1 The night before my wedding, I decided to play a prank. I dialed Gavin’s number, pretending to be my eighteen-year-old self—a “time-traveling call” from the past. I was full of a girl’s naive hope, my voice trembling with feigned excitement: “Gavin, what’s our life like at twenty-seven? Are we getting married? Are we… are we happy?” There was a long, suffocating silence on the other end. Then came Gavin’s voice, heavy with a weariness that chilled my blood. “Not great,” he said. “Jade, I’ve wasted my entire life on you.” My breath hitched. “I’m begging you,” he continued, his voice cracking with a desperation I didn’t recognize. “In whatever parallel universe you’re in… just let me go.” I froze, the phone slipping slightly in my palm. I thought I had misheard him. I thought it was a joke—a cruel, poorly timed joke. Seeking comfort, I called my mother, my voice already breaking. “Mom, I…” “I know, honey,” she interrupted, her voice a soft, maternal sigh. “You’re playing that eighteen-year-old Jade again, aren’t you?” My heart stopped. “Gavin’s had it hard, Jade,” she said, her tone dripping with a misplaced pity. “He and your sister have been in love for five years. They’ve been suppressing everything, suffering in silence, all because of you. Just… take my advice. In the next life, let him be with Sienna. Give them that much.” The tears on my face turned to ice. My hand shook as I made one final call—to my sister. She picked up, but she wasn’t talking to me. I heard the rhythmic creak of a bed, the heavy, tangled breathing of two people, and then her muffled, stifled sob: “Jade, forgive me. Just tonight. He’s only mine for tonight. I won’t fight you for him in this life… I just beg you, in the next one, let me have him. Just once.” I hung up, the silence of the room roaring in my ears. My heart didn’t just break; it died. Fine. We don’t need a next life. We don’t need a parallel universe. In this life, right now, I’m done. Gavin didn’t return until the next morning. He carried the faint, clean scent of rose-scented body wash—Sienna’s favorite—and the tips of his hair were still damp from a shower that wasn’t taken at home. He hung his coat on the rack with a casual indifference, his eyes sweeping over me briefly. “Why are you up so early?” “I couldn’t sleep,” I said, my voice eerily calm. I waited a beat, then spoke again. “Gavin, let’s call off the wedding.” He stiffened, turning to face me. His eyes landed on my swollen, red rims. “What… what kind of joke is this?” “I played a game last night,” I said, looking him straight in the eye. “A little game called a time-traveling phone call.” Gavin’s hand froze on his collar. Slowly, his expression shifted from confusion to a cold, hardening guilt. “Jade, were you testing me?” I let out a sharp, self-deprecating laugh. I hadn’t expected his first reaction to be an accusation. “If I hadn’t, would I have spent the rest of my life playing the fool?” My eyes burned. “Gavin, the two of you… are you not disgusted by yourselves?” Slap. The force of the blow sent my head snapping to the side. I touched my stinging cheek, completely stunned. Gavin stared at his own hand, looking as shocked as I was. He hadn’t meant to do it, but the instinct to protect his secret—to protect her—was faster than his conscience. He pressed his lips into a thin line and looked down at me, his voice dropping an octave. “Jade, if you have something ugly to say, say it to me. I won’t stand by while you insult her.” The blood rushed to my head. I swung back, my palm connecting with his face in a deafening crack. “How dare you hit me!” I screamed, the tears finally spilling over. “Gavin, not even my parents have ever laid a hand on me!” I tried to swing again, but he caught my wrist, his grip like a vice. A slow, mocking smirk spread across his face. “Your parents?” he echoed. “Jade, your parents have known about us the whole time. You really didn’t know?” I stared at him, my heart plummeting. “Last Thanksgiving, remember? You barely sat down before your mother insisted on taking you shopping, and your father ran out to ‘get that specific wine’ you liked?” He leaned in close, his voice a cruel whisper. “Your whole family was running interference for us. They were our lookouts.” It felt like a physical blow to the chest. I looked at him, searching for a lie, but I found only a terrifying, triumphant truth. He released me with a flick of his wrist, as if he were discarding trash. “Wake up, Jade. If I were you, I’d play nice and use whatever guilt I have left for you. After all… even your own parents don’t love you.” I collapsed onto the floor, the tiles cold against my skin. “Why?” I whispered. “Why would you do this to me?” “Gavin,” I sobbed, “I’m not the type to beg. If you wanted to be with her, I would have let you go! We could have broken up, canceled the wedding, and you could have married her! Why the lies? Why the elaborate deception?” “Why are you still marrying me?!” I shrieked, the pain in my