The blizzard grounded every flight out of Zurich, leaving me stranded in a sea of frustrated travelers inside the packed terminal. My phone screen suddenly lit up with a push notification. It was a video of Declan and Nancy holding their championship trophies. The comment section was already flooded with people calling them a literal power couple and the golden duo of the interpreting world. What stung the most was the little tag at the top. The video had just been shared and recommended by Declan himself. My fingers went numb as I opened our chat. More than a dozen unread messages sat pitifully on the screen. It was just me, rambling about my day, begging for his help. I had grown so used to talking to a brick wall. I was so used to chasing a silhouette that never bothered to look back. But right then, the sheer exhaustion of it all finally broke me. I had scored half a band higher than Nancy on the advanced French fluency exam. I was the one who originally signed up for this simultaneous interpreting competition with him. Why was someone else standing next to him, soaking up the flowers and the applause? It took me until this very moment to realize the truth. The real distance between us was never about test scores. This was already the nineteenth time he had unilaterally decided we were over. 1 Hour twenty three of being trapped in the Zurich airport. I watched that short video clip until I memorized every frame. When the winner of the French interpreting championship was announced, Nancy wept tears of joy and threw herself right into Declan's arms. They were an incredibly attractive pair, so naturally, the embrace sent the internet into a frenzy. Declan rubbed her back to comfort her. Then, with a gentle touch I rarely ever saw, he picked a stray piece of confetti out of her hair. That single, simple gesture had the gossips screaming. "This is true love! A couple with matched intellects is just superior!" The internet era was truly magical. A snippet barely lasting a few seconds already had over a million likes. The comments praised them as a romance novel brought to life. Some internet sleuths even dug up their real life details. "That's Declan! The absolute god of Yale's linguistics department. He speaks five languages fluently. He went viral before for his looks during a debate, but his actual skills are terrifying." "No wonder they took the gold. Partnering up with your girlfriend means the chemistry is off the charts." The comments kept refreshing. I read them one by one until my eyes burned. Then, the words 'Recommended by Declan' popped up on my screen. I thought my eyes were playing tricks on me. So he was looking at his phone. He had the time to share a viral video of himself and Nancy. He just did not have the time to reply to my desperate cries for help. I was originally supposed to be his partner for this competition in Switzerland. During our layover, he abruptly informed me that Nancy would be taking my place. Yes, informed. He did not discuss it with me. He did not ask for my opinion. Winning this championship guaranteed a fully funded spot in a prestigious overseas grad program in Paris. Declan knew exactly how much this competition meant to me. I wanted to study abroad with him so badly. I practiced from dawn until midnight. I was so sleep deprived my roommates thought I was going to drop dead. My throat was so swollen from speaking drills that I completely lost my voice for a week. I simply could not accept his ridiculous decision. The fragile string holding my sanity together snapped. I broke down and demanded a reason. Declan just sounded utterly indifferent. "Serena, don't you think you are being incredibly dramatic?" My brain stalled. I had no idea what he meant. "Excuse me?" "I mean your attitude is rarely serious. I simply do not trust you to perform well under the pressure of a live stage." I felt completely lost. I forced a smile, still trying to negotiate with him. "How can you say that? We practiced together so many times, and you saw my progress. I just scored an 8.5 on the advanced French fluency index. Doesn't that prove I am capable enough?" Declan cut me off with ice in his voice. "What exactly is there to be proud of with an 8.5?" "You swore up and down you would get a perfect score. And what happened? You are stuck in the exact same percentile every single time. Are you even trying?" "Serena, you grew up traveling the world with your parents. You enjoy a bottomless bank account and endless educational resources. How is it possible that you still can't master a second language perfectly?" Those three rapid fire questions choked the air right out of my lungs. I knew he was obsessively disciplined. His academic standards bordered on absolute insanity. Back in the day, I studied until I made myself sick just to crack the top ten in our major. That was the only way I managed to catch the eye of the untouchable academic god. Declan had sky high ambitions. He didn't care about romance or grand gestures. His only goal was to become the top interpreter in his field. He always said his girlfriend had to be equally exceptional. Just to stand by his side, I killed my own lazy habits. I buried myself in suffocating coursework