While I Burned with Fever in the ER, He Was at the Game with His Little Sister Chapter 01
Late one night, I suddenly came down with a high fever, and no one in my family was in Seattle.
I had no choice but to text my fiancé, Ethan, and ask him to pick up some fever medicine on his way home.
He replied almost immediately, his impatience obvious even through the screen.
[There’s a pharmacy right downstairs on the corner. Can’t you go buy it yourself?]
[If you really can’t go, use a delivery app.]
[I’m still working late at the office. I can’t come home right now.]
I wanted to tell him that the pharmacy closed at ten.
The nearest emergency room was two miles from our apartment. Rides were almost impossible to get in our neighborhood that late, and there was no telling when medicine ordered through an app would arrive.
In the end, I forced myself to get dressed and went out alone.
By the time I made it into the ER lobby, I nearly collapsed at the triage desk.
A nurse hooked me up to an IV and gave me a fever reducer. It took a long time for my temperature to come down and my breathing to finally steady.
I leaned back in a chair in the ER observation area and opened Instagram without thinking, only to see that Sophia had just posted.
[He brought me pizza and wings in the middle of the night and stayed to watch the World Cup with me. I’m so lucky to have someone who spoils me like this!]
The photo was taken in the apartment she rented.
Pizza, wings, and beer covered the table, and Ethan sat beside her watching the game on the big screen.
I stared at the gentle smile on Ethan’s face and felt like such a fool.
So when he said he was “working late,” what he really meant was that he was watching the match with Sophia.
Right then, I called Ethan’s father.
“I’m calling off my engagement to Ethan.”
…
I stared at the photo for a full three minutes.
Ethan had even left a comment under her post.
[Enjoy the match, babe. Don’t drink too much.]
The words were so affectionate that anyone would have thought they had been married for years.
I sat in the ER observation area with an IV running into the back of my right hand and my phone clutched in my left.
The digital thermometer read 103.6 degrees Fahrenheit.
A little over ten minutes earlier, I had almost passed out at the triage desk.
And Ethan had told me he was working late at the office.
This was not the first time.
Two weeks earlier, Ethan’s phone alarm had suddenly gone off at four in the morning.
I asked him where he was going so early.
He said Sophia wanted freshly baked cinnamon rolls from a bakery south of downtown.
The bakery opened at five, and if he arrived too late, there would be a long line.
I asked him whether he really needed to go that far for her.
As he pulled on his jacket and walked out of the room, he answered calmly, “What’s wrong with buying her some breakfast?”
I reminded him, “She’s only the daughter of your parents’ friends. You’re not related to her in any way.”
I only wanted him to understand that the way they treated each other had crossed the line a long time ago.
Ethan glanced back at me and suddenly laughed.
“Erin, don’t tell me you’re jealous over something like this.”
He walked over and ruffled my hair, speaking to me as though I were a child deliberately causing trouble.
“We really are like brother and sister. Sophia has depended on me since we were kids. She grew up in a single-parent home. You know that.”
“What’s wrong with me taking a little extra care of her?”
“You’re my fiancée. Everything I have belongs to you. You don’t need to worry about her taking me away from you.”
I stopped arguing.
No matter how I explained it, he would never admit there was anything wrong with the way they behaved around each other.
It always ended the same way.
He would tell me I was too sensitive and too controlling, then lecture me that a mature woman should not keep making an issue out of something so trivial.
So every time, I swallowed my hurt and let it go.
I thought that speaking up would at least earn me the most basic respect from him.
But less than two weeks later, the exact same thing happened again.
Sitting in the IV chair, I scrolled through every Instagram post Sophia had made over the past three months.
On April 7, Ethan celebrated her birthday with her.
The location tag showed an upscale sushi restaurant where the set menus started at four hundred dollars per person.
On my birthday, he had bought me nothing but a discounted pair of socks.
At two in the morning on May 17, he drove over to bring Sophia a late-night meal.
On June 1, he went on vacation with her in Miami.
And today, July 4, during the World Cup knockout match, the table was once again covered with pizza, wings, and beer while Ethan stayed by her side the entire time.
Ethan appeared in every single one of her posts.
But in our message history, his replies were almost always limited to the same few phrases.
[Busy.]
[We’ll talk later.]
[Stop.]
It turned out I was the one who had failed to see reality.
I had mistaken his indifference for the normal friction that came with being in a relationship.
I opened my contacts and found the number for Ethan’s father, Richard.
It was after one in the morning when he answered.
“Hello? Erin, did something happen to Ethan?”
I tried not to let the strain show in my voice.
“Richard, Ethan is fine.”
“I’m sorry for disturbing you and Margaret so late.”
I heard him breathe out in relief. Then his voice immediately turned impatient.
“Whatever it is, can’t it wait until tomorrow?”
“Do you have any idea what time it is? Margaret and I were already asleep.”
I said quietly, “I only need to say a few things. Once I’m finished, I won’t bother either of you about Ethan ever again.”
“What could possibly be so urgent?”
“The wedding in two weeks is canceled.”
The other end of the line went silent for two seconds.
Richard sounded as though he thought he had misheard me.
“What did you just say?”
“I said the wedding isn’t happening.”
“Please have Ethan come get his things.”