She Chose Him，I Chose the Next Flight Out

1: 1

My buddy was getting married, so I gave him a $50,000 cash gift.

Amelia Vance let out a scornful little laugh. What's your monthly salary again? Since when do you play the big spender?

I told her he was a friend I'd had since childhood. She clicked her tongue and said nothing more. That same night she swapped the $50,000 in the red envelope for five dollars.

The next day Quinn Mason called. "Brad Simmons, did you make a mistake? Why is there only five dollars in here?"

I gripped the phone and listened to Amelia in the living room, explaining it like it was nothing.

"Money doesn't stand for friendship. The gesture's what counts."

A week later, her childhood friend Duncan Delgado got engaged.

Drones spelled out CONGRATULATIONS ON YOUR UNION across the sky, followed by a rain of roses, and below it all sat a watch worth five million dollars and a lavish banquet with the whole venue booked out.

Amelia stood beside me, gazing up at the grand spectacle, her voice gentle.

"It's nothing, really. Adds up to maybe ten million."

"My friend's getting engaged. It had to be done right."

As the streaming lights fell across the sky, she and Duncan held each other's eyes across the crowd, long and open, as if no one else were there.

And all at once I saw through the last little lie I'd been telling myself.

...

The drones stretched out DUNCAN, WISHING YOU HAPPINESS across the night, the line glaringly bright in the wind.

Someone beside me sucked in a breath.

"Five million! Ms. Vance really goes all out..."

"Duncan's got some serious face. I hear these drones came from a team flown in specially from overseas..."

I kept my head tipped back until my neck ached and my eyes stung.

What kept flashing through my mind was Quinn's voice cracking on the phone and Amelia's cool indifference, not even lifting her eyelids.

Five dollars, and now ten million.

That day she hadn't even looked up. Knotting her scarf, she'd said, "Money doesn't stand for friendship. Why do you insist on using it to prove something?"

And now here she stood, using a display worth tens of millions to prove to everyone just how much she valued another man.

"Brad?"

A clear voice came from beside me.

I turned. Duncan had come over at some point, watch, cufflinks, and lapel pin all in gold, the light glancing off them sharp enough to make my eyes sting.

"Nice, isn't it?" He tilted his head slightly. "Amelia flew all the way to Switzerland just to order these for me. She said an engagement has to have the full gold set to show it really matters."

I knew that brand.

The cheapest set in the magazines still ran seven figures.

The birthday present she'd given me for my twenty-fifth.

A belt, a little over two thousand, without even a brand card in the box.

I heard myself give a small laugh. "That was very thoughtful of her, then."

A buddy who'd had too much came grinning over. "Amelia, look at this spread you laid on for Duncan. Full gold set, drones, the whole venue. You really came through as his friend."

Then he turned to me, his tongue thick with drink. "Brad, when are you two tying the knot? Amelia's bound to spend even more on you!"

Every gaze swung to me at once.

Amelia said nothing, just held her glass and gave me a look, a half-smile that wasn't quite a smile.

There was that familiar appraisal in it.

She was probably waiting for me to show hurt, jealousy, or whatever emotion she'd already predicted.

She waited a while. I only smiled, calm. "We'll see."

The truth was, I had been waiting for Amelia all this time.

Sophomore year, one autumn, she'd kissed me at the foot of the dorm building and promised she'd marry me the first autumn after graduation.

But afterward she broke that promise, year after year.

Amelia's brow creased, almost imperceptibly. Her eyes left my face and settled on Duncan's full set of gold. "My own wedding will naturally be the grandest of them all. Your fiance, though"

"Can't even come up with the gold set. What exactly are you planning to marry?"

Duncan watched her, the tail of his voice lifting lightly. "Amelia, my other half is so broke they can't even scrape together a dowry, and yet here you are. You've spent a whole month running around for this engagement party of mine. Drones, the watch, the yacht, the gold set flown back from Switzerland..."

"People who know say it's friendship. People who don't would think it's you getting engaged today, Amelia."

"If you really can't bear to let go"

"Why don't you try snatching the groom right here, right now?"

The guys roared with laughter. "Duncan, don't go egging Amelia on, she'd actually do it!"

"Right, right, once Amelia's worked up there's nothing she won't"

Everyone was waiting for Amelia to answer, watching to see whether she'd laugh and concede or toss back some flirty joke on purpose. No one remembered that I was Amelia's boyfriend, standing right there beside her.

I set down my glass.

Then I turned and walked through the room full of laughter and glittering light, toward the doors of the banquet hall.

If their world had no room for me, then I'd bow out. That was all.

2: 2

Amelia caught up with me right at the entrance to the parking lot.

Her hand clamped around my wrist, harder than I expected.

"Brad! What is this supposed to mean?"

Her voice was low, edged with irritation.

"You walk out of Duncan's engagement party with a face like that, in front of all those people. Where does that leave his pride?"

I looked up at her.

The neon light spilled from behind her, and the face I'd known for eight years was there with the brows knotted tight, the lips pressed thin.

"Amelia, in all these years, what's the most expensive thing you've ever given me?"

She hesitated.

