Adrian
Distance is a decision I make before dawn, when the house is quiet enough to hear my own breathing.
I sit at the kitchen table with a cup of coffee gone cold, papers spread in front of me like evidence. Passports. Temporary leases. School records. A life folded down to what fits in a suitcase. Protection always looks like logistics at first. Routes. Timelines. Contingencies. If I keep my hands busy, I don’t have to think about the other thing—the part of me that wants to stay close enough to be burned again.
Leonel pads into the room in socked feet, hair wild, eyes still half asleep. He climbs into the chair across from me without asking.
“Are we traveling?” he asks, peering at the documents.
“Yes,” I say. “For a little while.”
He nods, accepting it with the unsettling calm of a child who has learned that adults move worlds without warning. “Mama coming?”
My chest tightens. “Not this time.”
Aurelia appears in the doorway, already awake, already assessing. She takes in the table, the bags by the door, the tension I haven’t named.
“Why?” she asks.
“Because sometimes,” I say carefully, “space keeps people safe.”
She considers that. “From what?”
I don’t answer. I don’t have to. She reads it anyway.
When Serafina arrives, the room shifts immediately. Not louder. Sharper. She wears a coat she doesn’t need, hair pulled back with intention, eyes bright with understanding she pretends not to have yet.
“You’re serious,” she says.
“I am.”
She sets her bag down slowly. “How long?”
“Long enough,” I reply. “Not forever.”
Her jaw tightens. “You didn’t tell me you’d decided.”
“I told you I was considering it.”
“You told me you were tired.”
“I told you I was afraid,” I correct quietly.
She exhales, the sound controlled. “You’re protecting yourself.”
“And them,” I say, nodding toward the children. “And you.”
She steps closer, lowering her voice. “From me?”
“From what circles us when we stand too close,” I answer. “From whispers that turn into knives.”
Her eyes flash. “You think I can’t handle whispers?”
“I think you handle them so well you forget they cut,” I say.
Silence stretches. The children watch, uncharacteristically still.
“This isn’t abandonment,” Serafina insists, firm and immediate. “Say it.”
I meet her gaze. “It isn’t abandonment.”
She steps closer still, until the air between us hums with the kind of restraint that hurts more than touch. “Say it like you believe me.”
I swallow. “It isn’t abandonment.”
She searches my face, looking for the place where doubt lives. Finding it.
“You believe me,” she says softly. “And you’re still leaving.”
“Yes.”
Her hand lifts, then stops short of my chest, like muscle memory interrupted by will. “I won’t let this become a wound they carry,” she says, meaning the children.
“Neither will I,” I answer. “That’s why I’m going.”
Leonel stands, suddenly restless. “I don’t want to go,” he says.
I crouch in front of him, steadying my voice. “I know.”
“Is it my fault?”
“No,” Serafina and I say at the same time.
She kneels too, taking his face in her hands. “Never.”
Aurelia watches us, arms crossed. “Are you scared?” she asks me.
“Yes,” I tell her honestly.
She nods once. “Okay.”
It shouldn’t break me. It does.
Later, when the children are distracted with packing, Serafina and I stand alone in the hallway. The house feels like it’s holding its breath.
“You think distance will save you,” she says.
“I think closeness will destroy me,” I reply.
She flinches—not because I’m wrong, but because I’m precise.
“You’re running,” she says.
“I’m choosing,” I answer. “There’s a difference.”
Her voice softens. “From what?”
“From wanting you in ways I can’t afford,” I admit. “From pretending that restraint is something I can practice indefinitely without cost.”
Her eyes darken. “You don’t owe me suffering.”
“I don’t,” I agree. “I owe the children steadiness.”
“And yourself?”
I hesitate. “I owe myself survival.”
She looks away, then back. “I won’t disappear,” she says. “I won’t turn this into distance you can’t cross.”
“I know,” I say. “That’s why this hurts.”
At the airport, the air is thick with endings disguised as departures. The children cling, then release. Serafina holds herself like a woman refusing to beg, even when everything in her posture screams stay.
At the gate, she takes my hand at last—brief, controlled, devastating.
“This isn’t abandonment,” she says again, softer now.
“I believe you,” I tell her.
“And?”
“And believing you doesn’t make it painless.”
Her thumb presses once into my palm, grounding. “Come back,” she says. Not a command. A truth.
“I will,” I answer. Not a promise. A direction.
On the plane, as the city shrinks beneath clouds, the ache finally has room to spread. Distance doesn’t dull desire; it sharpens it into memory. Every touch we didn’t take becomes a phantom. Every word we swallowed gains weight.
Aurelia sleeps with her head on my shoulder. Leonel stares out the window, quiet and brave. I press my forehead to the glass and let myself feel it—the loss, the relief, the terrible clarity.
I chose distance to protect myself and the children.
I believe Serafina when she says this isn’t abandonment.
And believing her doesn’t save me from the hurt. It only makes it honest.
Some choices don’t heal you.
They keep you alive long enough to learn how to carry the scar.