"I'M NOT going," Auden said for the third time, her voice wavering with a conviction that seemed to diminish with each repetition. She moved restlessly around Brigid's kitchen, her footsteps marking time against the worn wooden floors while her friend prepared dinner. It seemed, no matter how hard Auden tried, Brigid would not sway against her dramatics. "It's ridiculous. I barely know him."

"Which is exactly why you should go." Brigid's hands moved in steady rhythm, the knife finding its way through onions with ease. Around them, the aromatics of garlic and herbs made Auden's stomach rumble. But Brigid didn't look up, and Auden caught the faint smile tugging at the corners of her mouth. "When's the last time you did something spontaneous?"

Auden paused mid-step, her reflection caught in the darkened window that looked out onto the narrow street below. When had she last done anything that wasn't planned, weighed, considered from every angle until all the joy had been extracted from it? The woman staring back at her looked tired, joy scooped out by an invisible spoon that symbolized the liminal space between being married and wanting a divorce.

She huffed, "I don't do spontaneous."

"I know. And that's the problem." Brigid set down her knife with finality and turned to face Auden. Her eyes held a combination of affection and exasperation that had only ever come from years of watching her make the same mistakes over and over again. "Look, when you're not with Kittie, you mope around here, going between the gallery and this flat like you're in some sort of prison. One evening out won't kill you."

The words stung because they were true. Auden had been existing rather than living, moving through her days like someone going through motions she no longer remembered choosing.

"Come with me then." The plea slipped out before she could stop it — the same desperate request she'd been imploring with Brigid since Auden's world felt like it was on the verge of collapse.

"No."

"Brigid —"

"No." The refusal was swift and final. Brigid stepped closer, reaching out to still Auden's restless hands. Her friend's touch was warm, grounding. It was a reminder of all the times Brigid had been her anchor when everything else shifted like sand.

But even this felt different. This felt like being pushed toward the edge of a cliff she wasn't ready to jump from.

"This isn't about me guiding you through every social interaction. Besides," she smiled wickedly, her eyes dancing with mischief, "you think he's cute."

Auden felt heat bloom across her cheeks, betraying what she'd been trying so hard to deny even to herself. "I'm married."

"You're separated." Brigid's voice softened, but her words carried the uncomfortable truth as her touch melted away. "And that didn't stop Cillian when he was with Jenni and getting with you in the end, did it?"

The words took root between them like seeds scattered on fertile ground, each one sprouting tendrils of memory. They were years of decisions pruned and regrown, the wild garden of human longing. Auden felt something bloom sharp in her chest. It was guilt, perhaps, or recognition of the stinging truth that her friend had seen clearly what she'd kept avoiding.

"That was different," Auden whispered, but even as she said it, she knew how fake it sounded.

"Was it?" Brigid raised an eyebrow. "This doesn't have to lead to anything. Just go. Get to know him. Remember what it feels like when someone looks at you and sees possibility instead of damage."

Auden exhaled slowly, "And what if Cillian found out?"

Brigid thought about this for a moment, her lips twisting in concentration. "What's the worst that could happen?" She asked her, "All you can say is that you spent an evening listening to someone talk about something you're interested in. You had a conversation with an intelligent man who also finds you intriguing. It's harmless."

"It still feels wrong," Auden countered.

"Of course it does," her friend replied, leaning against the counter. "You still love Cillian."

Auden's eyes fell to the ground, to the tips of her unpolished toes. It was another small surrender to the gravity of her diminished life and the admission sat heavy in her throat. She had only ever loved Cillian, had built her entire sense of self around being his wife, Catherine's mother, part of something larger than herself. The thought of entertaining another man felt like stepping out of her own skin.

"Aud," Brigid smiled sadly, "Is it a crime to try and remember what it's like to be seen as something other than half of a failing marriage?"

The last words hung in the air like a benediction, or maybe a dare. Regardless, it was all the reminder she needed.

