I Made Us Matching Avatars, But He Protected Another Girl Chapter 09

I Made Us Matching Avatars, But He Protected Another Girl Chapter 09

His eyes only grew redder, his lashes trembling until a string of tears finally broke loose.

I kept my gaze low, watching his hand grip mine like he thought he could hold on hard enough to change

anything.

It was almost funny, if I let myself think about it.

Five years together, and this was the tightest he’d ever held onto me.

Too bad it had come years too late.

I eased my hand free and looked at him, steady and calm.

“I don’t blame you, Nate.”

“But I’m done waiting. Five years, I stood by you for five years, waiting for you to say the word marriage, and now that I’m finally about to marry someone else, this is when you decide to wake up?”

“That’s almost funny, if you think about it.”

I shook my head, a bitter laugh slipping out at how absurd it all was.

So that was the truth of it, between him and Lily.

And yet one sentence, that’s all it would have taken, and he couldn’t bring himself to say it to me in five

straight years.

It felt ridiculous, and my chest ached for the version of myself who’d swallowed all of that alone, for so long,

without a single word of comfort.

One sentence, and I’d paid for his silence with five years of my life.

“Please, Claire. Don’t marry someone else. I know I was wrong. I mean it.”

“Whatever it is you like about him, I can learn it. I can change. Just don’t marry someone else.”

Before I could answer, an arm slid firmly around my waist.

I glanced over at Ryan, and he gave me a small, steady smile.

One look, and I knew exactly who was standing behind me.

“Learn? Learn what, exactly? How to spend five years without knowing Claire’s allergic to mangoes? How to ditch her for another woman the second she gets sick?”

“Who’s actually your girlfriend here, Nate? Do you even know the difference anymore?”

“That profile picture. The cartoon bear. Don’t you dare pretend you didn’t know exactly what you were doing. You and Lily flaunted matching pictures for the whole company to see. Did you ever once stop to think how that would make Claire feel? Did you ever wonder if it might break her heart?”

“No. You never thought about Claire at all. To you, she’s supposed to just sit there quietly, never fight for anything, some perfectly obedient little robot that follows every order you give.”

“But she’s a person. She has a heart. She has feelings. She bleeds, she cries, she hurts. When she needed

you, you weren’t there. Now that she doesn’t need you anymore, what exactly gives you the right to come crawling back?”

“Don’t tell me you didn’t know. You didn’t know you got drunk and leaned all over Lily at the company retreat?

You didn’t know you slid a ring onto her finger in front of everyone? Your whole company chat was flooded

with the photos and the videos. You’re going to stand there and tell me you had no idea?”

“Do you honestly believe Claire didn’t notice any of that?”

Ryan hit him with question after question, relentless.

Every word out of his mouth made my chest ache a little more, on my own behalf.

By the end, Ryan’s eyes had gone bloodshot, and he swung, his fist landing square across Nate’s face.

“That one was a long time coming.”

Nate stood frozen, staring blankly at me like he’d never seen me before.

Every truth Ryan had just ripped open in front of him seemed to finally land.

He didn’t swing back. His eyes only burned redder.

Regret and guilt crashed over him in a single wave, threatening to drown him where he stood.

Every memory came rushing back at once.

Every time he’d doted on Lily, he’d never once noticed the loneliness in my eyes.

He finally understood why I’d fought him so hard that one particular day.

It had all come down to a profile picture.

The one he’d swapped out the second Lily made an offhand joke about it.

A crushing wave of shame settled over him.

Tears fell freely, one after another, and for once Nate didn’t bother weighing his options or holding onto whatever composure he thought he owed the world.

His lips parted, something behind his eyes clearly breaking apart.

“Claire, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. This is all on me. I’m the one who let you down.”

“I thought you wouldn’t care. I thought Lily’s presence wouldn’t matter to you. I’m sorry. I mean that with everything I have.”

“Claire. I’m sorry.”