She didn’t remember deciding to snoop; her hands moved before her conscience could protest. The screen lit up, and with it, the last illusion she’d been clinging to. Names she knew. Dates that overlapped anniversaries. Love notes that were never meant for her. Every line she read felt like a small, precise cut, carving away the version of her life she’d believed in.

Silence filled the room, heavier than any argument. There was no dramatic confrontation, no cinematic shouting match—just the quiet realization that the man beside her in bed was a stranger wearing someone she loved as a mask. She closed the apps, placed the phone exactly where it had been, and lay awake until dawn, not crying, not moving, just mourning a life that still technically existed but no longer felt like it was hers.