Have You Ever

  The house has never been so quiet. The kettle hums in the background, and I half expect your hand to touch the small of my back as you sneak a biscuit from the tin. But you're not here anymore. You were my beginning, you know. High school sweethearts—what a phrase, so quaint, so true. I still remember that shy smile when you stood at our front door, hair combed, nerves visible beneath your pressed suit. Navy blue, if I recall correctly, with your grandfather’s cufflinks. I wore the pale pink dress I’d spent weeks sewing, with lace at the collar and a little ribbon around my waist. My father glowered behind me, arms crossed, giving you that stare— “Ten o'clock, son. Not a minute later, or else.” You swallowed hard and said, “Yes, sir,” then offered your arm like I was royalty. You always treated me that way. We built a life from next to nothing, but what we had overflowed with love. I remember the birth of our middle child—my body trembling, complications pressing down on...

  The grocery bags were heavy in my arms, my mind on autopilot as I wove through the crowded mall, barely paying attention—until I saw him. It had been years. More than enough time for wounds to heal, for memories to blur, yet the sight of him stopped me cold. His name formed on my lips before I even realized I was saying it. He turned, just as startled, and then came the smile—warm, familiar, like no time had passed at all. We started talking right there in the middle of the store, blocking foot traffic, laughing over how fate had thrown us together after so long. He suggested we grab a quick bite at a nearby restaurant, and I didn’t hesitate. Dinner stretched into hours. The conversation flowed too easily, as if the past had never hardened around us. He had changed—wiser, calmer—but so had I. And yet, some things had remained the same, lingering beneath the surface. Eventually, we moved to his car, parked in a shadowed corner of the lot, the outside world forgotten as we kept...

  There was a lot of yelling—roughly 99% mine, which honestly should’ve shattered some glass—but when you walk in on an infidelity horror show that feels specifically choreographed to ruin your life, you don’t exactly whisper. Let’s set the scene: my car is packed like a refugee convoy, loaded with every last remnant of my hopeful, blissfully unaware past. I’m carrying something—maybe a box labelled “our future”, maybe my last shred of dignity—and just as I step inside, there it is. The betrayal. Live. In action. No commercial breaks. He wasn’t just cheating—no, no—he was staging a performance. The timing? Impeccable. The audacity? Off the charts. And of all the choices in the universe, he chose her —his ex, a woman with whom history had already proven that love could not, would not, and should not thrive. Yet there they were, reigniting the dumpster fire, with me as the unwilling witness to their second act of self-destruction. Now, listen—I’m not here to critique his terrible ...