Violet's hands shook as she reached for her phone—the same one she'd kept in her bedside drawer for the past five years, as though refusing to let go of a wound that had never fully healed. The sun had dipped and returned many times since that day, but the pain was still raw beneath her practiced calm.
Alec stood just inside her living room, tall but trembling—a fierce, confused energy reflected in his restless pacing. The room was filled with the comfortable disorder of a home shaped by children: art-covered walls, soft toys half-buried in a blanket fort, stacks of library books and cozy pillows. For Violet, it was the only sanctuary she'd ever known, and tonight it felt as fragile as glass.
She looked up, locking eyes with Alec. He forced a steadying breath, his tone a blend of apology and hunger for the truth. "Violet, I never wanted to hurt you. Whatever did or didn't happen back then—you have to believe me, it wasn't how it looked. Let me explain. Please."
Violet nodded but her gaze remained frosty, poised on the edge of tears and anger. "Then explain. Because all I got was a message. No call. No visit. Just a few cold words that shattered my life."
She unlocked the phone, scrolled, and stopped—her finger trembling. She handed it to Alec. The screen glowed with a message date-stamped five years prior.
Violet,
I'm sorry it has come to this, but I have to end things between us. I can't marry you. My life is moving in a different direction, and I've decided to be with someone who is more suitable—a woman of background and means, someone who fits my world. I wish you happiness. Please don't try to contact me again.
Violet's voice was quiet, but it cut deeper than a cry. "That's what I got, Alec. That's how I learned you were gone."
Alec stared at the text. His face lost all color. For a long moment he didn't speak, only reread the lines as if willing them to shift or blur and reveal some trick of the light. "Violet…" His voice was a hoarse whisper. "I never sent this. Never."
Violet's lips trembled; she gave a sharp, bitter laugh. "Don't lie to me. Do you know what it's like to reread this message every night? To wonder why I wasn't good enough? You called me unworthy. You left me—no, you erased me."
Alec's hands shook as he tried to hand the phone back. "I never wrote these words, Violet. I couldn't. You knew me—did you ever imagine I'd say any of this? Someone else… someone—" he broke off, confusion darkening his face.
Violet stared at him, judgment warring with hope. "If not you, who? Only you had access to your account."
Alec's mind raced. His PA, Monica, had managed his travel, messages, sometimes correspondence he barely remembered. At the time, his work had been overwhelming, his schedule a chaos of business and events and constant interruptions. Monica prided herself on "handling the mess," as she liked to say—but this…could she have done this? His doubts turned to terror.
"When I was busy," Alec started, voice rough, "Monica did take care of my texts. I always thought it was small things—confirmations, time changes, apologies. She knew I was struggling. But this—" He shook his head, his own disbelief growing. "This isn't just business. This is everything. If she sent this—"
Violet's face was unreadable. "You never noticed? You didn't think it strange, after five years, that I never replied? That I vanished from your life so easily?" Her words were edged with years of heartbreak.
Alec's composure cracked and the horror that had been creeping up finally broke loose. "I thought you hated me. That I'd made my decision—and you, being proud, would never come back. You don't realize how much I regretted my silence. I drowned myself in work to forget."
Violet nearly dropped the phone. Her voice trembled, raw. "You broke me, Alec. You broke my faith. You made me believe you'd chosen someone else—someone richer, better, deserving. Was that Monica's idea of protecting you, too? Or did she decide I was beneath your world?"
Alec shook his head, trying to make sense of the tidal wave of guilt. "I promise you—I never…" His voice faltered. "Let me see the message details. The metadata. Please. If she sent it, I'll know."
Violet thrust the device into his hand, fingers brushing his briefly—a spark that stung after so many years. Alec's eyes scanned the message thread, flipping through the digital traces Monica might never have expected would be questioned. "She accessed my account 'for scheduling,'" he murmured, recalling old explanations. "She said she'd clear out old contacts, rewrite my calendar, answer family and friends."
Violet's breath caught. "So all this time, you thought I'd left you—while I sobbed in the dark thinking I'd been replaced, discarded."
Alec nodded, pain etched in the lines of his face. "It destroyed me too, Vi. I buried myself in business, convinced I had to forget. My letters—when I finally wrote, years later—never came back. You changed your address."
She swallowed, memories flooding back—her move to escape the whispers, her reluctance to open anything not addressed to her new home. "I started over. I had to. For them." Her eyes flicked toward the hallway, where childish giggles floated in.
For the first time, Alec stepped closer, hope and fear warring in his voice. "If you have the message, maybe we can prove it wasn't me. She might have left traces—she always thought she was too clever to get caught."
Violet wavered, arms folded, locked in grief. Then, split by a wave of old longing, she held his gaze. "And if you're lying? If this is just a way to pretend it wasn't your choice?"
Alec met her eyes, naked and unguarded. "I'd do anything to undo it, Violet. If I'd wanted to leave, I would have told you to your face. You deserved more than a text. You deserved forever."
The room felt simultaneously small and infinite, time unwinding and doubling back. Violet looked down at the phone, that cursed message still glowing like an open wound. "Even if what you say is true, it doesn't erase the years I lost. Or the faith I buried."
Alec's eyes shone. "No apology can fix what you lost. But let me help make something new. For you. For them." His voice dropped. "For us, if you'll let me try."
She shook her head but didn't pull away. "Trust isn't rebuilt in a night."
He managed a small, hopeful smile. "I'll earn every day, if you let me."
An unexpected sound burst from the other room—Eliot calling, "Mummy! Eloise took my coloring book!" Violet's eyes closed with a mixture of frustration and bittersweet relief: something normal, insisting on living, breathing, despite the heartbreak.
She called back gently, "I'll be right there!" Her eyes returned to Alec. "They need me now. And I don't want them to see me cry again. Not tonight."
Alec nodded, his own tears fighting for place. "Promise me you'll let me prove the truth. Let me start with Monica—let me bring you proof, from her own files or confession."
Violet hesitated, then nodded. "One chance. That's all you get."
He pressed her hand—gratefully, almost reverently. "One chance. I won't waste it."
As Violet gathered herself to tend to her children, Alec quietly reviewed the message—and, with a determined heart, prepared to confront Monica and the web of lies that stole five years from the lives of two people who should have never been apart.
Through the doorway, the light faded into evening and hope flickered, tentative but real—the start
of something healing, if only the truth would finally set them free.