After my shift, I scrolled into a post, [Should I chase someone I like even if she already has a boyfriend?]

One comment said, [Of course.]

[Five years back, I moved to a new city. The neighbor was a smart beauty, and she had a boyfriend then.]

[I first made friends with them, then blamed her boyfriend for hurting me and acted weak so she would pity me, and right away they drifted apart.]

[Later, they argued often; the worst was when the girl came to me crying, and I kissed her. She hesitated at once.]

[And that night, her boyfriend was still upset over not getting into the university]

[Now I think I chose right. She is now a partner of a listed firm, and we are close to marriage. If I hadn’t acted early, how would I have this life now?]

Then the man changed his tone. [As for her ex-boyfriend, too sad. Failed to get into the university,probably doomed to a messy life.]

I froze on the spot, because I knew at once I was the ex-boyfriend he meant.

——

Reading that bragging comment talking about how he stole another guy’s girlfriend, my first reaction was to close the post.

Because I had lived through the same thing.

However, I froze instead, because the profile picture looked familiar.

It was the first picture of Arden Cohen and Calliope Vaughn together, taken on Calliope’s birthday, and I was the one who snapped it.

I couldn’t stop staring at that reply for a long while.

Many people in the comments cursed him, calling him shameless for being a home-wrecker.

But some supported him, saying he just picked the best choice.

[This is a real man. Locked in a rising stock early and climbed up. What’s wrong with choosing better?]

[Even if that didn’t happen, they might have split. I think he did nothing bad.”

At that time, I stood beside the street.

The wind suddenly blew strongly. I staggered, and the food I held dropped into a dirty puddle.

I bent down and tossed the spoiled sandwich into the bin.

In truth, I was the ex-boyfriend that the comment talked about.

Afterward, Calliope and I went our separate ways. I failed to get into the university, and even the mother who cared for me most met with an accident.

In those days, I tried to end my life more than once.

In the later years, days slowly became calm again.

Only then did I notice that the five full years had gone by.

It was the fifth year since I broke up with Calliope, and the third since I fully let her fade away.

The hurt and sadness had long healed like the marks across my palms, thinning like dust in the breeze.

Returning home, I arranged the scattered sketches on the table.

Just as Arden said, I never went to university, nor touched that higher circle again.

Placing the drafts back into the drawer, I suddenly spotted a long-stored letter.

On it, in neat handwriting. “Rayne Zimmerman, personally.”

At the last line of that letter, she wrote she would leave everything to me, yet in the end, it was I who lost it all because of her.

My mind drifted back to the past.

Calliope and I were childhood sweethearts, growing up side by side.

We lived in nearby houses; in those days, she still had a warm family.

Later on, her dad’s company expanded, and he returned less.

She often slipped over to my place, saying that mine felt like home, and hers did not.

When she turned six, her dad cheated.

Her mom broke things across the house overnight and stopped caring for her.

During the divorce, her parents tossed her back and forth like a toy; neither wanted her.

The once cozy family of three soon became nothing more than a quiet shell.

Later, my parents felt sorry for her and treated her like their own daughter.

From that point, Calliope and I stayed close, almost never separating.

Calliope was always remarkable with outstanding grades and a pretty face.

And I was just a normal boy, plain looks, average grades, the only thing I did well was drawing.

But during those days, I never thought I didn’t match her.

She told me we gave her all the warmth a family should hold, that we were her real home.

She also told me I was the ray of brightness in her dark life.

In our first high school year, after night study, I walked back with Calliope as always.

Along a quiet path, we met her dad.

He was drunk, swaying, acting wild.

He had gone bankrupt, the lover who cheated with him had left, and now he came to take Calliope again.

She refused to follow, and he suddenly rushed forward, trying to drag her away.

At that second, I couldn’t think of anything else and moved in front of her without pause.

My knees shook from fear, yet I feared more that she might be harmed.

That night, Calliope held me firmly and promised that in her whole life she would only care for me.

After we entered high school, she grew even more outstanding, drawing attention from many boys.

She was always the top student, while I was just a normal art student.

I worried she might walk away one day, but she always smiled and pinched my hand, saying, “Dummy! Why would I leave you? I can’t repay what you, uncle and aunt, gave me.”

I thought we would stay happy just like that, until Arden showed up.

