“It’s just getting married. It’s not the same with everyone.”
The video ended there.
I stared at the dark screen.
Strangely, I didn’t cry.
Perhaps there was a limit to disappointment.
Once you crossed it, pain became clarity.
So Hoai An was right about one thing.
Marriage wasn’t the same with everyone.
That was exactly why I wouldn’t marry him.
I opened the message I’d sent earlier.
“In a week, the wedding is in Ireland, do you have an appointment?”
There was finally a reply.
Only four words.
“I’ll be there, Y Y.”
I smiled.
Then I deleted Khuong Oanh Oanh’s video.
They had Iceland.
I had Ireland.
Let us see who discovered the truth first.
For the next three days, So Hoai An barely contacted me.
Apparently, he still believed I was throwing a tantrum.
On the fourth day, he sent:
“Have you changed your ticket?”
I replied:
“Yes.”
Technically, I hadn’t lied.
I had changed everything except my ticket.
Five minutes later:
“Good girl.”
I stared at those two words and laughed.
He still thought the wedding was waiting for him.
He didn’t realize the bride had already left.
My mother’s health had always been the chain Hoai An used to keep me obedient.
What he didn’t know was that I had already told her everything.
I expected her to be devastated.
Instead, she remained silent for a long time.
Then she asked:
“Do you still love him?”
“I don’t know.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
I closed my eyes.
“No.”
Mother reached across the hospital bed and held my hand.
“Then don’t marry him for me.”
My eyes immediately burned.
“But your biggest wish—”
“My biggest wish is seeing you happy.”
She smiled weakly.
“If the groom is wrong, change him.”
I froze.
Mother winked.
“Didn’t you already do that?”
For the first time that week, I laughed until tears came.
The day before the wedding, So Hoai An flew to Iceland.
Khuong Oanh Oanh went with him.
She posted a photograph from the airport wearing my diamond ring.
Caption:
“Some journeys are worth waiting your whole life for.”
I didn’t respond.
At that moment, my plane was descending over Ireland.
The countryside appeared beneath the clouds.
Green.
Quiet.
Exactly as I had imagined when I planned every detail of my wedding.
Only one thing had changed.
The man waiting for me.
When I walked through arrivals, Lu Chen was standing near the exit.
We had known each other for years through work.
He had once asked me out before Hoai An and I became serious.
I rejected him.
He never asked again.
Three months earlier, his company had offered me a senior position in Dublin.
I had ignored it because I planned to marry Hoai An.
That was the message I’d finally answered.
Not a marriage proposal.
A new beginning.
When I’d written, “The wedding is in Ireland, do you have an appointment?” I hadn’t asked Lu Chen to marry me.
I had asked whether the job was still available.
But when I changed the groom’s name on the wedding plan, I’d written his name for another reason.
The ceremony had already been paid for.
My mother had dreamed of seeing me walk into that church.
So I decided the event would still happen.
Just not as a legal wedding.
It would become a celebration of my mother’s recovery—and my new life.
Lu Chen had agreed to stand beside me as host.
Nothing more.
I wasn’t replacing one man with another.
I was finally choosing myself.
Meanwhile, Iceland descended into chaos.
At noon, Hoai An called.
I didn’t answer.
Again.
Again.
Twenty-seven times.
Then came his message.
“WHERE ARE YOU?”
I looked at the clock.
Apparently, the bet had finally ended.
I replied:
“Ireland.”
He called immediately.
This time, I answered.
“Kieu Y Y, have you lost your mind?”
“No.”
“Our wedding is in Iceland!”
“Your wedding.”
Silence.
“What?”
“You changed the location without telling me.”
“You knew!”
“Yes.”
“Then why didn’t you come?”
I smiled.
“Because I didn’t want to.”
His breathing changed.
“Stop joking.”
“I’m not.”
“Oanh Oanh and I were only playing with you.”
“I know.”
“She means nothing.”
I glanced toward Lu Chen, who was speaking with the wedding planner.
“That isn’t my problem anymore.”
Hoai An’s voice finally became uncertain.
“Y Y… where exactly are you?”
“The church we originally booked.”
He stopped breathing.
Then I heard Khuong Oanh Oanh in the background.
“Hoai An, everyone’s waiting!”
