“I’m not jealous,” I whispered, the words barely audible even to myself. “I’m trying to make sense of what’s happening.”
He shook his head sharply, eyes flashing with a mixture of disbelief and frustration. “Maybe if you weren’t so buried in your job all the time, you’d see that nothing’s going on. Jesus.”
And that was it. That was the end of the conversation. I shut my mouth, swallowed my doubts, and chose—consciously, painstakingly—to trust him over myself, even as every instinct in my body warned me not to.
Then the weekend trips began. Rafael, Victor, and Celestine. They left without me, leaving the house emptier, colder, and somehow louder in my absence.
“We just needed a break,” Victor had said once, brushing off the tension like it was an inconvenience. “You’re always working anyway.”
“You could’ve invited me,” I had said, trying to sound casual, even though every word carried a weight that made my chest ache.
He shrugged, calm, unconcerned. “You would’ve said no.”
Celestine chimed in then, wrapped in one of my oversized jackets that smelled faintly of me and too much perfume, a soft, fake humility masking her confidence. “Yeah, you’re always exhausted. We didn’t want to stress you out more.”
I stared at her for a long, deliberate ten seconds, letting the silence stretch between us, wondering when exactly she stopped pretending to be grateful.
“I don’t recall asking you,” I said flatly, letting the words fall like stones into the space she tried to occupy.
She smiled, soft and sweet, the kind of smile that masked sharp edges. “Just trying to help.”
I laughed under my breath in the dark, alone in the stillness of my room. How many times had I defended her? To myself, to Rafael, to Victor?
“She’s grieving,” I had said once, rationalizing, excusing her behavior. “She’s lonely. She needs people.”
No. She didn’t need people. She needed a crown, a throne, a kingdom. And she was building it out of everything I had handed her, everything I had trusted her with.
I looked at one last photo on my phone. Four of us at the beach. Rafael’s arm around me. Celestine just behind, eyes locked on him, smiling too hard, a little too knowing, like she had anticipated my downfall.
I whispered to myself, voice rough and quiet, “You needed a place to rest, and I let you in. You needed a life, and I gave you mine.”
The silence answered nothing. Even it was tired of my defeat, tired of hearing the sound of me losing.
---
I woke up before the sun had a chance to gloat, before it could shine through the curtains and announce its smugness. The ache in my side pulsed, sharp and rhythmic, a metronome marking every old mistake, every betrayal, every wound. I ignored it, sitting on the edge of the bed for what felt like hours, staring at the floor, letting the quiet settle like dust in the corners of the room.
I was tired. Not the kind of tired that sleep could fix. The kind of tired that wrapped itself around your bones, tethered you to the floor, made every movement a chore. But something was different this morning. My mind wasn’t clouded. My thoughts weren’t racing. Just still. Quiet. Dead calm.
They had made a mess of a home I had built with my hands. Let them deal with the ashes.
I stood, walked to the drawer I rarely opened, and pulled out the manila folder buried beneath old tax returns and forgotten warranty receipts. Inside, pristine and untouched, lay the deed. My name, bold and indisputable. Just mine. No Rafael. No Victor. No manipulative little houseguest whose perfume still lingered in the hallway curtains.
I stared at it, the ink faint but defiant. “Of course it’s mine,” I murmured, the words tasting like freedom. And that was enough confirmation.
I picked up my phone and dialed the real estate agent. She answered on the third ring, chipper, bright, annoyingly perky in a way that made me want to hang up.
“Aurelia, it’s early! Everything alright?”
I leaned against the wall, looking out at the garden I had planted six years ago, neglected for months. The weeds had started claiming the corners, and the flowers drooped from lack of care.
“I want this house listed,” I said, crisp and cold. “Today. No delays.”
A pause. I imagined her calculating, judging, measuring my seriousness.
“Are you sure? I mean—it’s a premium property. You could take your time, maybe stage it—”
“I said today.” My voice didn’t rise. It didn’t need to. “I want the sign up before sunset. No calls. No updates. Just handle it.”
“Understood,” she said, finally subdued.
I hung up before she could try to offer sympathy.
By the time the sun showed its face fully, I was already knee-deep in boxes. I packed not like someone leaving a home, but like someone shutting down an office. Efficient. Detached. Only what mattered went into a bag.
Blueprints. The single photo of my dog, Bastian—his tail mid-wag, tongue out, eyes wide with blind trust he shouldn’t have had in this place.
Celestine had said she didn’t see him in the garage that night. She had cried, stumbled through apologies, broken sentences. “I swear, Aurelia, I—I didn’t know he was there. I didn’t see him—”
“No,” I had said, voice tight, controlled. “Of course you didn’t. You never see anything unless it benefits you.”
Then she had cried harder, as though grief could be borrowed, bought, borrowed again.
I slipped the photo into my duffel bag, careful not to crease it. The rest? Trash.
Her makeup. Her designer shoes she wore barefoot around the house. The silk robes more expensive than my mortgage. All bagged in black plastic like rot, left in the driveway like half-finished apologies.
She didn’t live here anymore. Rafael and Victor had bought her a small white house three blocks from Rafael’s. They didn’t hide it, didn’t bother. Investment, temporary, I was “reading into it again.”
I picked up the phone again, calling my lawyer.
“Aurelia. What can I do for you?”
“I want you to prepare a notice,” I said, sealing boxes while speaking. “Anyone not on the deed has three days to vacate. No excuses, no sob stories, no begging. Serve it officially.”
“Understood. I’ll draft it and send it for your review.”
“No need. I trust you.”
Then Victor’s name flashed on my screen.
Can we talk?
No punctuation. No apology. No context.
I blocked the number.
Then Rafael called. I let it ring once before answering.
“Aurelia?”
I didn’t even sigh. “Eviction.”
“What?”
“Courtesy of the real owner. You’ve got three days. After that, the locks change.”
“Aurelia, wait—what the hell is going on? You’re overreacting.”
I sat on the stairs, phone pressed to my ear, staring at the dent in the wall where he once slammed a door too hard during a fight we never resolved.
“I’m done reacting,” I said. “I’m moving. You should try it.”
Silence. Then I hung up.
By sunset, the house felt less like a home and more like a crime scene. Bare walls, empty shelves, shadows unsure of whether they belonged.
In the kitchen, I spotted the chipped ceramic mug Rafael had given me during our second year together. My name was painted across it in uneven, cheerful letters.
I picked it up, held it for a heartbeat, and let it drop.
It shattered quietly, final, irrevocable.
And that was enough.
