Chapter 2

I was about to put my phone away when another message came through from Adrian.

"Evelyn, let us just go with it for now. Serena already said yes in front of everyone. I am the family heir, and backing out now would make Moretti look bad. It would damage Serena's reputation too. Later I will tell them it was all a misunderstanding, that I always meant to propose to you."

I read the lines several times. It did not surprise me. The moment Adrian called out the wrong name, I knew exactly how this would go.

He had not asked whether I was safe. He had not said he was sorry. He had written to explain why Serena's reputation and the Moretti name required my cooperation.

For three years, Adrian had treated my patience like a private account he could draw from whenever he needed to avoid discomfort. He never checked the balance. He assumed I would keep depositing more.

It was the same as last Christmas, when he sent a scarf to my apartment but it ended up at Serena's address by mistake. When I tried to get it back, he held my hand and said: "Sorry, Evelyn, I must have filled in the wrong address. Just let her keep it. She has already opened it."

A message came through from the estate manager: "Mr. Moretti asked me to let you know that the reception after the dinner will be held in the main hall. The main course has been changed to lobster pasta with white truffle. The chef has confirmed the ingredients. We look forward to seeing you there."

It was part of the proposal plan. Since he had proposed to the wrong person, everything would go to Serena instead. That was how Adrian always handled things.

Once, he had ordered flowers for my birthday and sent the florist Serena's favorite arrangement. When I pointed out the mistake, he said the flowers were still beautiful. Another time, he reserved a weekend in Napa after I had asked for months to go somewhere together. Serena called because she was upset about a breakup, and Adrian spent half the trip on the phone with her. On Sunday morning, he told me I should be proud that he was loyal to people he cared about.

I had accepted every incident as separate. A wrong address. A bad weekend. A demanding friend. A complicated family. Standing in the car with his message on my screen, I finally saw the line connecting them.

I saw a guest's Instagram post of the dinner table. White linen, silver candlesticks, floral arrangements. The main course was lobster pasta with white truffle. I was allergic to truffle. Adrian never remembered. But it was Serena's favorite.

I went back to my Manhattan apartment alone. I pushed the door open. On the console table by the entrance sat a small record player and a record sleeve beside it. It was from our first date, a jazz show he had taken me to. He had bought a signed copy later and placed it there. I had said the first record you played in a new place gave it a voice.

Adrian had never cared much for rituals. I was the one who taught him. I remembered the day I put that record on the console table. He leaned against the doorframe and said, "It is just a record. Does it matter where it goes?" 

I turned and shook my head. "It matters. I want everyone who walks in to see it first and know this is a home."

That was the first time he did not argue with me. I thought that meant he was beginning to believe me.

I picked up the record sleeve and ran my finger along the crease on the cover. Images from the dinner flashed through my mind. In every photo, he stood next to Serena, relaxed, his mouth slightly lifted in a smile I had not seen on his face in a long time. I realized I had been the only one who thought we were happy.

The apartment had always been mine on paper. I had signed the lease before Adrian began staying most nights. Still, his suits occupied half the closet. His preferred coffee sat beside the machine. His mother's Christmas card was displayed on the refrigerator even though it addressed only him.

I opened a suitcase and began with the things that were unquestionably mine: clothes, passport, laptop, the framed photograph of my parents at Cape Cod. The process became harder when I reached the objects we had chosen together. Plates. Towels. Books bought on rainy Sundays. I left almost all of them.

I did not want to carry proof of a shared life into the next one.

At midnight, I emailed a moving service. At twelve fifteen, I arranged storage for the furniture I had purchased before Adrian moved in. At twelve thirty, I changed the account passwords he might know. I made a list of the clients whose files needed clean handovers. Each small task steadied me.

Grief still arrived in waves. It caught me when I found a grocery list in his handwriting, when I saw the dent his watch had made in the bedside table, when I reached automatically for the blanket he preferred. I let each wave pass without turning it into a reason to stay.

I turned the sleeve over and put it in a box with the record. My phone buzzed once. Serena had put up a story. A photo from the dinner, with one line: "Some things are decided for you."

She did not name anyone. She did not need to. 

I closed my phone and booked a flight. The morning flights were full. The only one left was the earliest flight the day after tomorrow. Six forty in the morning. Arriving in London that night. I confirmed the booking. 

[Booking confirmed. There were thirty-four hours left before takeoff.]

I took a screenshot, not because I feared losing the reservation, but because I needed to see the time in fixed numbers. Thirty-four hours. One last night in the apartment. One day at the office. Then an airport gate he did not control.