The Hurricane that Reversed My Decision

After three years in a long-distance relationship, I secretly traveled a thousand miles to give my girlfriend a surprise. That afternoon, right outside her apartment building, I caught her playing the claw machine with her first love. The girl I had always considered the perfect, completely devoted girlfriend was gazing at him with a bright, tender smile as he manipulated the joystick. The moment the plushie dropped into the chute, she threw her arms around him, her eyes brimming with delight. I clenched my phone and dialed her number. She answered almost instantly, her voice as soft and caring as ever. "Parker? Why are you calling right now? Did you miss me?" I stared fixedly at her from barely ten feet away, my voice tight. "Where are you? What are you up to?" While cooing into the receiver to reassure me, she attentively reached over and zipped up Benedict Wooten's jacket. Her tone carried just the right mix of fatigue and apology. "I'm still at the office, working late with my team to pull the proposal together. Get some sleep, okay? As soon as this crazy rush is over, I'll fly out to see you." The line went dead. On the street side, an electronic billboard was flashing a breaking news alert. [A major hurricane will make landfall tonight. All residents are urged to seek shelter immediately...] A sudden gale swept through the street, blowing away the last remnants of my wishful thinking. It turned out that her three years of single-minded devotion were nothing more than a masterclass in time management. Candace Richards wasn't loyal. She just wanted to have her cake and eat it too. Chapter 1 Cold rain pelted sideways against my face. I clutched the disconnected phone, my fingertips freezing. I couldn't bring myself to accept it, or maybe I was just desperately searching for an excuse that even I didn't believe. Taking a deep breath, I dialed her number again. It connected on the first ring. "Parker, why are you calling again?" Candace Richards's voice remained as gentle and smooth as ever. "Not used to being home alone?" Suppressing the tremor in my voice, I brought up the weather alert flashing on the digital billboard across the street. "The weather forecast says a major hurricane is about to hit." "I know," she chuckled, her tone dripping with reassurance. "Make sure you lock up all the doors and windows at home. Once I get through tonight's deadline, I'll pick a gift for you." A sting hit the back of my nose. My knuckles turned white against the phone before I finally said in a low voice, "Actually, I'm in Nightalmoor." Right then, a violent gust of wind howled down the street. "Look out!" Ten feet away, the coffee mug Benedict Wooten was holding tilted in the wind, spilling hot liquid all over his light-colored trousers. Candace's full attention was instantly pulled away, and her worried voice came through the receiver. "Oh no! Did it burn you? Don't move. Let me get some paper towels." She fumbled through her pockets for tissues and bent down to wipe the spilled drink off his pants. A few seconds passed before she seemed to remember she was still on the phone. She lifted the receiver back to her mouth, stammering, "Parker, something urgent just came up. I have to go take care of it right away. What did you say earlier? The wind was too loud, and I missed it. I'll call you back later." The line went dead with brutal finality. I didn't bother making a third call. I just stood there in silence. The freezing rain poured harder, stinging my face as it beat down. Unbidden, memories from six months ago began flashing through my mind. A rare torrential downpour had hit my city. Running a high fever, I had taken an Uber to the hospital all by myself to get put on an IV drip. When Candace had found out, she had canceled an important business dinner and stayed on the phone with me the entire night. She told me jokes, ordered hot soup to be delivered to me, and even kept precise track of the intervals between my IV bag changes. I used to think that in a long-distance relationship, having a partner who cared that deeply was enough to make every hardship worth it. But now, I finally understood how cheap words were when someone wasn't physically there. The devotion typed out on a keyboard and the companionship faked over a phone call cost almost nothing at all. The gale intensified, causing the roadside billboards to rattle with screeching groans. I didn't march over to confront her. The truth was laid bare right in front of me. I had traveled a thousand miles with a heart full of excitement to surprise her, only to end up looking like a complete fool. Storming over to start an argument would only make me look more pathetic. Pulling my thin trench coat tightly around myself, I grabbed my suitcase handle and turned away, walking in the opposite direction. Chapter 2 On the eve of the hurricane's landfall, dark clouds hung so low they seemed about to crush the city. The entire metro area was under a red alert. All the trains were suspended, and incoming and outgoing flights were all canceled. This was the first time in my twenty-four years that I had ever left the inland state where I grew up. I'd never experienced weather