return that ugly blazer your future mother in law gave you."
I let out a hollow laugh, but it quickly turns into something else, a stifled sob I manage to half-swallow. Maybe my wedding prep has been annoying, not just to Derek but even to my best girl. I sigh shakily. "No good news. No cake." Although there definitely has been cake, too much of it even.
There is a pause on the other end, Kaylee, who's not usually super perceptive, picks up on the shift immediately. "Skye? What's going on? You sound... weird."
I inhale sharply, trying to steady my voice, but the words come tumbling out in a mess. "He—Derek—he said he's not sure about the wedding. About us. He said he has feelings for someone else. A coworker. Emily."
There's a beat of silence, and then Kaylee's voice, sharp and incredulous: "*Emily*? Emily who? Who the fuck is Emily?"
"I—I don't even know." I sniff, wiping my nose with the back of my hand while simultaneously hating myself for being so damn gross. "Apparently she's fun. And laid-back. Unlike me." It's such a dumb, generic thing to say. It makes me wonder what Derek hasn't told me.
"Oh, for fuck's sake. He's been cheating on you?" Kaylee lets out a loud sigh, the kind that always comes before one of her rants. "And what? She's fun? She's fucking fun? What does that even mean? She like wears polka dots and dances in the rain or some shit? Laid-back? What? He didn't seriously say that to you?"
I can't help but let out a sad laugh, even though my chest still feels like it has been hollowed out. "It's absurd, right? I don't even know if he's been cheating-cheating. I... was too scared to ask. After five years in the middle of our wedding prep he just tells me he's met someone more fun."
"Skye, come on, that's... I mean, that can't be all he said," Kaylee mutters. "Even someone as bland and lazy as Derek must have given you more than that. I hope you told him to go fuck a duck though."
My humorless laughter dies down, and I rub my temple, the ache behind my cried out eyes making it hard to think straight. "No..." God, I sound pathetic even to myself. I should have screamed more, shouldn't I? I should have demanded more of an explanation. Should have made a huge scene. Maybe thrown cake in his face. "It is. I just... I don't get it. I thought we were okay. And then today, out of nowhere, he just drops this on me. He looked so... I don't know. Detached. Like I was just someone he was obligated to talk to."
I knew he wasn't enjoying the wedding preparations, but I thought that was just him being a guy.
Kaylee's voice softens. "Hey, he's an idiot, Skye. An idiot who doesn't realize that he's losing the best person in his life because some fun-size version of a human smiles at him in the break room. He's an *absolute moron*."
I sigh, picking at a loose thread on my blanket. "I feel so stupid. I didn't even see it coming. He's been distant, but I thought it was just the stress, you know? I thought we were both just tired from all the planning." Even though the planning had all been done by me. Maybe Derek had been tired from watching me do the work.
"You're not stupid," Kaylee says, and there's a hint of fierceness in her voice that makes me almost smile. I can always count on Kaylee defending me, even from myself. "You trusted him. You weren't supposed to see it coming. That's the whole point of being in a relationship—you're supposed to feel secure, not like you have to look over your shoulder every five minutes because someone more fun might come along, this isn't goddamn clown school. "
"I just don't get it," I whisper for what feels like the hundredth time, my voice cracking. "How did this happen? Why did he wait so long to tell me? He kept going along this whole time and then at the cake tasting of all events suddenly he springs this Emily on me. I'd never even heard her name before."
Kaylee makes a sound of disgust. "What an ass."
I bite my lip, my heart aching. "But we were together for *five years*, Kay. I thought we were building something real. And now... it's like he's not even the same person. How do you just throw a whole relationship away for someone who hangs out with you at work and makes a couple of jokes?" At least I assume that's what Emily does. Maybe she juggles or has a stand-up routine. Maybe she runs an entire circus.
"Skye, Derek is a coward," Kaylee says, her voice blunt and brimming with anger like she's been waiting to unleash on Derek for a long time, which, knowing her, she has. "He's the kind of guy who doesn't know what he wants, so instead of being honest with you, he lets it fester until he's too deep in his own bullshit to figure it out. And now he's blaming you because *he's* confused. It's not about you not being enough of whatever he thinks he needs. It's about him being too much of a spineless little jerk to be honest and face reality."
I sniff again, my voice wobbling. I hate how whiny I sound. "It just hurts so much. Like, we were supposed to get married. I don't even know what my life is supposed to look like without him in it." Like a picture book with one of the protagonists crudely erased.
"Skye, your life is going to look like whatever the hell you want it to. And honestly? It's going to be better without a guy who doesn't realize your worth." Kaylee's voice softens and i remember all the times she's comforted me, especially after my mom and dad died. "I know it hurts right now. I know it feels like the world's ending. But it's not. This is just a really, *really* shitty chapter. And I promise you, the next one is going to be better. And fun, without Derek dragging you down."
I smile weakly through my tears. Kay never really liked Derek. She tolerated him because I loved him, now she doesn't have to anymore and it's refreshing in a way. "You think?"
"I *know*," Kaylee said, matter-of-factly. "Look at it this way, stupid Derek saved you a divorce. If he was going to run away as soon as he met someone who got that dried out raisin he calls a heart to pump some blood for a change, you're better off with him doing it now."
Still hurts to think that I wasn't able to make him feel something anymore. I nod anyway and take a deep breath. Kaylee has a point about the divorce thing. Being dumped right before the proverbial altar hurts like hell, but at least there aren't any lawyers involved.
"Maybe..." I'd still have preferred my fantasy of us growing old together to me sitting on what used to be our bed surrounded by snotty tissues though.
"Definitely, believe me," Kaylee says. "And hey, when you're ready, we'll celebrate your freedom with wine, pizza, and a proper *roast* of Derek and his entire life's choices. Maybe we can make a few phone calls and legally get his name changed to Dreck. What do you say? Do you need me to come over there right now? Cause I'll jump on a plane and do it."
I snort at the Dreck line. Knowing Kaylee, she probably could convince some poor bureaucrat to do that. "Wine, pizza, and roast Derek. Got it."
"You've got this, Skye," Kaylee adds more gently. "And if you need to cry or yell or just sit on the phone in silence, I'm here. But for now, take a deep breath, maybe scream into a pillow, and remember that you deserve way better than a guy with cold feet and a weird crush on an Office Emily."
I let out a soft, half-hearted laugh. "I love you, Kaylee."
"Love you too, babe," Kaylee replies, her voice like hot chocolate for my soul. For a second, my Derek related pain is dwarfed by how much I miss living right next to my best friend.
"Talk soon, okay?"
"Yeah, soon."
I end the call, letting the phone drop onto the bed beside me. I stare at the ceiling for a moment, feeling both heavier and lighter at the same time. Reality is starting to catch up to me. It isn't quite the horrific monster it appeared to be at first. But it's sad and cold. It's absence and insecurity. I blink, realizing as my gaze slides to the wall-paper, pastel blue and soothing, that I won't be able to afford rent without Derek. On top of everything else, his love, my self-worth, I'd also lose the place I consider my home.