«Do you really think taking me to a cheap hotel fixes things?» she yelled.
«It’s a four-star hotel, Camilla,» he replied.
Camilla. That was her name. I felt a deep, sharp pang—not of loss, but of betrayal. I backed away slowly, one hand covering my mouth to stifle my trembling.
Inside the room, Mason murmured in his sleep. «Mom.»
I went to him, stroking his hair. «It’s okay, honey. Sleep.»
He sighed, turning onto his side, completely unaware that his world, and mine, had just changed forever.
That night, while Mason slept soundly, a mix of rage, disbelief, and something I didn’t want to name kept me awake. Standing in front of the window, looking at the distant glow of the hotel pool, I wanted to scream. I wanted to run. I wanted answers.
But more than anything, I needed to see him. I tied my hair back, put on dark glasses and a simple t-shirt, and went down to the hotel bar. The place was almost empty, a warm light enveloping everything, and in a corner, a small jazz trio played something soft, almost melancholic.
And there he was, Ryan, sitting alone at the bar, a glass of bourbon in his hands. He looked older, with new lines around his eyes and a weary air that hadn’t been there before. But there was no doubt. It was him.
My body moved before my mind could. I sat down two seats to his right. «Tough night?» I said in a low, neutral voice.
He turned his head, surprised for a second, then gave me a tired, half-smile. «You could say that.»
His voice. God, that voice cut through me like a knife wrapped in velvet.
«Want to talk about it?» I asked, feigning disinterest, as if I were just talking to any stranger.
Ryan shrugged. «Couple drama. You know how it is.» I hid my trembling hands under the bar. «She just doesn’t get me,» he continued, swirling his glass. «She thinks I’m a boring guy trying to be young again. Maybe she’s right.»
I glanced at him sideways. He was completely absorbed in his drink, in his thoughts, in his new life, and he didn’t even recognize me. «And what would you like her to see in you?» I asked in an almost whisper.
He let out a bitter laugh. «That I’m not just some guy with money. That I went through hell. That I’m trying to do better, but no one sees the whole picture.» He paused. «Forget it. You don’t want to hear my tragedies.»
«I’m a good listener,» I replied, my heart pounding so hard I could hear its echo in my ears.
Ryan sighed, rubbing his forehead. «Three years ago, I lost everything. I thought it was the end. I had to start from scratch, leave a lot of things behind. People. Not because I wanted to, but sometimes you just… disappear.»
Disappear. That’s what he called abandoning us. It hurt so much to hold it all in that I felt my stomach was breaking apart from the inside. I wanted to scream, It’s me. Your wife. The mother of your son. The woman who buried an empty urn.
But I didn’t. I stayed there, listening like a stranger while the man who had destroyed my world shared his version of events with someone who didn’t even know his name.
Ryan drained his glass and stood up. He looked at me this time with a kind expression. «Thanks for listening. You’re easier to talk to than most people.»
I gave him a tight smile back. «Anytime.»
And then he left. He walked out of the bar, leaving behind the echo of an incomplete story and my soul trembling over the melted ice in his glass. I didn’t cry that night. But for the first time, I felt that the truth was no longer buried. It was just beginning to emerge.
The next afternoon should have been perfect. The sun shone without burning. The sea breeze carried the scent of salt and freedom, and Mason was digging in the sand with an almost sacred intensity, determined to build the strongest sandcastle on the entire beach.
I was sitting on a striped towel, sipping water and trying without success to clear my mind. For the first time in days, I almost forgot about Ryan. Almost.
Then I heard screaming. A woman was screaming in desperation, her voice cutting through the constant murmur of the waves. Instinctively, I got up, scanning the beach. I saw her. Camilla, the young woman from the balcony, was on her knees next to someone who had fallen on the sand. Her body trembled as she shook the man’s shoulders.
My heart froze. It was him. Ryan was lying on his side, pale, with an arm twisted beneath his torso. He wasn’t moving.
