Daniel was waiting by the side exit again. It had become his routine, like some pathetic ritual he thought might rewind time if he performed it often enough. He stood there, arms crossed, leaning against the brick wall like a ghost who hadn’t yet realized he was dead. The casualness he tried to wear smeared across his face.

“I thought maybe we could talk,” he said, pushing off the wall and falling into step beside me.

I didn’t slow down. Didn’t even glance at him. “We’ve said everything,” I said, keeping my voice cool, my gaze locked straight ahead.

He followed anyway, stubborn in the way he always was when he wanted something. “Not everything. I know things ended badly, but I’m still—”

He hesitated, the words sticking like they might choke him. “Elena, I want to be part of this. Of your life. The baby—”

That stopped me cold.

I turned so fast he actually stumbled a step back, like he hadn’t expected resistance, like he thought the weight of his words alone could hold me in place. I faced him fully now, fury boiling up in a slow, tight coil inside my chest.

“You want to be part of something?” I asked, my voice steady but slicing straight through him. “Where was that energy when I was crying in the bathroom every month after another failed test? When your sister laughed at me and your mother called me a burden?”

Daniel’s face hardened, a flush creeping up his neck. “That’s not fair—”

“No.” I cut him off before he could build steam. “What’s not fair is what you did to me. You let them humiliate me at every breakfast, every holiday, every goddamn moment they could find to make me feel less. And you didn’t just stand there. You agreed. Every time you said nothing, you agreed.”

He opened his mouth again, probably to deny it, probably to spin some version of the past where he was less monstrous, but I didn’t give him the chance.

“I begged you for kindness,” I said, my voice rising despite myself.

“I asked you, so many times, to see me. To believe in me when I couldn’t even believe in myself. And you know what you did instead? You blamed me for your disappointment. You punished me for something neither of us could fix. You lied to me. You cheated. You replaced me before you even bothered to leave.”

Daniel’s jaw flexed, the muscle ticking under his skin as he tried to hold his composure. “I was under pressure—” he started, as if that could possibly excuse the years of slow, deliberate erasure he had inflicted on me.

“We all were,” I snapped, taking a step closer. “But I didn’t lie. I didn’t take my pain out on you. I didn’t humiliate you in a room full of strangers just because my pride got bruised.”

He dropped his gaze for half a second, a flash of guilt, shame, maybe even regret crossing his features before he buried it under the usual Daniel mask.

“I made a mistake,” he said, softer now, trying for contrition.

I almost laughed at the sheer audacity of it. A mistake? Mistakes were coffee stains on contracts. Mistakes were missed flights. Mistakes were not a systematic dismantling of a marriage built on trust and years of sacrifice.

“You made a series of choices,” I corrected, my voice steady now, deadly calm. “And now, I’m making mine.”

I reached into my bag and pulled out the manila envelope I’d been carrying for two days, waiting for the right moment. I held it out to him, arm fully extended like a barrier between us.

He didn’t move at first. He just stared at it like it might explode in his face.

“What is that?” he asked, suspicion coloring his tone.

“Final divorce papers,” I said simply. “Signed. Filed. All you have to do is show up and finish it.”

Daniel stared at the envelope for another long, heavy moment, then — reluctantly, almost shaking — he reached out and took it. His fingers brushed mine and I pulled away like I’d been burned.

“You don’t have to do this,” he said. The words were almost a plea now. “I can help. I want to help.”

I shook my head, sadness and fury battling inside me.

“No, Daniel. You don’t want to help. You want to be seen helping. You want redemption. You want the photo op, the applause, the forgiveness without the work.”

I straightened my shoulders, feeling a strength inside me that no longer had anything to do with him. “But this isn’t your story anymore.”

His hand tightened around the envelope like it physically hurt him to hold it. He looked at me with something like desperation, or maybe just the fear of losing control.

“I loved you,” he said, voice hoarse.

I almost pitied him. Almost. But not quite.

“No,” I said, clear and unflinching. “You loved the idea of me. You loved the obedient version. The quiet version. The one who gave and gave until there was nothing left. But I’m not her anymore.”

Daniel didn’t move, didn’t speak. He just stood there, clutching the divorce papers like a drowning man grabbing driftwood.

I turned without waiting for another word.

I walked away, my steps sure and deliberate.

“Goodbye, Daniel,” I said over my shoulder.

And for the first time….I truly, finally meant it.