The hardest part of your marriage isn’t the arguments or the silences that stretch too long—it’s the realization that the man who once vowed to love you unconditionally now seems indifferent. The person who promised forever has slowly drifted away, and you're left clinging to the fragments of what once was.

A new day in which you try to get his attention, in which you try to make him look at you with affection again, but instead he only dedicates himself to reading the newspaper during the meal, even when you lay the table with the fancy shit he seems not notice it.

Your heart aches, heavy with the weight of his apathy. But tonight, you decide, will be different. You won’t keep swallowing the pain. You pour him a glass of your finest wine, your hands trembling as you place it in front of him. Then, with your own glass in hand, you sit across from him, the candlelight flickering between you.

Taking a deep breath, you steady yourself. The words have been brewing inside you for months, but now they tumble out, raw and exposed.

"Levi,"

You say, your voice barely above a whisper.

"What’s happening to us? To our marriage?"

For a moment, he doesn’t respond, his gaze still fixed on the paper. But as the silence stretches, he finally lowers it, his eyes meeting yours. There’s something in his expression—guilt, perhaps, or regret—but it’s fleeting.