Goodbye, Mr. Regret

"Yes."

That's exactly how suffocating it felt.

If they could part on good terms, maybe she'd remember the good in him.

The failure of their marriage-she knew it was the result of her own bad choices. She wasn't about to pin all the blame on him.

But this relentless pressure-this was what she truly hated.

All Jessica wanted was a small slice of life that belonged to her alone, but even that tiny wish, he insisted on denying her.

Jessica Greene looked at him, sorrow weighing in her eyes. "You're not a fool, Timothy. You know exactly what's become of our marriage. There are only a few weeks left-what's the point in dragging this out?"

"Jessy, most marriages fall apart because of cheating, family issues, or lack of communication. Now you want a divorce-shouldn't we at least sit down and talk about what went wrong? If we can fix it, let's fix it. If we can't, then we'll end it. That's how a marriage should be-beginning to end. Why can't we just talk?"

Jessica let out a bitter laugh. "So you do understand."

He knew everything, yet acted as if he didn't know a thing.

"I've been thinking it through, Jessy. I'm sorry. We've been married seven years—I thought everything was normal. If you want to go home tonight, that's fine. But can we please sit down and talk?" Timothy gestured to the chair across from him.

Jessica remained standing. "We're way past the talking stage."

"We still have a few weeks, don't we? How is it too late?"

feeling I had left for

could bring back the woman she'd once been the one full of

fight. They barely ever argued. She used to be the quiet one, unable to speak up; now that she finally could, Timothy had become so accommodating that there was nothing left to

voice was steady, almost gentle. "So what you're saying is, you

think most people do," Jessica

burned down to the filter. He stubbed it out,

leaning on a cane, he was still devastatingly handsome-his

myself thirty more days. Time is slipping away-one week's already gone. I don't want to waste what's left. Can you give me

"Did you lie about the

us. Whatever you think you saw-did you ever try to verify it? There's a saying-even what we see with our own eyes can be

Jessica fell silent.

was nothing

silence, Timothy pressed on. "If you're leaving me, at least let

"Don't

"I know some of it. You mean about me

Better to face the whole ugly

of it. We don't see the

be bothered to mention Sheila again.

jealousy, and she was long past

to

blocking her path. "So

a chance to explain?"

the title of