The cracks came quietly. A missed phone call turned into a pattern: late replies, vague whereabouts, bedtime stories that ended with ellipses. He had reasons — work, a new project, friends who needed him — and for a long time I wanted to believe them. The truth, when it revealed itself, was not dramatic. It was a series of little betrayals: silences he asked me to accept, boundaries he ignored, promises treated like suggestions. I held onto the memory of his hand on mine in the dark and convinced myself that history mattered more than hesitation.