POV: Jasmine
The airport goodbye was nothing like I had imagined.
No tearful embraces. No promises to stay in touch. No desperate last-minute confessions that might change everything. Just two men with boarding passes and carefully neutral expressions, putting as much distance as possible between themselves and the life they'd shared.
The terminal bustled around us—families reuniting, couples kissing goodbye, businessmen rushing toward gates with coffee cups clutched like lifelines. Normal people living normal lives, completely oblivious to the quiet devastation unfolding near the international departures board.
Finn stood with his carry-on slung over one shoulder, looking everywhere except directly at me. The playful light that usually danced in his eyes had dimmed to something muted and guarded. He'd dressed casually—jeans, a worn leather jacket—like he was actively trying to look like someone other than the man I'd fallen in love with.
"So this is it," I said, hating how small my voice sounded against the airport's relentless noise.
"This is it." Finn finally met my eyes, and I watched him construct a smile that didn't reach anywhere near genuine. "End of an era. Beginning of another. All that poetic bullshit."
"Finn—"
He stepped forward and hugged me briefly—a friend's hug, not a lover's. The kind of embrace you'd give a colleague at a going-away party. Polite. Contained. Nothing like the way he used to hold me, like I was something precious he couldn't believe he got to keep.
"Take care of yourself," he said against my hair. "And the babies. Make sure they know their Uncle Finn was the fun one, even if he had to love them from a different continent."
"I will." My voice cracked on the promise. "I'll tell them stories. Show them pictures. They'll know you, Finn. They'll know all of you."
"And Liam." Something flickered in his eyes—not quite anger, not quite acceptance. Something in between that looked a lot like grief. "Take care of him too. He's going to need you when reality sets in. When the fairy tale stops being enough and he remembers what we had before it all went sideways."
"What does that mean?"
But Finn just smiled—sad and knowing, carrying secrets he'd decided weren't mine to share anymore—and turned toward security. His shoulders were straight, his stride confident, every inch the charming playboy who'd learned to perform composure even when he was falling apart inside.
I wanted to run after him. Wanted to grab his arm and beg him to stay, to give us another chance, to believe that we could figure this out together. But my feet stayed rooted to the industrial carpet, held in place by the knowledge that I'd already made my choice. That begging him to stay would be cruel when I couldn't offer him what he deserved.
Asher stepped into my line of vision, and the contrast hit me like a physical blow. Where Finn had given me a hug—however inadequate—Asher didn't touch me at all. Just stood there with his carry-on at his feet, nodding once like we were business associates concluding a transaction. Like the past year had been nothing more than a professional arrangement that had run its course.
"London will be good for you," I said, grasping for something true to offer in the face of his impenetrable composure. "New city, new challenges. You've always been at your best when you're building something from the ground up."
"Yes. It will." His steel-gray eyes held mine for a moment, and I caught a glimpse of something beneath the ice—regret, maybe, or the ghost of feelings he'd never quite let himself acknowledge. "I meant what I said, you know. About wanting you to be happy. That wasn't a lie."
"I know." And I did. Asher's honesty had always been brutal, but it had also always been real. "I want the same for you. I want you to find someone who—"
"Don't." The word came out sharper than he probably intended. He softened slightly, exhaling through his nose. "Don't wish things for me that we both know aren't going to happen. I'm not built for that kind of happiness. Never was."
"Everyone's built for happiness, Asher. You just have to let yourself—"
"I just can't be part of it." He picked up his carry-on, cutting off my attempt at comfort with the efficiency he brought to everything. "Some people aren't built for happy endings. I'm one of them. I've made my peace with that, and I'd appreciate it if you'd respect my self-awareness instead of trying to sunshine me into believing otherwise."
The words stung, but I recognized them for what they were—armor. Protection against the vulnerability of goodbye.
"Take care of yourself," I said quietly. "And take care of Finn. He's going to need you more than he'll ever admit."
Something shifted in Asher's expression—a crack in the ice that closed almost immediately. "That's the plan."
He walked away without looking back. Finn was waiting near the security line, and I watched them converge—two brothers bound by rejection, leaving me with the one who'd chosen to stay. They didn't touch, didn't embrace, but something passed between them.
An understanding. A shared grief that would carry them through security checkpoints and international flights and all the distance they were putting between themselves and the life we'd tried to build.
Then they were gone, swallowed by the crowd filtering through metal detectors, and I was left standing in an airport terminal feeling like someone had carved out essential pieces of me and packed them in their luggage.
Liam's arm came around my shoulders, warm and steady. His golden retriever energy was muted today, tempered by the weight of what we'd just witnessed. "You okay?"
"No." I watched the security line until I couldn't see them anymore, until they'd become indistinguishable from the hundreds of other travelers heading toward gates and planes and futures that didn't include me. "But I will be. Eventually. Probably."
"That's the spirit." His attempt at levity fell flat, and we both knew it.
We walked back through the airport hand in hand, weaving through crowds that parted around us without acknowledgment. The morning light streamed through the massive windows, bright and unforgiving, illuminating dust motes and casting long shadows across the polished floors.
"It feels like losing them forever," I admitted as we approached the exit. "Like watching something die that I can't resurrect no matter how hard I try."
"It's not forever." But Liam's voice lacked its usual conviction, the golden retriever optimism strained thin by reality. "Families change. They find new shapes. Asher will run the London branch, Finn will find his footing somewhere, and eventually the distance won't feel so much like loss. It'll just feel like... different."
I wanted to believe him. Wanted to trust that his relentless hope wasn't just denial wrapped in pretty packaging.
But I'd seen Finn's face when he walked away. Seen Asher's careful blankness that spoke louder than any words could have.
Some distances couldn't be measured in miles.
My phone buzzed in my pocket as we stepped into the parking garage, the sudden vibration making me jump. I pulled it out, expecting news about the babies from the nanny, or maybe a work emergency that would give me something to focus on besides the ache in my chest.
Instead, Leo's name glowed on the screen.
I'm back in the city. Can we talk? I think it's time to actually be family again.