"That belt. Two thousand three. You grabbed it at the mall on my birthday, and you told me these things just need to show the thought, no need to spend too much."

"But Duncan's tie, you flew all the way to Europe for it. His watch, his cufflinks, his tie pin, how much did all of that come to?"

My voice stayed level. "And tonight's drone show, the yacht, that five-million-dollar watch on your wrist. Amelia, explain something to me. What exactly does 'just need to show the thought' mean?"

The crease between her brows dug in deeper. "Why are you comparing yourself to Duncan? He's my brother in all but blood"

"Brother," I laughed once. "You give your brother a five-million-dollar drone show, and you have me hand over a five-dollar gift."

Her expression changed.

"Brad, don't stand here making a scene. I already explained the thing with your friend to you"

"Explained what?" I cut her off.

"Every single thing you explained was just you making excuses for yourself."

She went quiet for a few seconds, her face sinking bit by bit.

At last she pulled a bank card from her pocket and flung it at me.

The edge grazed my cheekbone, sharp and stinging.

"Isn't it that you think the money's too little?" Her voice turned cold.

"Take this card. Make it up to your friend, buy whatever else you want. Is it enough? If it's not, I have more."

I looked down at the card lying on the ground and found it almost funny.

Even now she still thought this was about money.

Eight years, and she had never once truly understood what had hurt me.

That was when her phone rang.

Amelia glanced at the screen, her brow easing a little, and picked up.

"Duncan? I'm coming back now... you all keep drinking... don't worry about him..."

She hung up, had already turned and taken two steps, then paused and looked back over her shoulder.

"Cool off and get yourself together. Stop making trouble out here."

Her footsteps faded.

I crouched down and picked the card up.

Turned it over.

On the back, four words in marker: "For Duncan Only."

So it turned out that even the thing I could only reach by fighting for it had his name on it all along.

I gripped the card in my palm, nails biting into the skin, a small ache.

In the end I dropped it into the trash can beside me.

3: 3

When I got home, my phone buzzed.

Duncan had sent a screenshot. I opened it.

The conversation was timestamped the day of my buddy's wedding.

Hahaha, I'm dying. Fifty grand down to five bucks. Amelia, you're brutal.

A bet's a bet.

You're not scared he'll find out?

If he finds out, he finds out. Worst case I make up the difference. But... don't let him know it was your idea. No point in him blaming you.

I stared at that line for a long time. My lips twitched, wanting to smile, but nothing came out.

So that five dollars was because of him.

So she "didn't want me blaming him," and that was why she'd skipped the explanation altogether.

She'd rather I thought she was cold and heartless than let him carry the smallest bit of it.

I tapped into his social feed.

The latest post, a nine-photo grid.

The one in the middle was a close-up of him and Amelia clinking glasses, with a caption: Fake engagement party, hired actors, betting whether a certain someone would dare crash it. She didn't. But once she knew it was fake she got wasted on her own, no idea what she was so happy about.

Someone had commented below: Duncan, you're playing with fire. Not scared the act turns real?

He'd replied with a tongue-out emoji:

I just wanted to see if she'd come stop the wedding. And? Not bad. Passing grade.

I set the phone face-down on the couch.

Got up and headed for the bedroom to start packing.

When I pulled open the nightstand drawer, a property deed sat on top, and under it a stack of design blueprints.

Every style, every color, laid out by me, chosen to match what she liked.

I'd booked the restaurant, bought the cake, tucked the blueprints into the gift box, and planned to watch her face when she opened it.

Would she smile? Would she freeze? Would she throw her arms around me?

At the bottom of the drawer I found an ultrasound.

She was pregnant.

I held the paper, its edges already worn soft from all the times I'd folded and smoothed it.

A home for us, a child. Weren't those worth giving her one more chance?

Late that night, Amelia came home reeking of alcohol.

She stumbled through the bedroom door, saw me sitting on the edge of the bed, crossed the room and dropped to a half-kneel in front of me, forehead pressed to my knee.

"Brad," she slurred, "I'm sorry... I shouldn't have snapped at you today."

Her hand covered the back of mine, her palm burning hot.

"Don't be mad, okay? Tomorrow's our anniversary. I'll take you to that restaurant you've always wanted to try. We'll have a good day."

I looked down at the messy crown of her hair.

Then I took the blueprints and the ultrasound out of the drawer and held them out to her.

"Amelia, I bought that house. The one you said you wanted to live in. Designed every inch of it the way you like."

"And this" I laid the ultrasound gently on top.

Her eyes dropped to the paper, her pupils shrinking.

"You went through my things?" Her voice went cold in an instant.

"Two months along. Why didn't you tell me?"

She stared at the ultrasound for several seconds, then looked up at me, a mocking smile forming at the corner of her mouth:

"Brad, what are you trying to pull, bringing this out? Force me to marry you? You're using a life and a house to blackmail me?"

"Blackmail you? I spent almost two years on that house. I just found out about this baby"

"Enough." She cut me off, snatched the ultrasound, and with a sharp rip tore it in two, the pieces scattering across the sheets. Then she grabbed the stack of blueprints and shredded those too.

