She met him when she was twenty -eight years old. < img src = "https://zycie.news/crrops/bfd595/620x0/1/0/2025/04/07/xdlsg6qthl36k5f1qkctoujp6l1zhb1atxwopsz9.jpg" alt = "man @pexels" styles = "background-color: rgba (123,123,126.1)" > < p > on & ndash; Ten, handsome, confident, smelling of success. He worked in banking, drove a black car with tinted windows and wore watches worth as much as she earned through P & Amp; Oacute; Łoś as a librarian. And yet he chose her.

< p > she fell in love quietly, without screaming and fireworm & oacute; w & ndash; As she did everything in her life. Quiet, loyal, with a heart on your hand. She cooked, took care of the house, always listened when he returned tired and frustrated. She had no aspiration to the big world. He was enough for her.

< p > but it ceased to be enough.

< p > He looked at her every year and cooler. He began to disappear, come back p & oacute; He stopped asking how he feels. He stopped noticing that it exists. Until Kt & oacute; the day when she asked shyly why they moved so much, he exploded:

< P >& ndash; Because you were a gray mouse and you remained! You won't shine! You don't inspire! I need a woman with a claw, not a member hostess!

< p > shuddered. But she didn't cry. She looked at him in silence, and he threw one more, last sentence:

< p > & ndash; I fold papers. Find someone at your level.

< p > moved the next day.

< p > disappeared. And she & Hellip; stayed. With a wound in the heart, with an empty apartment and hundreds of questions. But also with the decision: I will not let it be m & oacute; j end.

< p > started with a hairdresser. Then there were language lessons. Computer graphics course. She took a remote job, began to write a blog about literature and loneliness. She took off old sweaters, bought a lipstick in a shade of red wine. Not to recover it & ndash; but to regain yourself.

< p > year p & oacute; she sat in an elegant restaurant. Sam, with a glass of wine, waiting for the author's meeting, who was to lead as a guest. And then & Hellip; He came in

< p > the same, but older, with a gray face, without this flash. With a new partner who was more artificial than porcelain. He stopped, looked. His eyes have expanded in disbelief.

< p > & ndash; It's & hellip; you ?

< p > smiled calmly. There was no anger in her. There were no bitterness. There was only dignity.

< p > & ndash; Yes & ndash; She replied. & ndash; It's me. This & gray mouse & rdquo;. KT & oacute; Ra did not disappear. Just ceased to be your shadow.

< p > stood up, raised her head and left & ndash; leaving him with the memory of a woman who abandoned … and he flourished without him.

Natasha Kumar

By Natasha Kumar

Natasha Kumar has been a reporter on the news desk since 2018. Before that she wrote about young adolescence and family dynamics for Styles and was the legal affairs correspondent for the Metro desk. Before joining The Times Hub, Natasha Kumar worked as a staff writer at the Village Voice and a freelancer for Newsday, The Wall Street Journal, GQ and Mirabella. To get in touch, contact me through my natasha@thetimeshub.in 1-800-268-7116