WHEN THE FOG CLEARS

I backed my car out of the parking lot. In the rearview mirror, Celeste was clinging stubbornly to Julian.

Inside the car, the radio station was playing a classic nostalgic melody, the singer’s voice rich and melancholic:

“Whatever was never obtained…”

“Whatever is already past…”

“Always seems the most perfect.”

Pulling back my gaze, my mind drifted to the first time I discovered their entanglement years ago.

I never checked Julian’s phone; that time was purely accidental.

Scrolling up from the bottom, most of the messages she sent to Julian went unanswered.

Only a single message received a reply from Julian.

She had written: “Wow, a single glass of wine costs a fortune? I can’t even imagine what it tastes like, is it made of gold?”

Julian’s tone was mocking and disdainful: “An ignorant fool who has never seen the world.”

When I dropped his phone onto the table, Julian simply laughed: “Don’t you think it’s hilarious?”

「okok, don’t throw a tantrum at me, I’ll delete her right away.」

「Just some trash, if you’re unhappy, I’ll delete her immediately.」

Back then, I didn’t realize that when a man shows a playful, amused attitude toward another woman, it marks the beginning of his downfall.

I had tolerated him so easily, merely grumbling about his stray bees and butterflies.

Until the day she sighed sentimentally, expressing how magnificent the view from the city peak must be, wondering if she’d ever get to see it in this lifetime.

That very same day, Julian returned home unusually late. When he walked in, the collar of his crisp white shirt bore a faint trace of lipstick.

When I pointed at that shirt, my ears rang violently, blood rushing backward, until my trembling hands caused me to vomit violently in the bathroom.

Julian knelt down and swore an oath, claiming nothing ever happened between him and Celeste.

I cried uncontrollably, shaking as I repeatedly asked him why, just why?!

When he was fifteen, covered in scrapes and bruises, Julian had happily kicked away a guy harassing me.

When he was seventeen, unable to afford a decent set of clothes, he had scraped together coins bit by bit just to buy me a bracelet as a birthday gift.

When he was eighteen, I hid under the blanket, speaking into the phone: “Are you crying? I said I liked you, and you’re crying?”

His choked voice came through the receiver: “I haven’t even given you flowers or confessed properly yet, how could I let you say it first?”

I said, you’ve given me plenty of flowers.

He refused, insisting that the bouquet he would use to confess was different from all others—it was unique.

I was too stubborn, refusing to let go of each other.

Until the day Julian and Celeste were photographed walking out of a hotel by paparazzi, I was calmer than anyone else—no hysteria, no mad questioning, no tearing of my heart out.

Only then did I realize: back then, I had viewed myself as Mrs. Vance rather than Julian’s beloved partner.

My first instinct had been to protect the company’s stock value from crashing, spending a fortune to suppress the news so that no media outlet dared report their private scandal to this day.

For two whole years, Celeste hung around like an unshakeable ghost, a thorn stuck in the throat between Julian and me.

We argued, clawed at each other, until we were utterly exhausted.

Sometimes, watching his face distort with rage, I would suddenly recall the day long ago when he smiled and asked me: “Evelyn, do you want to marry me?”

Time had blurred the face of my beloved, leaving behind only a hateful expression.

Celeste got into the passenger seat, her eyes tracking Julian’s gaze as he stared fixedly at my departing taillights.

Unpleased, she gently tugged at his sleeve: “Julian, when do you plan to… marry me?”

Julian rested both hands on the steering wheel, turning to give her a long, mocking smirk.

“Marry you?”

He pinched Celeste’s chin, turning her face back and forth like evaluating a piece of merchandise: “You’re just a mistress, didn’t you know? You and I are worlds apart. If I marry you today, tomorrow I’ll be the laughingstock of the city.”

Celeste refused to accept this: “When Evelyn married you, didn’t she come from an ordinary background too?!”

Julian started the car, speaking indifferently: “What could you possibly compare to her with?”

Celeste didn’t believe it. Now that she had established her footing in London with fame and career, she believed she was every bit as worthy as Evelyn had been back then.

Julian had knelt to shake high society just to marry Evelyn; why couldn’t he fight for her, Celeste, and secure her some status as well?

Julian had no idea what was going on in her head. Associating his divorce with Celeste was utterly absurd.

He was a man; the women passing through his life were naturally countless. Even though Evelyn had occupied twelve years of his timeline, she was still just a woman.

At that moment, Julian had no inkling that later on in life, he would exhaust his entire existence searching desperately to reclaim those twelve years.