On a hot summer day, I was doing homework with Calliope at her home when sudden knocks sounded on the door.

Opening it, we saw a cheerful boy with a bright smile.

He said he had recently moved here and was Calliope’s new neighbor.

His soft tone seemed to ease the heat of summer, but inside me grew a quiet ten.

Maybe it was the glow coming from him, or maybe it was because I noticed the burning admiration in his eyes when he looked at her.

Later, I realized that the uneasy feeling wasn’t imagined; it became the main color of my remaining high school years.

The next morning, I found out that Arden not only became her neighbor but also moved into our school.

Right after the monthly test, the teacher was going over the results.

My grades were normally average, but I surprisingly took first place in English this time.

Just as the teacher praised me, Arden showed up at the classroom doorway.

The whole class burst into loud excitement; nobody cared about my result anymore, and everyone stared at him.

“Wow, our school actually has such a good-looking boy!”

“You fool, he must be new here, or we would’ve seen him earlier!”

Only then did I understand that he was now Calliope’s neighbor and soon also my classmate.

What I did not expect was that when choosing seats, Arden picked me.

“Rayne, you’re the only boy I know here, I’ll rely on you.”

“I know you and Calliope are close. Can you both take me along?”

He smiled like a gentle winter sun. And I… couldn’t think of any reason to say no.

From that moment, another person stepped into the place that once held only Calliope and me.

I didn’t have many classmates close to me, and after Arden came, people around us began to say Calliope, and he was the right pair, even though the girl who liked someone was Calliope liking me.

“School beauty with school prince, why is Rayne squeezing in?”

“Who knows, maybe a frog dreaming of a swan.”

Back then, I truly saw Arden as a buddy. I even asked if I really wasn’t worthy of Calliope.

But Arden only curved his lips and said, “How could that be? Though you really aren’t bright like others, Calliope doesn’t mind.”

“Oh, and she wants you to go to the amusement park this weekend. She’s too timid to say it, so she asked me instead. Don’t skip it.”

Even though what we shared was an unspoken love, that would have been our first day out like that.

That day after class, I left ahead of time. Even under heavy rain, I still went far to a mall to pick a present for her.

I chose a bottle of perfume.

The salesgirl asked whether it was for my girlfriend. I couldn’t stop the small smile and nodded.

Girlfriend

It was the first time someone called her that.

When amusement-park day came, I dressed up a bit. While standing at the gate, I wondered if I was doing too much.

But I waited until dark, and she still didn’t come.

My texts sank like pebbles into deep water.

My heart collapsed. I only feared she had met trouble.

It was too dim, and on the road back, I slipped and fell into dirty mud.

My neat white shirt became smeared with dirt. The scent I bought for her flew from my hand, too.

When I hurried to her place and pushed open the door, I saw Arden lying on her bed while she mixed cold-medicine tea for him.

The second she saw me, Calliope’s lovely face tightened in anger.

“Why did you show up only now? Where were you? I searched for you the whole day.”

“You didn’t know Arden got soaked yesterday and passed out with a fever early this morning? If I weren’t next door, who can say what danger it could have caused?”

No reason for missing our date, only blame thrown onto me.

In all the years I knew her, it was the first time she shouted at me like that.

Arden then lowered his face and spoke, “Rayne, I think something must have held you back, but you shouldn’t have taken my umbrella during such heavy rain.”

“My place had no cold pills. My mom and dad were not home. I sent you message after message, but you blocked me. Luckily, I fainted at Calliope’s house. If not, I really don’t know what might have happened.”

His tone sounded even more pitiful. “I just moved here, and I always treated you as my closest friend. Why treat me like that…”

Hearing this, Calliope’s anger rose.

I stood frozen right there. So in his story, I was the selfish one again.

After a long while, I finally opened my mouth and held out the present toward Calliope.

“I didn’t… I only…”

But she didn’t even glance at me. She simply passed the cup to Arden instead.

I became like a stranger standing in that room.

After some time, I walked out of her house. From that moment, we entered our first silent fight.

When classes resumed, I quietly switched my seat, no longer beside Arden.

The looks classmates gave me turned even more unusual.

Arden told others I picked on him because of Calliope, making himself seem like the wronged one.

Anywhere I appeared, the room swarmed with low voices about me.

“See? I told you he isn’t good enough for the class beauty. Yet he still kept hanging around.”