After I died, Ethan kept thinking about one thing.
What had I been thinking when I signed the full-body donation agreement?
He had never expected that the day he dragged Chloe out of my hospital room would be the last time he saw me alive.
That final afternoon, I had looked at him the same way I always did by then—calm, detached, almost bored, as if it made no difference to me whether he loved someone else or not.
But later, Ethan would keep telling himself that maybe, at that moment, my heart had finally died for real.
That was why I didn’t wait for him to come back.
That was why I never gave him a chance to explain.
The hospital took my body exactly as I had arranged.
There was no funeral for him to stand at.
No ashes for him to keep.
Nothing.
It was cruel.
He thought that over and over.
Ava was cruel.
Then he thought:
No.
The cruel one had always been me.
He regretted not telling me the truth that day.
Yes, Chloe had been pregnant.
But the baby wasn’t his.
On that night at the bar, Ethan had been drunk. Someone had dragged Chloe into a bathroom and assaulted her before anyone found her. By the time Ethan got there, it was already too late.
Chloe had cried and cried, saying she only drank because Ethan hurt her, that if he hadn’t pushed her away, none of it would have happened.
Ethan knew it was emotional blackmail.
He knew she was using pity like a weapon.
But when he saw her crying, he thought of me.
So he softened.
He sent the man responsible to prison.
He gave Chloe money.
He told her to get an abortion.
But that was all.
That was all he was ever willing to give.
He had thought Chloe was obedient.
Spoiled, yes, but manageable.
Instead, he had raised a greedy snake.
And when he wasn’t looking, she bit him.
Sometimes Ethan would dream about me.
In the dream, he asked me again and again, “Ava, why did you break up with me back then? You still loved me, didn’t you?”
And before I could answer, Lily would appear and stand in front of me, glaring at him.
When she wanted to tell you the truth, you didn’t listen. Now that she’s dead, you want answers?
He would wake from those dreams in a cold sweat.
He told himself he wasn’t afraid of Lily.
But he was.
Because he was terrified that if I really answered him, I’d say the words he could never survive hearing.
I stopped loving you a long time ago.
After my death, something went wrong with Ethan’s heart.
The doctor told him not to be too upset.
He said he was fine.
He even started growing flowers.
On the balcony were the little succulents I used to care for. By the time he noticed them, most were already dead.
He’d heard succulents were hard to kill.
So he tried to save them.
At night, he would crouch in front of those pots and talk to them in the dark.
Once, on some bright afternoon in the past, he had seen me doing exactly the same thing.
Curled up there, hugging my knees, talking softly to the leaves.
He had come home with another woman that day.
I had looked back at him once, then quietly lowered my eyes.
Remembering that, Ethan slapped himself across the face so hard his cheek swelled.
Later, at some business gathering, he beat a man half to death for cheating on his wife.
Their old friends cursed him.
“What the hell is wrong with you? You were the one bringing women around every other day. How dare you act righteous now?”
Another laughed.
“Then why don’t you go die too?”
Ethan lost control.
He smashed an entire private room apart and screamed that they were all lying.
He loved his wife the most.
He always had.
Then someone pulled out the photos.
The ones of him kissing Chloe.
He stared at them in silence.
Then left as if running from a fire.
All he could think was this:
He had to hurry home.
He had to explain it to his wife.
He didn’t want her getting mad.
Anger was bad for the body.
When he stepped out of the elevator at home, he saw a heavily pregnant woman standing at the door.
For a moment he didn’t recognize her.
Then he did.
Chloe.
His heart filled with dread.
Had she already come here before?
Had she said anything to upset me?
Had she made me sad?
Without a word, he grabbed her by the hair and dragged her into the stairwell.
“You really have a death wish, don’t you?”
He wrapped one hand around her throat and forced her backward, step by step, until her heel slipped off the edge.
Then she fell.
He stood there looking at the blood spreading across the stairs.
And smiled.
Good.
Now no one can ruin Ava and me anymore.
Two weeks later, Ethan Shaw was admitted to a psychiatric hospital.
On the surface, he behaved almost normally.
There was only one strange thing.
He was always talking to a broken little blessing doll.
The doll had been glued back together badly. It was full of cracks. A piece was missing from its chest, as if its heart had been chipped out and lost.
Ethan kept it by his pillow.
Sometimes he smiled at it and asked gently, “Wife, why haven’t you come to see me yet? I miss you so much. Do you miss me too?”
Then, after a while, his eyes would redden and he’d whisper to himself,
“I forgot. Someone with no heart can’t miss anyone.”
Only then would he remember.
A long, long time ago—
he was the one who lost my heart first.