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21
PEYTON
The email hits my inbox at 3:08 p.m. The subject line says FINAL JUDGMENT with bold letters. I open the message and read it once, my heart sprinting. Then I read it again, slower this time because my brain keeps looking for a footnote that says just kidding, you’re still legally tied to the man who lied to your face and let you build dreams on quicksand.
But there isn’t one. Only the line that matters the most: the marriage was annulled.
I stare at the screen until the letters blur. A strange little sound escapes me. I clap a hand over my mouth, but it's too late. Another laugh slips through, then another, each one louder than the last. My shoulders shake as I double over, one arm wrapped around my stomach, more laughter spilling out of me.
“Holy shit, I’m free!” I shout into the empty apartment as Tilly is downstairs with Heather who loves having her around the shop.
I’m about to text my family, followed by literally every other person I care about, when my fingers stall over the screen. Ollie. My thumb hovers over his name. He’s probably elbow-deep in car paint and customer chaos, trying to keep Dennis from flirting himself into a concussion. But none of that matters. I want him to be the first person I tell.
I tap the call button. It rings twice before he answers. “Everything okay?”
The sound of his comforting voice makes my eyes sting. “It’s over.” I press a hand to my mouth, shaking my head even though he can’t see me. “Ollie, I’m no longer married.”
There’s a beat of silence, then a sharp exhale on the other end. “Officially?”
“Officially. I just received the notification of the final judgment with the driest legal jargon I’ve ever read, and it’s still the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen,” I say through fresh tears.
“Okay,” he mutters. “Okay. That’s…that’s huge.”
Huge doesn't even begin to cover it. For months before I left for Brooklyn, I convinced myself my marriage ending meant I’d failed. That if I'd loved harder, been less emotional and more understanding, I could’ve saved our relationship. Now there’s a court document sitting in my inbox reminding me I did nothing wrong, but survived in the hands of an insecure man who used mental manipulation and other mindgames to control me.
Not anymore. It’s over. And so am I. Finished with Nathaniel James Friedman.
“How are you really doing?” Ollie asks carefully when I haven’t said a word in a while.
A strange kind of grief brushes against the relief. Not for Nathan. Never for him. Fuck him for real. But for the version of me who walked down the aisle believing she'd found her forever. She deserved so much better than what she got.
I blink rapidly, trying to keep my emotions from spilling over again. “I don't think I realized how much weight I was carrying until the ruling finally took it off my shoulders.”
Another beat of silence passes. Ollie doesn't offer empty reassurances or tell me everything happens for a reason. He doesn't try to convince me the hard part is over. He just stays on the line, the faint sounds of the garage in the background. He lets me have the moment exactly as it is. My fingers tighten around the phone as I put my thoughts together.
“It's like I can finally breathe all the way into my lungs after taking shallow breaths for so long. I kept telling myself the paperwork was just paperwork because we'd already been separated for months. But a part of me was still waiting for something to go wrong. For him to find one more way to keep hold of me when I wanted to break free.”
“He can't anymore.”
“No, he can't,” I agree.
“You shouldn't be on your own today.” Before I can respond, he says, “Give me half an hour and I'll be there.”
“Ollie, you don’t have to.” I glance at the clock and realize he has another two hours left. “You can’t just leave work.”
“Watch me.”
My grip on the phone loosens. “Okay.”
“Okay,” he repeats, softer this time. “I’ll be there,” he promises. “I can’t wait to see you.”
Twenty-seven minutes later, his hurried footsteps pound up the stairs and the door swings open. Ollie stands in the doorway, slightly out of breath, his cheeks flushed. A bouquet of wildflowers is clutched in one hand, his keys dangling from the other. My vision blurs before I can stop it. Of course he brought me flowers.
“I promised I wouldn’t cry more today,” I barely get out. “But you make it hard by being so damn sweet.”
Ollie shuts the door behind him with his foot and crosses the hall in a few quick steps. For a blissful moment, we stand there looking at each other. Then he remembers the flowers and thrusts them toward me. “These are for you. I had no idea what kind of flowers to get for such a life-changing occasion, so I told the florist to give me the biggest bouquet with the brightest blooms they had. Figured today deserved as much color as possible.”
“They’re perfect, Ollie. I love them.”