"I'll get rid of it," she said.

"What did you say?"

"I said I'm getting rid of it." She raised a hand and pressed at the space between her brows, her tone turning irritable.

"Brad, snap out of it. Can you stop being in such a rush to get married? Using a house and a baby to force a wedding, you'd actually do that."

In the second my eyes went red, I suddenly remembered sophomore year, out on the field, her gripping my hand and saying, "Brad, let's get married as soon as we graduate. I'm scared you'll run off."

Now, out of the same mouth, only eight years apart, it had become "in such a rush to get married."

She must have realized she'd gone too far. She softened her tone and pulled me into her arms.

"Tomorrow's our anniversary. Let me spend it with you properly. I already had my assistant book the restaurant, ordered the flowers too. I'll think about the house and the baby. We'll talk about the marriage slowly, all right?"

I let her hold me.

Her chin rested against the top of my head, her breathing slowly evening out, the smell of alcohol drifting up, and a few minutes later she went still.

She'd fallen asleep.

I eased myself out of her arms.

Stood up, picked the torn scraps off the bed one by one, and held them in my palm.

Then I opened the suitcase and started packing my clothes.

For her and me, there was no tomorrow, and no so-called marriage down the line.

4: 4

The next morning I went to the sales office alone to cancel the apartment.

The screen lit up.

A message from Amelia Vance:

Let's move the anniversary to another day. Duncan finally scored tickets to a concert he's dying to see, so I have to go with him. You've got plenty of free time anyway.

Plenty of free time anyway...

A few careless words, as if all my waiting and giving in over these eight years had only ever been idle hours I owed her.

Right behind it, a message from Duncan Delgado:

Forgot to mention. Amelia and I were together before you, actually. We were already a couple before you ever met her. Later she said she wanted a change of taste, so I let you have her for a few years.

Also, thought I'd let you know. Those "vitamins" Amelia's been giving you all these years, I'm the one who picked them out for her. That drug slowly takes away your ability to have kids. Long as you've been taking it, you're probably sterile by now. There was never any chance she'd keep that baby. But don't feel too bad. She was never going to let it be born anyway. Something that was never going to happen can't really be said to exist or not, right?

There was a video too. I opened it.

The frame jolted. Duncan's voice came through, thick with tears:

"Amelia... the doctor says I might not be able to have kids anymore."

Off-screen, Amelia's voice was muffled: "Don't cry. I'm here."

"Are you going to leave me someday because of it?"

"No. Stop overthinking. I promise you, I'll never carry anyone else's child."

The video ended.

I stared at the dead black screen, my fingertips ice-cold.

Eight years. Everything I'd taken for her care and consideration, every cup of warm water and pill she'd set into my hand, had only ever been her making sure I'd never become an accident in her life.

The funny part was, I'd still been hesitating over whether to give her a chance for the baby's sake.

He sent another file. I opened it. Nine thousand-some photos, all of him and Amelia together.

They'd crossed deserts, dived deep seas, held each other in front of sunsets, kissed at the mouth of a volcano, as if they'd lived out every grand and sweeping thing the world had to offer.

And in eight years with Amelia, the two of us together in a photo, I could count on one hand.

She'd said she didn't like being photographed, that a lens on her made her skin crawl.

Turned out that line of hers just didn't work on the other man.

Tears struck the screen, one after another, blurring all those smiling faces into a smear of water.

I switched off the phone and shoved it into my bag.

Sitting at the signing table in the sales office, the fluorescent lights overhead were very bright.

The clerk said softly, "Mr. Simmons, if you're confirming the cancellation, sign here."

I took the pen.

I thought of eight years ago, her pulling me at a run down Cherry Blossom Avenue, breathless, saying, "Hold my hand for a lifetime."

I thought of the first time she kissed me, the tips of her ears gone red.

I thought of her saying, "The first fall after we graduate, I'll marry you."

Those images were like old photos soaked in water, blooming open frame by frame, blurring, fading.

Until all that was left was white.

When the pen touched the paper, my hand shook faintly.

I finished signing and walked slowly across the sales office lobby, one hand braced against the wall, a dull ache sinking through my chest.

Passing the waiting area, out of the corner of my eye I caught it on my phone screen: Duncan had sent another video three hours ago.

I opened it. A concert. The big screen had just cut to the crowd, and Duncan turned his head and kissed the corner of Amelia's mouth.

The whole place screamed.

Off-screen, his voice carried a smile: "We've known each other twenty-some years. What's mine, how could it ever get away."

I switched off the screen and kept walking.

At the corner, I ran straight into two people.

Amelia had her hand on Duncan's arm, saying something to him in a low voice, a bag of documents in her other hand.

She looked up and saw me, and froze. "Brad Simmons? What are you doing here"

Duncan cut in lightly:

"Amelia came to look at a place with me. Said she wanted to buy me one. Didn't expect to run into you. Small world."

I stopped walking.

The hallway's fluorescent lights beat down white and pale.

I looked at her, and let out a small laugh.

"I came to sign off on the place you didn't want"

"It's canceled."

"Amelia. We're done."