Leaving The Man Who Never Chose Me

When my boyfriend went on a date, he made a point of bringing his sponsored student along, saying he wanted to show the girl a bit of the world.

Over dinner, he casually handed me a bouquet of rosesthe $9.99 group-deal kind.

But when I looked up, I watched a $2,999 arrangement from a luxury florist being carried over to Yolanda Swanson.

When I asked him about it, he answered like it was nothing.

"She's young, she likes all that flashy ceremony stuff. You're mature. You don't need any of that."

He and I once won a stuffed animal at a claw machine together. The very next day he gave her a whole carload of Jellycat plushies.

He brushed it off.

"Girls should be spoiled, or some punk will lure them away. I'm just granting her one little wish."

After that, every time he gave me a gift, he'd turn around and give Yolanda something more expensive.

Until our wedding day, when Greg Mann suddenly went dark.

I searched for him like a woman gone mad, and finally walked in on him in a groom's tuxedo, kissing Yolanda at another wedding.

He saw me, and his voice was flat, like he was mentioning something trivial:

"Yolanda envied your wedding, so I just went ahead and threw her one too."

And the wedding he'd arranged for Yolanda had the largest hall, with even the flowers flown in from Provencelavender, straight from the fields.

With him, what I got was always the budget version.

This love that would forever leave me second bestI didn't want it anymore.

Greg lifted his wrist and glanced at his watch.

"I still have toasts to make. Don't wait for me. Go home and rest first."

Then he draped his coat over my shoulders and told me to be careful on the way.

I gripped his sleeve, my voice hoarse: "Then what about our wedding?"

He pulled his hand free, his tone apologetic.

"Yolanda's still waiting for me."

Then he turned and walked straight toward her, up on the stage.

The coat still held his warmth, yet it left me shivering all over.

I went home in a daze.

The wedding officiant called, asking if the groom had been found.

I shook my head, my voice calmer than even I expected: "It's off. There's no groom."

As I set the coat down, Greg's phone slipped out of the pocket.

I picked it up and unlocked the screen.

The passcode was still my birthday, but the lock screen wallpaper had been changed to Yolanda, seen from behind.

I opened his transfer records.

The same Greg who'd been crying poverty to my face just last week had turned around and wired Yolanda 0-000,000, with a note that read: for a wedding dress.

That same week, I'd had my eye on a $5,000 gown I wanted to rent for our wedding.

He made a pained face and urged me not to be so wasteful.

So I understood, and picked a cheap dress that cost under $800.

The cut was awful, and it ran a size too big, hanging on me all wrong.

My chest tightened. I opened his private photo album, and inside were pictures of him and Yolanda vacationing in the Maldives.

The day they'd left was our dating anniversary.

And the day before, he'd only spent half a rushed afternoon walking around the next city over with me.

He'd claimed it was a business trip. In truth, he'd gone out of his way to make it up to Yolanda with a better vacation.

I scrolled down, and there was a couples photo shoot of the two of them.

Once, I'd begged and wheedled to get him to do a couples shoot with me.

He'd kept a cold face the whole time, without a trace of a smile.

Now, looking at his smile in these photos, my stomach churned.

After I ran to the bathroom and threw up, I opened his chat history again, like I was punishing myself.

And there it was: he'd thrown his full support behind Yolanda's application for the Cambridge exchange program.

Around that same time, I'd just received an invitation to study at a prestigious school overseas, and wanted to take a third of our joint savings for tuition.

Greg stopped me: "Yolanda has better credentials than you. The exchange experience will do more for her rsum. Spending this money on your studies is pointless. Better to save it for her."

I switched off the screen and pulled out the Harvard acceptance letter that had arrived just this morning.

A year and a half of grinding, all of it distilled into this one letter. He was the first person I'd wanted to tell.

A sound came from the doorway.

Greg came in, a drunk Yolanda leaning against him.

The perfumes on the two of them tangled together, so cloying it turned my stomach.

Greg never liked me wearing perfume. He always said it smelled awful.

He settled Yolanda into a bedroom.

It was the biggest room in the house, the master, and Greg had handed it over to her.

He said it wasn't safe for a girl like Yolanda to live alone.

