At my wedding to Liam, his nemesis, Sadie, crashed the ceremony. She made a scene, shoved me to the floor in the process, and then pointed a perfectly manicured finger at Liam. “You sabotaged my pitch meeting, so I’m sabotaging your wedding!” she shrieked, her voice echoing in the suddenly silent ballroom. A flash of familiar fire lit Liam’s eyes. He shot back, his voice rising to match hers. “That was payback for you getting my car towed during my client dinner!” “And what about the Henderson account? You poached them, and you know it!” They were off, lost in their own toxic orbit right there at the altar. A trickle of warmth ran down my temple, and I realized I was bleeding. I called his name, but my voice was a whisper drowned out by their shouting. My hand trembled as I stared at the two of them, their faces flushed, their bodies bristling with an energy that was far too intimate for a public fight. It was a dance I knew all too well. My fingers brushed against the microphone that had tumbled from the officiant’s stand. I picked it up, the cool metal a shock against my skin. The feedback squealed for a second, finally slicing through their argument. “Liam,” I said, my voice amplified and shaking. “The wedding is off.” 1 He froze, his mouth half-open. It took him a few seconds to even turn his head. When his gaze finally landed on the blood matting my hair, he stumbled toward me. “Chloe? Oh god, Chloe, are you okay?” I turned away from him, my eyes scanning the wreckage of what should have been the happiest day of my life. Most of the guests had fled. Only a few close friends lingered in the corners, looking horrified. I clenched my fists. The wedding I had dreamed of for years, reduced to this. “It’s all my fault,” Liam stammered, his hands hovering uselessly around me. “I never should have let that psycho in here. Don’t be angry. We’ll reschedule, we’ll do it again in a few weeks…” “Who are you calling a psycho?” Sadie’s voice cut in, sharp as glass. “This is what you get, Liam! You plan another wedding, and I’ll ruin that one, too!” “You…” Liam’s anger surged again, and he spun around to face her. I grabbed the corner of his tuxedo jacket, my grip desperate. I squeezed all the pain and exhaustion into five words. “If you argue with her, we’re done.” The fight drained out of him instantly. He deflated, turning to the venue’s security guards and simply telling them to get her out. We could still hear Sadie’s furious curses echoing from the lobby. “I’m not done with you, Liam! I’ll never let you be happy!” He finally ignored her, scooping me into his arms. “Chloe, I’m so sorry you had to go through that. I’m taking you to the ER, just to make sure you’re okay.” After a few stitches and a clean bill of health, I fell into a heavy, dreamless sleep in a quiet hospital room. I was woken up by the sound of a familiar argument. Liam was in the doorway, his back to me, hissing into his phone. “Sadie, if you ever pull a stunt like that again, I swear to God I will make you regret it… What do you mean, I started it? You’re threatening me now? You just wait!” He hung up, ready to storm out, but I shot a hand out and grabbed his wrist. “Don’t,” I whispered. “If you go after her, she’ll just come back with something worse. It will never end. You two will be doing this for the rest of your lives.” My voice was flat. “Just… let it go. For today, just let it be over.” I don’t know what part of my soul I had to scrape out to say those words. In the three years I’d been with Liam, I had been the collateral damage in their endless war. The expensive perfume he bought for my birthday, mysteriously replaced with a gag-gift bottle of hot sauce. The time he was supposed to pick me up from work, only to leave me waiting for two hours in the freezing rain because he got into a screaming match with her over a parking spot. I had tried to be patient. I had tried to understand the decade of baggage they shared. But this was my wedding. And for the first time, watching them fight, I saw something else flicker between them—an old, curdled intimacy that had nothing to do with hatred. So I was afraid. I was terrified that if he retaliated this time, I would be chained to their drama forever. He sighed, his shoulders slumping. He covered my hand with his. “Okay,” he said softly. “You’re right. I’m not going anywhere. I’m staying right here with you.” On the way home from the hospital, Liam held my hand, his words a constant stream of gentle apologies and promises. But as we reached my apartment door, I stopped. It was slightly ajar. A chaotic, violated energy seemed to pour from the crack. The moment I pushed the door open, my breath hitched in my chest. 