I accepted when he offered me a place to stay for the night. At the hotel, the tension between us was palpable. Then Dean told me something that stopped me cold: he hadn’t left Jolene for someone else—he’d fallen for me. The confession hung heavy in the air. I was angry, but part of me couldn’t deny the flickers of truth in his words. The next morning,
the police found my things. I went home, but not without the weight of Dean’s words haunting me. Jolene was still in my guest room, lost in her grief. Yet, when I checked my phone, I found myself typing: “How about coffee sometime?” It was selfish, maybe, but in that moment, honesty was all I had left.