Mira stared at her phone for a moment longer than necessary.
Elior watched her expression change—not dramatically, not sharply, but subtly, as if something inside her had settled into place. That frightened him more than panic would have. Panic could be talked through. Calm often meant a decision had already been made.
She turned the phone face down on the table.
"I need to answer that," she said softly. "But before I do, I need to know something."
Elior's pulse thudded in his ears. "Okay."
Mira took a breath. "I don't want you to choose for me. I need to be clear about that."
"I understand," he said quickly. "I wouldn't—"
"But," she continued, her voice steady but fragile beneath the control, "I need to know whether you believe in us enough to let this be hard."
The words pressed into his chest.
Let this be hard.
Not fix it.
Not guarantee it.
Not protect it from pain.
Just… allow difficulty to exist without walking away.
Elior had always believed love should feel safe. That safety meant certainty. Predictability. Proximity.
Now love was asking something different.
Courage without clarity.
"I've spent most of my life leaving before things could hurt," Elior said slowly. "Not physically—but emotionally. I kept exit routes in my head. Backup plans."
Mira listened without interrupting.
"I don't want to do that anymore," he continued. "But I don't want to promise something I don't yet know how to live."
Mira's lips curved faintly. "That might be the most honest thing you could say."
"But honesty doesn't tell us what to do," he said.
"No," she agreed. "It tells us who we are when we decide."
The café noise faded into the background as the moment deepened.
Elior looked at the two envelopes again.
One represented distance, uncertainty, time zones, longing stretched thin by months and miles.
The other represented stability, shared mornings, continuity.
But he knew better now than to assume simplicity equaled truth.
Sometimes the safer choice was the one that cost more.
"What scares you most?" Elior asked.
Mira hesitated. "That if I stay, I'll resent you. And if I go, I'll lose you."
The confession landed heavily between them.
"And you?" she asked.
"That I'll say I can handle this," Elior said, "and then disappear the first time it hurts."
Mira's eyes searched his face. "Would you?"
He didn't answer immediately.
The old Elior might have rushed to deny it.
The present Elior sat with the question.
"I don't want to," he said finally. "But wanting isn't proof."
"No," she said softly. "Consistency is."
They sat in silence again.
Outside, the river moved steadily past the windows, indifferent to human hesitation. The world didn't pause for decisions. It flowed forward regardless.
Elior realized something then.
There would be loss no matter what they chose.
Loss of certainty.
Loss of ease.
Loss of the version of love that didn't ask so much.
The question wasn't how to avoid loss.
It was which loss he was willing to live with.
"Mira," he said quietly, "if you go… I don't want us to become a memory we protect by never testing it."
Her breath caught.
"And if I stay?" she asked.
"I don't want you to shrink your future to make me comfortable."
She nodded, eyes glossy but steady.
"So what does that leave us?" she whispered.
Elior closed his eyes briefly.
"It leaves us choosing each other without guarantees," he said. "Or choosing ourselves without pretending it doesn't hurt."
Mira let out a shaky breath.
"That's not a fair choice."
"No," he agreed. "But it's a real one."
Her phone buzzed again.
This time, she didn't look at it immediately.
Instead, she reached for the fellowship envelope and ran her fingers along its edge.
"When I first got this," she said, "I felt alive. Seen. Like the work I've been building toward finally mattered."
Elior nodded. "That matters."
"And then I thought about you," she continued. "And I felt grounded. Like love had weight."
He swallowed.
"Both feelings are true," she said. "And I don't know how to choose between them without betraying part of myself."
Elior leaned forward slightly. "Maybe the betrayal isn't in the choice. Maybe it's in pretending one part doesn't exist."
Mira looked at him sharply.
"That sounds like something you've been learning," she said.
He gave a small smile. "Painfully."
She picked up the second envelope—the one that represented staying.
"This one feels safer," she admitted. "But safety has never been the same as fulfillment."
Elior's heart clenched.
He knew that truth intimately.
"So tell me," she said. "Do you believe love should ask us to stay—or to grow?"
The question pierced him.
"Both," he said quietly. "But not at the expense of honesty."
"And what is honesty asking of us right now?" she pressed.
Elior felt the weight of the moment settle fully.
This wasn't theoretical anymore.
Whatever he said next would ripple forward.
"I think," he said slowly, "honesty is asking me to admit that I'm afraid of distance… but more afraid of becoming someone who limits the people he loves."
Mira's eyes filled.
"And honesty is asking me," she said, "to admit that I don't want to choose between my future and my heart."
Their gazes locked.
For a moment, it felt like the world narrowed to that shared recognition.
Mira reached for her phone.
Elior's breath caught.
She glanced at the screen.
Then, deliberately, she turned it off.
"I'm not answering yet," she said.
Elior looked at her, surprised.
"Why?"
"Because before I choose a path," she said, "I need to know whether you're willing to walk beside me—even if the road stretches."
He felt fear surge.
Then something stronger.
Resolve.
"I can't promise it will be easy," he said. "And I can't promise I won't struggle."
She nodded.
"But," he continued, "I can promise that I won't disappear. Not into silence. Not into control. Not into fear."
Mira's breath trembled.
"And if it hurts?" she asked.
"Then we talk," he said. "We repair. We decide again."
She studied his face for a long moment.
This wasn't romance.
This was risk.
Finally, Mira stood.
Elior stood with her, heart racing.
She picked up the fellowship envelope—and placed it back into her bag.
Then she picked up the second envelope.
She held it out to him.
"I haven't opened this," she said. "And I won't… unless you ask me to stay."
Elior stared at it.
The weight of the choice pressed down on him, heavier than anything he had known.
If he asked her to stay, he risked becoming the very thing he feared—a reason someone abandoned their calling.
If he didn't, he risked losing her.
This was the cost of loving without control.
"Mira," he said, voice barely above a whisper, "I don't want to be the reason you choose against yourself."
Tears slipped down her cheeks.
"And I don't want to be the reason you choose against love," she replied.
The truth hung between them—raw and unresolved.
Elior reached for her hand.
Held it.
Felt the warmth.
The reality.
The risk.
"I think," he said slowly, "the only choice that doesn't betray us… is letting you choose freely."
Mira's hand tightened around his.
"And if my free choice takes me away?" she asked.
Elior's chest ached.
"Then I'll grieve," he said. "But I won't regret choosing honesty."
Mira searched his face, as if trying to memorize him.
Then she nodded once.
Slowly.
Decisively.
She stepped back.
"I need tonight," she said. "Alone."
Elior nodded, though every instinct screamed to hold her closer.
"Okay."
She hesitated, then leaned forward and pressed her forehead to his.
"Thank you for not controlling me," she whispered.
He closed his eyes.
"Thank you for trusting me enough to choose."
She pulled away.
Walked toward the door.
Then stopped.
Turned back.
"Elior?"
"Yes?"
Her voice was steady—but her eyes were fierce with emotion.
"Whatever I decide… promise me one thing."
"Anything."
"Don't close yourself because of this."
The plea cut deep.
"I won't," he said. "I promise."
Mira nodded.
Then she left.
Elior stood alone in the café, the space around him suddenly vast.
He didn't know whether he had just saved love—or let it slip through his fingers.
All he knew was that for the first time, he hadn't chosen fear.
His phone buzzed in his pocket.
A message.
From Mira.
He hesitated—
Then looked.
And felt his heart stop.
🌑 End of Chapter Forty