this extreme before, and the sheer violence of it stirred an instinctive sense of dread deep in my chest. Any reasonably safe hotel in the area had long been fully booked by stranded travelers and locals seeking shelter. Ultimately, right before the wind and rain paralyzed the streets, I was forced to shell out triple the usual rate just to duck into a rundown budget hotel. Noise isolation was nonexistent. The window panes rattled continuously against the wind, threatening to shatter at any second. At 9:30 that night, with a loud, muffled pop, the entire block lost power. In the pitch black, I sat propped against the narrow bed, listening to the howling wind outside, as though it were tearing the building apart. My nerves were stretched to their limit. I clutched my phone, the faint glow of its screen the only source of light left in the room. At ten o'clock sharp, Candace's message arrived right on cue. It was a 30-second voice note. I tapped play, and her familiar voice echoed in the dark, tinged with a hint of exhaustion. "Parker, we finally got through half of the proposal. The storm outside is terrifying. I wonder if it's raining in your city. "I wish I could wrap my arms around you right now. Looks like I'll be pulling an all-nighter tonight, so go to sleep early, okay? See you in my dreams." Staring at the audio wave playing on the screen, I typed back with no emotion. [The hurricane is so bad out there. Didn't your office building lose power?] The reply came almost instantly. [We're on backup generators. You know how corporate bosses are. They couldn't care less about us. But honestly, whenever I think about how I'm grinding for our future, I don't feel tired at all.] Then she sent a photo. The office blinds were drawn shut, with files scattered across the desk. A laptop screen glowed brightly next to a cup of coffee topped with intricate latte art. I zoomed in on the photo, my eyes locked on the coffee mug. The latte art was shaped like a heart, but the bottom right corner was slightly distorted. Suddenly, that flaw looked eerily familiar. Exiting the chat, I opened the search bar, typed in the word "overtime," and rapidly scrolled up through our message history. Sure enough, on a weekend three months ago, she had sent the same photo. The framing was identical, down to the distorted heart in the foam and the precise angle of the crease on the document sitting at the edge of the desk. Not only was she lying about being at work, but even the picture she used to blow me off was a recycled old shot. When disappointment hit rock bottom, it brought a surge of brutal clarity. Following the trail, I kept scrolling back through our chat logs. The further I went, the colder I felt. Over the past year, she had claimed to be "working late all weekend" on at least five different occasions, each time sending a differently cropped version of this same photo. Sometimes, she cropped the documents on the left. Other times, she zoomed in on the coffee on the right. She had pulled the same stunt for three whole years. With these recycled photos and scheduled voice calls, she had meticulously crafted the image of a hardworking, deeply devoted girlfriend. And I had been standing a thousand miles away, aching for her hard work while staring at old photos like a fool. Outside, the gale shrieked with increasing fury. I clicked off my phone screen and let myself sink into the darkness. Chapter 3 In the dead of night, the storm intensified. At three in the morning, as I dozed fitfully against the headboard, a deafening crash exploded as a thick tree branch slammed into my window. Glass shattered instantly, sending sharp shards spraying into the room like bullets alongside the howling wind and driving rain. I jerked awake, reflexively throwing my arm up to cover my face. A flying shard sliced across the back of my hand, and blood gushed out immediately. The desk lamp and water glass were blown off the nightstand, and rain drenched the bed within seconds. Ducking to avoid the airborne debris, I retreated into the bathroom and threw my weight against the door to hold it shut. Trembling with raw panic and utter helplessness, I pulled out my phone. Staring at the only contact I had in Nightalmoor, I gritted my teeth and dialed her number. It rang three times before she picked up. "Candace," I said, fighting to sound calm. "The window in my hotel room shattered. The storm is terrible out here, and I'm hurt. Can you come pick me up?" Candace paused, then offered me her usual soothing, patient tone. "Honey, don't panic. Take a deep breath. I'm still at the office right now, and the weather is insane. "All transportation is shut down, so how could I get to you? Just listen to me: stay in the bathroom and away from the windows. As soon as morning comes and the wind dies down, I'll fly straight over to be with you." Even now, she was still putting on her devoted-yet-powerless girlfriend act. I took a deep breath, watching the blood on the back of my hand drip onto the bathroom tile. Pressing my shoulder against the door as the wind and rain battered it, I said through gritted teeth, "I came to Nightalmoor. I was standing right outside your apartment building at three this afternoon." Deathly