The "engagement dinner" had just ended, and my boyfriend made it Instagram official. I zoomed in on the photo, only to find my wrist sporting a thick, gold Cartier-style bracelet, a heavy diamond necklace resting against my collarbone, and massive diamond studs edited onto my ears. His caption read: [Even with flawless diamonds hitting record highs today, I still want to give you the absolute best.] The comments section was blowing up. Our friends were universally praising him as the ultimate provider, a good man who spent every last dime spoiling his girl. A few minutes later, my boyfriend replied to a thread: [?? Chloe is my future wife, of course I’m going to spoil her rotten! You know what they say: Happy wife, happy life. Treat your queen right, and the universe rewards you with success.] I looked down at my bare, empty wrist. Suddenly, I was wide awake. 1 "Babe, you are so fake for this! How are you going to get engaged and not even tell me?" I had barely stepped into my apartment when my best friend, Sarah, called. I accidentally tapped the speakerphone button, and her teasing voice echoed through the room: "Gotta hand it to Liam, though. He’s got serious cash to drop on you. That diamond necklace? And those earrings? Absolutely blinded me." "What diamonds?" This year’s New York winter was especially brutal. Coming inside to the blasting radiator heat made my face feel hot and tight. "Liam’s Instagram post! He’s in the comments talking about 'happy wife, happy life.' Honestly, locking you down is the best move he’s ever made." With stiff fingers, I opened Instagram. The very first post on my feed was Liam’s official announcement. In the photo, my neck and ears were sparkling, not to mention the heavy gold bangle that looked at least an inch thick on my wrist. Gold and diamond prices had been skyrocketing lately. Coupled with Liam’s caption about giving me the best despite the market, it had drawn everyone’s attention. Liam and I had been together since college, and we shared a lot of mutual friends. I swiped through the comments, but there were too many to read. The ones that stung the most were from his old fraternity brothers. Brother A: [Yooo, so this is what it takes to lock down Chloe? She doesn't come cheap!] Brother B: [Congrats, man! Third time dropping a bag on a proposal and you finally got her to say yes.] Brother C: [My guy is moving up in the world! When are you bringing the future Mrs. out to buy the boys dinner? We don't ask for much, just keep it to the standard of that engagement ring.] "Babe? Chloe?!" Sarah seemed to sense something was wrong through my prolonged silence. She asked tentatively, "What’s wrong?" I looked down at my empty wrist. My eyes stung. "Tonight wasn't an engagement dinner..." Right then, a text from Liam popped up. My screen vibrated, and I saw his hesitant message: [Babe, you home yet?] [My parents are coming to the city for Thanksgiving. They want to meet your parents. Is that cool?] [Also... jewelry is just so overpriced right now. Let's skip the expensive engagement rings when we actually get married. That stuff costs as much as a Manhattan rent deposit, it's really not worth it...] Staring at his rambling texts, my patience finally snapped. [Then what is the meaning of that Instagram post?] [We literally just had a normal dinner tonight. Why did you tell everyone we're engaged?] [And the diamond necklace? The Cartier bracelet? What is going on?] The typing bubble at the top of the screen appeared and disappeared. After a long time, he finally replied, defensive and irritated. [Yeah, I used an AI app to Photoshop the jewelry on you.] [I just wanted to look good in front of my frat brothers and coworkers. Is that a crime?!] [Sarah heavily edits and filters her selfies all the time. I just Photoshopped some jewelry. Why are you blowing this out of proportion?] Blowing it out of proportion? Never mind the fact that Liam and I worked at the same tech firm. Dozens of our coworkers and managers were on his Instagram. He knew perfectly well that after the holidays, I was up for a critical promotion to management. The company never said it out loud, but the unspoken rule was that they frowned upon promoting women who were about to get married or go on maternity leave. The corporate ladder was already hostile enough for women, and he had just thrown a massive, unnecessary roadblock in my path. More importantly—I hadn't even said yes to marrying him! On the phone, Sarah suddenly gasped. "Holy crap!" "Chloe! Liam is in the comments saying you guys are trying for a baby! Is that true?!" I refreshed the page, only to find that Liam had restricted my account. I couldn't see the post anymore. 