I missed green on her. Before she left, green had always been hers. Dark emerald sweaters during winter evenings when she used to sit across from me pretending to focus on her notes while I watched her instead, soft olive dresses that moved around her legs when she walked through campus courtyards, the confidence of that color against her skin that somehow made her eyes appear darker, deeper.
Since coming here, I had not seen her wear it once.
No green. Never.
Her short hair was styled in loose waves that framed her face with a careful elegance I hated noticing. Everything about her seemed arranged to keep the world at a distance, from the way she held herself to the way she let her smile appear only when it served a purpose. For reasons I did not want to examine, I missed the way it used to be. I missed the longer hair, the easier laughter, the girl who walked into rooms without carrying defense in every movement, the girl who once looked at me with a trust so complete it made the rest of the world feel irrelevant.
Standing across the room in that red dress, she looked breathtaking, and the sight of her hit me with a force I had no way to soften. Yet under the heat, past the jealousy and the ugly need to drag every man’s gaze away from her, a softer ache opened in my chest and hurt worse than all of it.
It was not the green dresses I missed. It was not the long hair, or the careless smiles she used to give me when she thought no one else was watching. Those were only pieces of a life I had lost.
I missed her.
I missed the girl who had once laughed against my mouth, trusted me with the parts of herself she hid from everyoneelse, and belonged to the same fragile world I believed we were building before I let it fall apart in my hands.
And now she was standing only a few meters away from me, changed, distant, smiling at another man as if the sight of it did not carve straight through something I had spent years trying to harden. The anger in my chest shifted into a uglier thing with teeth, a vicious urge to cross the room and tear that easy smile off Daniel’s face for standing where I should have been.
It was more than jealousy. I knew that, and it pissed me off because there was no clean name for what she did to me. Watching her walk into that room tonight forced the truth into the open, the one I had buried beneath obsession, anger, and every failed attempt to convince myself that finding her was about answers.
I had not only been searching for her.
I had been missing her every fucking day she was gone. And I hated the fact that the first person standing beside her tonight wasn’t me.
Daniel. That fucking professor from the department.
He walked in next to her with the relaxed confidence of someone who believed he had every right to be there, his hand resting lightly against the small of her back as they moved through the entrance together.
My fingers tightened around the stem of the champagne glass. I did not like the way Daniel’s hand lingered near her, familiar in a way that made my jaw tighten, as if he had earned the right to stand close without thinking twice. What bothered me most was her face.
She was smiling.
Actually smiling.
It was nothing like the polite smile she used at work for students, colleagues, and people she kept at a safe distance. This smile was warmer, softer around her mouth, carrying the ease Iremembered from years ago, back when she still felt safe to let the world see it.
Then she laughed at something Daniel said, and the sound went straight under my skin.
I took another sip of champagne, keeping my eyes on them from across the room while something ugly twisted in my chest. Watching another man stand beside her with that kind of ease felt too much like watching him step into a place that had once been mine.
And the thought made me want to break the glass in my hand.
I did not like it. The way Daniel stood beside her. The casual brush of his hand against her back when they stopped to greet another group of colleagues. The ease in her smile, as if standing next to him cost her nothing while I stood across the room trying not to crush the glass in my hand.
I leaned back and forced my grip to loosen before the stem snapped between my fingers.
One thing became clear the moment I saw them walk in together. This evening was about to become far more interesting than I had expected, and if Daniel Whitmore believed he could spend the night beside Edwina Rhodes as though he belonged there, he was going to learn how badly he had misread the room.
Edwina
Agreeing to attend the wedding with Daniel had seemed simple when he asked me in the hallway earlier that week. Lena wanted everyone to arrive with a partner, and going with him felt easier than facing the questions that always came when someone appeared alone at events where colleagues knew too much about one another. At the time, it had felt harmless, just another part of university life, a small obligation that came with working around people until their private celebrations became part of your calendar. Yet as I stood in front of the mirror thatevening, adjusting the thin strap over my shoulder, the decision no longer felt so simple. The dress was red.
Back then, my wardrobe had been softer and simpler, filled with colors that felt safe to me, especially green. It had always been my favorite, or at least it used to be. I wore it so often that the color became part of how I remembered those years, in sweaters, dresses, and the winter coat I used to pull around myself on evenings when the campus library stayed open late and the air carried the scent of old books and coffee.
I could still remember the first time Hayden truly noticed it. I had been wearing a dark green dress that day, long-sleeved and simple, chosen without much thought before meeting him at the library. It became one of our best evenings, sitting across from each other between shelves of old volumes, talking about the books we loved, discovering each other’s tastes, and listening to him tease me about reading dark romance as if he had not been fascinated by every answer I gave. He hadn’t been pretending.
Hayden loved green on me, and after he said it, the color stopped belonging only to me. It became tied to the way he looked at me, to the evenings I once thought would become memories we shared, to a version of myself who still believed loving him was safe. After everything ended, I could not wear it anymore. Every green sweater, every dress, every piece of fabric left in my wardrobe seemed to hold some part of him I was still trying to survive. So I left them there, untouched, hidden at the back where I would not have to face what they carried. Years had passed, and I still did not know if I would ever be able to wear that color again, because seeing it meant remembering him, and remembering him still hurt in places I had not learned how to reach.
I slipped on my heels and reached for my coat, forcing myself to move before the memory pulled me any deeper. From the hallway behind me came the soft sound of Helena’s laughter.
