Watching the way Luke stood there, so certain I could never actually go through with leaving him, I suddenly lost the urge to tell him my decision outright.
If the day came when he realized I was truly walking away, what kind of face would he make?
So I agreed to go look at wedding dresses with him. Partly to avoid tipping him off, partly to give the woman I'd been for the last nine years some kind of closure.
After all, the old me really had waited for this day for so very long.
The lighting in the bridal salon was soft and dreamlike.
Luke stood beside me in a perfectly tailored suit, slowly merging with the groom I'd pictured in a thousand imagined weddings.
He'd booked out the entire salon. At this hour, it was just the two of us.
He picked out dresses for me with endless patience, leaning down now and then to ask,
“Do you like this one? Or do you want to try that mermaid cut? I think you look beautiful in anything.”
His tone was as gentle as it had always been.
I studied the line of his profile. Nearly thirty now, and still handsome, still magnetic. No wonder Lola had fallen for him the very day they first met in person.
I said nothing. I simply changed into the gown I'd loved for years.
Standing before the mirror, I froze for a moment. The woman looking back at me was beautiful in a way that felt almost like a stranger.
Luke was clearly struck too. He walked up slowly behind me and wrapped his arms around me from behind.
“Baby, I'm finally going to marry you. I'm so happy.”
In the mirror, I saw the faint red rimming his eyes.
In that instant, he overlapped with the boy from my memory, the one whose heart and eyes held nothing but me. As if nothing had ever changed.
But I knew. Some things had changed long ago.
Luke looked at me, earnest.
“Baby, we're going to be together forever. We'll have our own home, our own children. We'll be happy for the rest of our lives.”
“Haven't you always wanted to marry me more than anything? I promise, I will never let you down.”
I pulled at the corner of my mouth and said softly,
“Mm. Is that so?”
But the man I'd wanted to marry was always the Luke who put me first.
Not this one, the one whose mouth was full of lies, who had fallen in love with someone else behind my back.
I only wanted to leave him.
Never to see him again.
Just then, the drink Luke had ordered arrived. He handed it to me with a smile.
“Your favorite, mango milk. Go on, taste it.”
I looked down at the cup, paused, and didn't take it. I set it on the table instead.
Luke seemed about to say something when his phone rang.
The contact name read Little Moon.
He picked up almost instantly.
I couldn't hear what was said on the other end, but Luke's brow knotted at once.
Already moving toward the door, he said to me in a hurry,
“Baby, if you like the dress, keep it. Something urgent just came up at the company. I need to go deal with it.”
I nodded, flat. “Understood.”
Luke had already reached the doorway. The person on the line seemed to still be crying, and he lowered his voice to soothe them.
“Don't do this, don't hurt yourself. We'll go to Iceland, I promise. We'll go right away, all right?”
Looking at his retreating back, I don't know why, but I suddenly couldn't stop myself from reaching out and catching the hem of his jacket.
Luke turned, reflexively covering the phone's mouthpiece, his brow creasing.
“Maya, don't be difficult. There's a real emergency at work. I'll be back soon.”
With that, he pushed my hand away without a second of hesitation and left.
I stood where I was, still wearing the gown that cost a small fortune, the woman in the mirror like a princess waiting to be wed.
I said quietly to the attendant,
“Help me out of the dress. We won't be keeping this one.”
I pointed at the drink on the table.
“I haven't touched this. You can have it.”
Once I'd changed back into my own clothes, I left the bridal salon alone.
Luke, when was it that you forgot?
I'm not the one who likes mango milk. I'm allergic to mango.
In the second year we were together, I ended up in the ER after eating mango by mistake. That day Luke kept watch at my bedside, his eyes red from crying, gripping my hand and swearing,
“Maya, I'm so afraid of losing you.”
For a long time after that, he cared more than anyone about every single thing that passed my lips.
So this is what happens once love goes bad. Even the things once carved into the bone get forgotten.
The city blazed with light through the lively night, and human feeling was such a small thing inside all of it.
My phone buzzed.
I looked down. The last shareholder who'd been holding out had finally bought up the rest of the shares in my hands.
The two million from back then had turned into ten million. So I hadn't lost out, at least.
At the same moment, a message came through from Luke.
“Baby, head home first. Things here are a little tricky. I have to take a business trip.”
“Don't worry, I'll definitely be back before the wedding in three days.”
I looked at the message and thought,
Luke, we aren't getting married.
I opened that secret online forum trail directly. 【Little Moon】 had just posted an update.
Two photos of plane tickets to Iceland.
The caption read,
“He's taking me to Iceland to hold a wedding that belongs to us. One last selfish wish. I don't want to leave any regrets behind.”
“Even if I have to threaten to die for it, I'll carve out a place in his heart that can never be erased.”
I wasn't surprised. I simply went home, calm, dragged out my suitcase, said goodbye to Chloe, and then headed to the airport alone.
Waiting at the gate late that night, the forum updated again. This time it was a video posted by 【Little Sun】.
Maybe they'd never imagined anyone would find it. The video wasn't even blurred out.
In the footage, Luke held Lola's hands, one in a tuxedo, one draped in a veil.
There, between the vast, pure expanse of Iceland's earth and sky, before a priest as witness, they spoke their wedding vows.
They embraced and kissed, and Lola even left an unmistakable bite mark at the corner of Luke's lips.
The boarding call came over the speakers. I wiped away the tears that had slipped from my eyes at some point I hadn't noticed.
It was all over.
Luke. Lola.
You don't have to go to all that trouble staging some fake wedding.
If you want to be the most unforgettable person in each other's lives, then go and be it.
As for whether Luke actually loved Lola, or just craved the thrill before marriage, I no longer cared to dig into it.
Whoever it was he truly loved, it had nothing to do with me anymore.
From the moment I saw that post, we were already finished.
There would be no tenth year for us.
I screen-recorded the entire post and saved it, keeping every piece of evidence.
Then I deleted every photo on my phone that had anything to do with Luke, and blocked every way of reaching him and Lola.
Finally, I screenshotted the last line of the acceptance email from the Canadian firm and posted it to my social media feed.
“Ms. Henson, welcome aboard. Here's to the start of a brand-new chapter in your life.”
