“I might.”
And then she vanished.
No goodbye.
No fight.
No explanation.
One morning Ethan called.
Disconnected.
He went to her apartment.
Empty.
He went to the house where she lived with her parents.
Security refused to let him through the gate.
He sent letters.
Returned.
Emails.
No reply.
For almost a year, Ethan expected her to appear.
Then he stopped expecting.
Then he started hating himself for still hoping.
Now she stood six feet away from him beside a broken luxury sedan.
“Ethan?”
Her voice had changed slightly.
More controlled.
More polished.
Still Sophia.
He swallowed.
“Long time.”
The words sounded pathetic considering the decade between them.
Sophia looked as stunned as he felt.
“You…”
Her gaze moved over him.
Wet hair.
Beard.
Work shirt.
Grease-darkened jeans.
Heavy boots.
Then toward his truck.
Toward the child watching curiously from inside.
Something flickered across Sophia’s face.
“You have a daughter.”
Ethan’s defenses rose instantly.
“Yeah.”
“How old?”
“Eight.”
Sophia looked back toward the girl.
“She’s beautiful.”
“Thanks.”
Lily waved through the glass.
Sophia automatically lifted one hand.
A tiny wave back.
For half a second, Ethan saw the Sophia he remembered.
Then the years returned.
He looked toward the engine.
“What happened?”
The change in subject was obvious.
Sophia allowed it.
“Temperature warning came on.”
“Then?”
“Power dropped.”
“You shut it off?”
“Yes.”
“Good.”
“I called roadside assistance.”
“How long?”
“They said maybe two hours.”
Ethan nodded.
He opened the hood wider.
“Let me look.”
Sophia stared.
“You don’t have to.”
“I already stopped.”
“You could still leave.”
He looked at her.
A decade of questions pressed against his chest.
Instead of asking any of them, he said:
“Pop the engine cover release.”
She did.
Ethan bent over the engine.
He worked silently.
Sophia stood nearby.
Rain drummed across metal.
Cars passed.
The old intimacy between them had been replaced by awkward distance so complete it almost felt physical.
Ethan checked the cooling system.
The problem was surprisingly simple.
A hose clamp had loosened.
Coolant leaked around the connection.
Not enough damage yet to destroy anything.
“Lucky,” he said.
Sophia stepped closer.
“What?”
“Hose worked loose.”
“Can you fix it?”
“Yes.”
She watched his hands.
Ethan remembered how Sophia used to do that.
Whenever he worked on something, she became fascinated.
Even simple repairs.
Once she sat beside him for three hours while he rebuilt a motorcycle carburetor on his apartment floor.
She understood none of it.
Did not care.
She liked watching him know what he was doing.