The Timer of Death

"Olivia, would you stop overreacting already?" Xavier looked up at me, frustration clouding his eyes. It was as if I was the one causing all the problems.

"Yvie is like a sister to me. Can you stop twisting our relationship with your filthy thoughts? Honestly, I've stopped expecting a child from you," he said coldly.

"We can go to Cinnabar Island and I'll fulfill your request. Book five tickets for me, you, my parents, and Yvette. Yvie loves the ocean and has mentioned it a lot of times. After everything she's done for me, taking her along is the least I can do."

"Xav… I'm dying. This might be our last trip together. Why can't it just be the two of us?" I asked, looking into his eyes.

He straightened up and responded as if he was negotiating an insignificant business deal, "I'm letting you fulfil your wish to wear a wedding dress. I hope it'll bring some closure to the love we've shared all these years.

"My career is taking off now, and my future's bright. I need to have a lot of children. When we get back from the island, we should reassess our relationship." His tone was calm, his pace slow, yet each word felt like a sharp dagger sinking into my heart.

He reached out and brushed a hand through my dry, brittle hair before slowly resting on my face. His palm was warm, just like it had always been when he used to lull me to sleep. "I'll be sure to spend time with you then."

"Alright," I whispered back. "It'll be a trip to remember."

I smiled at him, but his eyes that once held so much love for me were now filled with nothing but indifference. Tears slid down my cheeks, falling onto his palm. He frowned, as if he had touched something filthy, and wiped his hand roughly against his shirt.

"Yvette will help us with the photos," he said without even looking at me. "She'll take our wedding photos. The photos she took before were much better than what you, the so-called 'professional photographer,' could do."

With that, he turned over, rested his head on the pillow, and drifted off to sleep with a peaceful sigh.

The man who once treated me like I was the world and told me there were stars in my eyes now looked at me like I was nothing but trash cluttering his life. I swallowed the lump in my throat and quietly slipped out onto the balcony.

The cool night breeze brushed against my skin as I looked up at the moon, low and sinking on the horizon. I laughed, but my laughter gradually crumbled into sobs I could no longer hold back.

I bit down hard on my bottom lip, tears rolling down one after another, landing in my hands and into this absurd, broken thing I had called love for ten wasted years.

I finally realized that the most devastating part about all this wasn't that he had fallen for someone else, but that he had made hurting and degrading me just another part of his everyday life.

Right then, I noticed a crimson "7" on the glass window before me, indicating the last bit of time I had left. "Xavier, could you please spend this last anniversary with me?"