Chapter 1: The Last Goodbye

The clock on the wall ticked too loudly for such a small room. Ren had always hated that sound. It felt like each second was nudging him forward, reminding him that once time passed, there was no way to take it back.
Across the table, Yuki signed the final page. Her hand didn’t shake, but her eyes were flat and empty, the way someone looks after crying for too many nights. She slid the papers toward the lawyer, not looking at Ren. He didn’t blame her. He couldn’t meet her eyes either.
“It’s done then,” she said. The words were soft, almost careful, like she was trying not to break them.
Ren nodded. “Yeah.”
A single sheet of paper separated them. A document that neatly ended ten years of marriage, two kids, and everything they had once promised each other.
The lawyer cleared his throat, already closing his folder. “You’re both free to go.”
Free. The word hit Ren strangely. He didn’t feel free. He felt hollow.
Yuki stood first. Her chair made a small scrape against the floor, a sound too sharp for such a quiet room. She picked up her umbrella, the one with the tiny sunflowers their daughter had painted on the handle. She still carried it even after the colors had faded.
Ren rose after her. He wanted to say something meaningful, something that would at least honor the years they’d shared. But his throat tightened instead. They stepped into the hallway together, walking side by side yet miles apart.
Outside, the clouds hung low and heavy. The first drop of rain fell right when they reached the exit.
Yuki paused. “Looks like the weather knows.”
Ren let out a breath that sounded like a laugh but wasn’t. “It always did.”
For a moment, they stood under the small canopy, both staring at the parking lot where puddles were already gathering. He glanced at her hands. She was holding the sunflower umbrella but didn’t open it.
“Yuki,” he said quietly.
She tilted her head a little, waiting.
He tried again. “I never wanted it to end like this.”
Her eyes finally met his. Something flickered there—pain, exhaustion, maybe even guilt—but it disappeared too fast to read.
“Neither did I,” she said. “But wanting wasn’t enough for us, was it?”
A memory flashed between them without needing words: their daughter running to them with her drawing of a family holding hands; their son asking why they weren’t eating dinner together anymore.
Ren swallowed. “If I had… tried harder—”
“You did,” Yuki cut in. “We both did. Just… in the wrong ways.”
The rain grew heavier, drumming softly on the roof above them. She stepped out first, opening her umbrella at last. He watched her walk away, sunflower-patterned handle steady in her grip.
She didn’t look back. She had always moved forward faster than he did.
By the time Ren reached his car, his hair and shoulders were soaked. He didn’t bother turning on the radio during the drive home. Silence felt more honest.

---
That night, Ren lay on his side of the bed, though there was no “their bed” anymore. The empty half felt colder than he expected. The house was quiet, unnervingly so. No soft footsteps from their daughter sneaking to get water. No toys left scattered across the carpet. No faint humming from Yuki in the kitchen.
Just him.
He stared at the ceiling, replaying the last ten years like a movie on fast-forward. All the moments he should’ve spoken. All the ones he should’ve listened. If time had a rewind button, he would’ve pressed it until his fingers bled.
He didn’t cry. Ren rarely did. But his chest felt tight, like he was holding something broken in place just so he could breathe.
“Goodnight,” he whispered into the dark, knowing nobody was there to hear it.

---
Yuki’s apartment was too small, too neat. She had cleaned everything earlier, hoping it would distract her. It didn’t.
She sat on her sofa, curled into a blanket, staring at a framed photo of their kids. Their daughter’s smile, wide and bright. Their son clutching Ren’s sleeve shyly. Yuki traced their outlines with her finger.
“I’m sorry,” she murmured.
For what? She wasn’t sure. For the fight that started it. For the ones that followed. For giving up too late or too early. For loving Ren so much that it hurt. For losing him anyway.
Her phone buzzed once before lighting up with Ren’s name. Her breath caught—then she saw it was just a reminder about the kids’ school meeting next month.
She turned the phone face-down.
When she finally closed her eyes, she felt the heaviness she had been carrying for so long settle deeper. Something inside her whispered that even though everything was finished, nothing felt resolved.
As sleep pulled her under, she clutched a small hair clip their daughter had made for her. The rain outside softened into a steady patter.
She didn’t know that somewhere in the quiet, the world was shifting.
She didn’t know that morning would not come the way she expected.

---
When dawn finally arrived, neither of them opened their eyes to the lives they had fallen asleep in.
Ren woke first, blinking at sunlight that felt too bright.
Yuki woke second, startled by the sound of a familiar alarm she hadn’t heard in years.
Both sat up at the same time.
And both realized instantly—
Nothing was the same.