Never See You Again

I discovered a separate system on my boyfriend's phone.

The system was completely clean, without a single app.

But the text messages, a sea of green, were filled with his longing for someone else and his complaints about me.

It was like a punch to the gut.

1

I wasn't paying attention when I picked up Sean Sagan's phone.

It was only when my password failed several times that I realized I was holding his phone.

We didn't have secrets. He'd told me all his passwords a long time ago, but I trusted him completely, so I'd never once looked through his phone.

'Maybe I'll exercise my girlfriend privileges today?'

The thought had barely crossed my mind when I smiled, glancing over at the man sleeping beside me. I typed in his most-used password and unlocked the phone.

But the moment I entered the password, the photo of us on the lock screen disappeared, opening to a default system interface.

"Huh?" I frowned and sat up, realizing something wasn't right.

I'd never snooped through his phone, but I'd seen him use it plenty of times.

His lock screen wasn't just a photo of us; his wallpaper was also a picture from a trip we'd taken together.

He'd even bragged to me when he set it, saying he would only change it to a family portrait after we got married and had kids.

So what was with this bare, default wallpaper now?

A sense of foreboding washed over me. I swiped through the phone, only to find that aside from the default apps, there wasn't a single extra one installed.

My anxiety began to fade. I breathed a sigh of relief, thinking I was just being paranoid.

But when I tapped on the Messages app, a screen full of green bubbles made my heart leap into my throat all over again.

"Worked overtime again today. So tired. Played a couple of games downstairs before coming up. Jade Harrow is working late too, so she's not back yet. It's such a relief not to have to pretend to be cheerful."

"I've been so tired lately. I miss you so much."

"Jade Harrow missed her period this month. I thought she was pregnant. It scared the hell out of me."

"Jade Harrow brought up meeting parents today, and it just made me think about when you and I talked about doing the same."

The contents of the messages were horrifying. Page after page of green bubbles chronicled his secret thoughts and frustrations. Some of them were even dated from before he and I got together.

My heart sank lower and lower. My eyes burned, and tears splashed onto the duvet, spreading into a dark, wet patch.