Three Little Heartbeats

Chapter 22: A Broken Heart

Alexia sat in the quiet of her apartment, staring out the window as the rain tapped softly against the glass. The grey skies outside seemed to mirror the heaviness in her chest, a dull ache that had settled there ever since she had walked away from Sandro. It had been months since their fight, since she had made the heart-wrenching decision to leave him, but the pain still felt as fresh as the day they'd said goodbye.

Her heart had been shattered, and no matter how much time had passed, she couldn't seem to put the pieces back together.

She wrapped her arms around her knees, pulling them close to her chest as she sank deeper into the couch. The memories of that night played over and over in her mind, like a movie she couldn't turn off. Sandro's face, his hurt, his confusion—it haunted her, reminding her of the love they had once shared and how it had slipped through their fingers.

"I thought I'd be stronger by now," she whispered to herself, the words catching in her throat. "I thought the distance would make it easier."

But it hadn't. If anything, the distance had only made the pain more unbearable, as if the space between them was filled with all the things they never said. The what-ifs lingered, tormenting her—what if she had stayed? What if she had fought harder for them? What if she hadn't let their dreams pull them apart?

The questions weighed on her, and as she sat there, alone with her thoughts, she couldn't help but wonder if she had made a mistake.

It wasn't that she didn't love Sandro. She did—she had loved him with every fiber of her being, from the moment they had met until the moment she walked away. But that love had felt like a battle, a constant struggle to keep up with the demands of his world. It had worn her down, chipped away at her sense of self until she didn't even recognize who she was anymore.

Still, there were moments when she thought about calling him, about hearing his voice again. She imagined what it would be like to apologize, to tell him that she missed him, that the love they shared was worth fighting for. But each time, fear and doubt crept in, whispering that it was too late, that too much had happened for them to go back.

As the rain continued to fall, Alexia's mind drifted to the early days of their relationship, back when everything had seemed so simple. She had been enchanted by Sandro's charisma, his passion for his work, his unwavering confidence in his future. She had admired him, looked up to him, and believed they could conquer anything together.

But as his career took off, the demands of his life became overwhelming. There were always speeches to give, meetings to attend, campaigns to run. And slowly, she had begun to feel like an outsider, as though she was watching his life from the sidelines while hers faded into the background.

"I should have known it would be like this," she muttered bitterly, wiping away the tears that threatened to fall. "I should have known that loving him meant losing a part of myself."

It was an ugly truth she hadn't wanted to face. Sandro had been everything she'd dreamed of—smart, driven, powerful. But the reality of loving a man like him had been more difficult than she could have imagined. His world had no room for compromise, no room for her needs or desires. It was all or nothing, and in the end, she had chosen to walk away rather than lose herself completely.

Yet even now, as she tried to justify her decision, doubt gnawed at her. Had she made the right choice? Could they have found a way to make it work? Or had she been too quick to give up on the love they shared?

Her thoughts were interrupted by the faint vibration of her phone on the coffee table. She glanced at the screen and saw a message from her best friend, Mica.

"Thinking of you. How are you holding up?"

Alexia sighed and typed out a quick response: "I'm okay. Just... thinking about everything. It's hard."

A moment later, Mica's reply came through: "I know. But you did what you had to do, Lex. Don't doubt that."

Alexia stared at the message for a long time, her heart heavy with conflicting emotions. Mica had been there through it all—the late-night phone calls, the tear-filled conversations, the moments of doubt and despair. She had been Alexia's rock, reassuring her that leaving Sandro had been the right decision.

But no matter how much Mica tried to comfort her, Alexia couldn't shake the feeling that she had lost something irreplaceable.

She got up from the couch and wandered over to the small box she kept in the corner of her bedroom closet. It was filled with mementos of her time with Sandro—photos, love letters, small tokens of their life together. She hadn't opened the box in months, but tonight, the urge to revisit the past was too strong to resist.

She pulled out a photo of the two of them, taken during one of Sandro's campaign events. He was smiling, his arm wrapped around her waist, his eyes filled with the promise of a future he believed in. She remembered how proud she had been to stand beside him, to support him as he chased his dreams.

"We were so happy then," she whispered, running her fingers over the picture. "What happened to us?"

But deep down, she knew what had happened. Their dreams had clashed, their priorities had shifted, and in the end, the love that had once felt unbreakable had crumbled under the weight of reality.

Tears blurred her vision as she placed the photo back in the box, her heart aching with a longing she couldn't fully explain. She had loved Sandro with everything she had, but sometimes, love wasn't enough. Sometimes, the life you thought you wanted turned out to be the one that broke you.

As Alexia closed the box and wiped away her tears, she realized that the question wasn't whether she still loved Sandro—she always would. The real question was whether that love was worth sacrificing herself for.

And as much as it hurt, she knew the answer.