Post by Blissful Stories (@Blissful)

BEFORE YOU SAY GOODBYE
EPISODE 8: IF YOU STILL LOVE ME

Maya stared at the old letter in Alexander’s hand, unsure whether she wanted to read it or throw it back at him. Five years of unanswered questions stood between them, and now he was asking her to trust him with a truth he had hidden for far too long.
“What is this?” she asked.
“Something I wrote before I left. I should have given it to you.”
“Before you left, or after you decided I wasn't worth an explanation?”
His face tightened. “You were always worth one.”
“Then why did I spend five years wondering what I did wrong?”
Alexander lowered his eyes. “Because I was a coward in the one way that mattered.”
Maya felt the words sting. “You can't come back with a letter and expect me to forget everything.”
“I don't expect you to forget. I just need you to know that leaving you was never what I wanted.”
She took the envelope, her fingers trembling as she recognised his handwriting. Once, his little notes had been the best part of her mornings. Now even seeing her name in his hand brought back memories she had fought desperately to bury.
“Why now, Alexander? Why come back after all this time?”
“Because I can't keep letting you believe you were easy to leave.”
“You made it look easy,” she whispered. “You disappeared without a goodbye. I waited for your calls, checked every unknown number, and convinced myself you would come back. Eventually, I had to teach myself to live without you.”
Her voice broke.
“Do you know how much it took to stop loving you?”
Alexander's eyes glistened. “I tried to stop loving you too. I failed every day.”
“Don't say that.”
“It's the truth.”
“No. The truth is what you keep hiding from me.”
He stepped closer, his expression stripped of the confidence he usually wore like armour.
“I never stopped loving you, Maya.”
The words she had dreamed of hearing for five years finally came, but instead of bringing relief, they opened a wound she had spent years trying to close.
“You don't get to say that like it fixes everything,” she whispered.
“I know it doesn't. Every day I stayed away, I loved you. Every time I wanted to call, I loved you. And every time I convinced myself you were better off without me, I was lying to myself about how much it hurt.”
Maya looked away, fighting her tears.
“Then why are you here now?”
“Because I can't leave again without giving you the truth. And because if there's even a small part of you that still loves me, I need to know I haven't returned too late.”
She shook her head. “You have no idea what you're asking.”
“I know you could tell me you hate me, and I would deserve to hear it.”
“I did hate you,” she admitted. “For a while, I hated you so much I thought it would save me.”
“Did it?”
“No.” She looked into his eyes. “It just made me miss you and hate myself for missing you.”
Something in Alexander's expression broke. He moved closer, slowly enough to give her the chance to step away, then lifted his hand and gently brushed a tear from her cheek.
“Maya, tell me to go and I will.”
She should have told him to leave. She should have protected the life she had fought so hard to rebuild. But when he turned as though he might actually walk away, panic rose inside her.
“Just for once,” she whispered, reaching for his hand, “don't make me be the brave one.”
Alexander stopped.
“I'm here.”
“Are you really?”
“Yes. I am.”
She looked at his lips, then back into his eyes. Between them lay five lost years, a thousand unanswered questions and a love neither had managed to bury.
Alexander leaned closer, stopping just before their lips touched, waiting for her to decide.
Maya closed the distance herself.
Their kiss began softly, almost uncertainly, but the years between them soon dissolved into the ache of everything they had tried to forget. Alexander held her as though he was afraid she might disappear, while Maya clutched his shirt and kissed him back with all the love she had buried beneath anger and heartbreak.
For a few precious moments, she was no longer the woman who had been abandoned, and he was no longer the man who had run. They were simply Maya and Alexander, finding each other again in the place where their love had never truly died.
When they finally separated, their foreheads rested together. Alexander brushed his thumb over her cheek, and Maya almost let herself believe that love might be enough.
Then the past returned.
She stepped back, wiping her tears.
“If you never stopped loving me, then why did you leave?”
The tenderness in Alexander's face gave way to fear. It was the same expression she had seen whenever her questions came too close to the truth.
He looked at the letter in her hand, then back at her.
“Because loving you was the only way I could lose you.”
Maya frowned. “That doesn't make sense.”
“It will when you know what happened.”
“Then tell me. No more secrets, Alexander. I can't do this again.”
He opened his mouth, but his phone began to ring. The name on the screen made the colour drain from his face.

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