He Fell For My Soul And Married Her Lies

Ten years after graduation, I was suddenly added to a new high school alumni group chat. The notifications were relentless. Everyone was buzzing about a tribute video they were piecing together—a wedding gift for Miles and Ivy. Someone noticed I’d joined and immediately tagged me with an assignment: “Oh, Nora! I heard you’re still back in our hometown. You should film the segments at the old high school campus! “It’ll be perfect for the montage. We need to relive the glory days of the school’s ultimate power couple.” I didn’t reply. Instead, I stared at the ring on my finger, a cold weight settling in my stomach. Miles and Ivy were getting married? Then who the hell was the man I was supposed to marry next month? 1 I stared at that message until the screen went dark. Because I didn’t respond immediately, the tags kept coming. I was the final piece of their puzzle, the “closer” for their grand romantic gesture. It was almost comical. From high school through college, I had been the silent stagehand in their sweeping epic. I thought I had finally stepped into the lead role of my own life, only to realize I was still just an uncredited extra. The group count showed fifty people. Our graduating class had fifty-two. The two missing people were the stars themselves. The former class president was practically vibrating with excitement in the chat: “Once we have everyone’s clips, we’ll have Miles and Ivy record their own vows. That makes fifty-two videos—one for every member of the class. It’s perfect. Remember, everyone, the clips have to be exactly fifty-two seconds long. We need that symmetry.” “God, that’s so romantic,” someone chimed in. “Makes me want to find a high school sweetheart of my own. Anyone looking for a second-chance romance?” “Shut up, Dave. You don’t have Miles’s looks or his brain. The man is a literal neuroscientist now. Go look in a mirror.” “True. They really were the King and Queen. The Golden Couple.” Someone finally asked the question I was screaming internally: “How do we even know they’re getting married? I haven’t seen a formal announcement.” “My wife told me,” the class president replied. “She was Ivy’s roommate when they were doing their post-grads abroad. Ivy talked about her and Miles all the time. Word is, Ivy just flew back into the States today, and Miles was the one who picked her up at the airport.” “My wife saw the invitation in Miles’s car. He went to pick up his first love with the wedding invites already printed. Can you imagine the romance of that?” “You wandered the world, but I stayed here, waiting to welcome you home.” Another message popped up: “Airport? Yeah, that was today. Look at Ivy’s Instagram.” He posted a screenshot. It was a photo of a glass of vintage red wine against a backdrop of city lights. The caption read: Coming home is easy when you’re the one waiting on the other side of the table. I felt a wave of nausea. I hit the “Mute Notifications” button and set my phone face down on the coffee table. 2 Miles didn’t get home until late. He looked startled to see me still sitting on the sofa, the living room bathed in the blue light of the TV. He walked over and pulled me into a hug, his coat still cold from the night air. “Hey, honey. Why aren’t you in bed?” I caught the faint, sophisticated scent of red wine. The Instagram photo flashed in my mind like a crime scene still. I couldn’t help it. I pulled away slightly, my brow furrowed. Miles noticed. He let out a weary sigh. “Do I smell like the bar? I grabbed a glass of wine with some colleagues. I’m going to go jump in the shower.” He practically bolted for the bathroom. Guilt in a man has a very specific velocity. Fifteen minutes later, he climbed into bed beside me. “Still awake? No beauty sleep tonight? Or are we thinking of something else?” In private, Miles was a different man than the reserved, brilliant professor the world saw. With me, he was usually warm, almost needy. It was how I had spent years convincing myself that I was enough. What did it matter if he’d had a legendary first love? I was the one in his bed. I was the one he’d asked to spend his life with. I pushed his hand away. He looked genuinely shocked. I almost never turned him down. I had been infatuated with him since the eleventh grade—a decade of pining, a college-era secret, and finally, the dream come true. He was the air I breathed. He reached over and clicked on the bedside lamp, studying my face. “What’s wrong? Did someone at the lab give you a hard time?” I forced a brittle smile. “My fiancé is the department head. Who would dare?” He ruffled my hair, satisfied that I wasn’t ill, and turned off the light. As soon as his breathing evened out into the steady rhythm of sleep, I reached for his phone. 3 I was still the pinned contact at the top of his messages. We’d set it that way the day we went official. But our last text thread was from a week ago. Miles was always “busy.” I’d learned not to clutter his day with my thoughts or the small details of my life because he never had the bandwidth to respond in real-time. Eventually, I just stopped sharing. If something was urgent, I called. If it wasn’t, I kept it to myself. Miles didn’t have many contacts. Most were work-related group chats. I scrolled down just an inch and saw a name that wasn’t a colleague. Ivy. I hesitated. Once you break the seal of trust, the monster inside you takes over. There was a voice note. Twenty-four seconds long. I didn’t want to hear her voice, so I hit the transcription button. The little loading icon spun for an eternity. Finally, the text appeared: Are you sure you aren’t just doing this to punish me? I couldn’t help myself. I put the phone to my ear and pressed play, the volume at a whisper. I heard muffled sobbing. Then the question, sharp and trembling. I played it over and over, trying to find a name for the hollow feeling opening up in my chest. I scrolled up, back through the months, until I found the beginning. The first message was from her: It’s been twelve years. Are you okay? Twelve years. I had watched them fall in love, watched them fight, watched them break up, and watched her move across the ocean without a backward glance. I thought twelve years was enough time for the ink to dry on that chapter. I thought my devotion, my warmth, and my presence had filled every crack she left behind. His first reply shattered that illusion: Everything