Alex instinctively stepped in front of me.
I gently caught his arm.
“Dylan and I need to settle this once and for all.”
Alex looked at me for a few seconds, then let go of my hand.
“I’ll be just up ahead.”
He walked to the end of the stone steps and waited with his back to us, close enough that I could see him whenever I looked up.
Only then did Dylan approach.
Rain dripped from his hair as he held out a copy of his final divorce decree with trembling hands.
“Ellie, I’m divorced.”
“The waiting period ended today. The divorce was finalized first thing this morning.”
He took out the engagement ring, too.
“Jade was never pregnant. She tricked me that night, too.”
“Now that we’ve cleared up the misunderstandings, we can start over.”
I looked at the ring.
He’d put it on Jade’s finger first, then used it to promise me the rest of his life.
After everything, it still wasn’t mine.
“Because she wasn’t pregnant, are we supposed to pretend you never slept with her?”
Dylan turned deathly pale.
“I was drunk. I didn’t mean for it to happen…”
“You weren’t drunk at the courthouse.”
I cut him off.
“You knew the wedding would be legally binding. You still sent me away and chose her.”
“Dylan, just because there was no baby doesn’t mean there was no betrayal.”
His eyes reddened.
“But I’ve always loved you.”
“You let her blow out my birthday candles first. You put my ring on her finger first. You let her try being your wife first. You even let her stay in the home that was supposed to be ours.”
I looked at him steadily.
“You never put me first. Not once.”
He grabbed my hand and pressed the ring into my palm, almost frantic.
“That won’t happen again.”
“I swear, this is the last time.”
The exact same promise he’d made for seven years.
Once, I’d clung to those words to forgive him again and again.
Now I was just tired.
I opened my hand.
The ring dropped into a puddle at my feet, splashing dirty water.
“It never fit me properly.”
“Neither did you.”
Dylan froze in the rain.
“Ellie… you really don’t want me anymore?”
“You were the one who stopped choosing me.”
“You just never imagined I might actually leave.”
I turned and walked toward Alex.
Behind me came the dull sound of knees striking wet stone.
I didn’t look back.
In the past, I had always been the one left waiting.
For once, Dylan could wait for someone who would never return.
The results of the Southpoint review were announced soon afterward.
Jade had forged my signature, taken credit for my work, and used someone else’s prenatal test report to back up her false claim that I’d attacked her.
She was fired and ordered to return every bonus she’d received. She and her mother also faced consequences for destroying my property and circulating the defamatory recordings.
When the company posted its correction and public apology on its official website, Mrs. Quinn no longer looked remotely arrogant in front of a camera.
As for Dylan, Sterling Group’s board suspended him from his position.
The project-lead change form he’d signed himself became evidence of his negligence.
Southpoint eventually terminated its agreement with the Sterling subsidiary and approached Riverton Group, where I now worked.
On the day I signed the new contract, Dylan stood outside my building all night.
I didn’t go down to see him.
Later, he sent flowers. He made porridge. He kept promising he would wait.
I accepted none of those gestures. Every one of them had arrived years too late.
My marriage to Alex, meanwhile, was easier than I’d ever imagined.
He never pressured me to move into his bedroom. He never asked when I’d finally fall in love with him.
When I worked late, he left a light on.
When I woke with a start in the night, he’d quietly ask through the door if I wanted company.
At our project celebration, he brought me a bowl of oatmeal, made from Mom’s recipe.
Before handing it over, he lowered his head and tested the temperature.
“Too hot?”
“Just right.”
I took a spoonful.
Alex was still looking at me nervously.
“If you don’t like it, I can keep practicing.”
I shook my head and took his hand.
“Alex.”
“Let’s have the wedding celebration we never got to have.”
He went very still. Then, slowly, his eyes lit up.
This time, nobody would try on my wedding dress first. No one else would wear my ring before I did. No one else would take my place at my own wedding.
It took me a long time to understand the difference.
Someone who truly loved me would check the temperature so I wouldn’t burn myself.
He’d steady me on slippery steps whenever I lost my footing.
But he’d save the first bite of cake for me, make sure I was the first to wear my own ring, and leave every choice about our future for the two of us to make together.
The rest of my life wasn’t anyone else’s to test-drive.
THE END