Looking back now, that unreadable flicker in his eyes must have been pity. Or mockery. He'd been laughing at me for reading too much into us.
I gagged as I canceled the couples' trip to the Maldives—flights, hotel, all of it.
The first year, we had no feelings for each other, so there was no anniversary trip.
The second year, things between us had gotten visibly better. With his quiet approval, I'd planned every detail of the vacation. Researched restaurants, mapped out itineraries, bookmarked sunset spots.
But a phone call came right before boarding. Patrick left and never came back.
That day, every headline was buzzing about how Patrick Sanchez had lost his mind—how he'd ignored everyone trying to stop him, ordered the artificial lake in the city center drained, and then jumped in himself to fish something out.
The third year, I planned to go public with our relationship first, then take the trip.
But fate had another cruel joke waiting for me.
It wasn't until I saw Patrick bring up the past with my own eyes that I finally understood. I was the fool. The complete and utter fool.
In Patrick's heart, Edith would always come first.
All she had to do was stand there, and I'd already lost.
The moment I walked through the door, my phone couldn't help but shove Patrick and Edith's love story in my face.
Childhood sweethearts. First love. Torn apart by fate. Reunited at last.
A pair of star-crossed lovers for the ages.
I sipped my Coke, tasting something faintly bitter and salt on my lips.
On the table, my phone still showed a message Patrick had sent three hours ago. He said he'd apologize in person when he got home.
I waited two weeks. No apology came. Instead, I watched Patrick escort Edith to event after event, right there on my screen.
The media called them the perfect couple, the center of every room they entered.
At a private auction, anything Edith so much as glanced at twice, Patrick bid on until he won it, no matter how absurd the price.
Posts praising the two of them flooded my social media feeds in real time. Articles congratulating them on their fairy-tale reunion were everywhere, and no matter how fast I blocked and muted, I couldn't keep up.
Then the paparazzi dropped a bombshell. Edith had casually mentioned missing her old girl-group days, and Patrick had immediately arranged for her to be parachuted in as the leader of the hottest girl group in the country.