Adrian stared at me for several seconds.
“You’re not going?”
“No.”
“The commander’s family will be there.”
“I know.”
“Everyone already knows you’re my fiancée.”
I closed my study guide.
“Then tell them your fiancée had something more important to do.”
His expression hardened.
“What could possibly be more important?”
I looked directly at him.
“My future.”
Something changed in his face.
In my previous life, those two words had always meant our future.
His promotions.
His assignments.
Our marriage.
The children we might someday have.
I had never realized how rarely my own name appeared inside the plans.
Adrian placed the dress on the bed.
“You’re being childish.”
“No. I’m studying.”
“Iris.”
He stepped closer.
“We’re getting married in three months. You need to start behaving like someone who understands what that means.”
I smiled.
“You’re right.”
For an instant, he relaxed.
Then I continued:
“That’s why I’ve decided not to marry you.”
His face emptied.
“What?”
“I don’t want the wedding.”
He laughed.
Actually laughed.
As if I’d told a joke.
“You’re angry about Valeria.”
“No.”
“You saw us drinking together and got jealous.”
“No.”
“You’re trying to scare me.”
I shook my head.
“Adrian, I don’t care who you take to the gala.”
His laughter stopped.
That hurt him more than jealousy ever could.
In my last life, I had cried because Valeria received everything I begged him for.
His attention.
His admiration.
His instinctive protection.
Now I finally understood something.
The opposite of love wasn’t hatred.
It was no longer caring whom he chose.
He stared at me.
“You’ll calm down.”
Then he turned and left the dress on my bed.
As though my decision were temporary.
As though I were temporary too.
The photographs from the gala appeared the next morning.
Exactly as they had in my previous life.
Adrian in formal uniform.
Valeria beside him.
Her hand resting lightly on his arm.
One photograph showed her leaning toward him while he bent down to hear her.
The caption underneath read:
CAPTAIN COLE AND LIEUTENANT KNOX — THE BASE’S GOLDEN PAIR.
In my last life, I had spent half the night crying over that photograph.
This time, I saved it.
Then I went back to studying.
Two weeks later, I completed the university re-enrollment process I had abandoned in my first life.
Three months later, I finished the credits necessary to obtain my bachelor’s degree.
Adrian barely noticed.
He was increasingly busy with training.
Or so he said.
Valeria visited constantly.
Sometimes she entered the house carrying food for Adrian.
Sometimes military reports.
Sometimes nothing at all.
One afternoon she found me completing practice questions.
She leaned against the desk.
“You’re still doing this?”
“Yes.”
“You know the postgraduate examination has an extremely low acceptance rate.”
“I know.”
She smiled.
“You’ve always been stubborn.”
I looked up.
“And you’ve always been interested in things that belong to me.”
Her smile disappeared.
“What does that mean?”
“Nothing.”
I returned to my book.
But she didn’t leave.
“Iris, Adrian is under a lot of pressure lately.”
“Then comfort him.”
Her expression changed.
“You really don’t care?”
“No.”
That answer frightened her too.
Because Valeria’s pleasure had never come simply from having Adrian’s attention.
She had enjoyed taking something from me.
If I no longer wanted it, what exactly had she won?
The wedding date approached.
My mother began receiving calls from Adrian’s family.
His mother came to see me personally.
“The hotel is reserved.”
“I know.”
“The invitations have gone out.”
“I know.”
“You can’t humiliate Adrian like this.”
I poured her tea.
“I’m not marrying him.”
She stared at me.
“But you’ve loved him since you were nineteen.”
“That doesn’t mean I have to love him forever.”
“He has a promising military career.”
“Good for him.”
“You’ll regret losing a man like Adrian.”
Perhaps in my first life I would have been frightened by those words.
Now I knew exactly what marrying a man like Adrian would cost me.
My degree.
My career.
My confidence.
And eventually, my life.
“I’ll take the risk.”
His mother left furious.
That night Adrian finally stopped treating my refusal as a tantrum.
He came into my room and placed our marriage-registration documents on the desk.
“Sign.”
I didn’t look at them.
“No.”
His voice became colder.
“Enough.”
I raised my eyes.
“Enough what?”
“This ridiculous rebellion.”
He pointed toward my books.
“The exams. The civil-service applications. Refusing family events. Pretending Valeria bothers you when you’re obviously doing all this to get my attention.”
For several seconds, I simply stared at him.
Then I began laughing.
Adrian’s expression darkened.
“What is funny?”
“You really think everything I do is about you.”
“Iris—”
“I studied because I want a career.”
I stood.
“I canceled the wedding because I don’t want to become your wife.”
I pushed the registration papers back toward him.
“And Valeria?”
I smiled.
“You can have her.”
His hand suddenly closed around my wrist.
“Don’t say that.”
The grip brought back a memory.
Another life.
Another argument.
The same hand stopping me from leaving while he insisted I was misunderstanding his relationship with Valeria.
This time I pulled free.
“Don’t touch me.”
Something in my voice made him release me immediately.
Then his expression changed.
For the first time, he wasn’t angry.
He was frightened.
“Iris.”
“What?”
“Do you love someone else?”
I almost felt sorry for him.
“No.”
“Then why?”
“Because I finally learned that being alone is better than being someone’s second choice.”
He went completely still.
I closed the door.
I passed my postgraduate entrance examination seven months later.
When the results appeared, I stared at my name for almost a full minute.
Then I cried.
Not because the score was extraordinary.
Because in my previous life, this version of me had never existed.
She had died before she was ever given the chance.
I called my mother.
Then my professor.
Then nobody else.
Adrian found out from someone at the base.
He arrived that evening.
“You passed.”
“Yes.”
He looked at me strangely.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Why would I?”
His face tightened.
“We’re not strangers.”
“We’re not engaged either.”
