The night before Valentine's Day, I crossed two thousand miles to surprise my long-distance boyfriend, Miles Gilbert.
The moment I rang the doorbell, a stranger answered.
When she saw me, her face lit up with sudden understanding.
"Oh, you must be the cleaner Miles called! Come in, come in."
She stepped aside, waving me through. "I kept telling him I could tidy up myself, but he insisted. Said he didn't want me getting tired, so he had to hire someone."
The moment I stepped inside, the smell of home hit me—lived-in, intimate, unmistakably shared.
My eyes swept the room and froze on the photo hanging in the center of the wall.
The girl was gazing up at a sky full of falling snow, and Miles—my Miles—was looking only at her. The tenderness in his eyes was so raw, so unguarded, it burned.
She followed my gaze and smiled softly.
"That was from our trip together. He promised to take me everywhere—said he wants to show me the whole country."
My fingers curled into my palms. Something tightened around my chest, squeezing until I couldn't breathe.
Miles had always been so cold with me. Reserved. Distant.
I never knew he was capable of looking at someone like that.
——
On the flight here, I'd let myself imagine this moment a hundred times.
Would he pull me into his arms? Would his eyes go soft with surprise? Would he scold me gently for traveling so far just to see him?
But those daydreams shattered the second she opened the door.
When I didn't move, she grabbed my wrist and tugged me toward the bedroom, rattling off instructions as we walked.
"Make sure you really scrub this rug—my boyfriend and I like to lie here and soak up the sun."
"Oh, and be careful with that ceramic piece. We brought it back from our first trip together."
I followed her numbly, but the moment we reached the closet, my whole body went rigid.
A row of matching couple's outfits hung in perfect order, mocking me.
I used to beg Miles for matching clothes. He always wrinkled his nose and said, "Aren't we a little old for that? It's childish."
So why wasn't it childish with her?
In the dressing room, she pointed to the center of the jewelry case, her tone suddenly serious.
"Be extra careful with that bracelet. Don't knock it or let it fall."
My gaze dropped to the bracelet she was pointing at.
The air left my lungs.
It was identical to the one on my wrist.
The memory slammed into me—our third anniversary. Miles sliding the bracelet onto my wrist himself, his voice low and certain: "This is a Gilbert family heirloom. It only goes to the woman I'm going to marry."
Stacy Fox's sharp eyes caught the glint of metal on my arm. Her brow arched.
"Your bracelet looks exactly like mine."
Before I could respond, she let out a small laugh.
"You must have been scammed. There's only one of these—it's been passed down from my boyfriend's grandmother. Anything else out there is just a knockoff."
My throat closed. But I forced the words out anyway, my voice tight.
"What if... yours is the fake?"
The second I said it, I wished I could take it back.
He was living with her. Why would he give her a fake?
I was only fooling myself.
Stacy laughed, light and unbothered.
"That's impossible. His mother gave it to me personally. Why would it be fake?"
His mother.
The words hit like a hammer to the chest, crushing the last fragile thread of hope I'd been clinging to.
Shame and humiliation twisted together, burning behind my eyes. My legs trembled. I wasn't sure how much longer I could stay standing.
