Chapter 1. Should I Just Leave with My Pride?

Mia

A Day Before

"I saw Evan enter the hotel with a woman," Addy said half an hour ago. And that's what made me come to The Gallan Hotel. I actually didn't trust Addy's words, which might be that she saw something wrong. Or maybe she misrecognized someone else as Evan. However, ten percent of me still wanted to confirm that she was wrong.

As I walked into The Gallan Hotel, my mind was divided between Addy's words and my own skepticism. The white marble floor stretched across the lobby, LED lights hiding underneath. The main walls were made of glass, reaching upwards and meeting the high white ceiling, in the center of which was a large avant-garde chandelier. 

An uneasy feeling gnawed at me as I made my way to the reception desk where a friendly woman greeted me with a warm smile. "Welcome to The Gallan Hotel. How may I assist you?"

Taking a deep breath, I decided to ask, utilizing my innate little talent. "Hi, I was wondering if you could help me with something. Me and a friend are planning to make a surprise for our old friend who just came from France. You know, a nice little surprise, in this hotel. Unfortunately, he's now unreachable - gosh, this bad habit of his is quite a hassle. My friend's name is Evan. Evan Lynch. Can you help me check if he has a reservation here?" I held my breath. Jesus, did what I just said make sense? I was not thinking much. Would she believe me?

The receptionist typed something on the keyboard, hopefully she was indeed accessing the hotel's reservation system. After a moment, the woman with the light brown hair looked at me. "I could help you, don't worry. Would you please spell his last name?"

"Lynch. L-Y-N-C-H. Evan Lynch."

She nodded. " I will check it out. Please give me a moment."

My fingers tapped on the reception desk that felt so cold. My heart is racing. Addy's words came back to my mind. Gosh, Addy, is this the right thing to do? Coming here, secretly checking my boyfriend's name in the hotel reservation system, doubting his loyalty after what we went through together for two years.

I took another breath, convincing myself. What I was doing was not to test Evan's loyalty, but to prove that Addy was wrong.

The receptionist looked back at me. "I'm sorry, but I was not able to find any recent check-in information that matches what you mentioned. There's a chance he didn't make a reservation here, or perhaps used another name. Is there another name you could think of?"

I exhaled a sigh of relief. "Forget it. Maybe he hasn't made a reservation yet. Thank you for your help." It was clear that Addy's vision was wrong.

Sitting in the lobby, I opened my phone, planning to send Addy a text message telling her that she had indeed mistaken someone else for Evan. She didn't know Evan as well as I did. The idea that Evan was involved in a suspicious situation was just absurd.

(I went to the hotel you mentioned and found nothing. Maybe you should meet Evan more often so you don't misrecognize him again.)

I pressed the send button, then leaned back against the back of the single sofa. I spent about two minutes observing the lobby's decor. The sitting room consisted of beige-colored sofas. Several ornamental plants were placed in the corners of the room. At one end of the room, there was a black-and-gold art installation that I wasn't sure what it was, but it was undeniably luxurious.

Feeling pretty good, I stood up proudly, ready to put this incident behind me and keep it close. I was becoming more and more confident in my assessment that my relationship with Evan was indeed very strong.

However, my heart throbbed violently when I followed my line of sight and found Evan across the lobby. My mind and emotions were in turmoil: shock, confusion, disappointment—all coming together and hitting me in the solar plexus. There I found Evan, the man I knew (or perhaps I didn't know him well enough) sharing an intimate moment with a strange woman. Their gestures suggested that they were lost in love, which would have been naive of me to believe that their relationship was merely one of friendship, or even kinship. My eyes clearly recognized who it was, but my heart kept asking was it really Evan?

The intimate scene of the two of them unfolded before me, bringing out the fog in my beliefs. I was clearly in the middle of a situation that required me to choose whether to believe in our memories or the undeniable facts before my eyes.

Taking a deep breath, I decided to approach them. Every step I took felt heavy, something unreasonable telling me to just leave, pretend I hadn't seen anything, and go about my love life as usual.

However, I couldn't. "Evan?" My voice trembled. God, I really couldn't back down. "Who is this woman?"

Evan's face instantly turned pale. He hurriedly unraveled his embrace with the blonde-haired, blue-eyed woman. Geez, seriously? 

"Why are you here?" he asked back instead of answering me.

I was losing my cool. "WHO THE FUCK IS SHE?!" My shoulders were heaving up and down. "You cheated on me?"

Evan's response was wrong. His face shouldn't have been pale, he shouldn't have rushed to untangle himself from that woman. He shouldn't have acted like he was caught red-handed. Come on, laugh and introduce this woman to me.

My knees weakened even more when the woman also looked surprised and misbehaved. What might her name be? Ashley? Olivia? What's a good name for a girl with blonde hair and blue eyes? Cinderella?

Evan stammered, struggling for words. "I... I can explain, please give me some time."

Wrong, Evan. Wrong answer!

The feeling of being betrayed hit me like a huge wave, rolling me into the middle of the ocean and sinking me to the bottom. My chest was suffocating. I couldn't hold on to anything to help me back to the surface. "You cheated on me!"

Evan tried to reach for me, which failed because I immediately took a step back. "Give me a chance to explain. Please, it's not what you think."

Exactly what was I thinking? My thoughts were all over the place. Everything was so noisy and chaotic that I couldn't hear myself. I was again caught between two things. Should I give Evan a chance to explain everything, which would probably save our relationship? Or should I just leave with my pride?

I stepped closer to Evan, automatically distancing the woman a little. There was a look on Evan's face as if he'd been given a chance, as if he'd managed to persuade me. I leaned in, looking him squarely in the eye. "Don't ever call me again!"

My voice trembled with a mixture of anger, feelings of betrayal, and disappointment. I pulled away, just to look at Evan's rigid face. 

"Mia, please ...."

The woman took a breath and opened her mouth, seemingly about to say something. But the tail of my eye caught the movement of Evan's hand that prevented her from speaking.

Without any other words, I turned around, realizing that I had made a scene. My gaze automatically fell on the receptionist. She, who I guessed had seen everything, hurriedly lowered her head. Really, her work ethic needs to be appreciated.