At our college reunion, I drew Carter Evans’s name in a stupid party game and answered 21 questions about him without missing a single one—including the question nobody expected me to answer aloud.
Chapter 2
Carter was waiting outside the hospital when I came out.
He had purchased another umbrella.
“Get in.”
“No.”
“You look terrible.”
“I’ll manage.”
“Why do you make everything difficult?”
I kept walking.
He followed.
“Are you still angry about the fellowship?”
I stopped.
“Do you seriously think that is why I left?”
“What else?”
The certainty in his voice almost fascinated me.
“I voted for Mia because she needed it more,” he said. “She didn’t have parents helping her. She worked two jobs. You had your mother.”
I stared at him.
“And you had me,” he added.
Something inside my chest went completely silent.
“You really believe that?”
“What?”
“That I had you?”
He rolled his eyes.
“There you go again.”
“I wanted my boyfriend to support me in a fair competition.”
“You always make emotions more important than reality.”
“And you always make mine worth nothing.”
“Sarah—”
“Give me the bracelet.”
He frowned.
“What bracelet?”
“The one my mother gave you.”
His wrist disappeared instinctively beneath his sleeve.
My mother had given Carter a heavy silver bracelet when she learned we were together. Inside, she’d had four words engraved.
To Carter, with love — Mom.
She adored him.
He had been the boy next door who ate dinner at our table after his parents’ divorce. She made him birthday cakes, washed his football uniform, and called him the son she never had.
I had once believed the bracelet meant Carter accepted our relationship even if he refused to say it publicly.
Now I wanted the last part of my mother back.
“Give it to me.”
His expression darkened.
“You’re really doing this?”
“Yes.”
“You want to erase everything?”
I said nothing.
He ripped the bracelet from his wrist.
Then he threw it.
The metal struck my collarbone hard enough to make me gasp before breaking against the pavement.
Carter stared at me.
For half a second, something like regret crossed his face.
Then pride won.
“Are you ever going to stop being dramatic?”
He walked away.
I knelt in the rain gathering pieces of silver.
It was the final gift my mother had ever given him.
And I suddenly understood why people say grief can arrive twice.
The next morning, I returned to the university laboratory.
Before leaving for England, I had stored an old research notebook in my locker. It contained years of trial data, failed formulas, and Carter’s handwritten corrections from when we were young and still believed we were building something together.
The locker was empty.
“Looking for this?”
Mia sat at a workstation holding my notebook.
“Give it back.”
She smiled.
“I was behind when I transferred into the lab. Carter said I could use it.”
Several pages were marked in red.
Others were torn.
I felt my pulse increase.
“That contains my original research.”
“He said you don’t need it anymore.”
I reached for it.
Mia stepped backward into Carter.
He caught her shoulders.
“Careful.”
I looked at him.
“You gave her my notebook?”
“You’ve already graduated from this project.”
“That’s irrelevant.”
“She needed help.”
The familiar explanation.
She needed it.
Therefore mine could be taken.
The fellowship.
My work.
My place beside him.
Everything became available the moment Mia wanted it.
I took the notebook from her.
Then I began tearing out the pages.
Carter’s face changed.
“What the hell are you doing?”
“My property.”
“Stop.”
I tore another page.
“You can’t give it away if it no longer exists.”
Mia’s eyes filled with tears.
“Carter, I didn’t mean—”
“This isn’t your fault,” he told her.
Of course not.
I dropped the final scraps into the trash.
Carter glared at me.
“You used to do anything for me. Now suddenly you’re acting like you’re above everybody?”
I walked away before he saw my eyes filling.
That night, an anonymous university forum post appeared.
It described a woman who had supposedly spent five years obsessively chasing a man who never wanted her. It didn’t use my name, but it identified my academic year, department, hometown, and recent return from England.
Everybody knew.
The comments became cruel within minutes.
Five years and she couldn’t get him to call her his girlfriend?
That’s not romance. That’s stalking.
Somebody check on the poor guy.
Zack commented beneath it.
If you know, you know.