For a second, I hesitated. I could stay right where I was. After all, he wasn’t my problem anymore. But then I saw Mason, who had stopped digging, his small body tense, his little face confused. «Mom, isn’t that—»
I didn’t let him finish. «Stay here, honey. Don’t move,» I yelled, already running. I knelt next to Ryan, noticing his shallow breathing and his pulse, weak but present. My hands moved on their own.
Years ago, I had taken a first aid course for work. That muscle memory surfaced like a reflex. I carefully turned him over, freeing his arm, and slightly lifted his chin to clear his airway. «He’s breathing,» I murmured, more to myself than to Camilla, who was sobbing uncontrollably.
I covered his face with my towel to protect him from the sun. «Go get help—the hotel, an ambulance, whatever you can find. Now!» I ordered. She nodded and ran off.
I stayed there, kneeling on the hot sand, holding the wrist of the man who had faked his death, who had destroyed my world, and whom I was still saving. He groaned. His eyelids fluttered. His voice came out weak, barely a whisper. «Juliet.»
My entire body tensed. He had recognized me.
«Yes,» I replied in a low voice with an edge I couldn’t control. «It’s me.»
His eyes opened. He focused on me with difficulty, his expression falling apart with surprise, fear, and guilt. A hotel employee came running with a first aid kit and knelt beside us, checking Ryan’s vital signs. I stepped aside, wiping my sandy hands on my shorts.
Ryan sat up with help, still disoriented. Camilla returned shortly after, out of breath, with a bottle of water, but he only looked at me. «Juliet, please, we have to talk.»
I stood up slowly. «No, not here,» I said without emotion. «Tonight, ten p.m. at the hotel bar.»
He nodded, still in a daze, not just from the fall, but because the woman he had buried in his past was alive and had confronted him. I went back to Mason, who was waiting for me, standing and hugging his toy shovel like a shield. «Mom, was it… was it really him?»
I knelt down and hugged him. «We’ll talk about it, honey. But for now, let’s go back inside.» As we walked toward the hotel, the air felt thicker. Tonight, I would finally hear the truth, and I didn’t know what I was more afraid of: that he had a good reason, or that he had none at all.
That night, I arrived at the hotel bar ten minutes early. I needed that time not to run away. My hands were trembling, so I wrapped them around a glass of water and tried to breathe normally.
At ten o’clock sharp, Ryan walked through the door. No glasses, no hat, nothing to hide behind. He looked older, not just from the lines on his face, but from something in his eyes I didn’t recognize anymore. He approached cautiously, as if I might run or slap him. To be honest, both options were on the table.
«Juliet,» he said in a low voice, as if speaking my name were a prayer.
I didn’t answer immediately. I just watched him, waiting. Finally, I let it out. «You have two minutes to explain why I buried an empty urn and spent three years raising your son alone.»
He flinched, rubbing his hands as if trying to remove something that had stuck to his skin. «I didn’t want it to be like this,» he began. «I had to disappear, Juliet. I had no other choice.»
I leaned toward him, not blinking. «You had no choice but to fake your death? To make me tell a five-year-old boy that his dad was gone forever?» My voice cracked despite my efforts to keep it steady. «Make me understand that, Ryan. Please. Make it make sense.»
He lowered his gaze. «I was in trouble. Serious trouble. Remember that investment I was working on? It wasn’t just a business deal. I borrowed money, a lot of it, from people who don’t forgive mistakes.»
I shivered. «And instead of coming to me, of asking me for help, you staged an accident and disappeared?»
«I thought that if I stayed, you and Mason would be in danger. So I left. I cut off everything. I changed my name, my city. I paid back every single dime.»
«And after you paid, why didn’t you come back?» I asked, my arms crossed.
«Because I had already destroyed everything. Because I didn’t know how to look my son in the eyes. Because I found someone else.»
My stomach lurched. «Camilla? That safe life you built while I was mourning a dead man?»
He tensed. «I met her later. She doesn’t know any of this.»
I leaned back in the chair, feeling a mix of disgust and sorrow. «For three years, I woke up every morning trying not to break. I taught our son how to tie his shoes, how to kick a ball, how to write his name. I told him a thousand times that his dad loved him when I didn’t even know if you were still breathing.»