2 The wreckage inside my home made me freeze. The first thing I saw was the framed photo of my mother—her last picture—smashed on the floor of the entryway, a dirty footprint marring her black-and-white image. My knees gave out, and I collapsed amidst the shards of glass, reaching for the ruined frame. My fingertips brushed against a soft, familiar object instead: my mother’s old photo album. I flipped it open. Every single picture had been cut to ribbons. Not one was left whole. On the inside back cover, scrawled in what looked like red lipstick, were the words: Still can’t win, Liam. -S. The tiny shreds of my mother’s smile, of my childhood, slipped through my fingers. A roar filled my ears. These photos were the only tangible pieces of her I had left. “It has to be Sadie,” Liam spat, his voice tight with rage. He hadn't even looked at me, hadn't seen the way I was crumbling. His eyes were fixed on the mess. “First the wedding, and now this? She’s gone too far.” He took out his phone, his thumb hovering over her contact. “Chloe, don’t try to stop me this time. I’m going to make her pay for this.” I reached for him, but my hand met empty air. I looked up just in time to see the front door slam back against the wall with a deafening crack that made my ears ring. He was gone. I don’t know how long I sat there on the floor, clutching the ruined album. An hour? Two? My fingers were numb with cold when I finally, shakily, pulled out my own phone. Sadie had just posted a new picture to her Instagram story. It was a smug selfie, her head tilted, a triumphant glint in her eyes. The caption was a poison dart. Some people just never learn. As I stared at the screen, my phone started ringing. It was Liam. “Chloe… I just remembered we were supposed to be setting up for the reception tonight,” he started, his voice rushed. “But Sadie was just… she was completely out of line. I had to go over there, for you. To make things right.” He took a breath. “I’m on my way back now…” “Don’t bother,” I said, my voice hollow. The well of my grief was so deep it had swallowed all my other emotions. “Liam,” I said, cutting him off before he could argue. “We need to break up.” The words hung in the air, final. “You and Sadie… you’ve completely taken over my life.” A single, hot tear escaped and slid down my cheek, a traitor to my resolve. They had been fighting for a decade. Over grades in college, over clients and promotions at work. And then, over me. Every fight was a category five hurricane, and I was always the person left standing in the rubble. The time they got into a shouting match over a table at a restaurant and flipped it over, leaving me to apologize to the manager. The surprise party he planned for my birthday that she crashed and ruined, forcing me to spend the rest of the night comforting him. I had endured so much. And now, the one thing I treasured most in the world had been shredded on my floor. Liam’s voice was panicked on the other end of the line. “Don’t cry, Chloe, please. I’m sorry, I was wrong. Just wait, I’m almost there.” Less than ten minutes later, my door burst open and Liam rushed in, breathless. He pulled me into his arms, holding me tight. “Chloe, I’m so, so sorry. Please don’t break up with me. We can fix this.” He pulled back, his eyes pleading. “I’ll never get tangled up with Sadie again. I promise.” I looked up at his face, a mask of guilt and desperation. He was always like this. No matter how badly he messed up, he always knew how to rush back, how to say the right thing. He was perfect in every way… except for Sadie. And that one exception was the wound that was killing me. I gently pushed him away. I was silent for a long moment before my voice emerged, quiet and cold. “You want to cut her out of your life for good?” I asked. “I have a way. Liam, we’re going to sue her.” He stared at me, blinking. “Sue her?” “For breaking and entering. For destruction of property.” I held his stunned gaze. “You hate her, don’t you? Isn’t this what you want? To send her a message she can’t ignore? A few months of legal trouble might finally get her to back off.” Without waiting for an answer, I stood up and walked toward the door. “Let’s go. Right now.” 3 I had my hand on the doorknob when Liam’s hand covered mine, stopping me. “You’re right,” he said, his voice firming up. “We absolutely have to sue her.” He put his hands on my shoulders, his tone softening. “But look at you. You’re exhausted. You don’t need to be running to a lawyer’s office right now.” He gave me a small, reassuring smile. “You forget, my best friend is Mark. He’s one of the best lawyers in the city. Just leave it to me, Chloe. I promise, I will make Sadie pay for this.” The knot of tension in my chest loosened, just a fraction. “Okay,” I whispered. Liam’s face broke into a wide, relieved grin. He leaned in and kissed my cheek, then took my hand. “So, what do you say we go check on the reception venue? We can start planning our do-over wedding,” he said, his voice full of forced cheer. “The one she ruined doesn’t count. I’m going to throw you a party so big, so perfect, it’ll make you forget any of this ever happened. I’ll make it up to you.” Maybe it was the emotional exhaustion, but the fatigue hit me like a tidal wave. I didn’t hear another word he said. Later that evening, he proudly held out his phone for me to see. “Look, Chloe. I blocked and deleted her. From everything.” He sounded like a little boy showing off a good report card. “She’s gone. She’ll never bother