I turned and went back into the bedroom, locking the door tight.
Outside, his voice came, impatient.
"Can you try to be reasonable? All I did was look after Marcia. Do you have to threaten me with a breakup every single time?"
"We're getting married next month. Stop being so childish."
"I'm keeping the porridge warm for you. Remember to come out and eat."
I didn't answer. I pulled the blanket over my head and cried, pressing the sound down so he wouldn't hear.
The next morning, for the first time in ages, a post from Landon popped up in my feed.
It was a photo of him and Marcia sitting side by side in the car, watching the sunrise together.
So he hadn't come home all night.
The car was packed with snacks and drinks of every kind.
I used to imagine it so many times, the two of us driving off somewhere far, watching a sunrise together.
But in all the time we'd been together, I'd sat in his car exactly twice.
The first time, my blood sugar dropped and I ate one piece of candy in the car.
He threw me out on the spot, saying no food in the car, it would leave a smell.
The second time, I forgot to sanitize first, and Marcia got carsick.
It was pouring rain that day, and he still had the heart to leave me on the side of the road.
But now Marcia was eating in his car, and somehow his germaphobia didn't apply.
Numbly, I liked the post and left a comment: "Wishing you two a long and happy life together."
The next second, the post was deleted.
A moment later, his voice call came through.
"Naomi, let me explain. Marcia posted that last night when I wasn't paying attention."
"She and I only watched the sunrise. I was helping her with her anxiety. Nothing happened."
I let out a low laugh.
"Landon, your germaphobia only ever applies to me. Never to Marcia. Am I right?"
The line went silent at once.
Marcia grabbed the phone and apologized to me.
"Naomi, Landon and I really are just friends now."
"He told me you like porridge. Let me make some tonight, as my way of apologizing to you. Okay?"
I wanted to refuse, but then I saw the transfer notice on my phone, with only one day left on it.
This was my chance to end things with Landon for good, face to face.
After I hung up, she sent me an address.
Looking at that familiar address, my nose stung.
The villa she lived in was less than five hundred meters from Landon's company.
And that villa was the one I'd spent most of last year crossing half the city to find.
At the time, Landon told me he was going to buy it and give it to me as a twenty-fifth birthday present.
Except in the end the place got reserved by someone else.
So it wasn't reserved at all. He'd just given it to someone else.
By the time I reached Marcia's place, I thought I'd braced myself for it.
But once I was inside, I still stood there at the entrance, silent.
Compared to our home, with its constant smell of disinfectant, there wasn't a single odd smell here.
A matching pair of his-and-hers slippers sat by the door, black and white, and on the sink stood a matching set of couple's cups.
And the wall right past the entrance was covered with photos of the two of them.
Cherry blossoms below the Rockies, the aurora spilling across the Arctic sky, a wooden boat on the slow rivers of New England.
They'd traveled all the most romantic places in the world.
While Landon and I had been together three years, and the farthest we'd ever gone was the amusement park downtown.
All because he said he had germaphobia.
Landon hurried over to block the photo wall, explaining in a rush.
"Those are all old photos, from before we broke up."
"If it bothers you, I'll have her move out right away. I'll take you to take photos like these later."
I shook my head and said calmly,
"It doesn't matter anymore. I don't want anything of yours now."
He froze.
"Naomi, you've gotten hooked on the drama, haven't you?"
"We're getting married next month. Do you have to pick a fight with me every single day?"
He came to my side to comfort me, and I pushed him straight away.
"Don't come near me. I told you. You're too dirty."
