My name is Tessa Monroe. I was thirty-four years old when I sat down for the last dinner I would ever share with my husband.
We met at The Ironwood Grill, a dimly lit, velvet-draped establishment in downtown Chicago. The air there always smelled of truffle oil and expensive cologne. It was the kind of place where people whispered—not out of politeness, but because the secrets traded over those tables were worth more than the food.
I arrived fifteen minutes early. I asked for table forty-two. The hostess, a young woman with sympathetic eyes, led me to a corner booth. She probably smelled the divorce on me.
This was the same table where Derek had proposed eight years ago. I remembered how his hands had shaken. He nearly dropped the velvet ring box into his French onion soup. Back then, he looked at me with such reverence that I felt like the only source of light in the room.
Now, eight years later, the same jazz track was playing on a loop. But everything else had rotted from the inside out. I ordered a glass of Pinot Noir and stared at the empty leather seat across from me. The leather was cracked. I wondered if it had been that way back then, or if I just hadn’t noticed.
Derek Cole arrived twenty minutes late. He burst into the restaurant with the feverish energy of a man who believes his time is the world’s most valuable currency. He wore a charcoal-gray suit I had picked out for him last Christmas. The subtle pinstripes made his shoulders look broader than they actually were.
His shirt was crisp and white. He left the collar unbuttoned just enough to hint at a casual sort of power. He looked handsome. He looked successful. And he looked like a total stranger.
He didn’t apologize. Derek slid into the booth, his eyes glued to his glowing phone screen. A small, involuntary smile played on his lips while his thumbs flew across the glass. I knew that smile. It used to belong to me. Now, it belonged to Lana Brooks—the twenty-four-year-old assistant who had decided my husband was the missing rung on her career ladder.
“Traffic at the interchange was a nightmare,” Derek said. He finally laid the phone on the table, face up. He didn’t look at me. With a sharp flick of his wrist, he summoned the waiter. “I’ll have the ribeye, medium-rare. And bring another glass of whatever she’s having.”
“I’m drinking to the end, Derek,” I said quietly.
He finally looked at me. He blinked, appearing surprised that I was actually there and not just a calendar notification. His eyes were clear, unburdened by guilt. That was the essence of Derek lately. He had rewritten our history so thoroughly that he truly believed he was the victim of a passionless marriage, rather than the arsonist who had burned it to the ground.
“Let’s not be dramatic, Tessa,” he sighed, unfolding his napkin. “We agreed to keep this civilized. The lawyers have the papers ready. This is just a formality. A closing ceremony.”
“A closing ceremony,” I repeated. The words tasted like ash.
The waiter brought our steaks. The meat was perfectly seared, juices bleeding onto the white porcelain. Derek cut into his steak with surgical precision. I watched his hands. They were strong, well-manicured hands. I remembered those hands holding me after my mother died. I remembered them covered in eggshell-white paint when we decorated our first apartment, laughing until our sides ached.
Now, he held his knife like a weapon he was eager to clean. His phone buzzed—a message from Lana. The screen lit up with a heart emoji. He glanced at it, and a momentary softness returned to his face before he masked it with a cough.
“So,” he said, chewing thoughtfully. “What’s the plan? You’re keeping the condo for a few more months. I imagine the market is decent if you want to sell.”
“I’m leaving Chicago, Derek. I’m moving to Harbor Ridge.”
Derek froze. His fork hovered halfway to his mouth. He frowned, trying to place the name. “Harbor Ridge? That tiny town on the coast where your grandmother lived? The one with bad cell service and the smell of dead fish?”
“It smells like salt and pines,” I corrected him, my voice flat. “And yes, Grandma Nora left me her cottage. I’m moving there after the court date. I’m starting over.”
He actually laughed. It was a short, sharp sound, devoid of humor. “You’re going to live in a drafty old shack in the middle of nowhere, Tessa? Be serious. You’re a city girl. You need your expensive lattes and designer showrooms. You’ll last two months. Max.”
“I think you’ll find I’m more resilient than you realize,” I said.
He shrugged, dismissing my entire future with a flick of his shoulders. “Well, if that’s what you want, I suppose it’s for the best. The quiet life suits you. You always did get overwhelmed easily.”
The insult was tossed out casually, wrapped in fake concern. I thought about the last three years. I thought of the nights I stayed up until 3:00 AM finishing freelance design projects to pay the extra mortgage points because Derek wanted to lease a luxury car we couldn’t afford.
I thought of the times he came home smelling of perfume that wasn’t mine, claiming he’d been entertaining clients until midnight. I realized now that I had subsidized his affair. I had worked myself to the bone to build a life comfortable enough for him to feel confident leaving it.
“I’m happy for you, really,” Derek continued, wiping his mouth. “Speaking of new beginnings, Lana and I have set a date. We’re booking Cedarline Manor for a ceremony next spring.”
The air left my lungs. Cedarline Manor was the most exclusive and obscenely expensive venue in the state. It was the place I had jokingly pointed out to him years ago, only for him to tell me we needed to be “realistic” about our budget.
“Cedarline,” I said, keeping my face a mask. “That’s ambitious.”
“It’s a statement,” Derek said, puffing his chest slightly. “Lana deserves the best. And frankly, so do I. It’s time I stopped playing small. This wedding is going to be the launchpad for the next phase of my career. It’s a power move. We’re inviting everyone. Partners. Investors. Everything has to be perfect.”
He was talking about his wedding to his mistress as if it were a corporate merger. He looked at me, his wife of eight years, and discussed floral arrangements for the woman who had dismantled our home. In that moment, something inside me snapped.
But it wasn’t a loud break. It wasn’t a scream or a plate thrown against the wall. It was the quiet, final click of a lock sliding into place. I looked at him—really looked at him—and realized he was a small man. He was a man who defined his worth by the reflection in other people’s eyes. He was empty. He was chasing a mirage of status, believing a younger wife and a more expensive venue would make him a king.
He had no idea that the foundation he stood on was made of sand. I thought of the house in Harbor Ridge. I thought of the wind off the Pacific. Solitude didn’t feel like a punishment anymore. It felt like a detox.
“I hope it’s everything you want, Derek,” I said. For the first time in a year, I wasn’t lying. I hoped he got exactly the life he was buying.
He checked his watch, then glanced at his phone again. “Look, I’ve got to run. Lana’s waiting for me to look at linen samples. You know how it is.”
“I do,” I said.
He stood up, buttoning his jacket, and tossed a credit card onto the table. “Dinner’s on me. Consider it a parting gift. Good luck with that town, whatever it’s called. Send me a postcard if you don’t freeze to death.”
He turned and walked away. He didn’t look back. He maneuvered through the restaurant, nodding to a few people he wanted to impress, and stepped out into the Chicago night.
I sat there alone. The noise of the restaurant rushed back in, filling the silence he’d left behind. The clink of forks. The laughter of a couple in the corner. The hiss of the espresso machine. I looked at the untouched steak. I looked at the glass of wine.
For months, I had been terrified of this moment. I’d feared being the woman sitting alone in a restaurant—the discarded first wife. I thought I would feel humiliated. But as I took a deep breath, inhaling the scent of truffles and old leather, I realized my hands weren’t shaking.
