Goodbye, Everyone

It was my birthday.

I thought he would take me to see the fireworks by the sea, but he showed up with another woman and her child.

“Vera has a kid with her, and it’s inconvenient for them. Be a little understanding. She doesn’t know her way around here, and she has a lot of luggage. I’ll just drop them at the hotel.”

He said it so casually, as if he were just explaining some trivial, everyday chore.

It was that very gentleness of his that made me feel like I was so unreasonable getting angry over it.

He helped them into the car. He leaned down to buckle the seatbelt on the child.

Then, he turned to me with a smile. “I’ll be right back. Don’t overthink things.”

I stood by the roadside and watched them drive away like a picture-perfect little family.

As night fell, the sea breeze turned sharp and biting.

Still, I waited until a notification of Vera Cannon’s social feed update lit up my screen.

He was holding her daughter in his arms. They were watching the fireworks by the beach.

It was a surprise I had planned for my own birthday.

The comments poured in.

[What a perfect match. What a beautiful little family!]

Someone asked him why he was not picking me up.

He just smiled and said, “Indy is very patient. She won’t be mad.”

At that moment, my birthday cake melted into a puddle of frosting.

I finally realized that he had not done that to be cruel to me.

He was certain that I would always wait for him.

However, even the warmest heart grew cold when neglected too many times.

The waves crashed against the shore, over and over.

With each crash, another shred of my hope washed away.

This time, I was not going to wait for him to come back.

I had spent an entire month planning the seaside birthday trip for myself.

I thought he would at least keep me in mind on that very day.

I had booked a beach house, picked out a restaurant, and even made a special reservation for dinner that promised a view of the fireworks.

I thought it would be a romantic getaway for just Shane Leonberg and me.

The morning we were supposed to leave, the doorbell rang.

I opened the door to find his childhood sweetheart, Vera Cannon, on my doorstep. She was holding her four-year-old daughter in her arms.

“Shane thought it would be a good idea to show us around the seaside and get the little one some fresh air.”

Vera was dressed in a flowing white chiffon dress, with full makeup on, and a designer bag over her shoulder. She looked like she was going to a photoshoot rather than a casual beach trip.

With a sweet smile, she added, “I told him it might not be appropriate and that it’d get in the way of your plans, but Shane told me you said it