· · ─ ·✶· ─ · ·

An hour later, Auden found herself slipping into the back row of the lecture hall at Trinity. The room, with its vaulted ceilings and almost ancient architecture, was fuller than she'd expected — students packed into tiered seating like eager disciples, some sitting cross-legged on the floor near the front, their faces turned upward in anticipation.

She'd chosen a seat in the far corner, hoping to dissolve into the shadows that pooled there like dark water. The anonymity felt both protective and thrilling, as if she were observing life through glass rather than living it directly.

The air vibrated with incoherent conversations mixed with occasional laughter, and for a moment, Auden was reminded of her younger self.

I'm just another graduate student attending a seminar, she tried convincing herself. But even that sounded like a pipe dream.

Minutes later, Conner took the stage with confidence that seemed to transform the very air around him. Up there, bathed in the warm glow of the lecture hall lights, he was different from the man she'd met at the gallery. Here, he was more rumpled, more magnetic, as if the act of sharing ideas had crystallized something authentic within him. His voice carried clearly through the room as he introduced himself, and she found herself drawn forward despite her intention to remain invisible.

"Tonight I want to share with you some ideas from my latest book, The Sound of Change," he began, as he held up the slim volume briefly — its cover featuring a stark black and white photograph of Belfast murals — before setting it onto the oak podium in front of him. He opened to a marked page, but barely glanced at it, his eyes finding faces in the audience instead.

"Look at Ireland in the 1990s," he continued, one hand gesturing with fluid grace while the other held his book loosely, as if it were simply a prop in a larger performance. "The Troubles are winding down, the Good Friday Agreement is on the horizon, and something extraordinary is happening. Political transformation doesn't just change governments. It transforms how we see ourselves, how we express ourselves, what stories we suddenly have permission to tell."

A student near the front instantly raised her hand, her voice carrying a note of intellectual courage Trinity seemed to cultivate. "But doesn't that suggest culture is just a byproduct of politics? That art is somehow secondary?"

Conner's grin was swift and disarming, the kind of smile that made you feel like you'd just asked exactly the right question.

"Ah, there's the Trinity skepticism I was hoping for." Laughter rippled through the audience, warm and appreciative. "You're absolutely right to push back on that. But here's what I argue in chapter three — " He held up his book briefly before setting it aside entirely, as if the real conversation was more important than any prepared text.

"Culture and politics aren't separate entities dancing around each other. They're lovers in constant embrace, each one leading, each one following, impossible to untangle. When our political landscape shifts, our cultural identity shifts too. But sometimes — and this is crucial — sometimes culture leads the revolution."

Another hand shot up. "Can you give us an example?"

"Absolutely." Conner moved closer to the audience, the charisma oozing off his shoulders, drawing them in like a magnetic field. "Think about Northern Ireland in the mid-90s. The ceasefire has just been declared, but the real peace hasn't been signed yet. You've got this incredible moment where artists — musicians, poets, playwrights — are suddenly free to explore themes that were too dangerous before. Van Morrison starts singing about reconciliation, not just love. The cultural shift creates space for the political breakthrough that follows."

Auden glanced at the crowd, watching a sea of nods, followed by the soft click of keys as some took notes across empty Word documents.  Mentally, she was taking notes herself — not on the topic, but the way Conner addressed the crowd, how he kept them hooked and interested. There was an intimacy to his delivery that made each person in the packed hall feel as though he were speaking directly to them, sharing insights rather than lecturing from on high.

"One more question and I'll have to continue," he said as hands began to rise throughout the room, "otherwise Trinity's going to charge me rent for this hall, and trust me, I don't want to be washing dishes in the Buttery until 2030." The room erupted in genuine laughter, and he flashed that disarming grin again. "Though I hear the shepherd's pie isn't terrible."

"You talk about cultural courage," a voice called from the middle of the hall. "But what about cultural responsibility? Don't artists have an obligation to their communities?"

