More angst cause why not?

"I didn't think I could live without you."

Rein kept her eyes focused on the cup of coffee before her.

She didn't want to look at him. Nor did she want to talk to him.

But he caught her. He begged her.

And here they were. In the closest cafe they could find, sitting across from each other in suffocating silence.

All Rein could do was curse her soft heart.

"Can you please talk to me, Rein?" He said in a voice barely above a whisper. Rein did not respond. "I think I have a right to know. Why you walked out on me." Rein felt her heart clench, but she did not move her focus from her coffee.

"I think the answer is quite obvious." Rein said, shutting her eyes. "We weren't going to last."

"How would you have known that?" He asked, almost desperate. Rein crossed her arms, letting her eyes wander towards the window.

"We had been married for just three months, Shade." Rein said. "Yet, I could already tell, we were going nowhere." She felt the tears threaten to escape her eyes, but she refused to let them fall. "I was a waitress in a rundown diner. You were... I don't even know what you were doing Shade." She looked back at the coffee. "You never bothered to tell me either."

"That's..." He started, but never finished. Rein took it as a sign for her to continue.

"All I knew is that you never came home until maybe 3 in the morning on most days. We lived paycheck to paycheck. Shade, that marriage, a marriage like that, was destined to fail."

"You never would have said that before." At that, Rein looked up at him, anger shining in her tearful eyes.

"Because one night, when you came home, I realized it!" Rein almost shouted. "I realized that my belief that as long as we were together, as long as we loved and trusted each other, everything would be okay was wrong! That's not love! That's blind faith." She slammed her hand on the table. Her eyes finally met with Shade's and she suddenly felt sick.

He looked like such a mess. His hair disheveled in all the wrong ways, an unshaven beard growing all over her cheeks, chin, and upper lip. His eyes had bags darker than she had ever seen them. Rein's heart clenched further.

"My faith in our marriage was based on my foolish fantasies, like those in books and movies. But as the days passed, my fears began to overpower my fantasies. 'What happens if I lose my job?' 'What if we can't afford rent anymore?'" This time, she looked at him long and hard. "Where was Shade at?"

"Rein, I-"

"I don't want to hear it. I just know that the longer we were married, the more often you disappeared. One time, I thought you had left me." Suddenly, Rein couldn't stop her tears anymore. "I didn't think I could live without you." She saw Shade's expression warp into one of pained regret. It was his turn to look down.

"So why did you go?" This time, it was a whisper. One that Rein almost missed.

"I forced myself." Rein said. "I forced myself to leave that house without a single word. I forced myself to stop believing in love conquers all. I just wanted the anxiety and fear to go away."

"Did it?" Another whisper.

"Not immediately, but..." She hesitated. She almost felt guilty. "Yes."

Almost.

The two were left with dreaded silence until Shade finally spoke up.

"I'm sorry. It was nice seeing you again." Rein heard him stand up. He leaned over her and gave her a faint kiss on her head. "Have a happy life, Rein." Rein didn't watch him leave the cafe. When she was sure he was gone, she let herself go.

She couldn't hold it in anymore.

She tried her best to wipe her tears and muffle her cries and stop her shaking shoulders.

She was the one who ended her marriage. So why did she feel so devastated?

Then she wondered if she was wrong. Maybe if she had more faith, maybe if she stayed, things would have been different. Maybe things would have gotten better.

Yet, she couldn't bring herself to regret her decision.

She learned to live without him.

She could learn to live with these bitter feelings he left behind too.