us again.” And for a while, he was right. Sadie vanished. Liam, as if trying to earn his way back into my life, became the perfect fiancé. He was more attentive, more loving than ever before. It was during that peaceful period that I found out I was pregnant. The day I told him, the pregnancy test trembled in his hand. Before I could even process it myself, he whooped with joy and swung me around in a hug. “This is it!” he cheered. “The new wedding has to happen, now! As soon as possible!” He held my face in his hands, his eyes shining. “No more waiting, Chloe. I’m not going to let you wait another day.” My heart, bruised and wary, slowly began to heal. I let myself believe him. I pushed all thoughts of him and Sadie away. Until the day I was cleaning out our closet and found one of his favorite dress shirts, shoved in the back, with a long, deliberate slash cut through the fabric. In the trash can under his desk, I found a project proposal that had been defaced with childish scribbles. A cold dread crept over me. I found a quiet place and called his friend, Mark. “Hey, Mark,” I said, trying to keep my voice steady. “I was just wondering… how is the lawsuit against Sadie coming along?” There was a moment of confused silence on the other end. “Uh… lawsuit? Sue who?” In that instant, all the blood drained from my head. The room started to buzz. My grip on the phone went slack. Mark, oblivious, kept talking. “Oh, you mean because she crashed the wedding? Chloe, that’s just how they are. You get used to it after a while.” He laughed, a horribly casual sound. “Honestly, those two almost got together back in college. It was a whole thing. Then Sadie started dating some guy just to make him jealous, so Liam did the same, and… well, they’ve been trying to one-up each other ever since.” I stood there, frozen, my fingers turning to ice. I was listening to a history I had never been told, a history that made our entire relationship feel like a sham, a move in their sick, decade-long game. Mark must have sensed he’d said too much. “Hey, but that’s all ancient history!” he said quickly. “He’s with you now. He’s crazy about you, he’s going to be a father. You’re all he cares about. Don’t even think twice about it.” His reassurances felt like gasoline on a fire, a desperate attempt to cover up a truth I could now see with blinding clarity. I couldn't listen anymore. I hung up without saying goodbye. A moment later, a heavy weight settled on my shoulders. A jacket, carrying Liam’s warmth, wrapped around me. His voice came from right behind my ear. “Why are you out here without a coat?” 4 “Our wedding is tomorrow,” Liam murmured, wrapping his arms around me from behind and resting his chin on the top of my head. “You can’t get sick now.” His breath was warm against my neck. His voice was filled with a genuine, bubbling excitement. “Chloe, tomorrow you’ll be my wife. I’ve never been happier.” This was the embrace that had always been my safe place. But now, listening to his sweet, cloying words, I felt like I was submerged in ice water. There wasn’t a trace of warmth left in me. I somehow managed to hold myself together through the night and into the next morning. I was in the back of the limo, the white dress pooling around me, when a sudden, violent impact threw me against the seat. “Son of a bitch!” the driver yelled, slamming his hand on the steering wheel. “He totaled the back end! We’re not getting to any wedding in this thing!” I was still trying to catch my breath when I turned and saw her. Sadie, climbing out of the sports car that had just rear-ended us. Before anyone could react, she strode up to our limo, pulled her car keys from her pocket, and dragged the sharp metal tip along the length of the white door. A deep, ugly gash bloomed on the pristine surface. “What the hell are you doing?!” I threw the door open and scrambled out, grabbing her by the wrist. “I have never done anything to you! Why can’t you leave me alone?” She wrenched her arm free, her eyes flashing with a wild hatred. A cold smile twisted her lips. “Because I hate Liam,” she snarled. “And by extension, I hate you.” She glanced back at the gash on the car. “This is his car, isn’t it? Perfect.” The traffic behind us was already backing up, a chorus of angry horns. Someone leaned out their window. “There’s an ambulance back here! You need to move, people are trying to save a life!” Sadie shot the driver a contemptuous look and planted her hands on her hips. “I don’t care about your stupid ambulance,” she announced to the world. “This wedding is not happening. I’m not letting Liam get what he wants. Not today.” The wail of the ambulance siren was a drill boring into my skull. I stared at her, a bitter laugh escaping my lips. “You’re in love with him, aren’t you?” I said, the realization hitting me with the force of a physical blow. “This isn’t hate. No one hates like this.” She stiffened for a second, then dropped the act entirely. “You’re damn right I am,” she spat. “And I’m ruining your wedding. What are you going to do about it?” “You’re insane,” I breathed. I turned to get