Conner paused, and in that moment of consideration, Auden saw the thoughtful man she'd met earlier that day, the one beneath the public persona. "That's the question that keeps me up at night," he said finally, his honesty cutting through any pretense. "And it's exactly why I wrote this book. Because I think the relationship between art and responsibility is more complicated than either the purists or the activists want to admit."

The next forty minutes passed like water through cupped hands, too quickly and leaving her somehow thirsty for more. When he wrapped up to enthusiastic applause that seemed to echo off of every surface, several students rushed forward with copies of his book clutched in their hands. Auden watched him sign them, polite gratitudes falling from his lips as he took his time to chat with each person.

She could leave now, slip away before he noticed her presence, return to Brigid's flat with the safe story of an evening spent listening to academic discourse. Should leave now, before whatever fragile equilibrium she constructed around her solitude could be disturbed. Instead, she found herself moving against the current of departing students, drawn forward by curiosity and the pull of possibility.

He looked up as she approached, and his face transformed with surprised delight, as if she were an unexpected gift. "Well, well. Auden. This is a surprise."

The way he said her name made something flutter low in her stomach. She tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. "Hello."

"I have to admit," Conner said, tilting his head towards her as his attention drifted away from his expectant readers. "I didn't think you'd actually come."

"Curiosity, I suppose." She waited while he finished signing a book for a young woman who couldn't have been older than nineteen, her eyes bright with fascination. It made her smile. "That was amazing, by the way. Really engaging."

"Thanks. Though I suspect you say that to all the academics who stumble into your gallery uninvited."

"Only if it's true."

The words slipped out before she could stop them, and she felt heat creep up her neck like rising tide. But Conner's smile widened, and she saw something shift in his eyes — a recognition of the game they'd begun to play.

He excused himself from the dissipating crowd of students.

"Careful now," Conner murmured as he drew closer. "Flattery will get you everywhere."

As the last few students drifted away, they were left alone in the emptying lecture hall. The easy banter from a moment before seemed to evaporate, replaced by something heavier, more charged. The silence stretched between them, taut as a wire, thrumming up and down Auden's spine.

Conner cleared his throat, eyes moving from her face to the podium he scarcely used. He began packing his laptop, shoving it into a cloth bag. "I was just going to grab a pint. Care to join me?"

This was the moment. The precise point where she should make her excuses, thank him for an enlightening evening, and retreat into her self-inflicted temporary exile. Yet, she heard herself saying, "Yes. All right," as if the words belonged to someone else entirely.

Conner took her to a pub near campus. It was a shrine to student life —  dim lighting that softened harsh edges, floors made sticky by decades of spilled beers mixing with cigarette ash. The wooden tables were worn, their uneven surfaces leveled by stacks of coasters beneath their legs. They found a corner away from the loudest group of undergraduates, a small island of relative quiet in the sea of energy.

"So," Conner sighed, settling into his chair with a pint of Guinness that gleamed like dark silk in the amber light. The foam clung to the glass in perfect scallops, and Auden found herself momentarily mesmerized by such simple beauty. "I have to ask. What made you actually show up tonight? And don't say curiosity again."

Auden took a sip of her wine, which was probably a mistake, given that she'd barely eaten dinner, and already she could feel it spreading through her bloodstream. Liquid courage, she thought to herself.

"Maybe I wanted to see if you were as insufferable in front of a crowd as you were in my gallery."

"Insufferable?" Conner chuckled, tongue licking the foam that settled across his upper lip. "I think I remember your friend using the word 'charming' earlier."

"Ah," Auden spun the stem of her wine glass, watching the red liquid swirl against the spotted glass. "Yes, Brigid likes to exaggerate on my behalf."

"So that's what we're labeling it as — a simple exaggeration," Conner leaned back in his seat with a soft chuckle, palms sliding down to his lap. "And what was your verdict?"

"Still deciding."

She was met with louder laughter — the sound rich and unguarded in her ears. Inside her, something loosened in her chest like a knot being gently teased apart. When was the last time she'd flirted with someone? Actually flirted, not just made polite conversation at gallery openings or the stilted topics at dinner parties with Cillian's investors, where every word felt full with expectation and judgment.