He ignored her.
“Why are you at the church?”
I looked through the window.
Guests were arriving.
My mother had been brought in carefully by relatives.
The flowers I’d chosen months ago decorated the aisle.
Everything was exactly as I’d dreamed.
Except I felt free.
“Because unlike you, I kept my original appointment.”
I disconnected.
An hour later, photographs began appearing online.
The first showed me walking into the church beside my mother.
The second showed Lu Chen standing near the front.
The third showed us laughing beneath the flower arch.
No one explained the context.
The internet did what it always did.
It invented one.
Within minutes:
KIeu Y Y CHANGES GROOM ON WEDDING DAY.
Iceland guests started receiving the photographs.
Then someone showed Hoai An.
According to his cousin, his face became completely white.
He abandoned the reception.
Khuong Oanh Oanh grabbed him.
“Where are you going?”
“Ireland.”
She laughed nervously.
“She’s just trying to scare you.”
Hoai An stared at her.
For the first time, he wasn’t smiling.
“What if she isn’t?”
He arrived the following morning.
Too late.
The celebration was over.
My mother’s wish had been fulfilled.
And I’d signed my Dublin employment contract.
Hoai An found me outside the hotel.
He looked exhausted.
“Where is he?”
“Who?”
“The man in the photographs.”
“Working.”
“So you really replaced me?”
“No.”
His face twisted.
“Then explain!”
I looked at him calmly.
“You still don’t understand.”
I removed the Cartier bracelet he’d given me and placed it in his hand.
“I didn’t leave you for another man.”
“I left because of you.”
His fingers closed around the bracelet.
“Oanh Oanh and I never slept together.”
“I didn’t ask.”
“I love you.”
“You enjoyed humiliating me.”
“It was joking!”
“The wedding dress?”
Silence.
“The family bracelet?”
Silence.
“My engagement ring?”
He looked away.
“The wedding venue?”
His face tightened.
I continued:
“You kept testing how much disrespect I’d tolerate because you were certain I would never leave.”
His eyes reddened.
“I was wrong.”
“Yes.”
I picked up my suitcase.
“That was the final bet.”
I moved to Dublin.
Hoai An returned home alone.
Khuong Oanh Oanh apparently believed that once I disappeared, she would naturally take my position.
She was wrong.
Without me standing between them, their relationship changed.
What had seemed exciting when it hurt me became ordinary when there was nobody left to provoke.
Within two months, they stopped appearing together.
Within four, Oanh Oanh resigned from his company.
Hoai An continued contacting me.
I never returned.
One year later, my mother moved to Ireland temporarily to stay with me.
My career flourished.
Lu Chen became a good friend.
Nothing more.
I had learned an important lesson.
Healing wasn’t about immediately finding a better man.
Sometimes the best ending was discovering that you didn’t need one.
Two years later, I returned home for business.
The wedding planner contacted me unexpectedly.
“Miss Kieu, I found something while clearing archived project files.”
She sent me an invoice.
It was from the original Ireland wedding.
I almost deleted it.
Then one line caught my attention.
Additional photography package.
Paid six months before the wedding.
Purchaser:
Khuong Oanh Oanh.
That made no sense.
Six months earlier, even I hadn’t finalized the photography package.
I called the planner.
“Why was she paying for my wedding?”
There was a long silence.
“I assumed you knew.”
“Knew what?”
“She wasn’t paying for your wedding.”
My fingers tightened around the phone.
“She originally booked a second ceremony.”
I stopped breathing.
“What second ceremony?”
The planner sent another document.
Same church.
Same week.
Same floral concept.
Same guest list template.
Bride:
Khuong Oanh Oanh.
The groom field had originally been blank.
Then, three months before my wedding, someone had filled it in.
So Hoai An.
I stared at the screen.
Suddenly, all those bets felt different.
The dress.
The bracelet.
The ring.
The venue.
They hadn’t simply been testing how much humiliation I would tolerate.
Someone had been rehearsing how much of my wedding could be transferred to Oanh Oanh before I finally objected.
And according to the payment records, the first person who had started preparing that replacement wedding wasn’t Hoai An.
It was Khuong Oanh Oanh herself.
Six months before I ever knew there was a game.
