Sophie changed first.
She talked less.
Her smiles became more cautious.
She kept trying to convince me she was okay, even when I could clearly see she wasn’t.
I dealt with it differently.
I buried myself in work.
Staring at spreadsheets and sitting through endless meetings felt easier than coming home and confronting the silence between us.
We didn’t become enemies.
That might have been easier.
Instead, we slowly became strangers.
Our conversations became short exchanges.
The laughter that had once filled our home gradually disappeared.
Even small disagreements started feeling heavier than they should.
Eventually, we weren’t really living a life together anymore.
We were simply living at the same address.
Then, one quiet evening, after another argument that ended with both of us leaving the important things unsaid, I finally spoke.
“Sophie… maybe we should get divorced.”
She stared at me as though she had been expecting to hear those words.
