The Butcher

by Jennifer Hillier

He’d always put his career before his relationship with Sam, but could anyone blame him? He’d had an incredible wave of success for someone so young. But here was the thing . . . he missed her. He missed her in a way he didn’t think was possible. He missed her laugh, he missed her smile, he missed her face. Sam had always been there for him, always doting on him, always so proactive about making sure they had plans to see each other, always thinking up fun things for them to do. But in the last few weeks, she had stopped all that. She hadn’t been around at all. She wasn’t interested in his reality show. She’d stopped coming by the restaurant to say hello. She hadn’t slept over at his place in weeks, not since he’d moved into the Chief’s old house. Other than that weird night when she’d snuck into his house only to catch him watching a porno, she seemed completely uninterested in his life. And he hated it. Because he realized now that he’d been taking her for granted, and that his life seemed less somehow without her in it.