Chapter 3

The emergency room was cold and sterile, a stark contrast to the chaotic party. A nurse cleaned the cut on my lip with an antiseptic wipe that burned. The doctor told me I had a mild concussion and a dislocated shoulder. They reset it, a moment of sharp, searing pain that made me cry out. As I sat on the edge of the hospital bed, the physical pain was nothing compared to the exhaustion that settled deep in my soul.

This wasn't just about tonight. It was about years of my life. I thought back to when I first met Vivian. I was a rising architect, full of ambition. She was a brilliant researcher, passionate and driven. I fell for her intelligence, her intensity. I loved her so much that when her research required a move to a city with fewer opportunities for me, I didn't hesitate. I gave up a partnership at a prestigious firm. I started my own small company, taking on less ambitious projects so I could support her career, so I could be there for her.

I built our life around her needs, her schedule, her dreams. I designed our house to be close to her lab. I learned to cook because she was often too busy to eat. I had poured everything I had into this relationship, and for what? To be a recurring problem she could solve with a needle and a vial of chemicals. The weight of all those forgotten sacrifices pressed down on me. I was tired. So incredibly tired.

The door to the small curtained-off room swished open. It was Vivian. She stood there, her white dress now looking out of place and slightly stained. She had a small, professional-looking case in her hand. Her face was a mask of practiced concern.

"Ethan, I was so worried," she said, her voice soft and hypnotic. "I came as soon as I could get away."

I just looked at her. I didn't feel anger anymore, just a vast, empty coldness. The performance was so familiar. It was the same tone she used every time. The concern was fake. The worry was for herself, for the disruption to her perfect, controlled life.

"Don't," I said, my voice hoarse. "Don't even start."

She set her case down on the small table next to the bed and opened it. Inside, nestled in foam, was her equipment. A small, sleek device with a set of fine needles.

"I know you're upset," she said, her hands moving with practiced efficiency. "It was a misunderstanding. Kyle was just being stupid. Let me help you. Let me make the pain go away. We can forget this ever happened. Tomorrow is our wedding day. We can still have that."

I watched her prepare the device, a cold dread washing over me. She really thought she could do it again. She thought she could erase this, erase my decision.

"No," I said, my voice stronger now. "There is no wedding. There is no us. We're done, Vivian. It's over."

I had never said those words to her before. In all the previous cycles, I had always been too broken, too consumed by rage and pain to be this clear.

She stopped what she was doing. She looked at me, truly looked at me, and for the first time, I saw a flicker of genuine shock in her eyes. The mask slipped.

"What did you say?" she asked, her voice losing its soothing quality.

"I said it's over," I repeated, pushing myself to my feet, ignoring the throb in my head and the ache in my shoulder. "I'm not letting you do this to me again."

Her shock quickly morphed into something else, something harder and more dangerous. Her eyes narrowed. She picked up the device.

"You don't mean that," she said, advancing on me. "You're just hurt and confused. You're concussed. You're not thinking clearly. I'm just going to help you relax."

"Get away from me," I warned, backing away until my back hit the wall.

"You don't get to decide this, Ethan," she said, her voice dropping to a menacing whisper. "I've invested too much in you, in us. We have a life together. I won't let you throw it away because of one stupid night."

One stupid night. She was dismissing nine previous betrayals, nine erasures, as one stupid night. The sheer audacity of it was staggering.

She lunged, grabbing my arm. I tried to pull away, but she was surprisingly strong. She pressed the device against my temple.

"This will only take a second," she murmured, her face close to mine. "Just close your eyes."

As the device whirred to life, a strange thing happened. The impending erasure, the tenth one, seemed to unlock something in my mind. It was like a dam breaking. Flashes of the past, the memories she had buried, surged forward.

I saw myself finding her with Kyle in our half-finished living room, the smell of fresh paint still in the air.

Flash. Her lab, late at night, their bodies tangled on a small cot in the back room.

Flash. A hotel room on a business trip she said she was taking alone, a receipt on the nightstand with two names on it.

Flash after flash. Eight distinct moments of soul-crushing betrayal, each one followed by her calm, reassuring voice, the hum of her machine, and then... nothing. The pain, the anger, the humiliation, all of it came rushing back at once, a tidal wave of agony from a past I wasn't supposed to remember. It was too much. The pain of nine betrayals hit me all at once. My last conscious thought was of her face, calm and determined, as she pushed the button.

Then, the world went black.