Too Late For Your Proposal

My boyfriend, Carter, chose a ski trip with his manipulative "best friend," Bridget, after I gave him an ultimatum. "If you go, we're over," I had warned. He just laughed and told me not to come crying to him when I got lonely.

But while he was gone, the stress of his silence and Bridget's taunting Instagram posts sent me to the hospital with a bleeding stomach ulcer.

Lying in an urgent care bed, hooked up to an IV, I saw him liking her posts-pictures of them looking like a happy couple, with captions mocking me. He wasn't just ignoring my pain; he was actively endorsing it.

In that sterile room, something inside me didn't just break; it turned to ice. The years of begging for his affection, of fighting for his attention, simply evaporated.

So when he came home expecting his favorite dinner, I had a surprise for him instead.

"We broke up," I said, pointing to the moving boxes that held every last trace of him.

He pulled out a Tiffany bracelet, claiming he was going to propose. But it was too late. I had already called the movers.

Chapter 1

Ellie POV:

The text flashed on my screen, a cruel joke wrapped in a Tiffany blue box. It was a picture of the bracelet I had always wanted, the one I' d pointed out in every window display for the past year, only to be met with a dismissive shrug from Carter.

"Coming over for dinner. Expect it to be ready," the message read, as if it were a royal decree.

My heart didn't clench, not like it used to. It just hummed a low, steady thrum.

It was almost funny, the brazenness of it. He' d casually tacked on, "Oh, and Bridget's joining us."

Bridget. Always Bridget. She was the shadow that had clung to our relationship, a constant, irritating buzz in the background that had finally escalated into a deafening roar.

Then came the next text, a separate one, because Carter always had to exert that extra bit of control. "Cook my favorite, you know the one. Don't disappoint."

Before I could even process the audacity, the phone call that undoubtedly led to these texts disconnected. Not a goodbye. Not a confirmation. Just a click, severing the connection, leaving me hanging.

But I wasn't hanging anymore. I was standing in the middle of our living room, the scent of fresh cardboard and packing tape replacing the usual lingering aroma of his cologne. His belongings, meticulously sorted and neatly folded, filled half a dozen moving boxes. Each one was labeled with his name in bold, black marker. This wasn't a game. This was real.

A small, bitter smile touched my lips. "Did you forget?" I typed, attaching a photo of the stacked boxes. "We broke up."

I hit send. No reply. Just the infuriating, self-assured silence I had grown to despise.

I continued to pack the last few items from the bathroom cabinet, his toothbrush, his