You weren’t supposed to be here—not in the “backstage of a sold-out arena in Milan with an all-access pass hanging from your neck” kind of way. Not in the “married to international heartthrob Aiden Rivera” kind of way. But life has a strange sense of humor, and somehow, here you are, sipping lukewarm tea from a paper cup, tucked into the corner of a dressing room lit with too many mirrors and not enough peace.

You lean against the armrest of a velvet couch, legs pulled up under you, your phone glowing softly in your hand. Aiden’s voice thunders through the concrete walls like a second heartbeat, the muffled sound of the crowd roaring with him in perfect rhythm. They love him—how could they not? That boyish grin, those eyes that spark mischief and music all at once, and the way he owns the stage like he was born on it. You’d laugh if it weren’t so surreal. He still sings to you the same way he used to in his dorm room, barefoot and off-key, asking if it sounded okay.

“Baby,” he’d said back then, “imagine one day I sing this to twenty thousand people.”

You’d rolled your eyes and tossed a pillow at him. “You better not forget to sing it to me first.”

He never forgot.

That’s what they don’t see when they write those comments. When they call you a trophy wife, a gold digger, say you only smile for the cameras and the designer bags. They don’t see the nights you stayed up with him before his first tour, patching his ripped jeans and heating up leftovers while he worried about ticket sales. They don’t see the way he used to bike across campus in the rain just to bring you coffee, or how you were still typing up project briefs while he was recording his first album in the garage of a mutual friend. They don’t know he begged you not to quit your job until the third world tour, and even then, only because he couldn’t stand waking up in hotel rooms without you anymore.

The door swings open, a burst of light and noise flooding in with Aidan, sweat-damp and flushed, his curls a mess and eyes electric.

“There she is,” he grins, crossing the room like gravity doesn’t apply to him when you’re near. “My lucky charm.”

You smile before you can stop yourself. He always looks at you like that—like you hung the stars and he’s just trying to memorize their pattern.

“You smell like fireworks and adrenaline,” you tease, but you set your phone down and let him pull you to your feet anyway.

“I missed you,” he murmurs, burying his face in your neck for just a moment, the scent of cologne and heat clinging to his skin. “The stage is cool, but nothing beats this.”

“You’re insufferable,” you whisper, but your arms are around him all the same.

A knock interrupts, someone announcing he has press in ten. He groans into your shoulder before pulling back just enough to kiss your forehead.

“You good?” he asks, always asking. It’s been years, and still, he checks in like you might vanish if he blinks wrong.

You nod. “Always.”

Outside, his fans chant his name like a hymn. Some of them even scream yours when you step out beside him, hands intertwined, the flash of phones lighting up like stardust. You wave because you’re polite, but mostly because you mean it. They’re not all bad. Some of them DM you photos of him from his earliest gigs and write things like “Thanks for staying. He needed someone like you.”

He did. And you needed someone like him too.

Later, when the chaos dies down and the cameras turn away, you’ll be curled up in his hotel hoodie on the tour bus, listening to him hum something half-written. He’ll kiss your bare shoulder and tell you he loves you in the same voice he uses when no one’s around to hear.