Carter liked his comment.
That hurt more than I expected.
I traced the post through campus network logs.
The device belonged to Mia.
I posted the technical evidence.
My response disappeared.
I reposted.
Deleted again.
I found Carter in the lab.
“Are you removing my posts?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Mia is applying to graduate programs.”
I stared at him.
“Excuse me?”
“This kind of accusation could ruin her future.”
“She posted lies about me.”
“I made her delete the original.”
“After thousands of people saw it.”
“It’ll blow over.”
“People are leaving notes on my apartment door.”
“No one actually hurt you.”
“Carter.”
He turned away.
I grabbed his sleeve.
“What about my future?”
His expression softened for perhaps one second.
Then Mia appeared.
Carter immediately stepped toward her.
“Don’t worry,” he said. “I’m here.”
I’m here.
Three words.
I had waited years to hear them.
Not when classmates mocked me.
Not when my mother was dying.
Not when I sat alone after the funeral.
He had saved those words for Mia.
The day before graduation, Carter and I were scheduled to co-host the university gala.
Public speaking had become one of the few things I genuinely loved. I had practiced for weeks.
An hour before the ceremony, Carter came backstage.
“We need to talk.”
“I don’t.”
He grabbed my wrist.
“Carter.”
He pulled me down a hallway and into an unused lecture room.
Before I understood what he was doing, he stepped outside.
The lock clicked.
I grabbed the handle.
“What are you doing?”
“Mia wants to host.”
I stared through the narrow window.
“You locked me in?”
“You’re already good at this. Missing one gala isn’t going to matter.”
My breath disappeared.
“Mia has dreamed about being on that stage.”
“So have I.”
“You’ll have other opportunities.”
I struck the door with my palm.
“The fellowship didn’t matter. The harassment didn’t matter. My research didn’t matter. Now this doesn’t matter?”
“Stop making a scene.”
Then he walked away.
Minutes later, I heard the opening music.
Mia’s cheerful voice filled the auditorium.
Then Carter’s.
Applause thundered through the building.
I sat on the floor of that locked room and finally cried.
Not because I lost the stage.
Because after five years, I understood something I should have understood much sooner.
Carter didn’t keep choosing Mia by accident.
He chose her because he wanted to.
When the gala ended, somebody unlocked the door.
Carter waited outside holding flowers.
“Stop crying.”
I walked past him.
He caught my arm.
Then his phone rang.
Mia.
His hand released me immediately.
“Hey.”
His expression changed.
“Don’t cry. I’m coming.”
He hung up.
“She’s upset.”
I almost smiled.
“Of course she is.”
He seemed irritated by my tone.
“Look, I requested some time off. Your mom’s birthday is coming up. I’ll come home with you, and we’ll finally tell everybody we’re together. Okay?”
Four years earlier, those words would have been everything.
Now they sounded absurd.
“You think I went to England because I was angry about us?”
“What else could it possibly have been?”
I looked at him.
Then I understood.
He truly didn’t know.
“My mother doesn’t need you to celebrate her birthday anymore.”
His face hardened.
“You’re impossible.”
I nodded.
“Maybe.”
His phone rang again.
Mia.
He left before asking what I meant.
That night, I finished packing.
Two weeks earlier, I had already terminated my lease.
My thesis had been defended early.
My research files were transferred.
And my new job was waiting hundreds of miles away.
Before leaving for the airport, I uploaded one final post to the university forum.
No accusations.
No insults.
Just evidence.
Photographs of Carter and me from seventeen to twenty-two.
The receipt for our matching rings.
Messages discussing our relationship.
Research timestamps proving my work existed before Mia entered the laboratory.
Network logs connecting Mia to the anonymous smear campaign.
And finally, security footage showing Carter locking me inside the lecture room.
I added one sentence.
For five years, Carter Evans told me acknowledging our relationship publicly was pointless. Today, I finally agree.
Then I sent the evidence to the dean.
Carter messaged almost immediately.
Where are you?
I’m outside your apartment.
I switched off my phone.
Then I boarded my flight.
