Chapter 4

The papers felt heavier than they should have.

Just a few sheets, clipped together, my lawyer's neat black signature already dried at the bottom of the last page. I sat in my car outside the office for ten full minutes just staring at them on the passenger seat, my hands still on the wheel, engine off.

*One way or another, Max is signing this.*

I'd spent the whole drive over rehearsing how I thought it would go, me sliding the papers across the kitchen table, calm and steady, telling him it was over and meaning it with my whole chest. But somewhere between the lawyer's office and the highway, I understood that version of the plan wasn't going to work.

Max didn't respond to calm.

Max responded to feeling like he'd won.

So if the only way out of that house were through a version of myself he wouldn't fight, then that's exactly who I was going to have to become. At least for one night.

I have to make him believe I don't want the divorce anymore.

The thought made my stomach turn even as I decided it. But I'd already tried honest. I'd already tried begging, and shouting, and locking myself behind a door while he cried on the other side of it. Honesty had gotten me a split lip and two nights on a concrete floor.

This time, I was done being honest.

---

Elena was waiting for me before I even made it up the stairs.

She stepped out of the hallway shadow like she'd been standing there just for this, arms crossed over the swell of her stomach, that same grin on her face that made my skin crawl.

"I told you." Her voice was light, almost sing-song, like she was enjoying herself. "I said I was going to make you suffer. And this…." she gestured vaguely at the house, at me, at all of it, "…this is just the beginning."

I looked at her.

Really looked, for the first time in days, the careful curl in her hair, the manicure, the way she stood like she already owned every square foot of this house.

I didn't say a word.

I walked around her, my shoulder brushing the wall to keep distance between us, and kept climbing. I heard her laugh behind me, soft and satisfied, and I let her have it. Let her think the silence meant she'd won something.

She had no idea I wasn't fighting her anymore.

I wasn't even looking at her anymore.

---

In my room, I pulled out my phone before I could talk myself out of it.

My thumbs hovered over the screen for a second, and then I typed it out fast, before the shame could catch up to what I was about to do.

*I'm sorry for wanting a divorce. I love you. Let's have dinner together tonight.*

I read it twice. It made me sick to send it; every word of it was a lie dressed up as an apology, and some small, stubborn part of me still flinched at lying to a man I used to trust with everything. But I thought about the concrete floor. I thought about *jealous.* I thought about his hand connecting with my face as it cost him nothing at all.

I pressed send.

I dropped the phone on the bed and sat there for a second, breathing slow, deliberate breaths, the kind you take when you're trying to talk your own body out of shaking.

Then I went downstairs and started cooking.

---

He came home glowing.

I heard it in his voice before I even saw his face, light, relieved, the voice of a man who thought he'd gotten exactly what he wanted without having to work for it at all. He kissed my temple in the kitchen like nothing had happened between us, like there wasn't still a fading yellow-green bruise under my makeup from three days ago.

"I knew you didn't mean it," he said, arms sliding around my waist from behind while I stirred the pot on the stove. "I knew you'd come around."

I smiled at the wall in front of me so he wouldn't see what my face actually wanted to do.

"I just missed you," I said instead. "I don't want to fight anymore."

Dinner went easy. Too easy, almost, the kind of easy that used to be normal for us, back before Elena's name became a permanent third guest at every meal. I kept his wine glass full. I laughed at things that weren't funny. I watched him get looser and warmer with every glass, his words starting to slide into each other by the second bottle, and I hated how good I'd apparently gotten at this.

By the time we made it back to our room, he could barely stand straight.

He pulled me toward the bed, mouth finding my neck, hands clumsy with wine and want, and every part of my body wanted to recoil from it. I made myself stay still. Made myself count the seconds instead.

"Stop." I pulled back.

He blinked at me, glassy-eyed, swaying slightly where he stood. "What, what happened?"

"I forgot to give you something to sign." I kept my voice light, easy, already reaching for the folder I'd hidden under a stack of magazines on the nightstand. "It's from work. For the project."

He frowned, swaying. "Now? Can't it, can't it wait till tomorrow?"

"I need it tonight, baby. It's due first thing." I pressed the pen into his hand before he could think too hard about it, my heart slamming so loud I was sure he could hear it. "It's nothing. Just sign where I marked it."

He looked down at the papers for a second too long, and I felt my whole chest go tight, certain he was about to focus, about to read a single word of what was actually in front of him.

He didn't.

He signed.

His signature came out sloppy, half his usual name, but it was enough, the pen dragging across the line my lawyer had marked with a tiny sticky arrow, and just like that, two years of marriage ended with a drunk man's scrawl he didn't even remember making the next morning.

I took the folder back before my hands could shake and give me away.

He was already reaching for me again, mouth against my neck, and I had to fight every instinct in my body not to shove him away completely.

"Wait for me." I forced warmth into my voice, forced my hands to rest gently against his chest instead of pushing. "Let me take a shower first."

"Anna…"

"I'll be quick." I was already moving, phone in hand, feet carrying me toward the bathroom before he could form a full argument. "Promise."

I shut the door behind me and threw the lock, my back hitting the wood a second later, breath coming out of me in one long, shaking rush.

I'd done it.

The papers were signed. Actually signed, in his own hand, no matter how sloppy or how little he understood what he was agreeing to. Some lawyer somewhere would tell me later whether it would hold up, whether a signature given drunk and half-conscious counted for anything in the eyes of the law, but for tonight, for right now, it existed. Proof that some part of this marriage was already, finally, ending.

I sank onto the closed toilet lid and pulled up my phone with hands that wouldn't quite stop shaking.

I scrolled through my contacts slower than I needed to, past names I talked to every week, past Max's contact still saved under a heart emoji I hadn't had the heart to delete, until I found the one I was looking for.

A number I hadn't called in over two years.

A number I used to know by heart before life got in the way, before Max, before all of it, a name I'd buried under a marriage that was supposed to be the only thing I needed.

My thumb hovered over it.

I thought about all the reasons I'd stopped calling. All the excuses I'd made to myself about being busy, about being happy, about not needing anyone else once I had Max. I thought about how easy it had been to let that number gather dust once I thought I had everything I wanted.

I didn't have anything I wanted anymore.

I typed the message before I could lose my nerve.

*Come and pick me up, please.*

My thumb hovered over send for one long second, one last chance to change my mind, to stay, to keep pretending this house was still my home.

Then I pressed it.

And somewhere on the other side of the city, a phone I hadn't heard ring in two years was about to light up with my name.