I stayed for a long time out of loyalty to the girl I used to be, the one who needed him like oxygen. She believed surviving the scandal meant we were unbreakable. But scandals end. Headlines fade. Then it’s just two people at a kitchen table, nothing left to say, realizing the only thing they still share is a history too heavy to carry forward.

Leaving isn’t about erasing what we were; it’s about admitting what we can never become. He gave me shelter when the world spat us out, but now that shelter is a ceiling I can’t grow beyond. So I will grieve the myth we built, honor the courage it took to live it, and then choose a different kind of courage: the kind where I walk away, not because I stopped caring, but because I finally started choosing myself.