I came across a post on my way home after getting off work.
"Should you pursue someone you like if they already have a girlfriend?"
One reply said, "Of course!"
"Five years ago, I moved. My neighbor was a handsome, brilliant guy, and he already had a girlfriend then."
"I befriended them first, then framed his girlfriend for hurting me, playing weak so he'd pity me. They quickly grew distant."
"Later, they argued constantly. The worst moment was when he came to vent to me, and I kissed him. He instantly lost control."
"And that night, his girlfriend was still devastated about failing her university entrance exam."
"Now I know I made the right call. He's a partner at a listed company, and we're getting married soon. If I hadn’t acted back then, I wouldn’t have this life now."
Then the girl suddenly switched topics: "His ex-girlfriend is done for. She didn’t get into university; she’ll probably stay stuck forever."
I froze on the spot, realizing I was the ex-girlfriend she was talking about.
——
Seeing that comment so proudly describing how she stole someone’s boyfriend, my first instinct was to close the thread.
Because I had lived through the same thing.
But I stopped, because the profile photo was painfully familiar.
It was the first picture of Felicity Miller and William Shaw together, taken by me on William’s birthday.
I stared at that comment for a long time.
Most replies were condemning her, calling her shameless for being a homewrecker.
But a small group agreed with her, saying she simply chose what benefited her most.
"That’s what a true heroine does—securing someone promising early to move up in life; wanting a better future isn’t wrong."
"Even without that, they might not have lasted. I don’t think she did anything wrong."
Just then, I was standing by the roadside when the wind suddenly rose. I stumbled, and my dinner rolled into a muddy puddle.
I bent down and tossed the ruined sandwich into a trash bin.
Actually, I am the ex-girlfriend mentioned in that comment.
Later, William and I broke up. I failed the university exam, and even my beloved mother had an accident.
Back then, I thought of dying more than once. Only in recent years did my life slowly return to normal.
Only then did I realize five years had passed—the fifth year since William and I broke up, and the third year since I finally let go.
The pain and resentment had long faded as the scars on my hands healed, blown away by time.
Once home, I sorted the scattered sketches on my desk.
Just as Felicity had said, I never entered university, and I never had another chance to rise in life.
As I returned the sketches to the cabinet, I suddenly found an old letter.
The handwriting was bold and steady: "To Emily Carter."
At the end, he wrote that he would give me everything he had, yet in the end, I lost everything because of him.
My thoughts were pulled back to the past.
William and I were childhood sweethearts, growing up side by side.
We lived in the same neighborhood, and back then, he had a warm family.
Later, his father’s business expanded, and he came home less and less. He would always run to my house, saying it felt like home, unlike his own.
When he was six, William’s father cheated, and his mother smashed everything overnight, then stopped caring about him altogether.
During the divorce, his parents tossed him around like a burden, without wanting him.
