Chapter 13 - CHLOE ASKED WHETHER I WOULD HAVE MARRIED HER IF THERE HAD BEEN NO LIVESTREAMWe met for coffee almost a year after the party.
Not to reconcile.
To close several personal matters.
She looked different.
Not physically.
Quieter.
She had taken a long break from livestreaming.
Reduced her public presence.
Left HaloHouse after settling with the other owners.
Then she asked:
“If Mason hadn’t streamed it, would you still have left?”
I thought.
“If you smashed my face into the cake privately?”
“Yes.”
“No audience?”
“Yes.”
I nodded.
“Maybe not that night.”
She looked down.
“But the problem wasn’t that strangers saw it.”
“It was that I did it.”
“Yes.”
She swallowed.
“I kept thinking the internet destroyed us.”
“It documented you ignoring a boundary.”
She nodded slowly.
Then:
“I’m sorry.”
I waited.
“I’m sorry I planned a humiliating prank after you specifically told me not to use you for prank content.”
Better.
“I’m sorry I cared more about whether people laughed than whether you felt safe with me.”
Better.
“And I’m sorry that when I saw the ring, my first real panic included the merger.”
There.
“That part still makes me sick.”
I believed her.
That did not mean we belonged together.
She asked:
“Did you ever love me?”
“Yes.”
Her eyes filled.
“Do you still?”
I considered lying.
“No.”
May you like
Not enough to return.
Sometimes that is what no means.
