He Posted Ninety-Nine Sorries And I Posted My Goodbye Chapter 07

He Posted Ninety-Nine Sorries And I Posted My Goodbye Chapter 07

A few days later, another one: [Sophie. At least reply.]

I still didn’t.

Then they got more frequent. Asking if I’d eaten. Telling me it was snowing in Northwood. Sometimes just a photo.

[I kept all your things. You’re coming back, right?]

I looked at the photo for a second, then went back to reading.

I wasn’t wavering.

I didn’t want to go back to the fighting, the silence, the chasing, the crying alone in every thunderstorm.

In December, London got its first snow.

I’d just finished finals. Walking out of the lecture building, snow landing on my shoulders in flakes.

Ethan stood across the street under a lamp post. Thinner. Gaunter.

“Sophie.”

“I came for you.”

“Can we talk?” he said.

I paused for a few seconds, then led him to a café near campus.

Face to face. Neither spoke first.

He finally broke.

“Have you been okay these past few months?”

“Yeah. I’m good.”

He nodded, fingers tracing the rim of his cup.

“Sophie.” He looked up. “Can we… go back to how it was?”

Outside, the snow fell harder. The café played some jazz piece I didn’t know, lazy piano notes threading through the air.

I looked at him for a long time.

In his eyes, there was this careful, fragile hope. Like when he was a kid and broke my favorite mug, then scoured the whole city trying to find an exact replacement.

But he never found it.

And he never would.

“Ethan,” I said. “You know why I came to London?”

He said nothing.

“I followed you for so long I didn’t know who I was anymore. Didn’t know what I wanted.”

“These past few months—I can live alone. I can face hard things alone. I can make my own choices.”

I held his eyes, word by word.

“So go back to how it was? No. We can’t.”

He was quiet a long time.

The jazz shifted to an old song.

He kept his head down. I couldn’t see his face, only his fingers tightening on the cup.

“If I’d just—”

“There’s no if.” I cut him off. “Ethan. Neither of us should look back.”

He raised his eyes. They were red.

But this time, I didn’t cave.

…

Ethan flew back to Northwood the day the city got its worst snow of the season.

All he could replay was the café.

She’d spoken so calmly. No tears. No anger. Barely any emotion at all.

Just flat.

Flat when she said she was doing fine.

Flat when she said she’d found herself.

Flat when she said she couldn’t go back.

The worst part wasn’t that she hated him.

It was that she didn’t.

Hate at least meant she still cared.

But her eyes had nothing. No love. No hate. Not even a trace of regret.