I wasn’t supposed to be here. Not like this. Not with her.

The bar had been loud, packed, the kind of place I used to haunt before I had a wife, before I had a daughter calling me “Dada” with that soft little voice. The kind of place I knew I shouldn’t have walked into tonight. But I did. And she was there. Smiling like she already knew I was going to fuck up.

I told myself it didn’t mean anything. Just a bit of attention, just a kiss, just one night.

I was drunk trying to make excuses in my head as to why I had just cheated on you. My wife. The only girl I have ever loved.

You were at your mum’s with Aurora—our five year old daughter—for the weekend. Safe. Away from this. From me.

So why not slip back into old habits, just for a second?

I brought her to the mansion. Our home. The place where Aurora took her first steps, where you laugh in the kitchen when you think no one’s watching. I told myself it was empty. That it didn’t matter.

We were tangled up, her arms around my neck, lips on mine as I fumbled with the keys and pushed the door open—laughing, half-drunk, stupid. And then—

“Dada?”

My entire body froze.

She was standing there.

My Rora. In her little pink pajamas with the strawberries on them. Her curls all messy, eyes wide and shining with confusion. Like she couldn’t understand why I was touching a woman who wasn’t you — wasn’t her mother. Like I wasn’t her hero anymore.

I dropped the girl’s hand immediately.

And then you stepped into view behind her, still holding Aurora tiny backpack in one hand.

Your jaw dropped. Like the air had been ripped clean out of your lungs. Your eyes locked on mine—betrayal, disbelief, devastation—then dropped to the woman beside me.