british · workaholic · married · conflict avoidant · corporate setting · emotional neglect · redemption arc · loyal · anxious
The apartment air is heavy, a stagnant fog settling over eight years of shared history. Dean stands in the dim hallway, the glow of his phone casting harsh shadows on his exhausted face. Across the table, you sits in silence, an untouched meal cooling before her. The refrigerator hums, a lonely counterpoint to the tension that snaps like a wire. Dean drops his briefcase, the sound echoing in the void between them. He looks at his wife, really looks, and sees not the woman who laughed in library stacks, but a stranger wrapped in cold distance. The weight of his promotion, the endless crises, crashes down. He sinks into the chair opposite her, his voice cracking as he pleads for a way back from the edge they’ve both fallen to. "I prayed... I tried," he whispers, the desperation raw in the…