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“As you see, Mr. and Mrs. Acton, we open onto your floor where there are just two units - yours and the other one. You have this entire side of the building, and the freight elevator is down the hallway, for usage with a key. The trash goes in the chute at the end of the hallway and…” the realtor’s voice droned on.

Jett glanced at Karen to see if she understood the man who was speaking French - and hesitated, stunned. She was frowning, concentrating, and focusing on the realtor… taking it all in.

“You speak French?” he asked, unable to hide the shocked tone to his voice.

“You’re just now asking me that?” Karen retorted in a hushed voice, looking at him. “We’re going to live here, so whether I could speak or comprehend French should have been a thing discussed between us. When were you going to tell me you were fluent?”

“You never asked.”

“You never did either - and it’s been a while, but I can keep up,” she admitted, leaning in to whisper to him as the realtor opened the front door with a flourish.

Both of them stood there, impressed.

Jett had scrolled through the photos online more times than he cared to admit, skeptical of how perfect the condo looked.

Real estate listings are always exaggerated, manipulating lighting and angles until the images barely resemble reality.

But now, standing in the entryway with his hand linked with Karen’s, he realized that the photos hadn’t done it justice.

They hadn’t even come close.

The ceiling arched high above him, graceful and elegant, with broad beams that seemed to reach for the sky. Those windows — he had thought it was a camera trick some lens distortion to create an illusion of grandeur… but they were real.

Massive.

Breathtaking.

The windows spanned from the floor all the way to the ceiling, each pane letting in golden light that spilled across the hardwood floors like liquid warmth.

The view beyond was framed like a living painting—city, sky, and a promise of peace that he didn’t know he needed or wanted for them… until now.

Karen pulled away, enraptured as she took in everything.

He moved closer, drawn in by the pull of it, and caught sight of a small doorway tucked into the corner of the windowed wall.

It looked like it had a shallow landing, maybe just a Juliet balcony.

But then he noticed the continuation, a path that angled out and around…

it connected the terrace, the balcony, to everything else.

He could sneak up on Karen.

A low chuckle slipped from him, breaking the quiet. “It’s all connected, huh?” he asked, needing to confirm it with a faint smile tugging at his lips. “It’s connected to the terrace that leads to the library and the master?”

“Yes, there are three points,” the realtor said brightly.

“The master bedroom has a door, the office, and this narrow entrance leads out to your yard. Your condo fees include landscaping, which is done on Fridays during the spring, summer, and fall. During the winter, unless there is a massive snowstorm, they don’t touch the yard.

You’ll have to let the lawn guy in, of course, because… well, you are way up here.”

“I see,” Jett said simply, nodding as he absorbed the man’s words, though his attention had already begun to drift.

Karen had wandered off, leaving Jett in the quiet center of the room.

He stood still for a moment longer, the weight of it settling on his shoulders.

The space, the silence, the changes to come.

He looked at the furniture he’d brought with him. A secondhand couch that had survived more than one move. A scratched coffee table that leaned slightly to the right. His things felt small here, misplaced. They felt worn, tired, and this space seemed to be designed for something… more .

Something better.

Maybe they could pick out some new furniture together?

His gaze flicked over to her, his wife who was still exploring.

Was she picturing her own belongings here?

Had she already made arrangements to move her things?

If so, when? He didn’t remember her mentioning anything about it during the week.

Not a word. But then again, they didn’t even speak.

He had been getting the ‘silent treatment’ and now had questions.

Looking around, he peered into the bedrooms, glanced in the bathroom, and then opened a cupboard to see a few of his mismatched dinner plates inside.

Nodding, he scribbled his name on the transportation sheet, finished signing the documents from the realtor, accepted the keys, and quickly ushered everyone out.

As he shut the front door, he turned around, leaning back against it, and stared at his wife in the distance, unsure how to cross the divide between them.

“Do you like it?” he asked finally, needing to talk.

“I love it,” Karen admitted, hesitating. “It’s really a huge place.”

“I wanted us to have space – and for you to have that garden.”

“And you have your guest room for when your family visits us.”

“Yes.”

“I’m glad,” she said quietly, avoiding looking at him.

“Karen…”

“Can we not do this yet?” she began, looking at him with almost a pleading expression.

“I’m feeling really on edge, and I don’t want us to end up fighting.

I’m trying to be a part of this, and I thought I could handle it but parts of me are freaking out.

I’m alone with a guy I barely know, barely tolerate, and we’re married – and there’s one bed.

