Summary: A moment of truth between Kendall and Ryan forever alters Ryan and Greenlee's marriage.

AN: I felt as if the show never allowed Kendall proper closure and this and a few other ideas have been pinballing in my head for some time. I hope you enjoy.

Shortficlet.

Forward

Greenlee excused herself and left the room to take a phone call.

Noticing Kendall staring at him, Ryan shifted on the couch and asked, "Why are you looking at me like that?"

"Today I told my therapist that I keep forgetting that we're not in love anymore."

Ryan just looked at her with a look that was equal parts confusion and reluctant awareness.

"But maybe I was just fooling myself again. Dr. McNamara thinks that we were never really in love. I think that I'm beginning to agree with him."

"No, he's wrongKendall, we were. We were very much in love with each other. Once."

Her smiling face held no remembered joy, it was a hollow thing, painful to see. "Maybe. But I doubt it."

"I have to go," she put her drink down and picked up her purse. "Tell Greenlee that I'llcall her later to wrap this up," moving as if to leave the room, Kendall turned toward the door, pausing at Ryan's retraining touch.

"Not much else was true Kendall, but the love we had was true."

"Was it?" she asked in a musing murmur, not turning around, "If it was, it was a pale sickly thing. Because it didn't last. And I've learned, to my cost, that love-real love, ishearty, sturdy. It's hard to kill. It takes its punches and its knocks and it refuses to stay down. It holds on through anger and betrayal, and infidelity and disappointments. It flowers under maddening conditions…conditions that kill shallow things like infatuation and lust and sexual heat."

"Kendall…" he tried to interrupt her.

She went on as if he hadn't spoken. "Less than six months Ryan. That's how long it took for your "love" for me to die and for Greenlee to take my place. And I loved you still. I tried everything I could think of to kill it, believe me. I even tried to convince myself that I hated you. But eventually I had to make a choice. Loving you or loving myself. I had no choice but to let go. And what makes me sad, is that I look at you and I remember. I remember it all. And now I know that I've wasted so much time and energy on something that was never as real for you as it was for me."

"Kendall, that's not true. I did love you. It was your lies and your schemes and your trust issues. Those are what killed our love…" Ryan protested.

Turning to look him in the eyes, Kendall just stared without comment as he defended his behavior and his choices and laid all the blame solely at her door. And suddenly she felt lighter. Free.

When he trailed off, Kendall smiled, her eyes and face shining, and she turned back to the door, reaching for the handle.

"Kendall, where are you going," he demanded.

"Forward. Tell Greenlee, I'll talk to her later."

As the door closed behind her Ryan felt tightness in his chest. And in that moment he knew that he would never again be that man that lived in Kendall's heart.

A slight movement caught his attention; turning, he saw Greenlee. Eyes meeting, he was unprepared and slow in guarding his sorrow and heartache. No words were spoken between them, but their marriage would never again be the bright shining thing that they had convinced themselves and each other it was.

The End