Page 6 of Love or Leave

He jogged to the front door, scanned his key and entered. He pulled up short when he came face to face with his neighbour, Sara. Her surprise at his sudden appearance vanished in a flash, instantly replaced by a sad scowl.

He lifted an awkward hand in a wave. "Hi—"

Sara snapped away from him and marched off down the hall, refusing to let him finish.

Honestly, he deserved worse. She would have been completely justified in chewing him out—or even slapping him, for that matter. He would have preferred it to the silent treatment.

He let remorse flow over him as he pulled the mail from his box and made his way down the narrow hall toward his door,doing his best to ignore the rancid stench wafting from one neighbour's unit and the blast of screaming metal coming from the other.

Sara was a beautiful girl. She was also smart and sweet, with a good head on her shoulders. Antonio couldn't help but be attracted to her when he first moved into the building. Especially when she'd started flirting with him at the lowest point in his life.

Then Fran showed up.

Shaking off the memory, he thumbed through the mail as he unlocked his door. He pushed into his depressingly cramped studio apartment when he saw it.

A letter from his wife's lawyer.

He stopped halfway through the door’s threshold and swallowed the nausea bubbling in his throat. She was actually going through with it.

His marriage was over.

He was on the verge of being the divorced guy.

He dropped his bag and stepped the rest of the way inside, letting the heavy metal door slam shut behind him. He took the three steps to the giant pull-out sofa that took up most of the three-hundred square foot living space and collapsed on its edge.

What a fucking disaster.

He couldn't bring himself to ripping the envelope open and reading it. Instead, he tossed it onto the coffee table currently doubling as a nightstand and dining table, and buried it under the rest of the mail, as if pretending it didn't exist would make it so.

He glanced around the room, painfully aware of the fact that if he hadn't let his marriage fall apart, he'd still be in the home he bought with Fran, and he'd only be a few doors down from his sister and his parents.

Instead, he had failed, and now his wife—well, soon-to-be ex-wife—whom he'd never wanted to divorce, lived in the house his grandparents had gifted the down payment for, and he was alone in what could only be described as a hellhole.

The only upside to the situation was that he wasn't still living at his parents' house.

That was where he'd first gone after moving out the house, and he'd never been so miserable. But he couldn't really blame his parents for being disappointed in him. He'd made a complete fucking mess of his life.

The only person he could blame was himself. Especially since Fran had come to him crying and begging to get back together, and he'd let his hurt ego stop him from giving them another shot.

It was the biggest mistake he'd made in his life.

He shook off the intrusive thoughts and stood, pulling his dirty clothes off and tossing them into the hamper next to the fridge, then took another three steps to the tiny bathroom. He had to get out of that place, but every time he thought about moving, he just wished he could go back to his home and make things work with Fran.

He'd poured countless hours and money into fixing up that house to make it theirs—new floors, new kitchen. His father helped him re-tile the bathroom and build the deck in the back. It was his home.

So was Fran.

They'd been together so long that his family didn't even know how to react when he attended family events alone. He'd always wanted to marry Fran, have kids with her, grow old in that house together with her.

And he'd let a stupid little dip in their relationship ruin it all. If he could travel back in time, he'd have gone to therapy with her when she first mentioned not being happy. He'd have told herthey had something worth fighting for when she'd told him she wanted a divorce. And heneverwould have been so stubborn after the Sara situation when she'd had second thoughts.

He turned on the shower and stepped into the cold, weak spray of water. He had to fix this.

If he couldn't make it work with Fran, he couldn’t make it work with anyone.

After showering and dressing quickly, he grabbed Sophie's gift and rushed out the door. He knew what needed to be done. He just hoped his mom and sister wouldn't lose their shit when he asked for their help.

Antonio arrived at his sister's house an hour late. He fought the urge to rush in and rang the doorbell instead. Maria's house was as much of a second home to him as his parents' house, but the last time he spoke with her, Maria mentioned how much Sophie loved answering the door.

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