It had been sixteen days since she walked out.
Sixteen days of silence.
Sixteen days without a call, a knock, a half-baked excuse.
And then, on the seventeenth morning, it came.
Not a message.
Not a knock.
But a voice note.
Eleena found it as she sipped her coffee, her phone buzzing quietly beside the open pages of her journal.
Jace Carter: 1 voice message, 3 minutes and 42 seconds.
Her thumb hovered over the play button.
She wasn't ready.
She was ready.
She pressed it.
> "Hey. It's me."
"I know I said I'd give you space, and I have. But I woke up today, and… I needed to say something. Not because I want to fix everything right now. Not because I expect a reply. But because silence starts to sound a lot like regret when there are words you never said."
His voice was rough — not rehearsed, not smooth. Real.
> "You were right. About everything. About me lying when it mattered. About me being afraid to show up. I've been thinking about that day — the look in your eyes when you realized I hadn't changed at all. And Eleena, that look has haunted me every single day."
She closed her eyes, the sound of his voice flooding her with memories. Late-night laughs. Forehead kisses. His breath in the dark when he whispered, "I've never felt this way before."
> "I've started therapy. You probably don't believe me — hell, I wouldn't believe me either. But I did. The first session wrecked me. Turns out I've spent years telling people what they wanted to hear so they wouldn't see how lost I really was."
A pause.
> "You were the first person who didn't ask me to perform. And I still lied. I still hid."
Eleena swallowed hard, her chest tightening.
> "You loved me in a way I didn't know how to accept. I kept asking myself, 'Why is she still here?' and instead of being grateful, I got scared. I thought if I let you too close, you'd leave. So I made sure you had a reason to."
Her hands trembled slightly. Not with anger — but something softer. Sadder.
> "I'm not asking you to forgive me. Not now. Maybe not ever. But I need you to know I'm not the same man who watched you walk away and said nothing. That man is gone. I miss you. But more than that, I'm learning to miss myself — the man I might've been, if I hadn't hurt you first."
Another pause. Then:
> "If you ever want to talk, even as a friend, I'm here. But if not… I'll carry this with me. And I'll still thank you. Because losing you is what finally made me find myself."
Click.
The message ended.
Eleena sat there, still.
No tears. Not yet.
Just stillness.
She listened to the message again. And again.
It didn't sound like manipulation. It didn't sound like guilt.
It sounded like… truth.
But the problem with truth was that it didn't undo damage.
It just made the wounds honest.
That afternoon, she went for a walk. The city felt different — too loud, too quiet. Everything reminded her of him.
The bench where they used to get coffee after late-night grocery runs.
The bookstore he once surprised her in with a copy of Little Women, because she'd said she missed it once in passing.
The little Italian place where he kissed her like the world might end after she'd cried in front of him the first time.
Memories were everywhere. But memory isn't reason.
Love wasn't a loop. It was a line — forward, not back.
And now, she had a choice.
She could call him. She could say she forgave him. She could start over.
But did she want to?
Or did she just miss the version of him she once believed in?
Back at home, she opened her journal and wrote:
> He's growing. And I'm proud of him. But I'm growing too. Maybe not toward each other. Maybe just… toward peace.
And that night, for the first time in a long time, she didn't cry thinking about him.
She simply closed her eyes, and let the silence feel like healing — not punishment.