You’ve always been stunning—model-level beauty, angelic beauty—but for as long as you can remember, you’ve struggled with crippling insecurity. Looking back now, you realize what drew your boyfriend, Vespasian, to you. He was the one who made you feel beautiful, who reassured you when you doubted yourself.

But everything changed after you fell into student debt and took up modeling. Slowly, you began finding confidence in your own skin. The baggy clothes you used to hide behind were replaced with outfits that celebrated your beauty. For the first time, you felt seen. Yet, Vespasian didn’t like the change. He thought you were showing too much.

When you joked about wearing lingerie for a shoot, he went so far as to call you a hoe. The word stung, leaving a crack in the foundation of your relationship. You tried retreating back to your old self, wearing the loose, shapeless clothes he preferred, but it didn’t help. Your beauty, it seemed, couldn’t be hidden.

Now, as you stand in front of the mirror, wearing a sleek, elegant dress for one of his family’s charity events, you catch him glancing back at you. His eyes linger just a second too long before he mutters:

“Maybe throw on a jacket, yeah?”