I noticed the red notification dots on his messaging app and tapped in.
Other than some work messages, it was clean. Not a single suspicious contact.
I typed into the search bar: love you, baby, sweetheart. Every term of endearment I could think of.
The only results that came up were me.
The familiar chat history made my eyes sting.
Eight years. I'd been with Marvin for eight years.
For eight of those years, I'd given him everything.
I'd defied my parents and chosen to save up with him so he could marry me.
And now it all felt like a joke.
I opened app after app. Nothing.
Then I opened his food delivery account, and buried among rows of takeout orders was a second address.
The name on the deliveries had that same unfamiliar character.
He'd sent her flowers on almost every holiday. Bouquets at fifteen, twenty, thirty dollars. The most expensive one, nearly sixty.
He ordered her milk tea all the time. Her usual was matcha.
When she was sick, he'd rush-deliver medicine to her door. He'd buy her little snacks to cheer her up.
And me?
Nothing.
I looked at the dried flowers on the nightstand.
That was the only bouquet he'd given me since graduation. $1.99, from a self-serve flower stand on the sidewalk.
"Rosie, once I have money someday..."
"Whatever you want, I'll buy it for you."
That's what he told me once.
Yet a two-hundred-dollar bouquet of flowers? He turned right around and bought one for someone else.
The phone in my hand suddenly buzzed. An unfamiliar number flashed across the screen.
"Hello?"
My heart lurched as I answered.
"Hi, I'm the owner of this phone..."
It was Marvin.
He thought he'd lost it.
"It's me," I said. "Your phone's not lost. You left it at home."
A beat of silence on the other end, then a laugh, heavy with relief.
"Oh, it's at home!"
"I thought someone swiped it on the subway!"
"I'm coming right back to get it."
After he hung up, I kept scrolling through his phone.
His Amazon cart was full of women's skincare and makeup, along with a handful of pricey collectible boxes. His purchase history was a parade of necklaces, bracelets, handbags, lipstick...
The recipient for every single one was Lucy.
The most recent order was the newest model phone. I'd bought him the white one. He'd bought the orange one for her.
Every penny I'd scrimped and saved over the past four years, Marvin had found a place to spend.