Sebastian came back from his morning run at seven. He never came back before nine.

I was kneeling in front of the bookcase in the study. Stacks of yellowed sheet music sat around me, along with a folder of my old contracts and my passport.

He leaned against the doorframe, towel around his neck.

"Spring cleaning?"

"Something like that."

He nudged a page with his sneaker. It was my handwriting. Pencil notes, smudged from years of erasing.

"You thinking about playing again?" He smiled like he was humoring a child. "Evie, you don't need to go out and work. I can afford you."

*Afford* me.

I tucked the page into the folder. "I had a career too, Sebastian. Before you."

"Sure. And you walked away from it." He shrugged and took a sip from his water bottle. "You chose this life, Evelyn."

The folder slipped against my knee.

Eight years ago, in that freezing Boston apartment, he had cried into my lap after I tore up the Vienna letter. His shoulders had shaken so hard I thought he would break.

"I'll make it up to you," he'd said. "Every single day, I'll make it up to you."

Now he was checking his phone.

"Don't leave a mess in here," he said. "The cleaners come Thursday."

He went upstairs. I finished packing the box.

---

At noon I sat across from a woman with silver-streaked hair and reading glasses pushed up on her head.

Grace Mitchell didn't waste words.

"California is a community property state. Anything you owned before the marriage is yours. Your compositions, your royalties from before, all yours."

"And the marriage certificate? His lawyer has it."

"Then we request a certified copy from the county. It's public record, even if he's kept it quiet." She tapped her pen on the desk. "Mrs. Vale, can I say something off the clock?"

"Please."

"Eight years is a long time. But it's not a debt. You don't owe him eight more."

I laughed. It came out shaky. "My mother would have said the same thing."

"Smart woman. I'll send you a first draft by tonight."

---

My phone buzzed the second I stepped onto the sidewalk.

*Free tonight. I can do 30 min for dinner. You pick.*

I stared at it until the screen went dark.

Thirty minutes. On our anniversary. He hadn't even remembered it was our anniversary.

Still, my thumb moved. I booked a table at Lucca's, the little Italian place where he'd taken me on our first date. Back then he'd counted his change twice to pay for the wine.

At home, I pulled the white dress from the back of my closet. He'd bought it the year we married, with his first real paycheck. It still fit.

I slid an old photo into my clutch. Us, twenty-four and broke, grinning on a Boston fire escape.

One last chance. That was all I was giving it.

---

The candle on our table had burned down an inch by the time he walked in. Twenty minutes late.

"Traffic," he said, dropping into the chair. "You look nice."

"Thank you. Do you know what day it is?"

He blinked. Then he spotted the small cake the waiter had set between us. White frosting. *8* piped in gold.

"Right. Of course." He reached for my hand. "Happy anniversary, babe."

His phone rang before his fingers touched mine.

He glanced at the screen and answered right away. "Chloe? Slow down."

I could hear her through the speaker. High, breathless. Something about a lighting rig falling at rehearsal. Something about being alone.

"Stay where you are. I'm coming."

He was already standing, car keys in his fist.

"Sebastian." I kept my voice low. "Can you at least stay until we finish dinner?"

His brows pulled together. "Chloe needs me. You know she doesn't have anyone else."

"And what about me?"

He paused. For one second, I thought he might actually sit back down.

"You're stronger than she is," he said.

Then he kissed the top of my head like he was signing an autograph.

"I'll make it up to you next week. Promise."

The door swung shut behind him. The waiter hovered nearby, holding two menus and not meeting my eyes.

"Would you still like to order, ma'am?"

I picked up the knife and cut the cake myself.

"Just a fork," I said. "And the check."

---

At home, I ate the rest of the cake straight from the box, sitting on the kitchen floor in my white dress.

At ten-thirty, Chloe posted again.

The video was long. Sebastian at a piano in a dim hall. He stopped playing to tuck his jacket around her shoulders. He brushed her hair off her forehead and murmured something that made her giggle.

His phone sat face-down on the piano bench. It stayed that way the whole video.

The timestamp in the corner said she'd been recording on and off for three hours.

I set my fork down.

The flu, the winter I was twenty-six. *You're tough, Evie. You'll be fine.*

The night my father died. *You're the strongest person I know. You don't need me to fuss.*

Last week, my wrist. *My hands are insured for millions.*

Strong. He'd been calling me strong for eight years.

I'd thought it was a compliment.

---

At eleven, the front door opened.