2 Liam and I had been together for five years. We started dating in the spring of our junior year. When we got together, he asked me repeatedly if I minded that he came from a poor farming town in the Midwest, that he was broke, and that he was drowning in student loans. Back then, I just smiled like an idiot. I thought I had hit the jackpot. Liam was poor, but he was brilliant. We constantly fought for the top spot on the Dean's List. His roommates told me he was meticulous and scrubbed their dorm clean every weekend. Plus, he was gorgeous. He had sharp, striking features and stood at a solid six-foot-two. That same year, my dad’s business went under. I was too embarrassed to ask my parents for an allowance, so I took a job serving food in the campus dining hall. Even wearing a hairnet and mask, feeling the stares of classmates I knew made my face burn with shame. One day, an arrogant pre-med student—a guy I regularly beat in exams—stood on the other side of the glass sneering at me. He complained that his beef stew only had potatoes, then whined that his pasta was overcooked, intentionally trying to humiliate me. The line behind him was backing up, and the murmurs were getting louder. That was when Liam appeared. He took the serving spoon right out of my hand and expertly scooped a perfect portion onto his own tray. The pre-med guy opened his mouth to complain, but Liam’s voice was icy: "You got your food. Move." The guy glared at me but eventually slinked away. After that day, Liam was always looking out for me. Then, toward the end of our junior year, a miracle happened. Some old factory land my dad bought years ago was purchased by commercial developers. A massive windfall hit our family—enough that we would never have to worry about money again. I quit the dining hall job. The day I quit, Liam confessed his feelings. "Chloe, I'm in love with you." My heart nearly leapt out of my chest. "But..." He hesitated. "I don't have money. My family is broke. Even with my scholarships, the second I graduate, every paycheck is going straight to my student loans." "Knowing all that, do you still want to be with me?" At the time, my family was newly rich. My dad spent his days bragging about the zeros in his bank account. With zero financial worries of my own, I was fully prepared to dive into a romance where money didn't matter. I nodded vigorously and promised I didn't care. Liam let out a huge breath of relief and took my hand. I held onto that hand for five years. In those five years, Liam "proposed" to me three times. The first time was at our graduation. Riding an adrenaline high, he snatched a bouquet of carnations his frat brother was supposed to give to a professor and dropped to one knee in front of the whole quad. The second time was our second year in the workforce. He had finally paid off his student loans. He took me out for cheap tacos, downed a few beers, and proposed using the aluminum pull-tab from his beer can. The third time... The third time was this past New Year's Eve. He actually put effort into it. He booked my favorite ski resort, dressed up in a ridiculous bear mascot costume, and bought roses and champagne. But it was also that exact proposal that led to a massive fight. It ended in disaster. We had been giving each other the silent treatment for a month until tonight, when he asked me to dinner to apologize. And that dinner resulted in this absurd "engagement" and the AI-generated jewelry. "Chloe... what are you thinking?" Sarah asked over the phone. What was I thinking? I forced a bitter smile. Over the past month of our cold war, the word breakup had been hovering on the tip of my tongue countless times. That night, my sleep was plagued by nightmares. I dreamt I was running, and Liam was chasing me, holding jewelry folded out of gold foil wrappers. He was screaming, "Chloe! Marry me! If you don't like the AI jewelry, I made you some out of paper!" 3 I woke up in a cold sweat at 4:00 AM. Unable to go back to sleep, I went into the office early. The power in the third-floor breakroom was out, so I took my mug down to the second floor. Just as I reached the landing between floors, someone pushed open the fire-escape door, chatting with the person behind them. "With prices this high, you really dropped that kind of cash on diamonds for her?" Diamonds. The word set off alarm bells in my head. I quietly stepped back and hid in the shadow of the stairwell. A familiar voice sighed. It was Liam. "Honestly, man, I'll level with you. I Photoshopped it." His tone was heavy, like he was carrying the weight of the world. "You know my background. I grew up with nothing. I can't afford the kind of rings Chloe expects. I just wanted to save face for her. She's always saying that once people see you in an outfit, it's basically secondhand. I figured if I Photoshopped the jewelry and everyone saw it, it's practically the same as her owning it." "But... she threw a massive fit over it." The man across from him was silent for a moment before speaking. "I always thought she was just a bit overly ambitious." "I never realized she was this shallow." "You've got the patience of a saint." Liam's voice was filled with nothing but helpless resignation. "What can