SHAPES UNSPOKEN

- Prologue -

HAPPY READING 🥰

Sean Britto

The ceiling had never looked so wide.

I lay flat on my back on the living room couch, staring up at it like it held answers written in invisible ink. The house was too quiet. Not peaceful quiet - hollow quiet. The kind that presses against your ears until you start hearing memories instead of sound.

This was not how I imagined the next chapter of my life.

I should have been upstairs. In our bed. On my side of it. But I couldn't bring myself to walk into that room. Every corner held her. The faint scent of her perfume still clung to the curtains. Her pillow still had the dip from where her head used to rest. Even the closet felt like it was waiting for her to open it.

Cindy.

I squeezed my eyes shut, but that only made her clearer.

I wanted more for us. More children. A bigger house. Family vacations. Loud dinners. Growing old with her. Watching Steph graduate. Watching him fall in love. Watching her nag me about my eating habits at sixty-five.

I wanted ordinary forever.

Instead, I was alone on a couch I didn't even remember buying.

I came from a small family. Just my parents, Dmitri, and me. Two sons. No sisters. No chaos. Just structure and loyalty.

Dmitri runs his hardware store in Denver now. Built it from nothing. I've always respected that about him. In this family, you build what you want - you don't wait for it.

Family has always been everything to me. Not business. Not money. Not reputation.

Family.

So what does it say about me that mine is falling apart?

I remember the first time I saw Cindy.

Brunette. Brown eyes. Pale ivory skin dusted with freckles like the sun had kissed her cheeks and refused to leave. She was short - but she carried herself like she was six feet tall. Confident. Sharp. Untouchable.

She gave me hell when I approached her.

I smile to myself now despite the ache in my chest.

She rejected me three times before she even agreed to have coffee with me. The fourth time, I stood in front of the entire assembly hall with a rose and a box of chocolates like some hopeless romantic fool.

"I like you," I had said into the microphone, heart pounding.

The entire room had gone silent.

She walked toward me slowly, eyes unreadable. Took the rose. Took the chocolate.

Then she leaned close enough for her lips to brush my ear.

"You don't think it would be that easy to get me."

The crowd erupted.

And I fell.

From that moment, I made it my mission. I pursued her like a tiger stalking prey - patient, relentless, focused. But somewhere along the hunt, she stopped being prey and became my whole world.

She was fire. Fierce. Stubborn. Honest to a fault. She didn't soften her words to protect my ego. She challenged me. Drove me insane. Made me laugh when I didn't want to.

And when she loved me - she loved me with everything she had.

Or at least I thought she did.

Now she doesn't want me.