The Last Run

Her hair escaped from her running cap — those silver threads she'd stopped dyeing six months ago, the same month everything started to unravel. I'd teased her about it then, said she looked distinguished. She'd just stared at her reflection and said, "It's just hair, David. It falls out. It changes. That's what things do."

I shouldn't be here. I shouldn't be running this route — the one we used to take together through Riverside Park, her slightly ahead, always competitive, always certain she'd beat me to the end of the trail. My iPhone buzzed against my hip, insistent, a third time this morning.

I stopped near the old oak where she'd once tried to teach me proper stretching form, laughing when I complained about my hamstrings. That was three years ago. Before the promotion. Before the late nights became permanent. Before the hotel receipts I'd found tucked inside her work bag, crumpled like secrets she'd meant to throw away.

I pulled out the phone. A text: "I'm leaving the city. Can we talk?"

The cable connecting us — twelve years of marriage, of shared mortgages and shared grief and comfortable silences turned uncomfortable — seemed to stretch impossibly thin now. I remembered how she'd looked that last morning, pulling on her hat without meeting my eyes. The way she'd smoothed her hair in the hallway mirror, like she was already rehearsing who she'd become without me. I'd said nothing. That was the problem.

The wind picked up, carrying the smell of rain and exhaust and other people's lives.

My thumb hovered. She'd already packed. She'd already decided. This conversation wasn't a discussion; it was a courtesy.

I started running again.

My legs burned. My hat flopped against my neck. And for the first time in months, I wasn't running away from something, but toward whatever came next — alone or otherwise.

I texted back: "Where?"

The phone buzzed instantly. "The coffee shop on 4th. 2 PM."

Four hours. Enough time to finish this run, go home, shower, decide if I was fighting for her or finally, finally letting go.