back in the car, to tell the driver to just try to pull over, but Sadie blocked my path. “No one is going anywhere.” My patience snapped. I pulled out my phone, took a picture of her standing defiantly in the middle of the highway, and sent it to Liam. Your nemesis is back. His reply was instantaneous. On my way. He arrived moments later, his car screeching to a halt. I instinctively took a step toward him, but he blew right past me without a glance. He grabbed Sadie by the front of her shirt, his face a mask of fury. “Sadie, are you out of your mind?!” he roared. “Why can’t you just let it go? Do you have to ruin every single important moment of my life?” She immediately fired back, and just like that, they were at it again, screaming at each other in the middle of a traffic jam. He didn’t look at me once. Not a single glance to see if I was okay. I stood there, frozen, a cold that had nothing to do with the weather seeping into my bones. Another driver leaned on his horn. “Hey! This is a wedding limo, right? You two should be celebrating, not fighting! Move it!” My heart twisted. He thought they were the couple. Sadie shot me a look of pure, venomous triumph. Pushing back the tears that threatened to fall, I held up my phone. “If you don’t move your car right now,” I said, my voice dangerously steady, “I’m calling the police.” As my thumb hovered over the dial button, my phone was violently slapped out of my hand, clattering onto the asphalt. I looked up in disbelief at Liam. The tears finally broke free. A desperate, destructive anger surged through me. I bent down to retrieve my phone, determined to make the call, to burn everything to the ground. And then I froze. Liam was holding a small pocketknife, the blade pointed directly at my stomach. My mind went completely blank. “Don’t call the cops,” he whispered, his voice trembling. “It’ll ruin her life.” He looked at me, his eyes a terrifying mix of pleading and command. “I’ll take her home. I’ll deal with this. Then I’ll come back, and we can get married, okay? I’ll cut her off for good, I swear. We’ll have the baby, we’ll have a good life. Please, Chloe. Please.” I stared at the knife pointed at my belly, at our child. The blood in my veins turned to ice. Before I could answer, he dropped the knife, grabbed Sadie’s arm, and dragged her away without a backward glance. Time seemed to stop. I just sat on the pavement, my mind a hollowed-out shell. I was still there when a traffic cop finally helped me to my feet. “Ma’am, are you the bride? Do you need us to give you a ride to the ceremony?” I shook my head slowly, my hand instinctively going to my slightly rounded stomach. “No,” I said, my voice eerily calm. “I need a ride to the hospital. I’m here for an abortion.” 5 When I woke up, I was out of the operating room. I placed a hand on my abdomen. It was flat again. My heart felt like a hollowed-out cavern, but underneath the emptiness was a profound, quiet sense of finality. It was over. Liam and I were completely, irrevocably over. There was no reason to bring a child into that wreckage. My phone was vibrating on the bedside table. It was a long chain of texts from Liam. Chloe, where are you? We can talk about what happened. I can explain. Please don’t shut me out. Chloe, it’s our wedding day… My finger hovered over the screen. A bitter, humorless laugh escaped my lips. He remembered. The screen lit up again and again. Annoyed, I opened the message thread and typed six words. Liam, we are broken up. Goodbye. The notifications stopped. The “typing…” bubble appeared and disappeared, over and over. Finally, a single message came through. Where are you? I’m coming to find you. I didn’t reply. I just turned off the phone. An hour later, he burst into my hospital room, his face frantic. He dropped to his knees by my bed and grabbed my hand. “Chloe, I was an idiot today. I was impulsive,” he pleaded. “Sadie’s father is critically ill; she’s all he has. If she got a police record, it would destroy her career, her whole life…” He squeezed my hand tighter. “I already told her it’s over. I made it clear. I will never have anything to do with her again. I swear it.” Looking at his guilty, desperate face just made me feel sick. I should have seen it all along. They weren’t enemies. There was a place for Sadie in his heart, a place he protected more fiercely than he ever protected me. I pulled my hand from his grasp. My voice was calm, almost conversational. “What ever happened with the lawsuit you were going to file? The one you asked Mark to handle for you?” His eyes flickered. He froze for a few seconds before mumbling, “It’s… it’s in process. It’ll be resolved soon.” I said nothing. I just reached into my purse, pulled out my phone, and pressed play on the recording of my call with Mark. As his friend’s cheerful, damning voice filled the sterile room, the composure Liam had been struggling to maintain completely shattered. “I…” he stammered. “Don’t,” I cut him off. “There’s nothing left to say, Liam. I’m not marrying you. We’re done.”
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