Chapter 4

Downstairs, I discovered that Shen Mo had taken the car I’d driven over in to get to the hospital.

She hadn’t considered whether I needed it, or how I would get home in the middle of the night.

The ride-hailing app searched and searched. No one accepted.

My finger was swelling. I gave up on the hospital and went into a small clinic instead.

The needle for the tetanus shot pierced my arm. I gritted my teeth against the pain.

Without thinking, I opened WeChat Moments. Ji Yan’s latest update appeared first.

“First tetanus shot of my life. Hurts like hell! Good thing someone helped take my mind off the pain!”

The photo showed tooth marks on Shen Mo’s cheek. She was smiling fondly.

Shen Mo said a perfect boyfriend had to be independent.

Even when my gastritis hurt so badly I nearly passed out, she ignored my pleas to go to the hospital and sent me a link to order painkillers.

I had thought her strict requirements had given me a high tolerance for pain.

Apparently not high enough. My eyes burned with tears.

The doctor paused, withdrew the needle more gently, and told me to stay for observation.

I nodded. My eyes drifted back to the comments.

“Perfectly still during the shot: plus one hundred. Bonus: the trip you’ve wanted most.”

I opened the screenshot beneath the comment. It was a booking for two on a group tour of Switzerland.

My finger stopped above the screen. For a long time, I couldn’t move.

Those were our honeymoon tickets.

For seven years, the wedding had never worked out. For seven years, the honeymoon had been postponed with it.

She said we could buy new tickets whenever the old ones expired, but we couldn’t break the sequence. No one could let personal feelings compromise our perfect marriage.

Now she had handed our honeymoon to another man as a bonus.

Could secondhand happiness still be perfect?

I didn’t know.

I wiped my tears and left a comment.

“Have a good trip. Let’s break up.”

All I knew was that I didn’t want a secondhand honeymoon.

Or a secondhand partner, either.

Shen Mo began calling immediately, over and over.

When I declined the calls, she flooded my phone with messages.

“Is making a scene on Ji Yan’s Moments fun for you? Have you reflected on what you did at all?”

“Ji Yan was generous enough to forgive you. Of course I owe him a trip on your behalf. Stop making it into something it isn’t.”

“Rule one of the Rules for the Perfect Boyfriend: always reply. Minus five.”

At last, she seemed to give a little.

“Ten tomorrow morning. Be there on time, and we’ll take you along.”

I ignored the arrangement she’d made for me, deleted her and Ji Yan, and blocked them both.

Then I opened my client’s message.

“The flight’s been moved up. We’re leaving tomorrow morning.”

“All right,” I replied.

I spent the night as best I could in the clinic. Early the next morning, I took a cab back to the rental, collected my luggage, and headed to the airport.

While I waited for my flight, I saw Shen Mo staring at me in surprise.

I checked my watch. It was only seven.

She opened her mouth, but Ji Yan’s delighted voice came from behind her.

“Chen! Are you coming on the trip with us?”

He hurried over with his suitcase, clearly just arriving.

Shen Mo swallowed whatever she had been about to say.

“No,” she said stiffly. “He’s late again.”

There it was. Her clock was only ever right for Ji Yan.

The time she’d given me was three hours later than theirs. Now she was openly taking his side.

She had never intended to let me intrude on their trip for two.

After a pause, she sighed in exasperation, took the cleaned wedding ring from her pocket, and gently slipped it onto my ring finger.

“Be good. We’ll be back in seven days. Get the wedding ready. I’ll be there on time. Don’t make a fuss now. I won’t take points off for you being late, all right?”

She was certain I was still the Xie Chen who would wait stupidly for her, get jealous and cause a scene over her closeness with Ji Yan, then be soothed by a single promise.

She was wrong.

Once I’d decided to leave, even explaining myself felt unnecessary.

I watched them walk away, dropped the ring into a trash can, and turned toward a different boarding gate.

Toward a future without her.

Seven days later, Shen Mo went straight from her flight to the wedding hall, arriving precisely on cue.

She stopped the instant she walked inside.

The hall was empty. No wedding. No guests.

Unease rose in her chest. She grabbed the manager.

“Isn’t Xie Chen’s wedding today? Where is everyone?”

He looked puzzled.

“Mr. Xie? He canceled every future wedding booking a week ago. I heard he’s already left the country.”