He'd had that bedroom decorated beautifully, every piece of furniture custom-made.

The room I slept in had furniture I'd dug up secondhand.

He came back out, quiet on his feet, and sat down beside me.

There was a crystal necklace in his hand. He reached over, swept my hair aside, and fastened it around my neck.

"I should've been with you today and gone to her tomorrow. But Yolanda threw a fit, so I had to go smooth things over first. Give me a few days and I'll throw you another wedding, all right?"

One glance at the necklace was all I needed to know it was a promotional freebie.

I'd already seen this exact style on Yolanda's social media feed.

I pushed him off, my voice level. "No need. There's no point in another wedding."

At that, Greg let out a small laugh.

"Is my wife worried about the money? Looking out for me, are you?"

I said it softly. "I just don't think there's any point anymore."

Greg got up and went into the kitchen to make Yolanda a sobering broth. He almost never cooked.

I stared at his back. "Have Yolanda move out. Otherwise, we're done."

His hand froze mid-reach for a bowl.

"Don't be difficult."

"I'm not being difficult. I mean it."

The words had barely left me when the second bedroom door clicked open.

Yolanda stood in the doorway, barefoot, her voice fragile and wounded.

"Sis, don't fight with Greg over me. I'll just go."

And she moved to grab the little purse she'd left in the living room.

Greg tossed the bowl onto the counter and crossed the room in a few quick strides, blocking her path. "Where do you think you're going at this hour? Stay right here. No one's going to throw you out."

He turned back to me, his tone accusing. "Act like an adult. Whatever's between us, don't drag her into it."

I looked at the two of them, and my heart sank all the way down.

Yolanda clutched the door frame, choking back a small sob. "I'm sorry, sis. This is my fault. But I still have to thank you. Thank you for being willing to pay the down payment on my house"

Greg's face changed.

My head went blank in an instant. I pulled up our joint savings account.

The balance on the screen read zero. Not a cent left.

I lifted my eyes and fixed them on Greg, my throat tight and trembling. "You took the down payment we'd been saving for our house and bought her one?"

Greg's gaze darted away without his meaning it to.

"She's a girl on her own, no roots in the city. It's only right for me to help her out."

"And me?" I cut him off. "What about our home? What about our future?"

He frowned, impatient. "So what if the house comes a little later? With what I can earn, you're seriously worried I can't get you a place?"

This was never about the timing of a house.

From the moment he started bankrolling Yolanda, everything had already changed.

The money we'd saved paid her tuition and covered her exchange abroad, and now even the down payment for our marriage home had been rerouted to hand her hers.

A life meant for two people, forced open to make room for a third.

Exhaustion flooded through me. I had no strength left to argue. I turned and went back into the bedroom.

Greg pushed the door open right behind me, his soothing tone half-hearted. "Don't sulk. Yolanda's going to pay all of it back later. I'd never just throw money at her for no reason."

The whole thing struck me as absurd. All those years, every dollar he'd spent on Yolanda, and not once had a cent of it come back to him.

I rehearsed the words in my head, over and over. How to say we were done.

Just as I opened my mouth, Yolanda shrieked from outside the room.

Greg didn't say a word. He turned and walked out.

All night, I lay there with my eyes open until dawn.

Over the next few days, I pulled several all-nighters in a row, organizing documents and starting the paperwork for my visa to the States.

The next morning I went into the office.

The first thing I saw was that my nameplate was gone from my desk. In its place sat Yolanda's name.

My personal things had been swept onto the floor, including the professional certifications I'd accumulated over years in this field.

Yvonne, the assistant, stood in the doorway, shrinking into herself as she spoke in a small voice. "Lena, you were out on leave, so you wouldn't know. Mr. Mann promoted Yolanda to team lead, and your desk got reassigned."

She'd barely finished when Greg walked into the work area with Yolanda beside him. I gripped the edge of the desk, my knuckles white. "I've held this position for five years. Every important client, every major translation project, I handled them, and I never made a single mistake. She's been here one year, and both projects she touched had translation errors. On what grounds does she get promoted over me?"

His expression was cool, his tone carrying the flat detachment of company business.

"The workplace doesn't reward seniority. It rewards value. And Yolanda has overseas exchange experience, plus a higher degree than yours. A promotion is perfectly normal."

