Chapter 1

While we were out shopping, I stopped to tie my shoelace.

When I looked up again, my boyfriend Robert and my best friend Nia were already ten feet ahead.

I was about to step forward to catch up, but the space between them — the space that had always been mine — was slowly closing.

They fell into step side by side, picking up a conversation I had no way of joining.

As if there had never been a third person there at all.

Back in school, Robert and Nia were the ones everyone called gifted.

After graduation, Robert and Nia became the youngest attending physicians at the hospital.

No matter how hard I pushed myself, I could only trail behind them — just another ordinary nurse.

Robert would always ruffle my hair and say,

"You're adorable, even when you're clueless."

Then he'd turn around and seamlessly perform one complex surgery after another with Nia.

Watching their backs, I suddenly felt exhausted.

This road I had been walking — always chasing after Robert — I didn't want to walk it anymore.