Nathan had spent the past few weeks trying to get used to life on the outside. He'd secured a job at a small mechanic shop, a quiet, solitary job that allowed him to bury his past beneath the noise of engines and the hum of machinery. But no matter how hard he worked, no matter how much he tried to push his memories away, one thing remained constant: Sarah.
She had been a part of him, a part of his soul, for so long that no matter how far he ran, she would always be there, lingering in the corners of his mind, the ghost of a love he could never have.
Nathan knew he couldn't keep running from her forever. So when he received the message, the one he had been dreading, he knew it was time.
The message was simple, but it struck him like a punch to the gut:
"I need to see you."
He hesitated, his finger hovering over the screen, torn between the urge to delete the message and the undeniable pull to respond. It had been years, years of silence and distance, but now she was reaching out again. It was like the universe had decided to give him one last chance, one last moment to face the woman who had once been everything to him.
Finally, his thumb moved, and he typed a simple reply.
"Where?"
Her response was swift: "The old park. The one we used to go to when we were younger. Meet me there at 3."
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Nathan arrived at the park early, the chill in the air creeping through his jacket. The trees stood bare, their limbs twisting in the wind like skeletal arms reaching out to grab him. He had forgotten how much he used to love this place—how many times he had walked here with Sarah, laughing and talking about dreams that now seemed so far out of reach.
He leaned against a nearby bench, trying to steady his breathing. His pulse was rapid, and every inch of him seemed to scream that this was a mistake, that seeing Sarah again was a mistake. He had moved on—or at least, he had tried to. But the truth was, no matter how much time passed, he would always carry the weight of what had happened between them. The love, the jealousy, the betrayal, and ultimately, the loss of his brother.
The crunch of footsteps on gravel broke his thoughts, and Nathan turned to see her—Sarah—walking toward him.
She looked the same, yet different. Her hair was longer, her face more mature, but her eyes... her eyes were still the same, filled with the kind of sorrow and longing that he knew too well. As she approached, he couldn't help but feel the years between them, the distance they had built, the silence they had endured.
Sarah stopped a few feet away, her gaze hesitant, as if she wasn't sure what to say or how to bridge the gap that had widened between them.
"Hi," she said softly, her voice trembling slightly.
"Hi," Nathan replied, his throat dry. He wanted to say more, to ask how she was, but the words stuck in his throat. They both knew that too much had happened, that too much had changed.
They stood there in silence for a long moment before Sarah spoke again.
"I didn't know where else to go," she confessed, her voice barely above a whisper. "I've been carrying this... this weight. I thought seeing you again might give me some kind of closure."
Nathan's heart pounded. Closure. That word. The very thing he had been chasing for years but had never been able to find. How could he find closure when everything between them was so tangled, so broken?
"You've moved on," he said, his voice thick with the unsaid things between them. "You're married. You've built a life without me. I've seen it, Sarah. It's too late for closure."
Tears welled up in her eyes, and she took a step closer. "You don't understand," she whispered. "I never stopped loving you, Nathan. Even after everything that happened, even after I married him, there's a part of me that still wants to be with you."
Nathan felt the weight of her words like a crushing blow. He wanted to reach out, to touch her, to make it all right. But he couldn't.
"You've made your choice," he said softly, his voice breaking. "You've lived your life. And I've lived mine. I'm not the same person I was. I can't be, not after everything that's happened."
She took another step forward, her gaze never leaving his. "I know," she said, her voice laced with regret. "I know that. But I also know that I've never stopped loving you. I've never stopped thinking about what we could have been."
The pain in her voice mirrored his own. It was like a knife twisting in his chest, and for a moment, he was paralyzed. All he could see was the girl he had once known, the girl he had once dreamed of, and the woman she had become. He reached out, his fingers brushing against hers, the touch so fleeting, so fragile.
For a moment, everything fell away—the years, the mistakes, the pain. It was just them, standing in the park, like they had so many years ago. But the moment didn't last. The reality of it all hit him like a wave, and he pulled his hand away.
"I can't do this anymore, Sarah," he said, his voice a raw whisper. "I can't keep living in the past, chasing something that doesn't exist anymore. It's over. And I need to let it go."
Tears spilled down her cheeks, and she stepped back, her hand trembling at her side. "I never wanted to hurt you," she said, her voice breaking. "I never wanted any of this. I just... I just didn't know how to fix it."
Nathan looked at her one last time, his heart heavy with all the things they had shared and lost. "You don't have to fix it, Sarah," he said quietly. "It's done. We're done."
With that, he turned and walked away, leaving her standing there, the ghosts of their past swirling around them. He knew there was no going back, no undoing the years, no erasing the mistakes.
But as he walked into the distance, he couldn't shake the feeling that their story would never truly be finished.
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