I do? We've been together for years. I just have to take the hit." I peeked through the gap in the stairwell. Standing across from Liam, smoking an e-cigarette, was David—the senior manager who mentored me when I first joined the company. David was notoriously strict and unsmiling. When I was first assigned to his team, I had actually complained to Liam about him. Liam had convinced me to stick it out, saying that a year under David was worth three years under anyone else. Surprisingly, the first time David met me, he smiled. "You're Chloe? I remember the portfolio you submitted. Great work." He dropped his harsh exterior and patiently mentored me. To me, he was both a teacher and a friend. But not long after, at the company retreat, Liam—who had agreed to keep our office romance a secret—suddenly grabbed my hand during an all-hands meeting, announcing our relationship to the entire firm. Shortly after that, David abruptly removed me from his core project team. When I chased him down to ask why, he just pressed his lips together and said coldly, "I don't keep team members with ulterior motives." He had looked at me with such ice in his eyes, as if I had committed an unforgivable crime. Yet right now, David was patting Liam on the shoulder like a brother. "If you hadn't warned me back then that Chloe was a flight risk and planning to leak our core data, I never would have guessed she was that kind of person," David said darkly. "You really can't judge a book by its cover." "Are you seriously going to marry a woman like that?" "Listen, Liam. I have a friend from grad school. If you want..." Under the dim fluorescent lights, I stared blankly at Liam's shadowed face. The core project data had always been securely stored on my encrypted laptop. I had never leaked it. The only time it was ever vulnerable was one weekend when Liam claimed his hard drive crashed and borrowed my laptop to "work overtime." After I was kicked off the team, Liam was mysteriously drafted onto it the very next quarter. He quickly got a promotion, got a raise, and paid off the rest of his student loans. "No," Liam said, suddenly looking up, brushing away the gloom. "I've made up my mind. I'm going to take responsibility for Chloe for the rest of my life." "No matter how awful she is." Looking at the fierce, self-righteous expression on Liam's face, a massive question mark exploded in my head. Why? My brain was a tangled mess. Tiny details I had forgotten over the years suddenly rapidly unspooled. Then, as the motion-sensor lights flickered off— It all made sense. 4 To verify the incredibly absurd theory forming in my head, I immediately took PTO and rushed back to my apartment. During our cold war, I had kicked Liam out to stay at a friend's place. Sitting on the coffee table was an old iPad Liam had been meaning to sell online. If I was lucky, his iMessage and iCloud were still logged in. Months ago, he had complained about running out of storage, so I had upgraded him to the highest tier of cloud backup on my dime. Everything synced automatically. I knew I would find exactly what I was looking for. And I did. In the dead silence of my apartment, my knuckles turned white gripping the tablet. I scrolled back five years. Back before we were officially dating, right after he 'heroically' defended me in the dining hall, he was texting his college roommates: [Some people will put on a pathetic act just to get out of doing real work.] On graduation day, when he hastily proposed with stolen flowers, he told me it was an impulse and it was okay if I said no. But to his frat brother, he texted: [Chloe thinks carnations are too cheap. She's demanding 999 roses before she'll say yes.] When he borrowed my laptop, he fabricated a digital trail making it look like I was trying to sell David's core data to a rival firm. Then he turned around and begged David not to fire me, playing the hero who prevented the leak, effectively securing his own spot on David's team. When I teased him that his second proposal with a beer tab lacked a bit of effort, he spent the entire night complaining in his department's group chat, playing the self-deprecating martyr: [I guess it's true what they say. Love without money is like sand in the wind. How am I supposed to afford a 5-carat diamond?] When coworkers gasped and asked if I specifically demanded five carats, he stayed silent, letting their imaginations run wild. And then came this past New Year's Eve. He booked the resort, put on the suit, and I admit—when he took off the heavy mascot head, sweating and smiling, I was genuinely moved. Until I noticed his phone propped up on a tripod, live-streaming the entire thing. He had sent the link to all our college alumni and colleagues. Hundreds of people were watching. In that moment, I couldn't tell if he actually loved me or if I was just a prop for his performance. We had a screaming match and didn't speak for a month. What I only discovered now was that