The Last Time I Loved Him (Autumn and Ryan)
Chapter 33

Chapter

12

Jacob knew everything. He deliberately used my love to trample all over me.

"Then listen carefully-I don't love you anymore, and I will never forgive you in this lifetime."

"To me, you're no different from a stranger on the street. Even if you were to die in front of me, my heart wouldn't feel a thing."

My words shook Jacob deeply. He stopped waiting outside my workplace each day, yet would still occasionally appear around me, sneaking glances. It seemed his love for me had reached its peak only after I left him. Exhausted by his constant presence, I filed a restraining order. After some negotiation, Jacob chose to return to his country.

His once-thriving business was now on the verge of collapse, while the job he had looked down upon was flourishing for me.

I'd still receive messages from him occasionally. Block one number, and he'd use another. He kept confessing his love, expressing regret for everything he had done. He even bought an entire hillside filled with roses, tending to it himself.

"Ivy, whether you accept it or not, I want to make up for everything I owe you," he wrote.

"If you'd come back to me, I'd give up everything for you."

The vast field of roses swayed in the wind, a sea of red, like a memory carved into the heart. Yet each vibrant rose silently reminded me of how painful it had been to feel their thorns dig into my skin.

I replied, "It's not that you're willing to give up everything for me.

It's that only after you lost everything did you remember me."

Through Ellie's friends back home, I learned more details. Jacob's company had gone under. Jasmine, desperate for his attention, resorted to self-harm but only succeeded in exhausting Jacob's patience. When she once again tried to gain his sympathy by hurting herself, he ignored her. Though she was rescued, she was left in a vegetative state. Jacob never visited her after that.

However, he often visited my mother. Upon learning of Jacob's bankruptcy, my mother stopped catering to him, treating him harshly instead. Yet he accepted it all without complaint, as if hoping to atone to me in some way. But what does any of this have to do with me

?

I closed my laptop, stretching by the window. The sun shone warmly, the grass lush and green. They remained caught up in their own self-pity and mutual torment, trapped in the swamp of the past. But I was different.

I had loved, I had tried, and I had let go. I had no regrets. They would rot in their regret, but my future, my tomorrow, would only grow brighter.