Jason
He hated weddings.
Not for what they were—but for what they stole.
He hadn't stayed for the ceremony.
Couldn't.
He'd left Ashbourne the night before, riding through fog and guilt, telling no one. He didn't need to see her in silk and pearls, not with that haunted smile she'd mastered since girlhood. He could already picture it—her eyes dimmed, her mouth curved politely, the world applauding her transformation into a bride.
He couldn't bear it.
Couldn't watch her become his brother's wife.
So instead, he left. Like a coward. Or a man on the brink of unraveling.
Now, more than a week later, the ache hadn't dulled. It had settled, quiet and constant, like a splinter under the skin. He painted obsessively—landscapes, faceless figures, fragments of the life he should've had. Always, her hand. Slender fingers, caught mid-motion. Always, her eyes. Autumn-colored. Lonely.
He remembered their orchard summers. The book debates. The way she once dared him to steal a kiss from the moonlight, and he almost did.
He remembered her saying, quietly:
"Jason, you'll never belong to anyone, will you?"
She had said it with awe.
Maybe envy.
Now, she belonged to his brother.
And Jason had never felt more caged.
The Studio
A week before the wedding...
Sunlight poured in through the high windows of his studio, dust swimming in gold. He worked shirtless, paint staining his hands, his wrists, his cheek. The scent of turpentine, bitter and familiar, anchored him. His world was color and canvas and silence.
Until he heard footsteps.
Soft. Barely there.
Real.
He turned.
Adele stood in the doorway like a ghost that refused to fade.
She wore a pale morning dress, hair unbound, eyes unreadable. She looked too real for the dream he'd tried to forget—and too fragile for the life she'd walked into.
"You left," she said softly. No judgment. Just a fact.
"I had to," he replied.
Her gaze swept the studio. "I used to love it here. It always smelled like freedom."
Jason said nothing. What could he say that didn't ache?
"I don't feel very free these days," she added, barely above a whisper.
She stepped inside.
This wasn't Adele from salons or supper tables. This was the girl he once ran through fields with, who once pressed daisy crowns into his hands like they were sacred. Now she stood in silk and shadows, about to get married but not loved, seen but not understood.
"I think," she murmured, fingers trailing across his worktable, "I will marry someone who will never see me."
His chest tightened.
She turned to face him.
The space between them crackled with a kind of grief neither knew how to name.
He didn't touch her.
She didn't step back.
And that was the problem, wasn't it?
He said, voice low and rough, "If you stay here, I won't be able to be the man you need me to be."
Her breath hitched. But she didn't move.
And neither did he.
Because the truth was, Jason had already made his decision long before the wedding.
He was going to leave.
Not out of bitterness, or pride—but because staying would only tear them both apart. He'd written the letter days before the ceremony, packed quietly, planned his escape like someone plotting a crime against his own heart.
He never told her.
Because saying goodbye would've meant touching what he couldn't have.
And if he touched her—he'd never let go.