1 My best friend called his fiancée, only to have her hang up on him. The text she sent back was cold and dismissive. “Lewis has a cold. I don’t have time.” My friend then called his own girlfriend, a superstar with connections everywhere. The reply he got was just as chilling. “Lewis’s sick. This is when he needs me the most.” After a night spent fighting for my life in the emergency room, we found ourselves in the same hospital ward, looking at each other. We spoke the words at the exact same time. “I don’t want to get married anymore.” We never expected that when the women who had abandoned us received the news, they would both lose their minds. … After a week of complete silence, my fiancée, Grace, finally called. I answered, and was immediately met with a barrage of accusations. “Liam, what the hell is wrong with you? Both our families have already agreed on the time and place for the wedding, and you just call it off? What are you trying to pull?” I opened my mouth to speak, but she cut me off with a torrent of self-righteous anger. “I’ve told you a million times, Lewis’s health is fragile! A simple cold can turn into a life-threatening crisis. I have to be by his side to make sure he’s safe. How can you be so petty and jealous? Don’t you have any regard for human life?!” Human life… A bitter laugh escaped my lips. Last night, I was on my way home after finalizing our wedding arrangements when a speeding truck slammed into my car. In the moments before I lost consciousness, I used every last ounce of strength to call Grace. The line went dead. She’d rejected the call. I tried again. Rejected. As my vision faded to black, my blood-smeared phone screen lit up with a notification. An impatient message from Grace. [What? Spit it out!] When I didn’t reply instantly, another one followed. [Are you sick in the head? Do you have any idea how much Lewis needs me right now? His emotional state is fragile! A breakdown could kill him!] And now, after all that, all she could do was berate me. Suddenly, my best friend, Brian, who had just walked in, snatched the phone from my hand. “Are you out of your mind, Grace?! Liam was in a car wreck last night! The driver hit him and then maliciously ran him over a second time! If they hadn’t gotten him to the hospital when they did, he’d be dead right now! Can you not tell the difference between a fucking cold and a car crash?!” A cold, dismissive laugh came from the other end. “You’re trying to pull that kind of lie on a doctor, Brian? You two really overestimate your own intelligence.” With that, she hung up. Brian stared at the phone, the veins in his hand popping as he gripped it. Almost immediately, his own phone rang. It was his fiancée, Bella—Grace’s childhood friend. “Brian, what is this game you two are playing? Do you have any idea what you’ve done? Because of your childish jealousy and lies, Lewis got so agitated he nearly had a full-blown relapse!” “If Grace and I hadn’t been here, what would have happened to him? Are you blind to a living, breathing human being in crisis?! The Vance family will not let someone as vicious and cruel as you through its doors. I don’t give a damn if we get married or not!” Brian was about to unleash a string of curses, but she had already blocked his number. “I swear to God, those…” I reached out a weak hand and grabbed his arm. “Don’t, Brian. They’re not worth it.” He looked at the mess of tubes and monitors connected to me, his voice filled with concern. “Liam, does it still hurt?” I smiled and shook my head. Not anymore. The real pain had stopped the moment Grace hung up on me while I was bleeding out. To distract us, Brian put on some reality TV show. We sat there, picking at a bag of chips, making snarky comments. “Look at that guy. He’s got the face of a B-list comedian.” “This whole segment is so fake. You can practically see the script.” But soon, the laughter died in our throats. On the screen, in a haze of soft lighting and dramatic music, was Bella. The A-list celebrity. The love of Brian’s life. Brian’s face darkened. “Nope, bad juju,” he muttered, fumbling for the remote. “Changing this right now.” But Bella’s voice, thick with emotion, stopped him. It was one of those sappy, heartfelt confessionals the shows loved. She looked directly into the camera, her famous eyes shimmering with unshed tears. “My biggest regret,” she said, her voice trembling, “is not telling a certain boy how I felt all those years ago…” The other guests on the show hooted and pressed for details. Brian’s hand, holding the remote, clenched into a white-knuckled fist. I put a comforting hand on his arm, my own heart aching for him. Bella and Brian were engaged, but she refused to make it public. She claimed it would hurt her brand, affect her "relatability" with her fans. This, despite the fact that her family was so wealthy that her acting career was little more than a hobby. Whenever Brian brought it up, she would fly into a rage, accusing him of not understanding her, of not supporting her dreams. But she never saw it. She never saw how Brian would pull all-nighters for damage control whenever a negative story about her broke. She never saw how he would mobilize his own network to promote her new shows and movies. Brian once told me he knew being a star was her dream. So he was willing to use all his resources, all his strength, to lift her to the very