The Last Three Months

My phone vibrated on the solid wood workbench as I was packing custom scented candles for a client. The words "Unknown Number" flashing on the screen were like a sudden exclamation point. My fingers clutching the packing twine faltered. I stared at the string of numbers for a solid three seconds before finally swiping to answer. "Tabitha, it's me." That voice, though roughened by five years, still stabbed into my ear like shards of jagged glass, traveling along the auditory nerves to the softest part of my heart, bringing with it a familiar dull ache. I clenched the packing strap tightly; the plastic cord left a white mark on my palm. The residual warmth of the wax seeped through the cardboard box—not burning, but pricking the skin like needles, stirring a restless irritation deep within. "Evan Scott?" I deliberately let my voice sound flat, as if speaking of a stranger of no consequence. "What is it?" Silence stretched long on the other end of the line, then faint coughing came through—broken, intermittent—like an old bellows being strained, sounding weaker than any breath after drunkenness I'd heard in the past five years. "I'm under the plane tree downstairs from your studio," his voice fell lower than before, carrying a barely perceptible plea. "Tabitha, could you... come down and see me? Just for ten minutes." I set down the takeout box in my hand and hurried over to the floor-to-ceiling window. With my fingertips, I drew aside a corner of the heavy linen curtain, my gaze precisely fixed on the lush old phoenix tree. Sure enough, a black luxury car was parked beneath the tree—the very model he had once favored. The car window was half lowered, allowing a clear view of Evan Scott slumped in the driver's seat. His once broad shoulders were now too thin to fill his suit jacket. He had wasted away too much. The deep gray suit, once tailored to fit, now hung loose on his frame. His profile was as sharp as if carved with a knife; even his jawline was far more defined than before. His cheekbones jutted slightly, casting a sickly pallor. The man who had once brimmed with vigor and ambition five years ago now seemed drained of all life by time and sickness, leaving behind nothing but a frail shell. "I'm very busy." I said this, then was about to hang up the telephone. "I have gastric cancer. It's in the late stage." These words floated lightly, yet like a block of ice freshly pulled from a freezer, they crashed unexpectedly into my burning heart, stirring a delicate shiver of cold. My fingers clenched the phone tightly, knuckles whitening to near pallor; my heartbeat skipped, yet I felt no surprise—instead, a bleak relief, as if the dust had finally settled—the man who once shattered my heart had at last tasted despair. My fingers gripping the phone tightened sharply, knuckles whitening, yet I felt no surprise—only a strangely absurd resignation. "Tabitha," he coughed again, harsher this time, as if trying to expel his very lungs, each cough fragile and faint, "I don't have much time left. I just want... a home, a home with you. Let's remarry." I couldn't help but laugh out loud, the sound shockingly out of place in the stillness of the studio. When he slammed the divorce papers in my face five years ago, did he never once think about wanting a home? "Evan, have you lost your mind because of your illness?" I leaned against the cold windowsill, staring at the figure curled up in the seat below, my voice as cold as ice. "Five years ago, it was you who asked for a divorce, saying I was unworthy of you, saying I was a failure for not even being able to keep a child. And now you come to me talking about remarriage?"