My Boyfriend Wants to Gift My House to His "Dream Girl"? Frozen!

Four years with Justin, and I honestly thought I was the most important person in his life. Until one night, after he fell asleep, his phone lit up. I saw a hidden folder labeled "Do Not Delete." Over two hundred photos, spanning from high school to just last month. Every single photo featured the same girl. And it wasn’t me. I knew her. Vivian. The girl Justin always brushed off as "just an old high school classmate I don't talk to anymore." I didn’t throw a tantrum. I didn't smash his phone. The next afternoon, I went to the mall, bought a gorgeous new dress, put on the makeup he loved most, and asked him out for dinner. Over a candlelit dinner, he smiled and asked why I looked so beautiful all of a sudden. I raised my wine glass and asked him, in a soft, casual voice: "Justin, if Vivian came back to you, who would you choose?" He froze for three seconds, then laughed. "What are you talking about? You must be drunk." He never said, "I'd choose you." I put my glass down, pulled a printed one-way flight ticket from my bag, and slid it across the table. "Fine. I booked you a ticket to her city. It departs tomorrow morning." "Goodbye." The wind was freezing when I walked out of the restaurant that night. I blocked and deleted him on Snapchat and every other app. For the first time, the streetlights seemed incredibly bright. 1 "Are you sure he actually got on that plane?" Maya poked her head out of the kitchen, holding a mug, her hair looking like a bird’s nest. The notification from my flight tracker app was still glowing on my screen—7:05 AM, passenger Justin Harris had checked in. Destination: Denver. The city Vivian had been living in for the past three years. "I booked the ticket. It was tied to his ID." Maya walked over, glanced at the screen, and then at me. "Chloe, you threw a ticket in his face, said goodbye—and he just left? Without even trying to call you?" "I blocked him everywhere." "But he could have used a burner number! He could have shown up at your door! He could have—" "He wouldn't." I flipped my phone face down on the coffee table. "The flight was at 7:05 AM. We left the restaurant at 11:00 PM last night. In those eight hours, he only had enough time to go home and pack a bag." Maya blinked, stunned. "So... he didn't even hesitate?" "Hesitation takes time. He didn't want to waste any." She slammed her mug down on the table. "Where is he rushing to? His own funeral?" I didn't laugh. "I need to go back to the apartment and get my things. While he's gone." "I'm coming with you." "No need. I’ll be in and out in twenty minutes." I turned the key in the lock. I had done this motion for four years. This was the last time, and it felt no different. The door opened. The place was empty. His grey running shoes were missing from the entryway. He had indeed come back to pack before rushing to the airport. On the fridge, there was a handwritten sticky note: *The yogurt is about to expire. Remember to throw it out.* Four years. All the yogurt in the fridge was always his because I'm lactose intolerant. He ate the breakfast I made him for four years, yet he could never remember that one simple detail. But he remembered to tell me to throw out his trash. I searched the bottom of the closet and my fingers brushed against something hard. A deep blue velvet box, about the size of my palm. I opened it. Inside was a delicate silver chain with a tiny sapphire pendant. Tucked under the cushion was a card: *Happy Graduation, Viv. - J* The date was from three years ago. Squatting by the closet, I called Maya. "What's wrong?" she answered. "I found a box at the bottom of the closet. A sapphire necklace with a card that says 'Happy Graduation, Viv.' From three years ago." "...Why is that still in your apartment?" "I don't know. Maybe he bought it and never sent it, or maybe she sent it back. But that's not the point." "What is?" "Three years ago, around that exact date, he told me he was tight on cash and borrowed eight thousand dollars from me. He said it was for rent." The other end of the line went dead silent for a few seconds. "Did he ever pay you back?" "No. He said 'I'll get you back later.' It’s been three years of 'later'." I hung up and was about to zip my suitcase when my phone buzzed. Caller ID: Eleanor. Justin's mom. I hesitated for two seconds, then picked up. "Chloe, sweetie! Justin told me he’s out of town on a business trip. Are you home alone? Why don't you come over for dinner?" A business trip. So that’s what he told his mother. "Eleanor, Justin and I broke up." There was a pause, and then she laughed—the kind of dismissive laugh used for toddlers throwing a tantrum. "Oh, sweetie, young couples fight all the time. Justin can be so emotionally clueless sometimes, don't take it to heart." "Eleanor, we didn't fight. We broke up." "Chloe, listen to me. He called me last night. He said you've been under a lot of stress lately and your mood hasn't been great. See? He worries about you." "Did he tell you he went to see Vivian? Do you know about