On the night before Match Day, it's 2:17 am when I find myself staring at the screenshot on my phone. For a long while, my heart refuses to calm down at all.

Ethan Blake: "Let's have a bet, guys. If Leah doesn't get a spot at Redwood General Hospital tomorrow, this will mark the end of our relationship. The starting bet is two thousand dollars. Is anyone following up on this bet?"

Already, more than a dozen people have responded to the message with various emojis. Someone even comments, "Count me in!"

I feel my nails digging into my palms.

"The end of our relationship", he says. To think that Ethan actually used this phrase.

We've been dating for four years. This is the very same man who once told me that he wanted to marry me.

Is it this easy for him to end a relationship?

I take a deep breath and force myself to calm down. There are still other medical interns in the staff room with me. I mustn't lose my composure around them.

I know that Ethan is waiting for me to react how I did in the previous times. I'd either spam his phone with missed calls, beg him to delete the message while crying, or apologize to him in an extremely humble manner.

But now…

Now, I'm really done with this relationship.

I quietly saved the screenshot, then turned off my phone.

From that moment on, I stopped paying attention to Ethan Blake.

Instead, I focused on noon tomorrow—the moment medical students across the country would log into the National Resident Matching Program (NRMP) system.

Three days later, Mark Powell, one of Ethan's colleagues and a resident doctor at Redwood General Hospital, messaged me.

"Leah, Ethan's been waiting for you to reach out. The day after tomorrow is his celebration for being promoted to attending physician. Come by. You two can make up."

As I stared at the message, a mocking smile tugged at my lips.

Make up?

Why must I always be the one to give in?

I replied with only one line, "Sorry, I can't make it."

And I truly couldn't.

The day after tomorrow, I was going to be on a flight to Fedria. Northview University's affiliate hospital, Northview Memorial Hospital, was waiting for me to report for its residency program.

As Ethan wished, we would never see each other again.

…

Seven days earlier, Ethan had allowed Victoria Hartfield, his first love and the hospital board chairman's daughter, to sabotage the most important research project of my life.

​When I discovered what Victoria did, I completely broke down. She'd secretly deleted eight months of my experimental data. Even worse, she leaked my research framework to her best friend, who was also applying for the same residency program.

"Do you even understand what she did?" My voice trembled.

"She deleted my research data! My eight months of work! My paper and application for the residency program are all ruined!"

Ethan didn't think it was a big deal. He even set down his cup of coffee with a hint of impatience.

"Come on, Leah. It's just some data. Victoria was in a bad mood that day. Her dad's been pressuring her about marriage. You should try to understand the pressure she's under. You have backups, right? Just reorganize everything."

He said it so casually, as if my future were nothing more than a toy he could knead in his hands.

My voice shook with incredulous rage. "She was in a bad mood, so she gets to destroy someone else's research? Ethan, that's academic misconduct! I can report this to the school!"

"I said it was a misunderstanding!" He shot to his feet, towering over me. Irritation was plain in his eyes.

"It's just a minor issue. Now that you know, just fix it. You always overreact."

He paused, his voice turning colder. "Leah, if you keep being this aggressive, I'll have to reconsider our relationship."

That was a familiar threat.

Ethan knew I couldn't leave him. Every time we argued, he dangled a breakup over my head.

Every time, I compromised.

And every time, I despised myself for being so weak.

Before Victoria showed up, Ethan and I had been steady.

I was a full-scholarship student at Hawford Medical School. He'd been my supervising physician during my third-year clinical rotation.

My mother, a single parent, passed away from cancer while I was in college. The medical debt nearly forced me to give up medical school altogether.

Ethan was the one who helped me apply for financial aid so I could continue my education. From there, our mentor-student relationship evolved into something more.

But ever since Victoria entered the picture, she'd been the source of constant arguments between us.

This was the ninth fight we'd had because of her.

After the first eight, Ethan had always resorted to threatening a breakup. And spineless as I was, I'd always been the one to back down.

This time was no different. He was certain I would compromise again because I loved him.

After issuing his threat, Ethan waited for me to give him an out and apologize first.

But this time…

Just now, as I watched Ethan criticize me impatiently while smiling down at a text from Victoria, something inside me went cold.

Suddenly, none of it felt worth it anymore.

I didn't feel an urge to apologize. I just sat there in stony silence.

Ethan waited for a moment. When it became clear that I wasn't going to admit fault, he clicked his tongue in annoyance, grabbed his phone, and walked out of the hospital cafeteria.

I sat alone, staring blankly at my laptop screen. I had no idea how long I'd been frozen there when my phone buzzed. I'd received a voice message.

After some hesitation, I tapped to play it.