I let out a cold laugh before I could stop myself.

Yolanda tugged at Greg's sleeve. "Greg, why don't we just drop it? I don't have to be team lead. Really, I don't mind."

Greg immediately moved to shield her, his voice going colder, as if the words were meant for my ears alone.

"The position is settled. It won't change. You don't have to accommodate anyone. Just do your own job."

The coworkers around us kept their heads down, not daring to make a sound.

Then, out of nowhere, Yolanda pulled my Harvard acceptance letter from my briefcase, her face all astonishment. "Is this a Harvard acceptance letter? You didn't forge a fake one to save face after finding out about the reassignment ahead of time, did you?"

"It's real. All of it," I said, the words out before I thought.

Greg reached over and took the papers, flipping through a few pages with careless indifference. Then he gave a low laugh.

"Even if you're desperate to climb, you shouldn't stoop to faking something like this."

"You've only got an ordinary bachelor's degree. How would you ever meet the admissions bar for a school like Harvard?"

The same old line.

Yolanda went to an elite university. She'd even been his junior at the same school.

In his mind, I'd always come up short next to Yolanda. Start to finish.

Five years of honest, diligent work at this company, and none of it outweighed his bias.

Yolanda held the letter between her fingers, a smug glint hidden in her eyes. "Lena, I know you've been under a lot of pressure lately. You were afraid the reassignment meant you'd get cut, so you wanted to prop yourself up a little. But fake is fake. Getting called out like this is so humiliating."

"I didn't fake anything." My voice stayed level. "Five minutes on the school's official website and you can verify it."

"Enough."

Greg cut me off flat and tossed the letter onto the floor.

"If my subordinates found out my girlfriend pulled a stunt like this, where would that leave me?"

"You might have no shame, but I still do."

With that, he turned and slid an arm around Yolanda, murmuring about how to redo this office in whatever style she liked.

I bent down and picked up the crumpled letter, wiped the dust off its surface, and turned to walk out of the office.

Glance after glance of pity swept over me from every direction.

I sat down at the out-of-the-way desk I'd been assigned, spread out the resignation letter I'd prepared in advance, and signed my name.

Then I raised my hand and knocked on the door of Greg's office.

He was on the phone when I handed over my resignation.

He signed it without so much as a glance.

I stood there for a beat, and he pulled the receiver away from his mouth, impatient.

"Anything else?"

I shook my head slightly. "No."

At the end of the day, Greg pulled his car up to the building.

Out of habit I reached for the passenger door. My hand had barely lifted before I saw someone already sitting there.

"I'm taking Yolanda out for a bit," Greg said. "Catch your own ride home."

Then, hearing the chill in his own voice, he softened it.

"It's been cold lately. Head back early."

The words had barely landed before the car started and drove off in the opposite direction from home.

The rain came down all at once, fast and hard.

I stood at the curb for almost half an hour and couldn't get a ride.

In the end I wrapped my arms around myself and walked to the subway station through the downpour.

By the time I dragged myself back to the rental, I was soaked through, my arms and legs shaking with cold.

I reached for the light switch. The room stayed pitch black, no response.

Only when I turned on my phone did I see the whole complex had lost power.

Right then Yolanda's post popped up on my social media feed.

Two pictures. One was a beautifully furnished new house, a hundred times more presentable than this cramped little rental of mine.

The other was the property deed, printed with her name.

The caption read: The favoritism that belongs to me alone.

A chill slid under my skin and settled deep in my chest, colder than all the rain on my body.

I stared at the screen for a long while, then quietly tapped "like."

A second later, a notification popped up. My visa had gone through.

That was probably the only good news of the day.

Without hesitating, I opened the booking page and bought a flight to the US for the day after tomorrow.

By the faint glow of my phone, I quickly packed all of my luggage.

Not long after I finished, my phone lit up with a dozen messages in a row, all from Greg.

Only then did it hit me. The payment was tied to a bank card in his name.

"Why are you buying a plane ticket to the US?"

"You don't actually think that if you keep up the act, you'll really make it to Harvard, do you?"

"Cancel the ticket now. Wait too long and they'll charge a cancellation fee."