As if he could read her mind, Conner spoke again.

"Does your husband know where you are this evening?"

The question hit her like cold water, washing away her small moment of feeling completely disconnected from her past self. Conner leaned forward slightly, his expression becoming more serious, shadows playing across the planes of his face. The directness of it caught her completely off guard.

"I mean," Conner recovered quickly, noticing the way her smile fell. "I may have done a bit of research after meeting you this morning. Hard not to, really. Your husband's quite prominent."

"You've been googling me?" The words came out sharper than she intended, defensive in a way that revealed more than she wanted to admit.

"Celebrated actor marries a woman who is virtually unknown. She then becomes an owner of one of Dublin's most lucrative galleries. It's all very impressive on paper." He took a long sip of his Guinness, watching her over the rim with eyes that seemed to see more than she was comfortable revealing. "But I'm curious about what the internet isn't telling me."

There was a moment of silence where Auden's fingers tightened imperceptibly around her wine glass. She could practically see the search results scrolling through his mind — the same ones that appeared whenever anyone typed her name: Cillian Murphy's wife spotted at premiere, Gallery owner Auden keeps low profile, Who is the mysterious American who captured the Peaky Blinders star's heart?

All those breathless articles that reduced her to a footnote in someone else's story, burying her decade of work beneath speculation about her marriage and grainy paparazzi photos.
She took a measured sip of her wine, the bitterness settling on the roof of her mouth as she bought herself time to choose her words.

"I grew up in Chicago," she told him finally. "Moved to Dublin when I was twenty-eight." She paused, the reality of what she wasn't saying — her father's death, the way grief had made staying in Chicago feel impossible — settling between them. "The rest kind of just happened."

The understatement hung in the air. Just happened. As if marrying Cillian had been a strategic move rather than falling unexpectedly, messily in love with a man who could somehow make her legs weak and make her eyes wet with a single look.

She met Connor's gaze directly. "The internet has a way of flattening people into digestible narratives, doesn't it? Much easier to write about who someone married rather than what they've actually accomplished."

Their silence was met with music from speakers above. Some pop song ballad about being young and going out to clubs. Conner scratched the side of his face, nails grazing the stubble of his jawbone.

"I wasn't trying to imply anything," he told her.

Auden exhaled slowly, tossing her hair of her shoulder as she placed her elbows on the table. Her index finger found a water stain — a perfect circle where a glass used to be — and traced the faint lines as something shifting inside her chest like tectonic plates finding new alignment. "You knew who I was married to before we met, didn't you?"

Conner nodded slowly, his eyes never leaving her face. "You caught me."

"Cillian and I..." She paused, eyeing him. "We're separated right now."

She was met with the faintest curl of his lips. "Separated," Conner echoed. "That sounds vaguely complicated."

"It is," Auden replied. "And I trust you'll keep it quiet — for business purposes."

"Auden,"  Conner began quietly, his voice carrying a sincerity that made her shoulders relax slightly. "I couldn't give a fuck about business right now. I only asked about your marriage because I wanted to know where my possibilities with you lie."

The boldness of the statement should have shocked her. Instead, despite everything — despite the wreckage of her marriage, the uncertainty of her future, the wine making everything feel both sharper and softer — Auden laughed.

"And your verdict?"

His smile was slow and confident, spreading across his face like sunrise. In that moment, sitting in the golden half-light of the pub with this man who looked at her as if she were something worth discovering, Auden felt her stomach curl in anticipation for his answer.

"I'm beginning to like my chances."

Auden reached for her wine, downing the rest in a single gulp. It slid down the back of her throat like butter, settling into her body in a cascade of warmth. She swiped the corners of her mouth with the pad of her thumb as she replied, "I would have to agree with you."

The air between them seemed to thicken as Auden set down her empty glass, her thumb still lingering at the corner of her mouth. Connor's eyes followed the movement, his gaze dropping to her lips before meeting her eyes.