after I stormed off that night, Liam kept the livestream running for hours. His frat brothers took turns joining the stream, calling me a gold-digging opportunist and urging him to dump me. Brother A aggressively demanded: "With your tech salary, you're doing just as well as these Manhattan girls. Dump her. You can find someone younger and richer. Why are you hung up on her?!" Liam played the role of the tragic, loyal boyfriend to perfection. "We've been together for five years. She gave me her best years. Walking away now would be a betrayal." "Besides, she's not a bad person. It's just her background. Her best friend Sarah is gorgeous and loaded. It makes sense that Chloe feels insecure and wants more material proof of my love." "I just need to work harder. Once I save enough, I'll bring her home." With just a few sentences, he solidified his image as the ultimate devoted partner. But during our month-long cold war, Liam had been actively swiping on dating apps and meeting new women. Yet, upon entering the brutal New York dating market, he quickly realized that a handsome face and a decent tech job weren't enough to secure the wealthy, elite city girls he secretly desired. He hit a wall. And so, he orchestrated this dinner to break the ice and win me back. He didn't propose because he loved me. He proposed because, after weighing the pros and cons, I—the girl with an apartment, no debt, and blind devotion to him—was his safest safety net. That was why he used AI to generate the jewelry on Instagram to mark his territory. If he hadn't restricted me from the post, I would have stayed in the dark forever. I sat frozen on my sofa, my blood turning to ice. I couldn't move a muscle. Suddenly, my phone buzzed. Sarah sent me a photo. I zoomed in. Liam was smiling brightly at a café. Sitting across from him was a young woman, and next to her was David—setting up the blind date he had promised. 5 [Chloe, what the hell is this?] Sarah texted. Sarah and I grew up together. She was the only person who knew my true financial situation. After surviving my family's bankruptcy, the debt collectors at our door, my exhausting shifts, and our sudden massive windfall, I became incredibly private about money. I never flaunted it. To Liam, I was just a middle-class girl with an apartment. I called Sarah and quickly gave her the rundown. She was seething. "That absolute parasite! I am going to ruin his little blind date right now..." Before she could finish, she suddenly burst into vindictive laughter. "Oh my god, never mind! The girl just asked about his family background. Her face went pale, and she literally walked out before the coffee arrived." "Seriously, Chloe, what did you ever see in him? Sure, his job is okay, but with his salary, he couldn't afford a down payment on a shoe box in Queens. His parents have medical debt, and his older brother is a deadbeat who lives in their basement..." I didn't say anything. I asked myself the same question: What did I see in him? To my face, Liam was gentle, polite, passionate, and responsible. But in the shadows, he spread rumors, stabbed me in the back, and manipulated my image. He was a leech, sucking the life out of me to make himself look better. The more monstrous I looked to the outside world, the more saintly he appeared by comparison. If I actually married him, my family's wealth would be used to prop up his entire existence. I morbidly wondered: if he found out my family had an eight-figure bank account, how would he spin my "gold digger" narrative then? But the thought vanished instantly. I wasn't going to have a future with this man. The sun began to set, casting a faint glow through the window. When Liam's text finally came through, I snapped out of my daze. In just a few hours, my heart had been on a rollercoaster—from fury, to breakdown, to self-doubt, and finally landing on absolute, cold clarity. I wiped away tears I hadn't realized I shed. My mind was made up. [Babe, I was so vain for posting that yesterday. I was wrong. Can you forgive me?] [I bought tickets for my parents and my brother. They'll be in New York for Thanksgiving. Let's get both our families together for dinner. Please?] I let him sweat. I could picture his face on the other end perfectly. Brows furrowed, unconsciously biting his nails, pacing anxiously for my reply. I watched the typing bubble appear and disappear for hours. I made dinner, took a shower, and only then picked up my phone. [Sure.] [But send me a photo of your family first. I don't want to accidentally greet the wrong people at the restaurant. That would be embarrassing.] 