chest becoming unbearable. He looked down at me for a long time, his expression unreadable. Finally, he gave a short, jagged laugh. “Why? You think it’s because I love you?” He knelt down, wiping a tear from my chin with a touch that was sickeningly gentle. “Jade, Sienna is your sister. She’s a single mother, a divorcee—her life is hard enough. I won’t have her name dragged through the mud.” He gripped my shoulders, his voice as smooth as velvet and as sharp as a razor. “If I call off our wedding and marry her, what do you think the neighbors will say? What will the family think? No. I can’t let her suffer that shame. So, I have to let you suffer instead.” A chill ran through my marrow. “You’re marrying me as a cover? So you can keep sleeping with my sister behind a veil of respectability?” “Smart girl.” He tapped the tip of my nose playfully. “So, you’re going to play your part, aren’t you?” I shoved his hand away, my voice trembling with rage. “You think I’ll just sit here and be your puppet? You think I’ll let you play me like this?” “You will,” he said, pulling a folded slip of paper from his pocket and dropping it in my lap. It was a lab report from my physical last week. “You’re pregnant, Jade. Six weeks.” He smiled, a terrifyingly beautiful expression. “This is our child. Conceived when you were still head-over-heels, still dreaming of our white picket fence. You wouldn’t want him to grow up without a father, would you?” “Besides,” he added, standing up, “you’ve given me ten years. All your youth, all your ‘firsts.’ Who’s going to want a pregnant, discarded woman like you if you walk away now?” I picked up the report, my fingers shaking so violently I could barely hold it. My vision blurred as the tears hit the paper. Then, I started to laugh. It was a hollow, jagged sound. “Gavin Miller… you really are a piece of work.” He smiled and ruffled my hair. “Good girl. You have no choice.” As he turned to leave, he paused at the door. “One more thing. Don’t go crying to Sienna. I don’t want her feeling guilty. She has enough on her plate.” I watched him walk out, realizing I was looking at a stranger. I ran to the bathroom and retched into the toilet until my throat burned. I couldn’t tell if it was my heart or my stomach that was on fire. I knelt on the cold linoleum, shaking, laughing, crying. Finally, I reached for my phone. I stopped the recording—I had captured every word of our conversation. Then, I opened my browser and booked the earliest appointment at the clinic. Gavin was wrong. I had a choice. I just had to be more ruthless than he was. The next day was supposed to be the day we signed our marriage license at City Hall. Gavin called me dozens of times. I didn’t answer. Eventually, Sienna called. “Jade,” she said, her voice a perfect blend of sweetness and gentle sisterly reproach. “It’s your big day. Why are you acting out? Did you and Gavin have a little spat? Let big sister handle him, okay? Just get down to City Hall.” I listened to her voice—so different from the panting, desperate woman on the phone the night before. I wished it was a nightmare. I wished she was still the sister I looked up to. “I’m sick,” I said, my voice rasping. “I can’t go. Tell Gavin we’ll do it another day.” I hung up and opened the app for Gavin’s dashcam. Since our accounts were linked, I could see the live feed. The camera showed Gavin and Sienna in his car. Sienna looked worried. “Gavin, what’s wrong with her? Why is she being like this? Does she know about us?” “No,” Gavin said, leaning over to kiss her deeply. “She’s too stupid to figure it out. And even if she did, she’s trapped. I won’t let anyone hurt you, Sienna.” “But if she doesn’t sign the papers, how can we…” “Then we won’t sign them,” Gavin said dismissively. “The wedding ceremony will still happen. We’ll give everyone the show they expect.” He took her face in his hands. “Sienna, let’s get married.” She gasped. “What are you saying?” He pulled her into his arms. “The ceremony is for her. But the license… that will be for you. From now on, in the eyes of the law, you will be my real wife.” I felt the air leave my lungs. I knew they were betraying me, but seeing the man I had loved for a decade say those words to my own sister… it was a brand of pain I wasn’t prepared for. In the video, Sienna’s eyes welled with tears. She nodded, then shook her head. “No, we can’t. It’s too cruel to Jade.” “And is it not cruel to me to keep us apart?” he countered. “Are you going to choose her over me?” She struggled, her face a mask of manufactured agony. Finally, she whispered, “Okay. Let’s do it. Even if we have to divorce later, I don’t care. For once, I want to be yours.” They kissed—a cinematic, desperate embrace. I sat on my hospital bed and cried until there was nothing left. Blood ties, sacred vows… they were all a joke. And I was the punchline. I closed my eyes as the nurse pushed my gurney toward the operating room.
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