He looked away.
By then, our wedding date had already passed.
No ceremony.
No registration.
No second chance for the trap to close.
Valeria had assumed Adrian would marry her afterward.
Apparently Adrian assumed so too.
But something unexpected happened.
He didn’t.
Instead, he began appearing near my university.
Bringing coffee.
Offering rides.
Asking whether I needed books.
Doing all the things I had once begged him to do.
I refused every offer.
Then one rainy afternoon, Valeria stopped me outside the library.
Her face was pale.
“What did you do to Adrian?”
I almost laughed.
“Nothing.”
“He doesn’t answer me anymore.”
“That sounds like a conversation for Adrian.”
“He said he can’t marry me.”
I closed my umbrella.
“And?”
Her eyes reddened.
“He said every time he sees me, he remembers that you’re gone because of us.”
Us.
Interesting.
“So you finally admitted there was an us?”
Valeria froze.
She had walked directly into it.
I smiled.
“In my last life, you were both much better liars.”
Her expression turned confused.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
I stepped around her.
But she grabbed my sleeve.
“Iris, he loves you.”
I looked back.
“No.”
“He does.”
“No, Valeria.”
I gently removed her hand.
“He misses the woman who made his life easy.”
I had learned that lesson the hard way.
Adrian didn’t miss me when I was beside him.
He missed me when my absence created inconvenience.
Two years passed.
I completed graduate school near the top of my class.
Then came the civil-service examination.
I passed that too.
My first appointment was modest.
A junior administrative research position.
Small office.
Average salary.
No prestige.
No military compound.
No powerful husband.
I had never been happier.
I rented a small apartment.
Bought a secondhand dining table.
Paid every bill myself.
The first night, I ate instant noodles sitting on the floor because my chairs had not arrived.
And I laughed.
It was mine.
My salary.
My door.
My life.
Nobody could tell me I owed my existence to the man standing beside me.
Adrian’s career continued rising.
Captain.
Major.
Decorations.
Promotions.
People occasionally sent me articles about him.
I stopped opening them.
Valeria transferred to another region after a disciplinary investigation involving misuse of training resources.
Nothing dramatic.
No prison.
No spectacular collapse.
Life rarely gave villains fireworks.
Sometimes it simply removed the people they believed would always remain available.
Adrian never married her.
He didn’t marry anyone.
Five years after our canceled wedding, we met again at a government-military coordination conference.
I was presenting research.
Adrian was part of the security delegation.
He recognized me immediately.
I wore a simple gray suit.
My name badge said:
DR. IRIS BENNETT
POLICY RESEARCH DIVISION
His eyes stayed on the word Doctor.
After the session, he waited outside.
“Iris.”
“Adrian.”
“You did it.”
I smiled.
“Yes.”
He looked older.
Still impressive.
Still the man my twenty-two-year-old self once believed could determine whether my life was successful.
Now he was simply someone standing in a hallway.
“I heard you passed the national appointment examination too.”
“I did.”
“Congratulations.”
“Thank you.”
Silence stretched between us.
Then he said:
“I was wrong.”
I waited.
“About you studying.”
“Yes.”
“About Valeria.”
I didn’t answer.
“About the wedding.”
His voice became quieter.
“I thought you were afraid of losing me.”
I looked at him.
“I was.”
His eyes lifted.
“In my first life.”
He frowned.
“What?”
I smiled faintly.
“Nothing.”
He continued.
“I thought if I made you insecure, you’d stay closer to me.”
There it was.
The truth I’d waited years to hear in another lifetime.
“I thought you’d always be there.”
“Yes.”
“I didn’t understand that every time I chose Valeria, I was teaching you how little I valued you.”
I studied his face.
Perhaps he genuinely understood now.
But understanding late did not create an obligation in me.
He swallowed.
“Iris, if I asked you now…”
“No.”
I didn’t let him finish.
His eyes reddened slightly.
“You don’t even know what I was going to ask.”
“Yes, I do.”
He gave a broken laugh.
“Would you ever marry me?”
“No.”
“Why?”
The question was almost gentle.
So I answered honestly.
“Because I already know what being your wife looks like.”
Adrian stared at me.
He could not possibly understand the full meaning.
He didn’t know about the other life.
The uniforms I washed.
The meals I prepared.
The career I abandoned.
The nights Valeria slept under our roof.
The door that opened.
His belt.
Her face.
The truck.
The blood.
My death.
And perhaps it was better that way.
That knowledge belonged only to me.
He whispered:
“I could do better.”
“I believe you.”
Hope appeared.
Then I continued:
“But you can do better for someone else.”
His face fell.
“I don’t want someone else.”
I looked at him calmly.
“That doesn’t mean you get me.”
For the first time, Adrian didn’t argue.
He simply lowered his head.
As I walked away, I remembered the moment I’d awakened at twenty-two.
I had thought rebirth meant I had been given another chance to defeat Valeria.
To punish Adrian.
To make them regret betraying me.
I had been wrong.
My second life was never about them.
It was about the degree I never finished.
The examinations I never took.
The salary I never earned.
The apartment I never owned.
The woman I never allowed myself to become.
In my first life, I had spent years asking Adrian to choose me over Valeria.
In my second, I finally understood the question had always been wrong.
I didn’t need Adrian to choose me.
I needed to choose myself before anyone else had the chance to decide what I was worth.
When I stepped outside the conference hall, the afternoon sun was bright.
My driver wasn’t waiting.
I didn’t have one.
So I walked toward the subway with my briefcase in one hand and my phone in the other.
Ordinary.
Independent.
Alive.
Behind me, Adrian Cole remained in that hallway with all the medals, promotions and regret his life could hold.
In front of me was everything I had once died without experiencing.
This time, I didn’t look back.
Because this time, I had a future worth walking toward.