right along with him. Just to keep up with his shadow, I gave it everything I had. I earned scholarships I never thought I could get. I collected certifications like spare change. Even the strictest professors praised my work. But from Declan, I received absolutely zero validation. I could never figure out why. I just kept comforting myself by saying he was naturally a harsh critic. Yet he handed my hard earned spot to Nancy, a girl whose grades were objectively worse than mine. A bitter seed of jealousy and resentment took root in my chest. It grew wild and out of control, wrapping tight around my heart. Even drawing breath hurt. I could not pretend to be calm anymore. "And what about her? Is her 7.0 suddenly the standard of excellence? Is that why you let her replace me?" Declan paused. When he spoke, his voice dripped with cold impatience. "Nancy is not like you. She actually works hard." "Without your parents' money paving the way, you wouldn't even be in the same league as her." I laughed out loud. It was a harsh, breathless sound. Then I hung up the phone. Works hard. Parents' money. With just a few lightweight words, he entirely erased years of my blood, sweat, and tears. I tilted my head back, but thick tears still crashed down onto my phone screen. I lost the battle with my emotions. I opened our messages and started a massive argument with him. It ended exactly how it always did. Declan pulled his favorite trick and told me we were done. 2 If I actually sat down and counted, this was roughly the nineteenth time Declan initiated a breakup over academics. My French accent wasn't authentic enough. I got an A instead of an A plus. I dropped one spot in the class rankings. Any of these were valid grounds for him to dump me. He measured the entire worth of our relationship against his own freezing, mechanical rubrics. He never cared when my menstrual cramps left me bedridden. He didn't notice my new dresses. He never cared about the cute restaurants I wanted to try. Only a flawless transcript could earn me a kiss or a rare moment of affection. Half the time, I wondered if I was dating a cyborg. But the second I looked at his handsome, aloof face, my brain would turn to mush. In the end, I was always the one begging to get back together. Declan was fully aware of this dynamic. That was exactly why he threw the word 'breakup' around without a second thought. After all, I was the one who chased him relentlessly. The person who loves more always ends up losing their dignity. But this time, my fingers hovered over the keyboard. I stared at the screen for an eternity, completely unable to type out an apology. While I was still in a daze, I got a frantic phone call. My dad had suffered a sudden heart attack. I panicked and tried to book the first flight back to the States, only to discover every single route was canceled. That was when I finally looked out the massive glass windows. A heavy, blinding snowstorm had swallowed the city. The entire airport infrastructure was paralyzed. I felt like someone had ripped my spine out. I stumbled around the terminal, frantically trying to find someone who could help. I didn't speak German. My French vocabulary completely scrambled in my panic. Halfway through trying to explain my situation to a staff member in English, my throat closed up, choked by violent sobs. Strangers shot me looks of deep pity, but they could only shake their heads. The more anxious I got, the worse my hands shook. I wiped the tears off my screen. The only person I could think of was Declan. He knew people in Zurich. He definitely had the connections to get me on an emergency flight home. I sent him over a dozen messages. I got absolute silence in return. I was trapped in that terminal all night. I cried until my eyes were completely dry. It wasn't until dawn that I got the text saying my dad was out of surgery and stabilizing. Not long after that, the algorithm pushed that viral video onto my feed. A little green dot glowed next to Declan's profile picture. He was online. I opened our chat and scrolled up. My heart plummeted straight into the abyss. The entire right side of the screen was just blocks of green text. It was my own pathetic monologue. He always claimed he was too busy studying to text back. I respected his focus. I accommodated his habits. I literally forced myself to stop being talkative just to please him. But today, the illusion shattered. He wasn't too busy for his phone. He didn't hate social media. He just didn't give a damn about me. I wasn't asking him to move mountains. A single text asking if I was okay would have been enough. He gave me nothing. While I was having a mental breakdown begging for his help, was he just rewatching his own victory speech? Or was he busy reading all the comments saying he and Nancy were soulmates? At this point, the answer didn't even matter. Loving someone this much was utterly exhausting. I didn't want to spend the rest of my life chasing a ghost. It was better to just end it here and cut my losses. I didn't try to contact him again. The moment I finally landed in the States, I went straight to the hospital to see my dad. The freezing night in the airport caught up to me. I developed