Silas

I missed all of that. Even though in my mind, it had only been last week that he’d been going off on one of those tirades, the knowledge that I wouldn’t hear another one tugged at my heart. And after I went back to Gach Rud, I’d remember the last year, and I’d feel the long stretch of time that had passed since I’d listened to George grumble about “I’m sure he’s not encouraging his basilisk to look at his mother-in-law.”

I wiped at my eye. Because it itched, not because it was welling up, because I was not getting emotional as I tried to let go of George. Yeah, I missed the good times in our life together, but those were over.

I kept scrolling back in time, and his posts got sparser and sparser.

Then, almost exactly a year ago, he’d posted simply: Biggest mistake of my life. I’m so sorry, Silas.

The comments… whew. No one cut him any slack.

I can’t believe I thought you guys were couples' goals.

You’re unbelievable.

You know, for someone with a doctorate, you can be one hell of a dumbass. What were you thinking?

George didn’t respond to any of them. In fact, he was radio silent for almost a month after that, and when he did finally resurface, it was a simple “I’ll call you” in response to his sister posting that she was worried about him.

Six weeks later, he was tagged in some photos from his cousin’s wedding.

Those photos… My God, even now, when I was angry enough that he could walk into traffic for all I cared, the photos from that wedding were heartbreaking. He’d put on a happy face in the family pictures, but his eyes gave him away. And it wasn’t like he could hide the scary gauntness in his cheeks. I’d thought he was surprisingly thin when I’d seen his picture on the clinic’s website yesterday and when I saw him in person, but at the wedding? Holy shit. In fact, looking closely, I was pretty sure he had on some makeup to at least try to cover the circles under his eyes.

I sat back on the couch and stared up at the ceiling.

As far as he’d known, I would never see those photos or his posts. It wasn’t performative. It wasn’t an attempt to tug at my heartstrings so I’d give him another chance. Those were him living life after me, and he looked…

He looked broken.

I’d always said cheating was my red line. There was no going back after someone had cheated.

Obviously, I’d stuck to that a year ago. George had cheated. I’d kicked him out. We’d both… Okay, saying we’d both gone on with our lives was being extraordinarily generous, but life had gone on and dragged us with it.

After a year, I’d been so damn miserable, I must’ve asked a fae to just make it all go away. Make me forget.

George had lost weight. Lost that sparkle in his eyes. From his sparse posts, he seemed to have lost his passion for anything except the animals he’d devoted his life to treating. Even that seemed to have dimmed—there was a video about six months ago of him holding a baby griffin. Griffins were absolutely his catnip, and the babies melted his heart like nothing else in the world. Holding one? Especially while it tucked its head under his chin, kneaded on his arm, and purred loudly? That should’ve had him grinning like a kid on Christmas.

He was smiling, but with about as much conviction as he had in the wedding photos and his clinic portrait.

In his post about us breaking up, he hadn’t made any excuses. He hadn’t tried to downplay what he did or convince anyone that I’d deserved it. He hadn’t even responded to the people torching him in the comments, which they kept doing every time he posted. Though he did respond to one—someone who’d tried to insinuate I must’ve done something to deserve it.

No, George had replied. This is on me.

It was entirely possible there’d been other posts and comments that he’d since deleted, but the one that still stood—unflattering comments and all—was the one where he owned what he did and apologized for it.

I lowered my phone and blew out a breath. I didn’t imagine I’d had too many charitable thoughts about George over the past year. Today, though…

I kept circling back to yesterday. I hadn’t been used to life without George because I didn’t remember. In that moment, I hadn’t known what George had done. He’d told me we’d split amicably a few months ago, and when I’d asked if there was any going back, I hadn’t been able to deny the pain in his eyes when he’d sadly told me no.

Fuck. He could’ve kissed me right then. Suggested we go into the bedroom we’d shared. Told me that, yes, we could start over. I’d have taken him up on it in a heartbeat—the reconciliation and the makeup sex.

But he’d told me we couldn’t go back.

So… was it fair to say he’d lied to me? Yeah, it was. And he should’ve told me the truth from the start. But when I’d all but offered him a way back in, he’d said no even though the desire had been plain to see in his eyes.

Some cynical part of my mind told me he probably knew in that moment that I’d find out the truth sooner or later. Maybe he was a cheating dickhole, but even he had to be above taking advantage of the gap in my memory to sneak in one last fuck.

Still, it made me think. It made me wonder.

What if…

What if George really was sorry for what he did? What if he really did regret it and wish he could change the past?

I rubbed my aching, gritty eyes. I needed to talk to him. One way or the other, we had to sort this out, or we were both going to be hunting down fae and paying for amnesia just to keep from going insane.

Small problem, though: I didn’t know where he lived.

I didn’t even have his number anymore. He’d given it to me yesterday, and while I’d been drunk and crying last night, I’d deleted and blocked him again. I had him on social media now, since I’d unblocked him, but for as long as I’d known him, he’d kept push notifications turned off for almost everything.

Lucky me, though, his work cell was on the clinic’s website. I hemmed and hawed a few times, wondering if this was a good idea. Did I really want to know what he had to say about any of this? My current situation put that in some perspective, I supposed—maybe I didn’t want to know, but at the same time, not knowing was killing me. I didn’t know what I’d thought or felt over the past year, and I hated that. It was like I’d been tearing open wounds I didn’t even remember getting, and it was confusing and impossible to find anything close to closure.

Did I want to know? Probably not. But I needed to know.

Hoping he was on call or at least checking his messages, I sent a text:

Silas: Can we talk?