silence fell over the line. I could even hear her breath catch in her throat. Right then, a deafening crack of thunder exploded right above the building. I instinctively ducked, dodging bits of debris squeezing through the crack beneath the door. At the same second, a panicked voice carried clearly through the receiver. "Candace! The living room window just blew open. Come give me a hand." It was Benedict, the realization hitting me like a physical blow. Candace hadn't just lied to me with recycled pictures; she had brought her ex to her apartment on this storm-ravaged night. Her knee-jerk reaction was to cup her hand over the receiver, but I still caught her urgent reply. "Stay away from the window. I'm coming." A few seconds passed before she remembered she was still on the phone. This time, total panic flooded her voice. "Honey, when did you get here? Listen to me. He's just..." "We're done." I cut through her frantic babbling, my voice deadly calm, and ended the call. Barely two seconds passed before she began calling back. The screen lit up and went off repeatedly, followed by a torrent of incoming minute-long voice messages. I didn't pick up, nor did I type out a single reply. Instead, I tapped on the voice messages. Chapter 4 The cut on the back of my hand throbbed with a dull pain. This storm was unlike anything I had ever experienced. In an unfamiliar city, I needed the sound of a familiar voice just to keep myself grounded and sane. I sat there, listening to Candace's frantic, rambling voice notes and her panicked breathing. "I swear, I never did anything to betray you." I felt utterly disgusted, yet painfully comforted by the familiarity of it. Before this, Candace had always been the perfect girlfriend. She was attentive, responding to every text, and able to soothe my every insecurity. Paralyzed by primal fear in the middle of a raging storm, I had to admit that I still instinctively reached for the sense of security her voice offered. I dragged myself through that horrific night listening to her recordings. As the gray sky slowly brightened into pale dawn, the storm's fury finally began to subside. First responders braved the lingering wind and rain to evacuate the terrified guests, bringing us to the lobby of a sturdier hotel nearby that served as an emergency shelter. I was drenched to the skin, my thin trench coat clinging to my body and my matted hair dripping over my forehead. A paramedic had hastily wrapped a gauze bandage around the cut on my hand, but blood was still oozing through the cloth. As I sat staring blankly at a paper cup of warm water the front desk had given me, the hotel's revolving glass doors suddenly swung open. Candace rushed inside, soaked through and without an umbrella. Anxiety was written all over her face, her eyes frantically sweeping through the crowded shelter. The moment she spotted me sitting in the corner, she froze. "Parker! What happened to your hand?" She rushed over and spoke anxiously. "I've been so worried about you." Expressionless, I held my cup tightly and pulled away from her touch. Her hand hovered awkwardly in midair as surrounding evacuees threw curious glances our way. She took a deep breath. "Why weren't you picking up your phone? Things aren't what you think at all." She stooped down in front of me, trying to catch my eye. "The storm was terrifying, and the floor of Benedict's rental got flooded. As a... friend, I couldn't just sit by and watch him get washed away, could I? "So, I picked him up and brought him home. I slept in the bedroom, and he slept on the couch. We didn't do anything, I swear. We've been together for three years. Don't you trust me at all?" Looking at her seamless, righteous act, I felt nothing but absurdity. Even now, she was blaming me for a lack of trust. "Didn't do anything?" I set down the paper cup, pulled out my phone with my uninjured hand, and tapped on the screen. "At three yesterday afternoon, you were downstairs playing the claw machine with him, claiming you were dealing with a work emergency. "At ten last night, you recycled a three-month-old photo and lied to me that you were working late at the office. And at three in the morning, when the window blew open, the first person you scrambled to take care of was him." On my screen were the photos I had taken of her and Benedict at the claw machine, along with side-by-side comparisons of the identical photos she had sent at different times. Watching the color drain from her face, I let out a dry, bitter laugh. "You wanted an easygoing, low-maintenance boyfriend to check the box, but you also wanted your first love close by to satisfy your nostalgia and regrets. You make me sick." Her lips parted, but at that point, the usually eloquent, smooth-talking woman couldn't string together a coherent sentence. After a few agonizing seconds of silence, she suddenly stood up and grabbed my wrist. "Don't make a scene here," she whispered. "Let's go home and talk this through." "Let go of me. Who said anything about going with you?" I yanked my arm back, tearing open the cut on my hand again. Just as we were locked in a standoff, a deep voice echoed from the lobby entrance. "Candace? Why did you suddenly run off?"