The Echo of a Broken Vow

"You can stay as long as you want."

Then we graduated and got married.

The last time we planned to go to Disney, something urgent came up at work, and we had to cancel.

Pierse looked at me, full of guilt, but I just gave him a reassuring smile.

“It’s really not that important. Pierse, I’m not a kid anymore. Missing a trip to an amusement park isn’t going to upset me. You don’t have to feel bad about it.”

He stared at me for a long, long time before finally nodding.

And after that, he never brought up Disney again.

Now I knew why because he had already gone with Dolly.

…

I kept scrolling through Dolly’s posts, reading far more than I should have.

By the time I reached the bottom, a deep, suffocating ache spread through my chest, making it hard to breathe.

I didn’t want to see any more.

Wiping my tears away, I moved to exit her profile.

But just as I did, a new post popped up.

Posted just three minutes ago, it was a photo of Dolly in skimpy lingerie, with a man's hand barely visible at the edge of the frame.

There was a fresh red kiss mark on her collarbone.

"Someone has some… unique ways of making it up to me. My back is killing me, my throat is sore, and he’s acting like nothing even happened."

In the comments, an account with a matching couple avatar replied:

"Try calling me an old man again and see what happens."

It was Pierse.

Dolly pouted in response. "I was wrong, okay? My sweet Pierse."

A violent wave of nausea surged up my throat.

Stumbling to the bathroom, I barely made it in time before doubling over the sink, gagging uncontrollably.

But since I hadn’t eaten anything all day, there was nothing to throw up.

The room swayed before me, light and shadow blurring together.

Holding my stomach, I sank onto the cold bathroom floor.

…

Pierse didn’t come home until the following evening.

The moment he walked in, he pulled out a small box and handed it to me.

His face was filled with guilt. “Eva, I had my assistant look for it, but they couldn’t find the wedding ring I lost.

“It wasn’t anything special anyway—we didn’t have much money back then. So, I figured I’d just replace it with something better.”

I looked down at his open palm.

Resting on a black velvet cushion were two gleaming platinum diamond rings, so dazzling that their worth was obvious at a glance.

His gaze was steady, sincere—so utterly convincing, as if his devotion had never wavered, not even for a second.

I stared at the rings for a long time before finally lifting my head.

"You didn’t come home last night. Where were you?"

He hesitated for half a second before answering.

“After the dinner, it was already late. I had been drinking, and I didn’t want to risk driving, so I stayed at a hotel nearby—"

He suddenly stopped mid-sentence because across from him, I was already crying.

Tears streamed down my face as I curved my lips into a bitter smile, my vision blurring again.

From the moment I discovered his affair with Dolly, the thought of divorce had been simmering in my heart.

But I couldn’t say it.

From twelve to twenty-eight, Pierse had been a part of my life for as long as I could remember.

This wasn’t as simple as ending a relationship.

Our lives had grown together, seamlessly intertwined.

Ending it now felt like cutting off a part of myself—painful, excruciating, leaving behind nothing but raw, bleeding wounds.

I replayed the past over and over, searching for where it all went wrong—wondering if I hadn’t been enough, if that was why he strayed, why he chose someone else.

"Eva, you—"

Pierse reached for my hand, his voice filled with shock and concern, but his fingers only brushed against mine before the world suddenly lurched.

For a second, I couldn’t process what was happening.

Then—

“An earthquake!”

The massive crystal chandelier above us swayed violently before the chain snapped, sending it crashing down.

Without hesitation, Pierse threw himself over me, shielding me with his entire body.

His familiar yet unfamiliar scent surrounded me, overwhelming and suffocating.

Through the swirling dust and debris, I caught a glimpse of the two shimmering rings—rolling across the floor, disappearing into the wreckage.