Victoria's sweet voice filled my ears. "Ethan, is Leah mad because of my mistake? Why don't you call her and ask her to come over? I'll apologize to her in person."

Ethan's impatient voice cut in. "No need! Let her sulk if she wants to. I'm not her babysitter. I don't have to keep coddling her."

"Oh, Ethan, don't say that. Women need to be coddled. If you talk like that, you'll just push Leah farther away."

Victoria sounded gentle and thoughtful, like some understanding little angel.

Ethan snorted. "I don't have time to coddle her. She can be mad if she wants. Honestly, if she hadn't helped me with that impossible case analysis back then, I wouldn't even be dating a broke student like her. She's so sensitive and cries over everything. I've been done with it for years."

At that moment, it felt like someone had ripped my heart out.

It hurt.

It really hurt.

"Seriously, Leah's just way too fragile. I've never met someone so emotional."

That was Mark's voice.

"Tell me about it. Every time I threaten to break up, she cries and apologizes first. I'm tired of it! Honestly, she'd be doing me a favor by ignoring me. That way, I can finally be rid of her for good."

Mark laughed. "Be rid of Leah? No way. She's so clingy. I bet if you don't go back tonight, she'll be crying and apologizing at your door tomorrow."

"Alright! Let's make a bet. The loser buys dinner!"

The recording ended.

I sat in the corner of the cafeteria, gripping my phone so hard that my nails dug into my palm, but I barely felt it.

So that was how Ethan saw me. For four years, he'd thought of me as a burden. Everything he'd ever done for me was just because I'd helped him out once.

Finally, the dam broke. Tears streamed down my face. I covered my mouth, trying not to make a sound.

I thought to myself, "Leah Hayes, you're really pathetic."

That night, Ethan didn't come back to our apartment in BackBay.

I didn't call him endlessly or demand to know where he was like I would have done before.

I just sat on the bed, listening to that recording over and over.

Every time I played it, my heart broke a little more.

After Mom died of cancer, I thought I'd found a new anchor—Ethan. He was the youngest candidate for attending physician at Redwood General Hospital and a star lecturer at Hawford Medical School.

It had been four years. Four years of supporting each other through everything.

Ethan had genuinely cared for me. During clinical rotations, whenever senior doctors made things difficult, he was always the first to stand up for me.

He remembered what kind of coffee I liked on night shifts, and he would order takeout for me after I pulled 36-hour shifts.

We were inseparable, like two halves of a whole.

Because of that, people envied us, calling us the "power couple of medicine".

After four years of being so close, I'd grown used to Ethan being a part of my life. I thought I couldn't live without him.

I'd imagined our future together. We would be at the same top hospital, complete our residencies side by side, get married, have kids, and build a warm home together.

I believed there was nothing that could ever come between us.

But that peace ended the day Victoria returned to Estain.

She came back when I was in my fourth year of med school.

Her father, Seth Hartfield, was the chairman of Redwood General Hospital's board. Her mother, Diana Rosales, was a renowned plastic surgeon.

Victoria had finished a master's in public health at Boskary and returned to take a hospital operations role under Seth.

She and Ethan had been engaged once, but they broke up when she went abroad.

Now that she was back, she made it clear that she wanted him again.

The first time Victoria showed up in front of me, I felt the threat immediately.

Poised like a princess, she was in a Chanel suit, Louboutins clicking under her feet. Meanwhile, I was in wrinkled scrubs, my hair in a messy ponytail, with dark circles from sleepless nights.

"So, you're Leah?" Victoria sized me up. "Ethan mentioned you. Thank you for taking care of him all these years."

Her tone was polite but distant, as if I were nothing more than a passing presence in Ethan's life.

"But now I'm back." She smiled and continued, "Ethan needs someone who can support him in social circles and help build his career. You get what I mean, right?"

At that moment, the gap between us hit me like a punch to the gut.

I was a broke student scraping by on scholarships and grants. Victoria, meanwhile, was a high-born heiress, raised in the lap of luxury.

I thought Ethan would stand by me and tell Victoria that we were together, but he didn't.

He simply said, "Victoria, Leah is a very important… friend of mine."

Friend.

He used that word.

Not girlfriend, not partner—friend.

From that day forward, Victoria began to set her plan in motion.

She "accidentally" booked two concert tickets and invited Ethan. She mentioned his research projects at board meetings to get him more resources. She even hosted weekend gatherings for doctors and left me out.

Gradually, Ethan started spending more time with Victoria.

"Her dad's the board chairman," he explained. "I need to maintain that connection. It's important for my career. Besides, Victoria's in the medical field too. We have a lot in common. Don't overthink it. It's just work."

Every time, I chose to believe him.

Every time, I convinced myself it was temporary.

Until the day I discovered that months of my research data had vanished.