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    Sienna’s POV


    I drew in a long breath and slowly sat back down on the chair. My hands clutched the coffee cup that had long gone cold. For some reason, the apartment felt emptier than usual. And I hated admitting that.


    I sat still at the dining table, still cluttered with the remnants of the breakfast Liam had brought earlier. The half-eaten sandwich


    had lost its warmth. The coffee in my cup was cold, its taste t now. Yet I kept holding on to it, as if it were the only tangible thing


    I could cling to today.


    Liam’s words still echoed in my head.


    “I’lle again, even if you keep driving me away.”


    Why didn’t he ever grow tired? Why did he keeping, keep waiting, keep smiling, even though I had made it clear over and over that I didn’t want him here? Or maybe I was only pretending not to?


    I turned my face toward the window. The sea stretched out calm in the distance, the sky a cloudless blue hanging wide above, and


    the breeze carried its familiar briny scent. This view should have soothed me. But today, it only made my chest feel tighter.


    I swallowed the air slowly, though it suddenly felt heavy, as if the entire room had shrunk and was caging me in. The wooden chair


    beneath me was cold, making me realize how stiffly I was sitting here. The cup in my hands grew colder still, but I held onto it


    tightly, like someone terrified of losing something simple, even if it no longer gave anything back.


    Liam was gone. His voice had disappeared. Yet his presence lingered in the air, like a faint scent that refused to fade. I hated that. I


    hated how my apartment, which usually felt enough, now turned into a space haunted by echoes of memory. As if every corner still


    carried his footsteps.


    The dining table in front of me was proof that my life was far from tidy. Crumbs scattered across its surface, a piece of sandwich


    sat abandoned, its filling nearly slipping out, and a crumpled napkin clung to an empty te. All of it reminded me that someone


    had been here, making a small mess. A mess that, strangely, had left behind a warmth I didn’t want to acknowledge.


    I inhaled deeply, trying to banish the images, but my mind refused. Instead, they sharpened. His smile. His gaze. The cadence of


    his voice when he spoke softly, as if he knew exactly how to slip past the walls I’d built. And damn it, I could feel those walls


    cracking bit by bit.


    I rose slowly from the chair, ced the cup into the sink without any real intention of washing it. The drip of water from the faucet sounded loud in this silence. Each tiny drop was like a reminder, echoing again and again, that I was alone. The quiet spread, not just across the room but deep inside my chest.


    I walked toward therge window. The sheer curtains swayed gently with the breeze. From here, the sea shimmered under sunlight, glittering but distant. So very distant. I pressed my palm against the ss, its chill seeping into my skin. I wished that calmness could seep into me as well, but instead, the gap between what I saw and what I felt grew even clearer.


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    There was an emptiness I couldn’t fill. Not with coffee, not with books, not with work. Not even with the ocean view. An emptiness once filled by someone who had no business knocking on my door again.


    I closed my eyes for a moment, feeling the throb at my temples. Trying to convince myself that I was strong, that I could live without anyone. I’d made it this far, hadn’t I? But why did his leaving just now make this ce feel lonelier than ever before?


    I returned to the table, tidying the leftovers in automatic motions. Tossing the sandwich into the trash, gathering napkins, stacking tes neatly to one side. Small gestures, as if I could still control something. If I couldn’t control my heart, at least I


    could control the neatness of the table.


    But when I sat down again, the emptiness remained. Sharper now. I lowered my gaze to the bare table I had just cleared and


    realized the peace I was chasing never really came.


    All that remained was a silent room with the faint traces of someone who had already gone, leaving my heart cracked open, just a


    little but enough to make me afraid of myself.


    Liam.


    For years, I had taught myself to live without him. I rebuilt myself from the shards of a heart he had broken. I learned to breathe without depending on the oxygen of his presence. I learned to arrange a life, to ept that he had chosen someone else. That he


    built a home and a new family-without me in it.


    And now he hade back with all the memories, the regrets, and perhaps the hope.


    I looked down at the small invitation he had left on the table. A kindergarten graduation for Noah. His name written there,


    like a time bomb. Forcing me to face a truth I had long denied—that I was his mother.


    Biologically, yes. But in role? I felt like a stranger in Noah’s life. The child I gave birth to, the one I longed for in silence, but never


    dared to reach for because the guilt was too deep.


    Liam had said Noah was waiting for me.


    That sentence pierced me more than anything. To picture Noah standing among other children, ncing toward the doorway,


    hoping to see his mother’s face-my face. I didn’t know if I was strong enough to fulfill that hope.


    But hadn’t I spent all these years trying to be strong? Hadn’t I moved here, far from the city, to begin again? Wasn’t it time to face


    things, instead of hiding forever?


    I rose from the chair and walked slowly into the kitchen. Turned on the faucet and rinsed the coffee cup, washed the te from breakfast. My hands were busy, but my thoughts stayed tangled around Liam.


    He was different. I didn’t know since when, but the look in his eyes, the way he spoke, even the way heughed none of it was the same as before. Back then he had been cold, distant, never really understanding what I needed. But now he carried with him a kind of quietness, a matured silence, and a care that felt unforced. As though he had weathered his own storms and returned with wounds as deep as mine.


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    But was that change enough for me to open my heart again?


    I walked over to the sofa and sank into it, clutching a small pillow against my chest. I was exhausted. The emotions of the day had piled up too high, shredding the fragile calm I had tried to hold onto. His sudden appearance had unsettled everything.


    And yet, beneath the irritation, there was a small, stubborn part of me I refused to acknowledge-one that felt strangely d. d


    that he came. d that he remembered me. d that he still thought of me as a part of Noah’s life.


    “Don’t make a habit of this, Liam,” I whispered to myself, repeating the words I’d said aloud earlier.


    But who was I really warning? Him? Or myself?


    GET IT N…


    11:24 AM Tue 2 Sep