that, Eleanor?" Silence. But this silence was different. It wasn't surprise. It was calculation. "Well... Vivian is a sweet girl. She and Justin grew up together. It’s hard for her living out there all by herself. It's only normal for him to check on her." "He has over two hundred photos of her on his phone, from high school until now. Did you know about that, Eleanor?" I heard her sigh. "Chloe, a girl shouldn't go snooping through a man's phone. The more you look, the more miserable you'll make yourself." "Let me ask you this, sweetie—has Justin been good to you? He has, hasn't he? He let you manage the household budget, he came home on time every day, and he didn't mess around with other girls. What more could you want?" Three rhetorical questions. I couldn't even bother to argue. Except for the last one—whether he "messed around" or not apparently depended on how one defined two hundred photos and a necklace bought with my money. "Eleanor, if Vivian comes back to Seattle permanently, who will Justin choose?" Another pause. "Well, isn't Vivian doing so well over there in Denver..." "If she comes back?" Eleanor didn't answer. "Chloe, come over this weekend. I'll make you some comfort food." I hung up. I zipped my suitcase and walked out the door. In the elevator, I texted Maya: *Eleanor didn't say he'd choose me either.* She called back instantly. "What does that mean?" "Exactly what you think it means." "Chloe, are you ever going back to that apartment?" I watched the elevator floor numbers tick down. "That place was never my home anyway." 2 *Hi, Chloe.* This Snapchat friend request appeared on the third day. The profile picture was a backlit silhouette, but I recognized the sapphire necklace. It gleamed mockingly in the sunlight. The add request had no other message. Maya told me to ignore it. I tapped accept. *Hey girl, I'm Vivian,* a smiling emoji followed. *Justin gave me your Snapchat. He said you guys had a little misunderstanding and wanted me to clear things up.* A little misunderstanding. Our breakup was reduced to a "little misunderstanding" in his mouth. "No need to explain. We broke up. It has nothing to do with you." *I know,* she replied instantly. *Justin has been staying at my place the last few days. He's really devastated.* "Staying at my place." She typed those words so casually, as if he had just dropped by to pick up a package. *He’s just not very good at expressing himself. I'm sure you know him better than I do.* I didn't reply. A minute later, another paragraph came through: *Please don't get the wrong idea, Chloe. Justin and I are really just old friends. He saved those photos on his own, I had absolutely no idea.* *I guess he's just a bit sentimental? Guys are like that, you know.* Two hundred photos of another woman is "sentimental." *Chloe, can I ask you something?* "What?" *What does Justin usually like to eat? I’ve been cooking for him the past two days, but he barely touched his food. I'm worried he'll starve.* Maya walked over, saw my expression, and leaned in to look at the screen. Five seconds of silence. "Is this bitch insane?!" "She's asking me what he likes to eat." "I see what she's asking! I'm saying she's psycho! Who asks the ex-girlfriend what her ex-man likes to eat?!" "She doesn't think of me as his ex-girlfriend." I took my phone back. "Justin told her we were just roommates who split the rent. He told her we were never officially dating." Maya opened her mouth, closed it, and opened it again. "Four years. And he claims you weren't officially dating?" "Yeah. He never posted me on Instagram, never introduced me to his friends." "What about anniversaries? Your birthdays?" "We celebrated them privately. He said our relationship was nobody else's business." Maya sat down beside me, speechless for a long time. My phone lit up again. Vivian sent a photo. It was Justin's back, standing in the kitchen, chopping vegetables. He was wearing a light blue apron I had never seen before. Warm sunlight streamed through the window, making the scene look like a cozy magazine spread. The caption read: *Look, Chloe! Justin is learning how to cook! He's so clumsy at chopping potatoes, haha.* I stared at the photo. For four years, he never stepped foot in the kitchen. I cooked every single meal. He would sit down, eat, and the most he’d say was, "It's fine." I always thought he just didn't know how to cook, or hated it. Turns out, he wasn't incapable. He just didn't want to do it for me. "How are you going to reply?" Maya stared at me. I thought about it and typed: *He hates cilantro. He has a weak stomach, so don't make things too spicy.* Maya snatched the phone out of my hand. "Are you out of your mind, Chloe? She’s rubbing it in your face, and you’re giving her a manual on how to pamper your ex?!" "Well, I don't need the manual anymore." I took the phone back and exited the chat. Vivian sent one last voice message. It was eighteen seconds long. I didn't play it. Maya grabbed the phone and played it anyway. After listening, her face darkened. "What did she say?" "She said, 'You're so sweet, Chloe. No wonder Justin said you're the kindest person he's ever met.'" Maya paused. "And?" "And then she said—'But he also told me that kind girls are usually not the ones men actually fall in love with.'" That night, after turning off the lights, I stared at the ceiling. I realized the word "kind" could sound so incredibly ugly. My phone vibrated. An unknown number with a Denver area code. *You blocked me? How childish.