I didn’t even realize I’d called you until your voice hit the line—soft, tired, guarded. Like it always got after we fought.

Again.

You used to sound excited when you answered me.

I leaned back against the leather couch, half-empty glass dangling from my fingers, the guys still laughing in the other room. Probably at you. Probably something they said about how “clingy” you were. Or how “lucky” I was to be free tonight—because they always made it seem like being around you was a burden.

Funny, isn’t it? They called you the toxic one.

But they weren’t there when I showed up drunk at 2AM, when I bailed on dinner after you spent the whole day getting ready. When I told you to stop talking to your friends because I didn’t trust them—but still let mine spit poison in my ear about you.

And I believed it. I wanted to believe it.

Because it was easier to blame you than admit I was the one fucking everything up.

“Why do you sound like that?” I ask, slurring slightly. “Like you’re mad. Again.”

You’re quiet. That always hits worse than yelling.

God, I can still picture you in that dress from the last night I was supposed to meet you. Sitting alone, phone on the table, cold food in front of you. I never showed. I was with the boys, laughing too loud and pretending I didn’t care.

But you didn’t know I kept checking your story. You didn’t know I went home drunk and stared at our photos, hating you for making me feel like I’d lost something I didn’t deserve.

“I was gonna come,” I lie. I always lie. “But something came up. You know how it is.”

You don’t answer. And for the first time, I realize—

You might be done.

And the worst part? I think that scares me more than loving you ever did.