Maybe this Time

Chapter 2

The commissioner seemed to ponder for a few seconds before finally asking.

"Are you alright?"

Ilgaz frowned impatiently.

"Why wouldn't I be?" The prosecutor asked in an unusually curt voice.

Eren narrowed his eyes with equal shares of exasperation and disapproval.

"You can't seriously expect me to believe you didn't feel anything when you saw her again," the commissioner reproached him. "After everything you've been through the last two years, how could that be possible?"

Ilgaz glared at Eren. He wanted to formulate a convincing answer that made his friend drop the subject, but his prolonged silence and atypical sulking only confirmed Eren's suspicion.

Ilgaz had always been a terrible liar; now, it was no different. The prosecutor knew exactly what Eren was insinuating and couldn't hide his discomfort about the situation.

Ilgaz took a deep breath and turned his head toward his office window to gaze outside before exhaling slowly. Two years ago, the woman he loved had walked out of his life abruptly and unexpectedly.

The beginning of the end had come with the discovery of Zafer Erguvan's death and then with the revelation of Çinar and Metin's involvement in the mess. Ilgaz and Ceylin had stumbled across a vast abyss that had served to put them on opposite sides for the first time since they'd met.

The heavy emotional burden of their families becoming enemies had proved severe enough to eventually culminate in their separation.

Ilgaz was not an impulsive person. He had never been comfortable making decisions on the spur of the moment, hence why proposing marriage to Ceylin without much deliberation had been one of the most unsettling things he had ever done.

But nothing compared to how difficult it had been to agree to divorce her.

Ilgaz suspected that he already had feelings for the audacious lawyer by the time he suggested they got married to save her license. But when they broke up, Ilgaz was sure he had never loved anyone so intensely.

Ceylin had been like a hurricane in his life. She had turned his world upside down, disrupted the status quo of his existence, and made him question the way he viewed everything around him.

The lawyer had challenged him as no one had ever dared to do. She had enchanted him and filled his life with color, but she had also drowned Ilgaz in pain and suffering when she suddenly decided to move to another city.

But even after all this time, Ilgaz didn't hold it against her.

He was still haunted by the blistering pain he'd seen on Ceylin's face two years ago when he'd informed her that he could no longer stay in their new house. Ilgaz had done so because he knew that if they forced themselves to stay together, the damage to their feelings could be even more significant.

At that moment, Ceylin was facing many losses simultaneously, and the pain was clouding her vision. She couldn't dissociate those around her from the trauma she'd endured. Ilgaz knew she needed to let go of everything to gain a new perspective and finally process her emotions. It wouldn't be easy or fast. But it was the only way.

If Ilgaz could go through the painful process of coping in her place, he would. But if Ceylin wanted to get rid of her demons, she would have to face and defeat them herself.

And Ilgaz hadn't doubted for a second that she could.

He'd agreed to divorce Ceylin because he didn't want her to feel trapped, forced to face and overcome so much pain and loss by his side just because they'd signed their names on a piece of paper. Not if seeing his face every day would only remind her of her loss, and increase her pain. Their marriage hadn't started in the most orthodox way, so it was unfair to expect Ceylin to honor the vows she hadn't really meant when she'd made them, even if somewhere along the way, their feelings had transcended any sense of obligation that the formal union implied.