Part 1Thirty Two Secrets Seven Thousand Goodbyes

After she drifted off to sleep, her phone buzzed with a notification from the cloud:

[32 photos in "Recently Deleted" will be permanently removed soon.]

Driven by a dark, inexplicable impulse, I tapped it.

The first was a photo of a stranger—a boy, face pressed against a desk, sleeping soundly.

The second was a group shot from a department dinner. He was smiling brightly at the camera. She was standing right next to him, her gaze lingering on his profile, her expression softer than I’d seen in years.

The third was at a late-night bodega. Both their hands were in the frame, sharing a container of hot soup.

The fourth: two movie stubs tucked side-by-side.

The fifth, the sixth… Thirty-two photos in total. A curated gallery of a boy she’d been hiding for a long time.

The deletion dates coincided perfectly with every time we’d video chatted, every time I’d told her, “I miss you,” like a pathetic child.

I restored every single one of them and emailed them to myself.

Then, I opened my own camera roll. I selected every memory of us—every anniversary, every grainy selfie from the last seven years—and hit Permanently Delete.

Thirty-two photos were her secret.

Seven thousand, eight hundred and forty-seven photos were the weight of a ghost I was finally letting go of.

* * *

Cassidy and I had been together since our freshman year of college. Seven years of long-distance. Everyone back home in our small town asked the same thing:

“When is enough, enough?”

So, I did it. I quietly resigned from my secure, pension-track civil service job, booked a flight, and flew across the country to Chicago. I wanted to surprise her for her birthday. I wanted to tell her I was finally moving here for good.

Instead, in the glow of her phone at 2:00 AM, I found the heartbeats she couldn’t quite bring herself to erase.

I knew I shouldn't keep digging. But I opened her messages anyway.

Her "pinned" contact had changed.

It wasn't me anymore.

I tapped the profile of a guy named "Jordan."

I scrolled up.

There wasn't any explicit sexting. On the surface, it looked almost innocent.

But it was the mundanity that killed me.

[Check out this food truck, looks insane!] (Link)

[My boss is being a total dick today. I’m fuming.] (Meme)

[Watch this, I’m literally crying.] (TikTok link)

[Which color hoodie looks better on me?] (Image) (Image)

[Drive safe.]

[Did you make it home?]

[Yeah. Go to sleep. Night. I’ll bring you breakfast tomorrow.]

One day. Two days. A week. A month.

Three hundred and sixty-five days. Not a single gap in the timeline.

I checked his Instagram. Every post—a selfie, a shot of his dog, a complaint about overtime—had a heart from her.

I realized then I couldn't remember the last time she’d even seen one of my stories. I’d convinced myself she was just "buried in work."

I opened her DoorDash history.

The "Frequent Addresses" included her apartment, my place back home, and a third, unfamiliar location.

Her order history was a diary of devotion: Hangover cures sent at 10:00 AM. Stomach meds.

Wontons with the specific note: No cilantro, extra green onions.

Late-night fever reducers and a thermometer.

A birthday cake and flowers with a digital note: To the best, Jordan.

My fingers tightened around her phone, my face slick with tears I didn't remember shedding.

She remembered his hangover kit.

She remembered his allergies.

She remembered the cake and the card.

I spent seven years teaching her those things. I taught her how to make a man feel loved, how to show someone they were the center of her world.

She had learned the lesson perfectly.

I set the phone back down, moving like a ghost.

She was still asleep.

Her breathing was steady, her brow relaxed. She looked peaceful.

I stared at her for a long time.

Seven years ago, in a cramped high school hallway, she’d slipped a note into my locker: “I like you. Want to try being an ‘us’?”

Seven years later, every ounce of joy I had died in the silence of the truth she’d hidden.

I didn't wake her. I got up, grabbed a beer from the fridge, and walked out onto the balcony of the 18th-floor apartment.

The cold liquid burned my throat, and the Chicago wind slapped my face, forcing me awake.

Looking down at the scattered lights of a city that didn't know me, it hit me:

I had just thrown away my career.

I had bet my entire future on a woman who was already gone.

After a while, I heard footsteps behind me.

Arms wrapped around my waist, carrying the warmth of the duvet.

“Why are you up?”

Her voice was thick with sleep, her chin resting on my shoulder like a contented cat.

I didn't move.

“I thought I was dreaming,” she murmured. “I wish I could wake up to you every single day.”

I turned and pulled her into my arms.

Images flashed in my mind, uncontrollable.

Her borrowing my notes in high school and scrawling I love you in the margins.

Her saving every cent to take a miserable ten-hour bus ride to see me at my uni, peeling bags of roasted chestnuts for me because she knew they were my favorite.

She’d told me that once she climbed the corporate ladder in the city, she’d come back and marry me. Her eyes had been so bright; she wasn't just selling me a dream, she believed it.

The gifts that arrived exactly on time for every anniversary.

The way she was always the first to apologize after a fight.

Seven years.

We’d survived the distance, the temptations, the growth spurts of our twenties. Or so I thought.

My eyes burned. Maybe it was the wind. Maybe I was just weak.

I told myself: Maybe she’s just lonely. She’s alone in this massive city, working late, with no one to talk to. Maybe he’s just a work friend. Maybe I’m overreacting.

She didn't wait for an answer. She pulled me back to the bedroom, tucked me into the sheets, and held me. Her breathing soon leveled out again.

I stared at the ceiling until the dark turned to gray, then to white.

When the sun finally hit the glass, I made a choice.

I’d give her one chance.

I’d wait until after her birthday, and then we’d have the talk.