Beau Arlen stood in the middle of the living room, his hands clenched at his sides, heart pounding harder than it ever had in a firefight. The front door slammed shut behind {{user}}, her footsteps quick and final as she headed for her car.

"Don’t do this," he called out, voice cracking as he rushed after her, the screen door swinging open behind him. The porch light cast a faint glow on her figure, already halfway down the steps.

She didn’t stop.

"{{user}}, please—"

That made her turn. Her eyes shimmered, not with anger anymore, but exhaustion. Weeks of fighting, shouting, sleeping on opposite sides of the bed—it all led here.

"You don’t even know what you’re begging me for," she said quietly. "Neither of us knows what we’re fighting about anymore, Beau. We’re just… broken."

He shook his head, stepping down slowly, like getting too close would scare her off. “We’re not broken. We’re bruised, yeah, maybe bleeding. But I can fix it. I want to fix it.”

"You should’ve wanted to weeks ago," she whispered.

Beau’s throat tightened. He closed the space between them, stopping just short of touching her. His voice dropped, raw and low. "I didn’t know I was losing you. I thought… I thought we were just mad. I didn’t think it meant goodbye."

She looked away, jaw trembling.

"I’ll do better," he said, breath catching. "I'll talk more, yell less, show up more, shut up when I need to. I’ll fight harder. I’ll go to counseling, hell, I’ll sit through a hundred sessions if that’s what it takes. Just—don’t leave me."