6 Probably because his blind dates kept crashing and burning, Liam became incredibly attentive. He kept hovering around my desk at work, dropping hints about when he could move back into my apartment. I deflected every time. During those weeks, I broke my lease on the small apartment. I threw away every single thing tied to Liam—the cheap stuffed animals, the yellowing phone cases, the photobooth strips. Five years of a relationship, bagged up like garbage and tossed into the dumpster. I told my parents everything. Furious, my dad immediately bought a luxury penthouse in Manhattan under my name and wired seven figures into my personal account. "Money is an adult's armor," my parents told me. "And we are your fortress." Armed with that fortress, I went to Liam's Thanksgiving dinner. Standing outside the private dining room, I could hear the raucous cheers through the heavy oak door. Loud. Very loud. The moment he sent me the restaurant address, I knew this was going to be the "grand, public proposal" he had promised his audience. I pushed the doors open. Instantly, dozens of eyes locked onto me. Liam was the first to stand up, walking toward me with a massive bouquet of flowers. His face was a mask of tender affection. Behind him were our college friends, colleagues, his frat brothers, and his parents and brother. He slowly pushed a worn, patched-up cloth bag across the table toward me. He dropped to one knee and untied the string. Inside were crumpled bills. Very few hundreds; mostly tens, fives, and ones. "Babe, you always said my proposals weren't formal enough, not grand enough." "This time, my family is here. Our friends and colleagues are here. With everyone as my witness, I am offering you my absolute all. This is the life savings my parents scraped together for my wedding. It's exactly $13,268." "I know it's not a lot to someone from the city, but this is everything my humble family has to give to our new life together." He had clearly rehearsed this. His voice trembled with orchestrated emotion, every word echoing with noble sacrifice. "So, Chloe Bennett, will you marry me?" I looked at his frat brothers. Beneath their fake excitement, I saw the gleam of mockery. To them, it was the perfect joke: the greedy city girl forced to accept the broke country boy's pennies. "Say yes! Say yes!" his roommate chanted. "He already got you the diamonds! You can't say no now!" I stood there in dead silence. The cheering slowly died down, replaced by a bizarre, heavy tension. You could hear a pin drop. Brother B clicked his tongue, his tone dripping with sarcasm. "Wow. Liam bought the jewelry, brought his life savings, flew his family out here. You show up late, your parents didn't even bother coming, and you're still acting like you're too good for him?" Liam frowned, playing the hurt puppy. "Chloe, we agreed both our parents would be here..." I reached into my bag, pulled out a stack of oversized, high-gloss printed photos, and slammed them into his chest. Hard. The top photo was an AI-generated family portrait. Liam's real family was on one side, but the "bride's" family was composed entirely of AI-generated avatars. It looked terrifyingly fake. "What is this?" he demanded, shocked and angry. "You love using AI, don't you? If you can Photoshop diamond rings, I can Photoshop a family portrait. Consider our parents officially introduced." I tossed the next photo on the table. It was a poorly edited image of a pink carnation drowning in a sea of 999 red roses. I looked directly at the frat brother whose flowers Liam had stolen years ago. "Chad, right? Years ago, Liam stole your carnations and told everyone I rejected him because I demanded 999 roses. Consider the debt paid." Chad stared at the photo, dumbfounded. "Photoshop...? Wait, what?" I smiled sweetly. "Liam told everyone that as long as you guys see the Photoshopped jewelry, it counts as me owning it. So, you've seen the roses. That means he bought them. Flawless logic, right?" Next, I pulled out an absurdly scaled photo of a 5-carat diamond ring and slid it toward his coworkers. "I never asked for a 5-carat diamond. I got a beer tab. But I'm gifting him a picture of one. Fair trade, wouldn't you say?" "..." The photos rained down on the floor like snow. The final item I threw was a cheap, plastic jewelry set coated in fake gold paint I bought off Temu for $9.99. "You faked diamond jewelry for Instagram. I bought you plastic jewelry. How's that for matching your energy?!" I looked at him with pure disgust. "For five years, you played me for a fool." "Now it's your turn to see how it feels." Amidst the stunned silence of the room, I grabbed my purse, turned on my heel, and walked out. On the cab ride home, my phone didn't stop vibrating. By the time I walked into my new penthouse, I had over a hundred missed calls. His latest text was pathetically desperate: [Chloe, I know I have a fragile ego. I know I'm poor. But I never wanted to hurt you. If you asked me to, I would literally die for you.] [Please, for the sake of our five years together, don't throw me away like this.] Right now, to him, I was a winning lottery ticket he was terrified of losing. I knew the battle wasn't over. But with the truth on my side, I wasn't afraid of him anymore.
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