a low grade fever and slept in a haze until the next morning. A phone call woke me up. It was one of the guys from my cohort. "Serena, are you not coming to Declan's welcome back dinner? He's drinking pretty heavy, and we are not babysitting him!" I opened my mouth to decline, but the guy quickly added more pressure. "Professor Bennett is here too. Are you absolutely sure you want to skip?" Professor Bennett had mentored me through the early stages of the competition. He had always looked out for me. Out of sheer respect for him, I couldn't just brush it off. But when I pushed the private dining room door open, the room was entirely filled with students. There wasn't a professor in sight. Nancy was pressed right up against Declan's side. She looked at me and giggled. "Sorry, Serena. We were just playing Truth or Dare." "Declan's dare was to trick you into coming here. We really didn't think you would actually show up!" 3 The fever made my whole body feel heavy and sluggish. My brain was a step behind. It was a long rectangular table. Everyone else was scattered on the sides, leaving Declan and Nancy sitting dead center like royalty. They looked like the real couple. I was just the intruder crashing their party. Right. I almost forgot. Declan and I were officially broken up. I had absolutely no right to be angry or jealous. When I just stood there without reacting, Nancy's smile froze. She suddenly jumped up, looking incredibly flustered. "I am so sorry. This was the only empty seat earlier. I will go sit somewhere else right now." But Declan reached out and pulled her right back down. His voice was laced with alcohol. "Don't be ridiculous." "Serena, leave Nancy alone." He had that same, infuriatingly calm expression. I literally hadn't said a single word. How was I the one being unreasonable? The irony made me sick. I dug my nails hard into my palms, trying to steady my trembling legs. I turned around, fully intending to walk right back out. One of Declan's roommates rushed over and grabbed my arm. He pulled a chair up on Declan's other side. "Come on, Serena, don't be mad. We were just messing around. It's a huge night, none of us want Declan's girl missing out. You look super pale. Have you even eaten? Just sit down and get some food in you." Standing was somewhat manageable. Sitting down and smelling the heavy grease of the restaurant food made my stomach violently churn. I gripped my chopsticks tight, swallowing down the nausea. "Declan and I broke up. Did he forget to mention that?" The chaotic noise in the private room vanished instantly. You could hear a pin drop. Clatter. Nancy's chopsticks hit the floor. She muttered a quiet apology. When she bent down to pick them up, a tiny smirk flashed across her lips before vanishing entirely. Declan's perfect composure finally cracked. He furrowed his brows and glared at me. "Serena, do you have to ruin the mood for everyone?" I stood up briskly and let out a dry laugh. "Then I will just leave." "I am clearly irrelevant here. I won't ruin your celebration any longer." Without another word, I walked out of the restaurant. My fast walk quickly turned into a run. The freezing night wind sliced against my face like actual blades. But this masochistic, physical pain somehow made the suffocating ache in my chest feel a little better. I thought I had run far enough. I finally collapsed by a streetlamp, dry heaving from exhaustion. Then I heard Declan's voice right behind me. He wasn't just exceptionally smart. He was athletic, with long, terrifyingly fast strides. He had chased me down while dragging his rolling suitcase, not looking out of breath in the slightest. "Explain yourself. You want to throw us away just because Nancy took your spot?" He reached out to pull me up, but his tone was full of that typical, condescending interrogation. I slapped his hand away and turned my face. "Do you even need to ask? You were the one who dumped me." Being sick made me disgustingly fragile. The tears just kept coming, no matter how hard I scrubbed my eyes. I rubbed my cheeks until they burned, silently cursing myself for being so pathetic. Suddenly, a warm weight settled against my back. The familiar scent of his clean soap, mixed heavily with expensive liquor, wrapped around me. He pulled me into his chest with one arm, using his free hand to pinch my cheek and shake it lightly. His voice dropped low, his hot breath brushing against my ear. "I'm sorry. You know I only said that because I was angry." "It was wrong of me to let Nancy replace you. But her family is drowning in debt. She needed this opportunity way more than you did." "You are completely different. You have endless options. You can just pay out of pocket to study abroad with me, and we can still be partners in the program." He then pressed a small, red velvet jewelry box into my palm. "An apology gift. Stop being mad at me, okay?" My entire body went rigid. My brain short circuited. A drunk Declan was terrifyingly affectionate. It was overwhelming. He was notoriously rigid. On a normal day, he wouldn't even hold my hand unless we were hidden on a quiet campus trail. Apologizing while pulling me into a hug? That was unheard of. I stared blankly at the velvet box in my hand. I opened it. When I saw what was resting on the cushion, the tiny bit of hope that had just resurrected plummeted straight down and shattered. 