Page 39 of Pretend You Love Me

He hands Milo over without protest, his movements easy, his face seems almost resigned.

“Don’t go,” he says. “We’ll figure this out.”

“No,” I tell him simply. “We won’t.”

I gather the twins, Maisie already settled against Henry’s chest, Milo warm and solid in my arms, and turn toward the door. The family watches in silence, Jack and Emma exchanging glances that contain entire paragraphs of unspoken communication, Olivia with her hand still on her husband’s arm, Sophie now openly crying, Diane standing perfectly still with the expression of someone whose careful architecture has just collapsed.

At the door, I pause, just a moment of hesitation that happens when you’re about to step into a life you can’t return from.

“Elsie.”

I turn back just as Henry crosses the room toward me, Maisie balanced carefully against his chest. For a second, I think he’s going to say something practical, something about timing or the twins or whether I need help getting the bags into the car, but instead he just presses his spare house key into my hand.

I look at him in complete confusion which he must see as he offers me a gentle smile.

“You come back whenever you need to,” he says quietly. “I mean that.”

I swallow hard enough it hurts.

“Henry…”

His expression changes slightly, something tired and sad but deeply certain underneath it. Not pity or obligation. Just support given without conditions attached to it.

“Yes,” he says simply. “You can.”

Our eyes meet across the distance he’s maintaining, and I see it, not pity or judgment or any of the other reactions I’ve been braced for, but the recognition that happens when someone sees you as you are. Not the woman who’s breaking her marriage or the mother who’s disrupting a family gathering or even the daughter-in-law who’s finally causing a scene, but just Elsie.

“Thank you,” I say quietly.

He nods once, passing me Maisie and steps back to give me space. “Drive safely,” he says. “Text me when you’re home.”

I nod, already moving toward the door with Milo balanced against my chest and Maisie watching the proceedings with confusion. The family remains where I left them, Daniel in the centre of the room with his face distraught, Diane standing perfectly still with one hand pressed to her mouth, Jack and Emma seated in the same spot.

I push through the door with careful attention, the door closing behind me with a soft click that feels like the period at the end of a very long sentence.

The afternoon is what it was when we arrived, bright and clear and completely unaware that anything has changed, but something has fundamentally fractured.

I settle the twins into my car, Milo in his seat, Maisie in hers, both of them watching me. Through it all, my phone buzzes repeatedly in my pocket, message notifications stacking up like falling dominoes, the group chat I presume seeing as I left the Quinn household stupefied.

I don’t answer. Can’t answer.

Instead, I slide into the driver’s seat, adjust the mirrors with careful attention, and pull away from the curb. The house recedes in the rearview mirror, white and immaculate.

Fuck, what did I just do?

Fourteen

I grip my steering wheel with both hands, my knuckles white against the grey leather, and wait for the panic to hit. Or maybe shame, that hot, crawling feeling that used to flood my chest whenever Diane’s eyes landed on a stain or a wrinkle or anything that she thought was shameful. But there’s nothing. Just bone-deep exhaustion and a hollow feeling that comes after you’ve said what you mean for the first time in months.

In the rearview mirror, Maisie is fast asleep. Milo, meanwhile, his face is scrunched into a perfect expression of outrage, his tiny fists punching the air.

“Just hold on,” I tell him, my voice firm even though my hands are shaking slightly. “Just ten more minutes and we’ll be home.”

He responds with a wail that manages to contain at least three distinct emotional states: hunger, exhaustion, and what can only be described as moral outrage at the entire concept of car seats.

My phone buzzes from the passenger seat, a single, insistent vibration that’s immediately followed by another, then another, then what sounds like an entire string of notifications all hitting at once. I don’t look. Can’t look. Not while driving with my children in the back and my marriage in literal pieces on the Quinn family living room floor.

But at the red light, a long one that seems specifically designed to make sure I have enough time to think about everything that just happened, I give in and glance at the screen. The notifications are stacked like falling dominoes: seven missed calls from Luca, three voice notes, twelve texts from Liv that read like someone rapidly translating a complete emotional breakdown into emoji, and a single, careful message from Harper: “Where are you? Are you safe? Call when you can.”