I stood in the driveway, phone in hand, realizing I’d been rehearsing the wrong kind of heartbreak. Those messages weren’t love notes; they were lab results, referrals, and quiet admissions typed to strangers because he couldn’t yet say the words to me. Every hushed call I’d resented was him chasing answers, not someone else’s attention. He’d mistaken secrecy for protection, not understanding how silence can cut deeper than any confession.

We ended up on the front steps, the night cool around us, finally telling the truth we’d both been dodging. He spoke about scans, statistics, and the terror of becoming a burden; I spoke about the way distance had been hollowing us out. Somewhere between his shaking voice and my tearful apologies, we chose a different story. Not me versus him, not him versus his body—just us, facing the unknown together, with nothing left locked away.