Sebastian loosened his collar on his way into the kitchen. He didn't ask why I was on the floor. He held out his right hand.

"It's killing me tonight. Can you work on it a bit? Like you used to?"

I lifted my own wrist instead. It had swollen again, puffy and purple around the bone from cutting that stubborn cake one-handed.

"Call your physical therapist."

His hand hung in the air. "Excuse me?"

"Dr. Okafor. His number's on the fridge."

Sebastian lowered his arm slowly. His jaw worked. "Is this about dinner? Seriously?"

I said nothing.

He let out a long breath through his nose, like he was the one being patient. "Okay. Fine. Next week, I'll give you twenty minutes instead of ten. Happy?"

I rose to my feet. The cake box tipped over beside me.

"You gave her three hours," I said quietly. "And you think I should thank you for twenty minutes?"

His face went flat and cold. The same face he'd used to play a hitman.

"You've become unreasonable, Evelyn. I don't even recognize you."

"That makes two of us."

I walked past him. He didn't follow.

---

In my room, I opened my laptop.

Grace's email was waiting. *Draft Settlement Agreement — Confidential.* I saved it to my private account, the one Sebastian didn't know existed.

Then I opened the airline tab.

*New York, JFK. Departing in 3 days. Confirm purchase?*

I clicked yes.

The confirmation chimed. A second email arrived right behind it.

Gold border. Studio logo.

*You are cordially invited to the world premiere of* Unscripted: The Sebastian Vale Story.

I scrolled to the seating chart attached at the bottom.

VIP Row A, Seat 2, right beside Sebastian's name: *Chloe Bennett.*

I kept scrolling. Row after row.

There I was at last. Section F. General Admission.

Typed in small gray letters under the heading:

*Guest — No Affiliation.*

Three days left in Los Angeles.

I taped the fourth box shut and sat back on my heels. Sheet music. Old letters. My mother's teacups. A sweater from Boston with a burn hole in the sleeve.

That was it. Eight years, and everything that was mine fit into four boxes.

The rest of the house belonged to Sebastian. His posters. His trophies. Racks of tuxedos worth more than my first car.

The front door slammed. He walked in, sunglasses pushed up into his hair, and stopped.

"Switching out your summer clothes?"

"Something like that."

"Good timing." He tossed his keys onto the dresser. "While you're digging around, find that pearl necklace. The one with the gold clasp. Chloe needs something classic for the premiere."

My hands went still on the tape gun.

"You gave me that necklace on our fifth anniversary."

"Did I?" He frowned like he was trying to remember a line. "Okay. So?"

"So no."

He laughed once, short and surprised. "Evie, come on. It's one night."

"It's mine, Sebastian."

His smile slipped. He crossed the room, opened my jewelry box, and lifted the pearls out himself. They swung from his fingers like they weighed nothing.

"It's just jewelry, Evelyn. Don't make it a competition."

He walked out with them.

---

That night, Chloe came over to try on dresses.

In our bedroom.

I heard her laughter from the hallway, bright and easy, like she'd been laughing in this house for years. The door was cracked open. A sliver of gold light spilled across the carpet.

"Sebastian, look."

I didn't mean to stop walking. My feet just did.

Through the gap, I saw her standing at our mirror in a white slip dress. My pearls rested against her collarbone. She touched them with two fingertips and tilted her head.

"Be honest." Her voice went soft and teasing. "Do I look like the real lady of the house?"

I waited for him to say *no*. To say *that's my wife's*. To say anything at all that belonged to me.

Sebastian leaned against the bedpost, arms folded.

"You look beautiful."

Chloe giggled and spun once. The pearls caught the light.

I stepped back from the door without a sound and went downstairs. I rinsed a clean mug that didn't need rinsing. Then I rinsed it again.

---

The next morning, a documentary crew swarmed the living room. Cables everywhere. A director named Marcus with a gray beanie was shouting about lighting.

"We need one more angle on the piano story. Chloe, sweetheart, you're up."

They'd moved my piano out of the guest room. Pulled off the dust sheet. Set Chloe on the bench beside it.

I hovered at the edge of the kitchen, holding a dish towel.

"So tell us," Marcus said. "The song. 'The One I Love.'"

Chloe pressed a hand to her heart. "Sebastian wrote it during the hardest time of his life. After the accident. I'd sit with him on the bad nights, and he'd play it for me. That's how I knew he was going to make it."

The towel twisted in my fists.

