---- Chapter 25 Michael's disillusionment with Serena grew daily. She made no effort to find work, expecting him to provide for her and Mikey, even as his financial situation became dire. Her days were spent shopping online with the last of his dwindling credit, or complaining about the shabbiness of the small apartment they'd been forced to move into. He'd find himself staring at her, wondering how he could ever have found her attractive, how he'd mistaken her manipulative ploys for vulnerability. Nostalgic flashbacks of Liv became more frequent, more painful. Liv, bringing him soup when he was sick. Liv, listening patiently to his endless startup pitches, offering insightful advice. Liv, her face glowing as she told him she was pregnant. The contrast between those memories and the current reality with Serena was a constant torment. Serena, sensing his withdrawal, his growing regret, would try to reel him back in. Her methods were crude, usually involving manipulative sexual advances or tearful accusations that he didn't love her or their son. "You're thinking about her again, aren't you?" she'd hiss, her ---- eyes narrowed. "You'll never get her back, Michael. She's gone. You have me. You have Mikey. Isn't that enough?" It wasn't. It was a suffocating trap Sometimes, she would use Mikey as a pawn, withholding him or threatening to leave if Michael didn't comply with her wishes. He passively accepted her blackmail, too exhausted, too broken to fight. But a dawning suspicion about her true character, about the depths of her deception, began to stir. Her story about the "tragic loss" of her previous partner, the one that had initially elicited his sympathy - it felt increasingly hollow, rehearsed. He was trapped in a nightmare of his own making, and the woman beside him was not a comfort, but a tormentor.