IAN'S POV

"Love," she replied, and I was still too stunned. My thoughts raced back to a time not too long ago when she didn’t even have a boyfriend, and now, suddenly, she was married. I hadn’t been gone for more than a few months. How could something so monumental have happened in such a short period?

I tried to steady myself, but the words spilled out before I could stop them. “So, who’s the lucky guy?” I asked, my voice carrying more weight than I intended.

“Kyle,” she said, and I froze.

Kyle? I thought, disbelief creeping into my voice. “Kyle? The one you used to fight with constantly? The one you used to hate? I distinctly remember you chasing him around with a shoe in your hand more than once. That Kyle?”

She smiled, a soft, almost nostalgic smile, as if recalling those moments herself. “Yes, that Kyle. I hated him, and the devil knows how much I wanted to send him back to hell. But something changed between us after that ‘all-compulsory doctor’s picnic,’ the one held just after you left. I had no friends besides you, so I was pretty much alone. And then he appeared out of nowhere with the kindest personality I’ve ever seen in the last two years. We talked for hours, and somehow, we got paired up in nearly every game. That picnic made us come a little closer, and after hanging out for a week, I started liking him. He liked me too. One day, he proposed, and without even thinking for a second, I said yes. We dated for a few months, and he proposed again, this time at the hospital, right in front of all the doctors. He made them hold up signs that said ‘Yes,’ and as a result, I said ‘Yes’ too.”

She laughed, the sound light and airy, as if recounting a fairy tale. But all I could feel was the pressure in my chest, tightening with every word she said. Kyle. Out of all people, it had to be Kyle. And just like that, she was gone. My true love, the woman I had secretly planned a future with, had slipped through my fingers, and I didn’t even see it coming.

“And, did you know?” she continued, her voice softening. “He liked me from the day he met me. All that bickering was just his way of staying close. He was too shy to be my friend, so fighting was his only option. But now, everything has turned out perfectly.”

Her eyes drifted to my hand, and her gaze softened. “Oh my God! Are you engaged?”

I blinked, trying to pull myself out of the swirling chaos in my head. My fingers reflexively brushed against the ring that marked my engagement. I smiled, but it felt hollow. “Yes, I am.”

Her eyes sparkled with curiosity and excitement. “So, who’s the lucky girl?”

A sharp breath escaped me before I could correct her. “Well, it’s not a girl. His name is Masimo.”

Her eyes widened, surprise and amusement dancing on her face. “Is he a gangster or something? Who names their kid with such a hot, sexy, but dangerous name these days?” She giggled, and I couldn’t help but chuckle with her, the absurdity of my situation not lost on me.

I was happy for her, truly. After everything she’d been through, she deserved someone to love and be loved by. But God, it hurt. It felt like a thousand tiny shards piercing my heart every time she smiled or mentioned Kyle. This wasn’t how things were supposed to be. I was supposed to be the one to make her smile like that. I was the one who had imagined our future together, our house, our children, our life. And now, all those dreams were slipping through my fingers like sand.

I could feel my heart breaking as we talked. Each sentence she said about Kyle felt like another crack forming, another piece of my soul shattering into tiny fragments. I had spent so long loving her from afar, imagining a life where we were together, only to return and find that everything had changed. She had changed. And in a way, so had I.

This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

But I smiled through it all. I listened as she gushed about her honeymoon in Turkey, how incredible the Turkish people were, and the cute little notes Kyle left on her desk. I nodded along as she told me about their lives, their happiness, and all the tiny details that made her love him even more. And all the while, I couldn’t help but wonder if she even remembered the days we spent together, the memories we had built.

Then, inevitably, she turned the conversation toward me and Masimo.

“So, how did you two meet?” she asked, curiosity bubbling up.

I swallowed hard. How was I supposed to explain this? How could I tell her the truth without shattering her perception of love, marriage, and everything she believed in? I couldn’t. So, I didn’t.

“It was… simple, really,” I started, my voice almost too steady. “We met at a bar. I was out with some friends, and they introduced me to him. It wasn’t love at first sight, at least not for me, but he told me later that when our eyes met, he fell for me instantly.”

I could feel the lie coating my tongue like acid, burning every word I spoke, but I kept going.

“He pursued me relentlessly after that night. We went on a few dates, and eventually, I fell for him too. Not long after, he proposed to me on a yacht, and I said yes.” I forced a smile, trying to make it sound romantic, but inside, I felt nothing but emptiness.

Ol’s eyes sparkled with excitement. “That’s so cute! I’m rooting for you two.”

If only she knew.

We spent the rest of the day catching up, gossiping about hospital life and exchanging stories about the staff. But even as we laughed and joked, I felt a deep, unsettling emptiness in my chest. The more she talked about her life with Kyle, the more I realized just how far apart our lives had drifted.

When she suggested we go on a double date sometime, I could only nod weakly. I wasn’t sure I could handle seeing her with Kyle, knowing that he was the one who made her happy while I was stuck in this twisted situation with Masimo. But I agreed anyway, not wanting to raise suspicion.

The rest of the day passed in a blur, and before I knew it, I was back at Masimo’s mansion. The bodyguard dropped me off at the entrance, and as I stepped inside, the silence of the empty house swallowed me whole.

Masimo had been gone for weeks, traveling for business or locked away in meetings. The only time we spoke was during brief, hurried exchanges when he would pack his bags for yet another trip. It was strange how much I missed him, despite everything. Despite my resentment, my confusion, and the fear that constantly gnawed at me, his absence felt like a gaping void.

I should have been relieved that he was away, that I had time to myself. But instead, every time I walked through the doors of the mansion, I felt a suffocating loneliness settle over me. My mind would wander, thinking about what could have been if things had turned out differently. If I hadn’t been forced into this marriage. If I hadn’t lost Ol to Kyle. If I hadn’t fallen into Masimo’s dangerous world.

And yet, part of me longed for his return, even though I wasn’t sure what I would say to him when he did come back. I hated that I felt this way, that his absence affected me so much. But it did.

Two months passed like this. Two months of pretending everything was fine, of going to work, seeing Ol, and trying to convince myself that I wasn’t falling apart. Masimo let me work full-time at the hospital again, and in those moments, surrounded by the chaos of surgeries and patients, I could almost forget the life I had been dragged into. But the second I came home, the silence would remind me, pulling me back into the reality of my situation.

I started sleeping at my old house sometimes, just to escape the suffocating loneliness of the mansion. I caught up with my brother, spent time with old friends, and tried to keep my life as normal as possible. But even as I went through the motions, the nagging thought in the back of my mind persisted: What if this is all temporary?

Everything felt too perfect, too calm. It was as if I was standing on the edge of something terrible, waiting for the inevitable crash. The quiet before the storm. Masimo’s world wasn’t meant to be calm, and sooner or later, that storm would come.

And when it did, I wasn’t sure I would survive it.