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Ethan stood on the balcony, watching her silhouette fade into the distance before glancing at the overcast sky. Rain was coming.
His brow furrowed.
Grabbing his jacket from the couch, he turned to me. “It’s late. Not safe for her to walk back alone. I’ll see her home.”
Before I could reply, he was already hurrying downstairs.
Through the window, I saw Lily’s surprised smile when she spotted him—the way her face lit up as she looped her arm through his. They walked off like two halves of a whole.
Tears blurred my vision. Not the hollow numbness from earlier—this pain was raw, real.
My eyes aren’t blind. But my heart? It might as well have been.
That night, Ethan didn’t come home. My fingers brushed the cold, empty space beside me in bed. The hollowness in my chest echoed it.
Then Lily’s post lit up my phone:
“Ethan looks so cute when he’s asleep 😴”
The photo showed him passed out on her sofa. That sharp jawline, the dark lashes casting shadows under his eyes. Those same eyes that had drawn me to him years ago.
My knuckles went white gripping the phone. Rain lashed against the Boston streets outside, thrashing the balcony geraniums. My heart felt just as waterlogged. Cold. Heavy. Like it might never thaw.
Later, Ethan woke to a dozen missed calls and texts from me. His reply buzzed in:
“Sophie, sorry—crazy night. Didn’t see your messages.”
A voice note followed, as if my blindness hid his guilt: “Lily got spooked alone in her apartment. You know how jumpy she is. Had to stay.”
A tear smeared my phone screen.
So I don’t get to be afraid?
A blind woman in a pitch-black apartment doesn’t deserve comfort?
My voice shook when I called him. “Are you coming home?”
Since Lily came back, he’d been clinging to her orbit. What was I? A placeholder?
Sometimes, it felt like she was his real girlfriend. Like my three years were just… borrowed time.
Silence. No reply.
But then—a notification. He’d liked Lily’s photo. Commented:
“👎 Not my best angle, Lil.”
Her instant reply:
“Ugh, you’re still hotter than 90% of Boston. Remember when you were, like, actual perfection?”
“Lol, lies. Pretty sure you swore you’d marry me at Sarah’s 10th bday party.”
Their inside jokes stacked up—a shared history I could never touch. I sat frozen on the couch, phone screen burning my palm.
Midnight. A buzz. I grabbed it.
Not Ethan. His friend Mark:
“Yo, Ethan’s hammered. Can you come grab him?”
They’d forgotten. Forgotten I couldn’t drive. Forgotten I was blind.
I called an Uber.
Outside the bar’s private room, voices spilled into the hall:
“…c’mon, man. Lily’s back, Sophie’s still here… you keeping both on the hook?” Teasing laughter. I recognized Mark’s voice. This whole party—a “Welcome Home Lily” bash.
Ethan’s words slurred, thick with whiskey and confession: “One’s my heart. The other’s my guilt. What would you do?”
Silence. Then Mark, blunt: “You pick the one you love. Every damn time.”
The cheer that erupted wasn’t a celebration—it was a verdict.
Lily. They cheered for Lily.
My cane clattered to the floor. I stumbled backward, into the chaos of downtown—horns blaring, rain stinging, the world tilting. Inside my chest, his words echoed like a siren:
He loved her.
He pitied me.
My three years? Just filling his emptiness while he waited.
For her.
