Seven days before the wedding.
Darren woke up at five in the morning. He hadn't slept all night.
He sat on the edge of the bed. Nora slept peacefully beside him. Her hair was spread across the pillow. Her breathing was steady. Calm. Trusting.
Darren reached out his hand. He almost touched her cheek. Then he pulled it back.
He couldn't feel anything anymore.
There was no love. No hatred. No regret. Only a vast emptiness, slowly gnawing away at every part of him. Every time he breathed, he could feel the hole growing larger.
He got up. He showered. He put on a freshly ironed white shirt. He put on a tie. He looked at his own face in the mirror.
The person he saw there was a stranger.
At seven in the morning, he arrived at Arden's house. The door was still locked. He waited on the porch. An hour later, Arden opened the door, his eyes swollen and his hair a mess.
"What are you doing here this early?"
"I want to talk."
Arden snorted. He let Darren inside. They sat at the dining table. There was no coffee. No bread. Only a heavy silence.
"You want to call off the wedding?" Arden finally asked.
Darren shook his head.
Arden let out a bitter laugh. "Then what? You want my permission to hurt my sister a second time? You want to tell me you love her but are still going to marry another woman? You want me to listen to that?"
"I want you to look after her."
Arden froze.
"Arka is a good man," Darren said. His voice didn't tremble at all. "He won't hurt her. He won't make her wait. He won't pretend to love someone else for seven years just because he's a coward. But he's Arka. Someday, he'll make her cry. And when that happens, you'll be there."
"And you?"
"I won't be there."
Darren placed an envelope on the table.
"Inside is the deed to a house on the outskirts of the city. It's for her. For when she gets tired of the city and wants to move away. For when she needs somewhere to hide. Don't tell her it's from me. Tell her it was our grandfather's inheritance. Tell her anything. Just never tell her it came from me."
Arden stared at the envelope. Then he looked at his friend.
"You're really going to leave?"
"Yes."
"And you'll never tell her anything?"
Darren nodded.
"As long as she's happy, she doesn't need to know. As long as she doesn't know, she won't feel guilty. She can love someone else. She can live a normal life. She won't be trapped like me."
"And you?"
Darren smiled. Barely. Completely broken.
"I'll be fine."
He stood up. He walked toward the door. Before he left, he paused for a moment.
"Don't let her wait for someone who isn't coming. Don't let her become like me."
Then he left.
Arden remained seated there. For an hour, he did nothing but stare at the envelope on the table. Until he heard footsteps on the stairs. Aurelia came downstairs with swollen eyes. She had just woken up.
"Who came by earlier?" she asked.
"No one," Arden replied. "No one at all."
Aurelia stared at the closed door. She knew. She could smell Darren's cologne still lingering in the air. She knew he had just been there. She knew he had stood right in front of that door. She knew he had left without seeing her.
She didn't ask anything else.
She simply turned around and walked back upstairs.
That afternoon, Arka came over. He brought pizza. He sat on the floor of Aurelia's bedroom. He didn't say anything about Darren. He didn't say anything about the wedding. He just told her a ridiculous story about his dog eating his new shoes. He laughed. He made Aurelia laugh too, even though tears still fell in the middle of her laughter.
When evening began to fall, Aurelia spoke softly.
"Is he going to be okay?"
Arka stopped chewing his pizza. He stared at her for a long moment.
"No," he answered honestly. "He'll never be okay."
Aurelia lowered her head.
"But it's not your fault," Arka continued. "This was his choice. He chose this. You don't have to save him. You don't have to wait for him. You don't have to feel guilty for wanting to be happy."
Aurelia wiped away her tears.
"Why didn't he say anything?"
"Because he loves you too much to dare make you his."
That night, Darren sat alone in his car. He had parked across the street from Arden's house. The bespectacled man watched Aurelia's bedroom light come on, watched Arka standing near the window. He watched them talk and watched Aurelia smile.
Darren sat there in silence for three hours. He didn't cry or get angry. He simply watched from a distance.
And for the first time in his life, he understood.
The greatest love isn't when you're brave enough to risk everything for someone.
The greatest love is when you're brave enough to let someone go, even when it means destroying yourself.
He started the car, pressed down on the gas, and drove away without looking back.
In seven days, he would get married.
In seven days, everything would be over.
And no one would ever know that on that night, inside a car slowly cutting through the deserted streets, a man had left every piece of his heart behind in a house he would never visit again.
No one would know.
No one needed to know.