top. But in her eyes, everything he did was just a desperate attempt to keep her, a tool in his jealous game. She was convinced that the only person in the world who truly understood her was their shared childhood friend, Lewis. Seeing the worry in my eyes, Brian forced a smile. “It’s okay, Liam. We already decided, right? We’re calling it off.” “All that’s left is to tell our parents. Then it’s over. We’ll be free.” I nodded, a heavy silence settling between us. But that night, my phone rang again. It was Grace. “Liam, why are you being so unreasonable?” she said, her voice laced with annoyance. “Lewis was sick. I was helping him as a doctor! Why do you have to twist everything into something so ugly?! And because of this petty little tantrum, you’re not even coming to the engagement dinner!” “Both our families are here. We’re all waiting for you! Liam, I’m warning you, be sensible. Don’t make me come and get you.” In the past, her cold, scolding tone would have crushed me. But now, faced with her fury, I just felt… nothing. “Grace,” I said calmly, “since I’m breaking off the engagement, there’s no reason for me to be at that dinner.” The words “breaking off” reignited her rage. “Do you have any idea how pathetic you sound right now? Is this some kind of stupid pissing contest? Liam, I never knew you could be this manipulative and childish! I’m the one calling you, giving you an out. Is it that hard to just back down?!” “Everyone is waiting! How long are you going to keep this up?! You have to be here today! Tell me where you are, I’m coming to get you right now!” I looked down at the hospital-issue blanket covering me, a wave of exhaustion washing over me. “I’m at Mercy General Hospital. Come and get me.” There were two seconds of silence, then a cold, derisive laugh. “Wow, Liam. You don’t even bother with believable lies anymore. You’d say anything just to make me grovel and beg for your forgiveness, wouldn’t you?” I closed my eyes, a bitter smile on my face. I knew it would end like this. I knew that no matter what happened to me, it would never be as important as a single hair on Lewis’s head. I knew all of this, and yet, some foolish part of me still held onto a sliver of hope. A wave of nausea churned in my stomach, and I leaned over the side of the bed, vomiting into a basin. Grace, oblivious, continued her tirade, her tone as arrogant as ever. “And don’t you dare drag Brian into your little drama! He was supposed to be meeting Bella’s parents tonight to set a wedding date, and now he’s nowhere to be found! You can’t handle your own relationship, so you have to poison someone else’s? And now you’re stooping to faking a life-threatening injury? Liam, have you ever considered how truly toxic you are?! What’s next? If I give in this time, will you start self-harming to force my hand?” Yes. No matter what, she would always assume the worst. That I was the master manipulator, orchestrating everything just to prey on her non-existent sympathy. It was just like last year, at a party, when Lewis deliberately fed me something I was severely allergic to. I spiked a fever immediately, my throat closing up. I almost died. Her reaction then? She looked down at me, her face a mask of cold disdain. “Liam, the way you use these lies to get attention is absolutely disgusting. You just want to marry into my family, don't you? You already tricked my parents into this engagement. What’s the point of this pathetic act?” In her mind, that’s all I was. A vicious, scheming man, using self-inflicted wounds to drive a wedge between her and her precious Lewis. Before, I would have argued, I would have desperately tried to explain. But now, I was just tired. So tired, I couldn’t be bothered to say another word to save us. “Grace, I’m breaking the engagement,” I said, my voice flat. “When I’m out of the hospital, I’ll explain everything to your parents myself. I’m not coming to the dinner tonight.” I hung up. I never thought she would actually show up. When she stormed into my hospital room and saw me lying in the bed, she froze, a deep frown creasing her forehead. But before she could speak, Lewis appeared behind her. He habitually looped his arm through hers, pressing his entire body against her side in a blatant act of ownership. He looked at me, his face a caricature of pity. “What’s all this? Liam, what happened to you?” “I’m so sorry, Liam. I really wasn’t feeling well that day, that’s the only reason Grace came to see me. You shouldn’t be so upset with her. Both our families are waiting for you at the hotel! You’re making things so awkward for them!” Before he could continue his cloying, manipulative speech, Grace cut him off. She looked at him, her eyes filled with a pained tenderness that she had never once shown me. “Lewis, you don’t have to say any of this to him! Liam! You are getting more and more out of line! Did you really think staging this little drama would make me submit to you? You need to apologize to Lewis right now! And you need to apologize to our parents!” “This is your last chance! Otherwise, you can forget about this wedding!” A cold laugh escaped me. “Grace, we’re done. Please take your boyfriend and get the hell out of my room.” The mention of her beloved Lewis sent her into a rage. Her hand flew up, and the sharp crack of a slap echoed in the quiet room.
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