* I ignored it. The next morning, three more texts appeared. *Chloe, have you thrown your tantrum yet?* *I'll be back in a couple of days once things are sorted here.* *Did you throw out the expired yogurt in the fridge yet?* That last text was sent at 4:00 AM. Maya brought in breakfast, saw me staring at my phone, and asked if it was him. "Yeah. He's still worried about his expired yogurt." "Is something wrong with his brain?" "He doesn't care about the yogurt. He just wants to make sure the girl who cleans up after him is still waiting." Maya set the coffee on the nightstand. With the most serious face I had ever seen her make, she asked: "Are you still waiting?" "No." 3 "You must be Chloe." Vivian stood in the entryway. She was wearing my plush slippers—the pink ones with the slightly worn-out left sole. She held a mug of water. It was also mine. A white mug with a blue rim that I bought in a set of four from Ikea. "Justin went out to get groceries. He said you were coming to pick up some files today? Come on in." She smiled warmly. Her hair was in a messy bun, and she wore an oversized t-shirt. She didn't look like a guest. She looked like she lived here. "When did you get here?" I asked. "Two days ago. Justin said there was a spare bedroom, so he let me stay here while I look for a job." A spare bedroom. That was my home office. I didn't step into the living room. I walked straight toward the bedroom. Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed the changes. There was a vase of dried flowers on the coffee table. A small frame sat on the TV stand—their high school graduation photo, Justin and Vivian standing side-by-side in the crowd. A light grey throw blanket was draped over the sofa. Not mine. The fridge magnets were gone. All twelve of them, which I had collected from every city I visited, had been cleared out. In their place were a few cute cartoon magnets. "Chloe? Are you okay?" "Yeah. I'm just grabbing my things and leaving." "Won't you wait for Justin to come back? He bought your favorite—" "No." She leaned against the doorframe, sipping water and chatting with me while I packed, her tone as casual as a neighbor gossiping over the fence. "Chloe, don't blame Justin." "He's just too indecisive. He's so afraid of hurting anyone that he ends up hurting everyone." "To be honest, during the years you two were together... I was really miserable over in Denver, too." Her voice dropped to a whisper. "Sometimes when he forgot to reply to my texts, I’d wonder if he was with you. I'm sure you know exactly how that feels." I stopped packing and looked at her. She was standing in my apartment, wearing my slippers, drinking from my mug, and telling me that *she* was the victim. "I don't blame him, and I don't blame you. I'm just done." "But he said he couldn't reach you. He was so worried he drank himself to sleep last night..." Her eyes welled with tears. "He kept calling out your name when he was drunk." The front door unlocked. Justin walked in, holding two bags of groceries. When he saw me, he froze. "You're here. Why didn't you tell me beforehand—" "Tell you beforehand? So you could hide her first?" "Chloe, can you talk like a normal person for once?" "I am talking normally. You let her wear my slippers, drink from my mug, sleep in my home office, and you threw away all my fridge magnets. I came to get my things. Is that unreasonable?" Vivian sniffled softly. "I'm sorry, Chloe. I found the slippers in the closet. I didn't know they were yours..." "It's not your fault. It's the fault of the guy who gave you the keys." Justin’s jaw clenched. "She just moved to the city and had nowhere to stay! I'm letting her crash here temporarily. Why do you have to blow everything out of proportion?" "You have thirty hotel apps on your phone, Justin." "Chloe." He took a step closer, lowering his voice. "When you said you wanted a breakup, I didn't stop you. When you said goodbye, I respected it. Now you're back here throwing a fit. What exactly do you want?" I grabbed my bag and walked right past him. At the door, Vivian called out behind me. "Chloe, you forgot something." She was holding out the white mug with the blue rim. "This is yours, right? I washed it." A set of four. When we moved in, I brought two: one for me, one for him. "Keep it. I don't want it." I got into Maya’s car. Before I could even buckle my seatbelt, she started asking questions. "How did it go?" "She's wearing my slippers, using my mug, and sleeping in my room. The fridge magnets are gone." "And him?" "He said I'm blowing things out of proportion." I started the engine and drove out of the lot. At a red light, I said, "She told me he drank himself to sleep calling my name." "You believe that?" "It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter whose name he calls anymore." The light turned green. I kept driving. After a long silence, Maya finally spoke. "Chloe. You paid the down payment on that apartment, didn't you?" "Yeah. Thirty-eight thousand." "And the mortgage?" "Paid from our joint account. But I put in seventy percent of the funds." "Whose name is on the deed?" The cool wind rushed in through the window. I didn't answer. Because we both knew the answer. "Chloe, you need to get back what is yours." 