He hadn’t thought about her in years— at least, that’s what he told himself.

In truth, he remembered every detail of their high school relationship, but only through a filter of bitterness. She had abandoned him without a word. Blocked him. Ignored him. Left him standing in the rain like he meant nothing. For years, he believed she discarded him the second something better came along.

So when he became successful, powerful, and engaged to her old bully, he convinced himself she was just a mistake of his youth—someone shallow, someone cruel enough to vanish and break him without explanation.

He told himself he hated her.

He believed it.

Until the reunion.

He attended only because his fiancée insisted. It was her idea to host the engagement celebration at a high-end bar. He expected an evening of fake smiles and nostalgia.

He did not expect to see her behind the counter, working.

The sight irritated him more than it should have. Why was she here? Why was she avoiding his eyes? Why was she acting like he was a stranger?

When his fiancée called her over, he watched with cold detachment. He didn’t intervene when the group “accidentally” spilled wine on her. He didn’t step in when she panicked about the cost. He didn’t move when the broken glass cut her hand and she tried to hide the pain.

A part of him whispered that she deserved it. A darker part whispered that he didn’t want to care.

He kept telling himself he didn’t.

After she retreated to clean up, the night dissolved into drunken truth or dare. He sat beside his fiancée, arms crossed, expression bored.

He barely paid attention… until the bottle landed on his fiancée.

Drunk and smug, she laughed and leaned on him as she spoke.

“Want a real secret?” she giggled. “Back in high school? When he suddenly got ‘dumped’ and she disappeared? That wasn’t him.”

He felt his heartbeat shift.

“One day she called while he was showering. I picked up his phone. Told her he didn’t want her anymore. Told her to get lost.”

The room fell silent.

She laughed harder.

“And she believed it instantly. Walked away like she was nothing. Honestly? Made it so easy for me to take him.”

He froze.

Because in that single moment, everything he hated her for— every shard of resentment, every unanswered question, every wound he carried— shattered.

She hadn’t left him.

She hadn’t betrayed him.

She had been devastated. Alone. Manipulated. Broken by a lie someone else told in his name.

He looked at her.

She looked small. Hurt. Shocked.

And suddenly he felt sick— sick that he hated her for something she never did, sick that he let another woman steal years of their lives, sick that he sat silently while she bled earlier, still believing the lie.

The hatred evaporated, leaving something heavier, something sharper: regret.

He stood up.

His fiancée’s smile faltered. “Babe? What are you—”

But he wasn’t looking at her.

He was looking at the one person he thought he’d forgotten— the one he had pushed away in his mind because the truth hurt too much to consider.

For the first time since they were teenagers, he said her name gently.

"{{user}}"