"No."
The word comes out flat, final, but Kayden can hear the desperation underneath it. Andrea is standing in the middle of their living room—his living room now, he supposes—with her arms wrapped around herself like she's physically holding her body together.
"Andrea—"
"No, Kayden. You can't just—you can't ask me to leave our home." Her voice cracks on the last word. "This is our apartment. Our life. You can't just erase that."
"I'm not erasing anything." Kayden keeps his tone measured, reasonable, even though every instinct is screaming at him to close the distance between them, to take back everything he said yesterday, to stop hurting her. "I'm trying to give us both space to figure out what we really want."
"I know what I want!" Andrea's composure fractures completely. "I want you! I want us! I don't need a month to figure that out!"
