Behind him, where he couldn't see, my eyes snapped open.
My phone buzzed nonstop. Earlier that day, I'd slipped into his group chat using a burner account.
Zane had sent a message：
「Bros, what do I do? That whole thing today was Eva testing me. The tampon was hers. She blew up and turned down the proposal.」
The chat exploded：
「Dude, that's cold! One little move and she had all of us fooled. How is she that calculating?」
「What'd she say? Just flipped out and refused the engagement? After everything you've given her for eight years?」
Zane replied, tone dripping with self-pity：
「It was also because of the message Norma Stewart sent……」
A pink My Melody avatar popped up and dropped a tongue-out sticker.
「Sooorry, I was just worried about you! How was I supposed to know your little wifey was watching that closely?」
I tapped into her profile. The suggestive photo on her page matched the one from the "wrong" message perfectly.
It was never sent to the wrong person. Just at the wrong time.
My fingers clenched the phone until my knuckles went white, and pain spread through my chest like a thousand tiny needles.
Zane followed up：
「It's fine. I'm giving her the cold shoulder. She can only keep up the attitude for one night. By morning she'll come crawling back.」
「She's worthless and desperate to get married. She'd hand over everything she owns just to lock me down.」
A bitter laugh escaped me, and my vision blurred.
Eight years ago, we met at a campus job fair. Both of us too broke to scrape together a dollar between us, desperate for any job that would put food on the table.
We were competing for the same position, but when he heard my stomach growl,
he stepped aside and let me have it.
I knew HR had preferred a male candidate, so I bought him a bowl of ramen to make up for it.
Two people eating hot noodles in the early hours of a spring morning. Hearts tend to close the distance on their own.
Later, when he moved up north for a better opportunity, I gave him every penny I'd saved from work.
He stood there holding those few thousand dollars, eyes glistening, and swore he'd build us a future.
A few years passed. He landed a position at a top tech company and climbed the ranks, one promotion after another.
But my father fell seriously ill. By the time he was on his deathbed, Zane hadn't made it in time to say goodbye.
I cried until I couldn't breathe, and told him my father's last wish was for the two of us to stay together.
Wrapped in Zane's arms, I'd cried so hard I could barely open my eyes.
“Zane, I have nothing left. My mom walked out on me when I was a kid, and now my dad's gone too. You can't leave me.”
His broad shoulders held me so tight it hurt, and he kept repeating：
“I won't leave you……I won't.”
All I remembered thinking back then was that I had to fulfill my father's dying wish.
But now Zane's heart had moved on, and those promises were nothing but cheap chains.
Tears dropped one by one onto the screen. I didn't confront him. I just closed the phone in silence.
Zane had guessed wrong. I wasn't desperate to get married anymore. And I didn't need him anymore either.
The next morning, we sat across from each other with nothing to say.
As we headed out, Zane held the umbrella toward me out of habit.
I didn't take it. I grabbed my bag, walked out the door, and behind me his ‘be careful out there’ died somewhere between his throat and his eyes.
Once I was at my desk and had settled in, I went straight to my director and submitted an application for the overseas transfer.
The company had wanted to send me abroad last year for a posting at a branch office in a region that needed my language skills.
My college major was in foreign languages. I'd graduated top of my class.
Back then, I'd turned it down without a second thought so I could take care of Zane.
Now that his heart belonged to someone else, there was no reason to stay for him.
The moment I submitted the application, a message popped up from a mutual friend of ours.