"..."

I looked at the messages on the screen and could only find it laughable.

Half a year of effort, and in his eyes it was nothing but a show I'd staged and starred in myself.

Then let the show go on.

I replied with a single line, "I'm not canceling," and right after, wired him the full cost of the ticket.

Greg didn't send another word.

For the next few days, he didn't come back to the rental at all.

I contacted the landlord to end the lease, settled the rent, got back my deposit, and mailed all my luggage to a hotel near the airport.

On my last day at work, I ran straight into Greg in the break room.

I kept my eyes down, pressing the buttons on the coffee machine, avoiding his gaze.

In the past, whenever we crossed paths on a break, I'd always be the one to come over and vent about whatever was bothering me at work.

But today I couldn't be bothered to say a single word.

I was just about to leave when I was yanked hard into an embrace.

Greg's breath brushed against the side of my neck, his tone gentle.

"Why so down lately? Having trouble settling into the new position?"

I said nothing, pulled free of him, picked up my coffee cup, and turned to go.

The moment I turned, my shoulder slammed hard into someone.

Scalding coffee splashed all over my clothes. I looked up and met Yolanda's eyes.

Yolanda cupped a small red burn on the back of her hand, her eyes instantly welling up.

Greg grabbed her hand and rushed her to the faucet, running cold water over it to cool the burn.

He whipped his head around and glared at me, anger held tight beneath his voice. "Happy now?"

I froze.

"Yolanda just took over your project, and you go and get even out of spite?"

The breath in my chest jammed up tight and dull.

I raised my eyes slowly. "If she'd earned the project on merit, I'd have nothing to say. But she doesn't deserve it."

I set the cup down on the counter and walked straight out of the break room.

I'd just finished dabbing burn ointment on my hand when my supervisor pulled me in last minute to cover for a colleague on simultaneous interpretation. My partners, as it happened, were Greg Mann and Yolanda Swanson.

I pushed the emotion down, took the materials, and slipped into work mode.

Yolanda stood behind me, in charge of passing along the terminology notes.

The first half of the session went smoothly.

After the client rattled off a long string of technical terms, Yolanda dragged her feet and never handed over the organized notes.

My interpreting was forced to a halt.

The whole room went dead silent for a solid dozen seconds.

Greg strode up behind me and hissed under his breath, "Get up."

I didn't stand. Leaning on my own experience, I quickly smoothed out the phrasing and improvised a rough interpretation on the spot, then finished the rest without a single slip.

Once the client was seen off, only the three of us were left in the conference room.

Yolanda kept her head down and said nothing.

Greg's face was dark. "You blanked on the terminology right there in front of everyone. Since when did your skills slip this badly?" His voice was cold.

My back was still soaked in cold sweat. I tried to explain. "Yolanda didn't hand me the materials in time. I didn't have a chance to get familiar with the content"

"Don't make excuses and pass the blame! I won't report this to management this time. One more, and you're gone."

The rest of it lodged in my throat. I couldn't get out half a word in my defense.

All his eyes could see was Yolanda getting the raw end of it. If he'd paid me even a little more attention, he'd have realized I had already submitted my resignation.

I stopped arguing and gave a small nod.

When I walked out of the building after work, Greg's voice came from behind me. "I'll give you a ride. We can grab dinner on the way."

I shook my head and turned him down.

He didn't push it. He left with Yolanda instead.

Watching the car pull away, I raised my hand for a cab, bent down and got in, and gave the driver the airport address.

On the way, I opened my contacts and deleted every last one of Greg's and Yolanda's numbers.

The next morning.

Greg passed my workstation, saw the empty seat, and frowned.

I was never late.

He looked down and opened our chat window, ready to type and ask where I was.

The words were still sitting in the message box when his department pinged him about an urgent new project, and he set the doubt aside for now.

He figured he'd use it as a chance to season Yolanda, so he put her straight in as lead interpreter.

But Yolanda kept fumbling live, her translations full of holes.

The longer Greg listened, the more agitated he got. He turned and told his assistant, "Is Lena here yet? Have her come cover this."

The assistant looked startled and reminded him quietly, "Manager Mann, Lena finished her resignation paperwork yesterday."