4 The earrings inside were promotional freebies from a niche boutique brand. On my cab ride back this morning, I had scrolled past a massive photo dump on Nancy's Instagram. In the center photo, she was wearing a thick scarf from this exact same brand, flashing a peace sign at the camera. It was a live photo. The background audio was piercingly clear. "Thank you for the gift, Declan! I promise I'll keep working hard!" Followed immediately by Declan's low, soft chuckle. The tiny box in my hand suddenly felt like burning lead. It ground whatever miserable scraps of self esteem I had left into fine dust. I thought about it with deep, pathetic irony. Why did I have to click on her post? If I hadn't seen that picture, I never would have known the gift he was using to pacify me was literally a piece of trash another girl didn't want. Wouldn't it be so nice to just be an ignorant idiot, happily accepting my little prize? This was just sad. I felt like an absolute joke. The corner of my mouth twitched. "Never again," I whispered. "I'm never doing this again." I would never shamelessly throw myself at him again. And I sure as hell wasn't following him across the world. "Hmm?" Declan didn't catch my whisper. He narrowed his eyes and leaned in closer. A bright, sweet voice shattered the moment. "Um... am I interrupting something?" Nancy was standing there, wrapped up warm in that exact scarf, looking at me with wide, timid eyes. "Declan, I think I left a few things in your suitcase." Declan nodded casually and unzipped his luggage. She reached right into the inner mesh pocket and pulled out a makeup bag and a box of tampons. I felt like I was nailed to the concrete. I just watched how incredibly natural their routine was. The howling wind sounded like it was laughing at me. It was mocking my entire existence. "Oh, um... Serena, please don't get the wrong idea. My period started right before the finals, so I had to beg Declan to run to the pharmacy for me. Plus, my suitcase was completely over the weight limit..." Nancy nervously tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, making sure she sounded suitably pitiful. I stared right into her bright, defiant eyes. It was crazy how much things changed. Who would have thought the painfully shy, sunburnt scholarship kid from freshman year would blossom into this confident, manipulative girl? Back then, I genuinely considered Nancy a friend. I was terrified she felt left out, so I constantly dragged her to meals and study sessions. I gave her my clothes, my expensive skincare, everything. I never imagined she would set her sights on Declan, or that she would completely backstab me to steal my competition slot. It felt like I swallowed a handful of crushed glass. I couldn't cough it up, and I couldn't force it down. I heard my own voice echoing, hoarse and mocking. "Did the hotel you stayed at not have a front desk? Were there absolutely zero other women in the entire competition circuit?" "You just had to force a guy with a girlfriend to go buy your feminine products? Wow, you and your precious Declan must have a really special bond." "Serena!" Declan practically roared. "Since when did you become so classless? I just did a favor for a classmate in need. Do you really have to twist it into something so filthy?" "Apologize to Nancy right now!" Nancy's eyes were already swimming in dramatic tears. "Serena, I know you are still furious that I took your spot." "But you literally have everything. You don't need one little competition. Please, can you just forgive me?" Declan gripped her trembling shoulders, his voice instantly softening. "It is not your fault." Then, he turned his glare back to me, his tone hardening. "Serena. Apologize." "Why the hell should I?" I raised my voice, my vision blurring with hot, angry tears. Declan didn't even bother looking at me anymore. He gently guided Nancy to the curb and hailed a cab for her. I didn't blink. I just watched him display a level of patience he had never, ever shown me. He leaned into the window, softly comforting the sobbing girl. The amber glow of the streetlights caught a warm, genuine smile on his face. I inhaled a lungful of freezing air. The cold sank straight into my bones. It reminded me of the time I had to get emergency appendicitis surgery. My dad was tied up overseas on business and couldn't make it back in time. I was lying in the hospital, so incredibly lonely. I just wanted to see Declan for five minutes. If he had just held my hand and said a few nice words, the pain wouldn't have been so bad. But as my boyfriend, his only response was a freezing text. 'I am busy with finals.' He couldn't even be bothered to fake a shred of concern. Seeing him tonight made everything crystal clear. Declan was not a heartless studying machine. He was perfectly capable of loving someone. Being loved gives a person life. But so does the act of loving someone else. The problem was simply that the person bringing Declan to life was not me. It was never me.
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