Chapter 4: The Confession

He never compromises with me. The boundaries and principles of a grown man can’t be swayed by acting cute.

One set of their wedding photos was taken at Ethan’s university. They were actually schoolmates. She wrote: “I want to go back to freshman year, to the finance department, and grab the hand of the boy who didn’t know me yet, and ask him, if I told you we’d get married seven years later, would you believe it?”

Piecing it all together, I could reconstruct their story. They were a perfect match—same university, studied abroad together, supported each other in a foreign country. Ethan probably learned to cook while overseas.

Just to cook for her.

She would repost recipes on Instagram and tag him, bossing him around: “Make this for me!”

That’s their memory. I’m like a fly on the wall, or the wicked stepmother in Snow White, secretly peeking at their once-sweet past.

It’s shameful. The guilt gnawed at me, but the curiosity was stronger.

But I can’t help myself.

In 2014, they were preparing to welcome a child.

A woman pampered by Ethan had her own worries—she felt she hadn’t had enough fun yet, but both families were pressing for a child. She’d grown up spoiled, and her only real setback was in June 2014, when one of her dogs fell seriously ill while Ethan was abroad.

She must have been devastated—she posted constantly for three days, praying at the animal hospital. On the third day, the dog couldn’t be saved. That night, Ethan rushed back, probably straight from the airport to the hospital, because she posted a photo of the long corridor, with Ethan standing in the distance, suitcase in hand, his elbow resting on his jacket. He was backlit, and the photo was blurry, so I couldn’t see his expression.

I reached out and touched Ethan’s image on the screen, the glass cold beneath my fingertips, wishing I could ask if he was tired, or if he’d eaten.

They must have had a cold war for a while—she didn’t post for a long time. The next update was a repost of pre-pregnancy tips, tagging Ethan.

After that, her posts were all about pregnancy. I was peeking into their lives, their happiness, my heart tightening as if it were being squeezed. Each ultrasound photo, each craving, felt like a private memory I wasn’t meant to see.

Ethan loved her—deeply. She looked so happy. I don’t know how things ended up so badly between them.