Something in our shared intuition screamed at us to stay silent, to not even breathe. But then we heard keys in the lock, and Eli's whole body went rigid against mine.

Dylan stumbled in, clearly drunk despite the early hour. The smell of alcohol rolled off him in waves as he swayed at the bottom of the stairs.

"Dylan, please," Eli's voice cracked. "You've done enough. Just go away."

"Done enough?" he slurred, gripping the banister. "Haven't done anything yet. You're the one... the one running around with some guy..."

I felt something dark and primitive rise in my chest—a rage more intense than anything I'd felt before. Something like my Conquerer’s Haki being awakened. This feeling, this vibration, was more radical than when I was tormented about my weight in middle school, more extreme than when I was publically humiliated in university after sharing too much esoteric information on ascension mechanics and the deep state puppet show. I wanted to kick him back down those stairs, to make him feel a fraction of the pain evident in Eli's tears. If we were watching a One Piece episode, we would have seen the black Haki lightning streaking across the screen wildly, exploding out of me in arrays of flashy patterns.

But then I felt her hand on my arm, and the touch grounded me. We hadn't destroyed our old lives just to ruin our new one over this drunken fool.

"There are better ways to deal with your emotions than this," I said, keeping my voice steady despite the anger coursing through me.

"Yeah?" Dylan sneered, taking another unsteady step up the stairs. "Like stealing my damn wife?"

"She's not your wife," I shot back, feeling Eli's grip tighten on my arm. "And she's not your property."

"She's mine!" he roared, lunging up the stairs with drunken rage. "She was always mine!"

I moved faster than I knew I could, placing myself between Dylan and Eli. But before either of us could act, Eli's voice cut through the tension like a blade.

"No, Dylan," she said, her voice carrying that same steel I'd heard at the drugstore. "I was never yours. I was just playing a part, like you were. We were both pretending to be people we're not." She stepped out from behind me, though I kept my arm partially extended, ready to pull her back if needed. "Look at yourself. Look at what you've done to my home. To our home. Is this really who you want to be?"

Dylan's face crumpled, the rage giving way to something more broken. He slumped against the wall, sliding down until he sat on the top step.

"I loved you," he whispered, his voice small and lost.

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"No," Eli said gently. "You loved the idea of me. The perfect fiancée who fit into your perfect life plan. But that wasn't really me. Just like the perfect husband-to-be wasn't really you."

I watched in amazement as she knelt beside him, keeping a safe distance but close enough to be heard clearly. "We were both trying so hard to be what everyone expected that we forgot to be ourselves. And look where it got us—you, drunk and destroying things, and me, running away in a wedding dress."

A sob escaped him, raw and painful. "I don't know who I am without you."

"Yes, you do," she said firmly. "You're the guy who used to write poetry but stopped because your father said it wasn't practical. You're the one who wanted to travel but settled for a corporate job because it was expected. You're someone who deserves to find their own path, just like I have."

I stood there, witnessing this exchange with a mixture of awe and understanding. Here was Eli, facing down her past with the same grace and wisdom that had drawn me to her in the first place. Even in this chaos, she was helping someone else find their truth.

Dylan looked up at her, then at me, his bloodshot eyes clearing slightly. "You really love him, don't you?"

"Yes," she said without hesitation. "Because he sees me. The real me. And I see him."

He nodded slowly, then struggled to his feet. "I'm sorry," he mumbled, gesturing vaguely at the destruction around us. "I'll... I'll pay for everything."

"Keep the ring," Eli said softly. "Sell it, use the money to travel. Find your poetry again."

He stared at her for a long moment, then turned and stumbled back down the stairs. We listened to his unsteady footsteps fade away, followed by the sound of a car door closing and an engine starting.

Only when we were sure he was gone did Eli collapse into my arms, her body shaking with released tension. I held her tight, marveling at her strength, her compassion, her ability to turn even this horrible situation into something healing.

"That was incredible," I whispered into her hair. "You're incredible."

She laughed weakly against my chest. "I learned from the best. You could have hurt him, but you didn't. You chose peace."

"We both did," I said, looking around at the destroyed apartment. "Now what?"

She pulled back just enough to meet my eyes, that impossible smile playing at her lips despite everything. "Now we pack what can be saved, leave what can't, and go home."

"Home?" I asked, though I already knew the answer.

"Your mom's," she said simply. "For now. Until we figure out our next step. Together."

I kissed her then, among the wreckage of her old life, feeling the perfect rightness of it all. Even this destruction was part of our path—clearing away the old to make room for something new. Something real.

"Together," I agreed. "Everything together."

We spent the next few hours salvaging what we could, packing her essential belongings into whatever bags and boxes had survived Dylan's rampage. Each item we saved felt like a small victory, each thing we had to leave behind a necessary sacrifice.

As we loaded the last box into Mom's car, the sun was fully up, painting the world in shades of golden possibility. We'd faced down our pasts—both Sarah's calculated rage and Dylan's drunken destruction—and emerged stronger. Whatever came next, we would face it the same way we'd faced this: together, with truth as our compass and love as our shield.

Because some things are worth breaking everything for. Some people are worth rebuilding your entire world around. And sometimes, the greatest act of love is letting everything burn so something real can rise from the ashes.

We drove home in comfortable silence, our hands linked as always. The morning light caught Eli's face just right, making her eyes shine like the treasures they were. And I knew, with absolute certainty, that every broken thing behind us was worth it for this single moment of pure, unscripted truth.

This was us, exactly as we were meant to be. Everything else was just details.