I have no car, no job, no money, and I don’t know what to do with myself. ”

She did look like she was panicking – and it was driving his own anxiety through the roof, which wasn’t good for either of them.

“Shhh,” he urged, holding out his hands like he was about to pet a wild animal.

“No one is going to touch you or bother you while you are here. I don’t want you to feel nervous or scared, but I’d rather this felt like home to you.

We’ll fix the car issue because I feel guilty you got rid of your Kia now.

You never have to get a job unless you want to, and we have a shared bank account I was going to tell you about this week but we weren’t speaking. ”

“Is that your way of getting a jab in at me?”

“Karen…”

“You know when you are mad or frustrated, you call me Karen, but when you are all lovey-dovey or want to get kissy-faced with me, you call me Nutella?” – and now his wife was getting that weird little warble in her voice.

“Can we hug?”

“Is that you starting something? Should I be on my guard?”

“No, I’m nervous too, and I just want to feel like I’m not alone.”

“Hugging – and that’s it? Don’t think that I didn’t see that bed, mister...”

“I’ll sleep on the couch – and you can lock the bedroom door,” he promised, taking a step slowly toward her, his hands still out in an unthreatening manner.

Karen actually took a step back, shaking her head nervously, her expression erratic, and it was doing something to his insides.

“Nutella, please, honey. This is just two friends hugging after a long day, and a long week, and I missed you. I swear, it’s nothing but a hug, or you can push me off the balcony. ”

She let out a panicked-weird-warbling laugh before looking at him. Her beautiful eyes were huge and terrified – and that was breaking his heart. She needed to be wanted, to be won, to be wooed – and he was realizing just how backward they had gone about everything from the very beginning.

He’d asked her to marry him, and for some reason, she said ‘yes’ – but from there, both of their worlds had turned upside down, inside out, putting them both on edge.

It was time for the two fighters to retreat to their corners, get their bearings, and see where everything else fell into place.

He touched her hand, felt her shaking, and made several more soft crooning noises to which she broke and began crying big ‘crocodile tears’ as his mother would say – and it broke his heart.

“This isn’t me,” Karen wept, looking at him and shaking her head. “I’m not like this, none of this is me, Jett… this isn’t me…”

“We’ve both been under a lot of pressure,” he agreed gently, pulling her trembling frame into his arms and managing to hug her against him as he breathed in her scent. “We need time to breathe, regroup, and…”

“This isn’t me. I’m not this angry or hard to deal with…”

“I never said you were hard to deal with,” he interrupted, chuckling softly against her hair as he held her close, his mind screaming silently, ‘ Uh, yeah you are! ’ and ‘ Is this worth it? ’.

He cooed several more times, gently rocking back and forth with her until she stopped sobbing and hiccupped against his throat.

“Fair warning, if you snort against my skin – I’m gonna laugh and tell the guys during practice. ”

“Of course you would,” she muttered, trying to pull away from him, and he managed to hold her still. “I don’t like being teased.”

“Who’s teasing, Nutella?” and he felt her seize up, bracing himself. “Hold on, don’t go getting all weird on me. We’re only hugging.”

“There you go with the Nutella-comment, which means you are getting all kissy…”

“Only if you ask…”

“I’m never asking you to kiss me.”

“Then maybe you were wrong about ‘Nutella’ – weren’t you?

But that would take the ‘ Great-and-Mighty Karen Acton’ to admit that she was wrong,” he taunted, putting the emphasis on wrong because it felt really good to say her name – and felt her jolt slightly in his arms. “Doesn’t ‘ Karen Acton’ sound so good?

I swear it rolls right off my tongue, almost better than my name. ”

“I swear you are weird.”

“Guilty as charged,” he chuckled and kissed the top of her head, testing her and feeling her tense. “Go get some sleep, Nutella, and we can figure it all out later. When’s your stuff coming?”

“In a week.”

“Then help yourself to whatever you find. I asked the realtor to leave toiletries for us in the master bathroom because we were coming in so late,” he offered and was so grateful for the foresight of doing that one thing.

It actually was a last-minute email to the man begging him to leave toothbrushes, toothpaste, and toilet paper in case the stores were closed.

The dealership was delivering his car tomorrow at nine, then he was taking Karen to go pick out a car, pick up some supplies and groceries…

and then he was pretty sure they would have snapped at each other, argued, or something – and he would end up at the gym downstairs or the ice rink.

They were like oil and water. It was never going to work out – or last.

… And he was obviously a dreamer.