Divorced and Kicked Out: But Wait... He Wants Me Back?

“Sophia, this is the kind of thing you should talk to me about in person.”

That was the last thing he said before adding that he was busy and hanging up.

I didn’t know when my face had gotten wet with tears; it was probably when he called me Sophia.

He only ever called me Sophia when I was throwing a fit and he thought I needed to be coaxed.

He probably figured I was just being a little dramatic, and a little drama could be soothed.

I thought back. The first time he ever called me Sophia, he was drunk.

Later, there was another time—when he secretly met up with his first love. I found out. I hadn’t planned on making a scene; I’d actually been thinking about breaking up, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. And then he kept calling me “Sophia, Sophia” over and over…

So annoying.

I pulled the blanket over my head and fell into a heavy sleep.

When I woke up, it was already afternoon. My head was pounding, and I still wanted to sleep.

But I dragged myself up and scrolled on my phone for a while.

Just as I was about to go back to my long hibernation, a message from Ethan popped up.

I didn’t want to reply. I didn’t even want to look at it.

He’s my ex-husband now. I don’t have to indulge him anymore.

So I buried my face in the pillow and pretended not to hear, not to see, not to care.

“Your phone’s ringing! Babe, your phone’s ringing!…”

It was Ethan calling. I fought with myself for five seconds and still answered.

I’ve never had any real resistance when it comes to Ethan. Olivia always says there’s always something that can tame you, and Ethan is probably the one who tames me.

“Sophia, stop making trouble. It’s time to come home.”

His voice was still as pleasant as ever, like he knew exactly how to play me.

“I left with nothing. That’s your home now, not mine.”

For me to say something that ruthless, Ethan was probably heartbroken by now—or at least, that’s what I liked to imagine.

Ethan’s tone didn’t change at all. “If you come home now, we can pretend that agreement never existed.”

He was as calm as if he were negotiating a business deal. It had always been me, carefully tiptoeing around his emotions in every conversation.

“Ethan, will you tell me a bedtime story tonight?”

He’d never agreed before. It’s not that I didn’t want the divorce; I just wanted to test his limits one last time.

Ethan went silent for a full minute. “Sophia, come back early. Stop making trouble.”

Eight years. I knew he used to tell his first love a bedtime story every single night, but with me, all I ever got was perfunctory answers and rejection—even when I used divorce as the bargaining chip, he still turned me down.

It was just a small thing between a couple.

“I remember you don’t have any business dinners this Thursday morning. Tomorrow at ten, I’ll be waiting for you at the Arlington Civil Affairs Bureau.”

Ethan had never voluntarily reported his schedule to me. If I didn’t ask, he wouldn’t say a word.

It’s not that he couldn’t give a woman a sense of security. He just didn’t want to give it to me.

This time, I was the one who hung up.

I don’t think I’d ever hung up on him first before. It was always him saying he had to go and then cutting the call without a second thought.

This time, I wanted to be the one to end it.

After that call, I couldn’t fall back asleep.

I had to admit he could still affect my mood, but I was too exhausted to even try to put my emotions back in order.

Scenes from the past flashed through my mind like a carousel—I knew I was in for a sleepless night.

At eighteen, na?ve and unworldly, I’d stepped onto campus full of expectations for college life. At the freshman welcome party, I saw him at a glance, and that was the beginning of this doomed entanglement.

From finding a way to get his contact information, to figuring out his hobbies, to engineering “chance” encounters again and again, and then watching him confess to his first love…

The whole time, I felt like both a stranger and a participant, as if I were the only one living through the joy of a secret crush and the soul-tearing pain of heartbreak.

I stopped paying attention to him.