"Good," he said, his voice rougher now. "You're not what I expected, Auden."

"What did you expect?"

"Someone less..." He paused, his eyes searching her face as if trying to decode some essential truth written there. "Less real, I suppose. Less alive."

Less real. Less alive.

Suddenly she was with Cillian again — not in this shitty college bar, but in his old apartment. In that tiny bathroom after he had officially divorced Jenni, attempting to take all his pain and making it her own so he could no longer have to bare it all.

I just need to know that you're here with me. That this is real for you, she had said.

You're the only real thing I have, he had told her.

The memory crystallized with painful clarity: how those same words had made her feel chosen, special, like she possessed some rare quality worth coveting. How she'd leaned into that identity, that role of being his touchstone to something genuine in a world of artifice.

And now here was Connor, different man, almost different decade, but the same fascination with her supposed authenticity. The same way of looking at her as if she were something precious only he'd discovered, something real to collect.

Her stomach turned, no longer with desire now but with a sick recognition. Was this what she did? Drew men in with this promise of being unguarded, unperformed? Was this her unconscious pattern — to be the escape from other people's complicated lives, the breath of fresh air, the real thing?

The pub suddenly felt suffocating. The golden light that had seemed warm moments before now felt harsh, exposing. She could feel Connor watching her expectantly, waiting for her to be flattered by his assessment, to lean into this familiar dynamic.

Instead, all she could think about was how Cillian had said almost exactly the same thing, and how that story had ended.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

"I should go," she said suddenly, the words cutting through the comfortable intimacy they'd built like a blade through silk. She glanced at her watch, though time had become an abstract concept somewhere during their round of drinks. "It's getting late."

She saw something flicker across his face — disappointment and frustration at a conversation cut short just as it was reaching its peak. But he nodded with the grace of someone who understood the difference between what we want and what we can have.

"Of course. Let me walk you to your car."

"I took the bus."

"Then let me call you a taxi."

"I can manage." Even as she said it, she knew she was being stubborn, maintaining her independence out of habit more than necessity.

"I know you can. But humor me."

Outside the pub, the air bit at her cheeks painfully, even against the alcohol in her system. Connor raised his hand to hail a passing taxi, and Auden watched his profile in the streetlight — the sharp line of his jaw, the way his breath misted in the cold. There was something almost protective in the gesture, something that should have felt comforting.

Instead, it only deepened the unease that had settled in her chest like a stone.

The taxi pulled to the curb. Connor opened the door for her, his hand briefly touching the small of her back as she moved past him. The contact was light, innocent, but it sent an unwelcome shiver through her that had nothing to do with the cold.

"Thank you," she said, settling into the backseat. Through the open door, she could see Connor's face clearly — concerned, attentive, waiting to make sure she was safely on her way.

Again, she heard the words: You're the only real thing I have.

They echoed in her mind as she gave the driver Brigid's address. Connor stepped back from the curb, hands sliding into his pockets, and she caught his small wave as the taxi pulled away.

Auden pressed her back against the worn leather seat and closed her eyes. The revelation from the pub still fluid, this uncomfortable recognition of a pattern she'd never consciously noticed before. But beneath that was something else, something harder to name.

She thought of Connor's hand on her back, the way he'd looked at her across the table, the attention he'd paid to her words. It should have felt good to be seen that way, desired that way. And it had, for a moment.

So why did she feel like she was betraying something? Not Cillian — they were separated, after all, and whatever loyalty she owed him had been fractured months ago. This felt more personal, more internal. As if by allowing herself to be charmed by Connor's attention, by letting him call her a taxi and guide her to the curb, she was somehow diminishing herself.

The taxi turned onto Brigid's street, and Auden opened her eyes. The feeling nagged at her, pulling apart pieces of her brain relentlessly, this sense that she'd crossed some invisible line she hadn't even known was there. She couldn't quite place what it was, only that something fundamental had shifted tonight, and she wasn't sure she understood what it meant.