She joined his team three years ago. *Three.*

"Cut! Gorgeous." Marcus grinned at Sebastian. "And the credit reads *music by Sebastian Vale, written for Chloe*, right? That's the hook."

Sebastian nodded. "Sure. Run it."

I waited until the crew broke for lunch. Then I followed him into the study and shut the door.

"You're letting them say you wrote it."

He was scrolling through emails. "It's a documentary, Evelyn. It needs a story."

"It's my song. I wrote it with a wrapped hand because I'd sprained it carrying your groceries up four flights of stairs."

"Nobody cares about the details."

"She wasn't there. *I* was there."

He finally looked up, and his face held nothing but impatience.

"You're being way too sensitive about this." He set the phone down. "Does it really matter who was there eight years ago?"

My throat closed. I felt the heat crawl up behind my eyes and didn't bother hiding it.

"It mattered to me."

For a second, something flickered across his face. Confusion, maybe. Like a door had opened in a house he thought he knew every room of.

Then it was gone.

"Look, I'll get you something nice after the premiere," he said. "That bracelet you liked in Paris. Okay?"

I opened the study door and walked out.

---

The night of the premiere, the flashbulbs turned Hollywood Boulevard white.

From the backseat of my rideshare, I watched the red carpet on my phone. Chloe in white silk. Sebastian in black. Her hand curled around his arm. My pearls at her throat.

"SEBASTIAN! CHLOE! Over here!"

"Look this way! Kiss for the camera!"

A group of fans waved a glowing sign. *HOLLYWOOD'S PERFECT COUPLE.*

The driver whistled. "Those two, huh? Real-life romance."

"So they say."

I went in through the side entrance. A staffer with a clipboard barely glanced at my ticket.

"Section F. All the way up, last row. Watch the steps."

From up there, Sebastian was a dark shape in the first row. I couldn't see his expression. I couldn't even see his hands.

The lights went down.

The film was polished. Expensive. Then the screen cut to the recovery years, and the room went quiet.

There was footage I recognized. I'd shot it on a cheap camcorder in our Boston kitchen. Sebastian at the table, gripping a stress ball, sweat on his lip.

But the woman beside him had been blurred. Cropped. Cut down to the back of a sweater with a burn hole in the sleeve.

Then Chloe's face filled the screen. *"I was the one who stayed with him through the darkest part."*

And the piano began.

The first four notes of "The One I Love."

I'd written those notes at two in the morning in January, my wrist throbbing in a bandage, the radiator knocking, Sebastian asleep with his head in my lap.

The tears came before I could stop them. Silent ones. I didn't wipe them away.

The credits rolled. The theater rose to its feet. The applause was so loud the floor hummed under my shoes.

A spotlight found Sebastian. He pulled Chloe into his arms on the stage.

"I want to thank one person," he said into the mic. His voice was warm. Thick. "Chloe. Thank you for never leaving."

The crowd went wild.

Then he bent and tugged her shawl up over her bare shoulder. Smoothed it flat with his palm.

My chest went quiet.

Eight years ago, on a freezing Boston street, he'd done that exact thing for me. Pulled my scarf higher. Told me I'd catch my death.

I laughed under my breath. The man beside me shot me a look.

I hadn't lost to Chloe.

I'd lost to a man who never really held on to me at all.

I stood and made my way down the aisle. As I passed the front row, Sebastian's eyes drifted my way.

They touched me for half a second.

Then they slid right back to her, like I was just another stranger heading for the restroom.

---

At LAX, my phone lit up.

*Why did you leave early? Chloe isn't feeling well. I'll take her home first. Dinner next week?*

I read it twice. I didn't answer.

I'd worn my wedding ring tonight. First time in months. I twisted it off my finger. It came free easily. My hand must have gotten thinner.

I dropped it into the deepest pocket of my carry-on and zipped it shut.

---

The plane began to taxi. My phone buzzed one last time.

Grace. *Confirmed. Papers will be served to Mr. Vale tomorrow at 10 a.m.*

A news alert slid in right below it. A clip from the afterparty. A reporter shoving a mic toward Sebastian.

"Is Chloe your muse?"

He smiled the smile that had won him two Oscars.

"She's very special to me."

I switched my phone to airplane mode. The engines roared. Los Angeles tilted and fell away beneath the wing.

Tomorrow at ten, a stranger would knock on his door.

And for the first time in eight years, Sebastian Vale would have to wait for me.