is fine, except for the part where you aren’t here. He had sent that text the day after he proposed to me. 4 They didn’t talk constantly. Miles was, after all, a busy man. But he answered every single one of her messages. Sometimes an hour later, sometimes a day. It was like a long-running correspondence that never lost its signal. The frequency had picked up a week ago. Ivy had sent him her flight itinerary. She was landing at 7:00 PM tonight. What followed was a delicate dance of “will they, won’t they.” Ivy threw out bait; Miles didn’t always bite. Until yesterday. Ivy: Will I see you at the gate tomorrow night? Miles: It’s not a good idea. I don’t want Nora to be upset. Ivy: In my memory, Nora was always such a… gracious girl. You’ve been together for years; surely she won’t mind you greeting an old friend? Ivy: Besides, I’m joining your research team. Isn’t it a lead’s job to welcome new staff? If she can’t handle this, how are we supposed to work together every day? Miles had hesitated for hours. Then, at 5:00 PM today, he replied: Safe flight. See you at the airport. Five minutes after that, he had called me. “Hey, I have to pick up a new researcher at the airport tonight, so I won’t be home for dinner. Why don’t you go over to your parents’ place? And don’t eat anything cold—your period is starting soon, remember? Stay warm.” I remembered exactly where I was when he said that. I was walking to the parking garage, planning to drive across town to get that rotisserie duck he loved so much—the place with the hour-long line. Hearing his voice, his “concern” for my health… it had made me feel so cherished. I’d walked to my car with a smile, thinking about how lucky I was. I didn’t realize that his “concern” was just the padding he used to soften the blow of a lie. 5 Miles rolled over in his sleep and pulled me into his chest. “Your arms are so cold,” he murmured, half-awake. “Get under the covers.” The heat of his body felt like an insult. It made everything too real. Me, him, and the ghost that had finally taken on a physical form. He was up early the next morning. He had a guest lecture at a university a few towns over. Before leaving, he touched my forehead, checking for a fever. “It’s getting chilly out. Don’t be stubborn, wear a coat.” I nodded. Just then, his phone buzzed. He glanced at the screen, gave me a quick, distracted kiss, and headed for the door. “Did you pick up your new researcher last night?” I asked, my voice flat. His back stiffened. He turned around, his expression a mask of “casual” curiosity. “Yeah. Caught her at the gate. We should have her over for dinner sometime once she settles in.” I forced a smile. “Maybe. You know I’m not great with strangers.” Miles lingered for a second. “She’s not exactly a stranger. Look, there’s something I need to talk to you about. I just have a crazy couple of days. Can we talk soon?” His phone buzzed again. He silenced it with a flick of his thumb, looking annoyed. “The day after tomorrow?” he pressed. “Tuesday night?” A thousand thoughts raced through my mind. What was the talk going to be? My first love is back, so we’re done? Or, My first love is back, so I need you to be okay with her being in my life every day? I wasn’t going to be the prey in this scenario. I wasn’t going to wait around for him to decide my fate. “If you want to talk,” I said, “it has to be tonight at eight. After that, don’t bother.” 6 Miles’s phone rang for the third time. He finally picked it up. “I’m coming down now. Give me a minute.” We worked at the same research institute. I knew everyone in his orbit. The institute provided him with a driver, a guy named Will who was the soul of discretion. Will never called three times in a row. I walked to the window. Will was standing by the black sedan, circling the car as if checking the tire pressure. But someone was already in the backseat. A woman, her head turned toward our apartment building. Miles walked out, opened the back door, and slid in beside her. As the car pulled away, I got a clear look at her face. Ivy. One look, and ten years vanished. To Miles, she was the “One That Got Away,” the eternal heartbeat. To me, she was the architect of the worst years of my life. She had transferred to our school junior year. She was sunlight and charisma. Within a week, she was everyone’s best friend. Except mine. I was going through a family tragedy then—my mother’s illness—and I had retreated into a shell. Ivy saw me in the corner and decided I was a project. She tried to “warm me up” with relentless, sunny intrusion. I was a teenage girl; I couldn’t hide my heart. Ivy realized I had a crush on Miles. When she asked, I confessed. I thought she was my friend. A week later, she started dating him. 7 The group chat was exploding again. Even on mute, the number of unread messages climbed into the hundreds. They were doing the “video relay” now. The class president and his wife had posted the first one. They were up north, and it was already snowing. They filmed themselves running through a field, laughing, and then stomping the names MILES + IVY into the fresh powder inside a giant heart. It was cheesy. It was sincere. It was exactly fifty-two seconds long. The comments were a chorus of clapping emojis. Everyone was eager to take the next “baton.” I didn’t get it. Why did they care so much? But they were like white phosphorus—once ignited, they couldn’t stop. By the second day, they were on the thirteenth video. People were sharing memories of the “Golden Couple” like they were sacred relics. “I remember when Ivy wrote that ten-thousand-word love letter. It was like thirty pages long. We were all floored.” “And Miles had it bound into a little book! He carried it everywhere. He even designed a custom cover for it.” “God, we’re all so nostalgic. Back then, they were just the hottest couple in school. Now, seeing that they’ve stayed true to each other after all these years? That’s the real dream.” “Seriously. I never got the sweet romance, or the epic drama, or the world-stopping love. How did one girl get it all in her first try?” Yeah. How did one girl get to experience the entire spectrum of human emotion before her twentieth birthday, while I was still trying to figure out how to be the protagonist of my own life? I didn’t know if I was the luckiest person in the world for having avoided that kind of drama, or the unluckiest for being the one left holding the bill.