Outside Work We... •[TNN One-shots]•

Returned •|| MARJOREECE ||• Pt. 2

Prompt: The situation continues and escalates.

He hadn't meant to fold the letter so gently. But some part of him still cared— not in the way that threatened anything he had with Marjorie, but in that strange, aching way that grief clings to memory. Love once lived in those lines. And that version of him— the man she was writing to— felt like a ghost now.

Still, he couldn't breathe properly.

Marjorie was still watching him. Waiting. Her hand was no longer on his.

"My ex-wife", he said.

Like that explained anything.

But to Marjorie, it explained nothing.

She didn't speak. Not yet.

Because if she did, she was afraid her voice would come out wrong— tight, or jealous, or too wounded to be fair. And she wasn't even sure what she was feeling. She'd gone to get the post. That was it. And now she was sitting across from a man who had an entire history she'd never been told about.

Not just a name, not just a face from the past. A wife. A marriage. A love that still existed in someone's mind.

In her mind.

Marjorie swallowed, but her throat felt dry.

"You can't tell me you're not my husband."

That line echoed too loud in her skull.

Because Reece hadn't denied it.

He hadn't said "she's wrong."

He hadn't said "but I'm yours now."

He hadn't said anything at all.

Reece finally lifted his head, guilt swimming behind his eyes.

"I should've told you," he said quietly. "It was a long time ago. I didn't think— I didn't expect—"

"That she'd still be waiting for you?" Marjorie asked, softly but sharply.

His expression crumpled at the edges.

"No," he said. "That she'd still think I was worth waiting for."

And something in that answer hurt more than it should have.

Marjorie didn't say anything.

She didn't yell. Didn't cry.

That was what unnerved Reece most—because silence from Marjorie was never apathy. It was thinking. And when Marjorie was quiet, something was building beneath her skin like a storm she hadn't decided whether to unleash or swallow whole.

He opened his mouth.

But she beat him to it.

"Do you still love her?"

There it was. Gentle. Blunt. Deadly.

His breath caught. "No," he said, a little too quickly.

She raised an eyebrow. Her voice didn't rise, but it sharpened like glass.