4 "Chloe! You're here, come on in!" Eleanor poked her head out of the kitchen, her apron covered in flour, her smile warm and welcoming. I had scheduled with Justin to come by at 2:00 PM to pick up the rest of my legal documents. He assured me no one would be home. Yet, sitting on the living room sofa was his aunt, Clara. On the coffee table were plates of fruit and pastries. And Vivian was curled up in an armchair, holding a mug of hot cocoa. Clara saw me and let out a dry laugh. "Oh, is this..." "Justin's old roommate," Eleanor cut in smoothly, guiding me inside. "They shared an apartment for a while. Chloe, dear, have a mandarin orange." Roommate. Shared an apartment for a while. Four years of my life were reduced to those two sentences. Vivian smiled softly at me. "Hi, Chloe." She was wearing a pastel yellow sweater today. And on her wrist, there was something new. I looked closely. It was a vintage emerald bracelet. Highly polished and clearly an antique. I recognized that bracelet. Three years ago, during Thanksgiving dinner at Eleanor's, she had pulled it out of her jewelry box to show me. *This was Justin's grandmother's. It's meant for his future wife.* Three years ago, she only let me "look at it." Now, it was sitting on Vivian's wrist. "Vivian has such delicate wrists, it fits her perfectly," Clara piped up with a smile. "You have great taste, Eleanor." Eleanor smirked. "Oh, they aren't even officially engaged yet. Don't start calling her your niece-in-law." Vivian looked down at her wrist, her ears flushing red, but she didn't say a word. And she didn't take it off. "Eleanor, I'm just here to grab some documents. I won't stay to bother you." "What's the rush? Stay a while. We're making homemade lasagna today. We have plenty of food." She tried to shove a plate of sliced fruit into my hands. "Chloe, don't be a stranger. Even though you aren't living with Justin anymore, you'll always be like family to me." "Not living with Justin anymore." Not "broken up." Just "not living together." Just like our four years weren't a relationship, but a "roommate arrangement." I set the fruit plate down and walked into the study. When I pushed the door open, I thought I was in the wrong room. All my books on the shelves were gone. The desk was covered in a lavender tablecloth, and a row of succulents lined the windowsill. My yoga mat in the corner was gone, replaced by a full-length mirror. Two of Vivian's coats hung behind the door. I knelt down to search the desk drawers. My passport and bank statements had been shoved to the very bottom, buried under a stack of papers. As I pulled them out, my fingers brushed against another document. An official form. The bold heading read: *Real Property Transfer Deed Application* Grantor: Justin Harris. Grantee: Vivian Wen. My fingers froze on those two names. The down payment on this apartment was $38,000. My hard-earned savings. The monthly mortgage was $2,200, paid from a joint account for three years, with over seventy percent of the deposits coming from my paycheck. He was preparing to transfer the deed of the apartment—bought with my money—to Vivian. From the living room, Eleanor’s laughter drifted in. "Vivian, sweetie, tell me what you want to eat tomorrow and I'll make it." Vivian replied sweetly, "I love anything you cook, Eleanor." Clara joined in, "Look at her, Eleanor, she's so sweet. No wonder Justin has been crazy about her for all these years." I pulled out my phone. I took photos of every single page of the transfer deed. Front and back. I didn't miss a single line. Then, I placed it back exactly as I found it. I grabbed my passport and bank statements and walked out of the study. As I put on my shoes at the door, Eleanor called out from behind me, "Chloe, you really won't stay for dinner?" "No, Eleanor. I have things to take care of." "Alright then. Come visit whenever you're free. Don't be a stranger now." Vivian leaned forward slightly from the sofa. "Goodbye, Chloe." The emerald bracelet caught the light as she waved. I walked out of the building, got into my car, and immediately dialed Maya's number. "Maya, find me a lawyer. Right now." "What happened?" "He's transferring the deed of the apartment to Vivian." There was a dead silence on the line. "The down payment was your money, right?" "Thirty-eight thousand dollars. And I paid the majority of the mortgage. I have every single bank transfer record." "Chloe, do you have proof of the transfer deed?" I looked at the photos stored in my phone gallery. "I do now."