The Lies He Loved Me With

The sales associate tried very hard not to stare. Emma Carter noticed anyway. She noticed the woman’s perfectly shaped brows, the polite curve of her mouth, the way her eyes dropped for half a second to Emma’s faded T-shirt, then to the frayed hem of her jeans, then finally to the pair of white canvas sneakers Emma had scrubbed so many times the fabric had gone thin at the toes. Emma also noticed the grocery bags in her own hands. Plastic. Cheap. Awkwardly full. One of them held a whole chicken wrapped in butcher paper. Another carried potatoes, carrots, onions, and the little glass jar of imported mustard Ethan once said reminded him of Paris. The bags did not belong in Harrow House. Nothing about Emma belonged in Harrow House. The store smelled like money. Not perfume exactly, though there was plenty of that too. It smelled like polished marble, soft leather, chilled champagne, and the kind of silence only rich people could afford. Emma stood in the middle of it with grocery bags cutting red marks into her fingers. “Miss Carter,” the sales associate said, her voice smooth again, “the custom tie will take approximately two weeks. We’ll send the final sketch to the Italian workshop tonight, and they’ll begin production once the design is approved.” Emma’s fingers tightened around the receipt. “Is there any way to make it faster?” The woman blinked. Emma heard how desperate she sounded and hated herself for it, but she pushed on. “It’s for my boyfriend’s birthday. I know it’s last minute. I can pay the rush fee.” The sales associate glanced down at the order screen. Italian silk. Hand-finished. Midnight blue. A tiny silver thread woven into the back of the tie, hidden where only the wearer would know it was there. E.S. Ethan Sinclair. Emma had drawn the design herself over three sleepless nights, hunched over the desk in her dorm room after closing shifts at the diner. She had wanted it to look elegant. Understated. Like something Ethan could wear when everything finally got better. When he graduated. When his debts were paid off. When his mother’s medical bills stopped haunting him. When he could stop pretending he was fine. The total price made her stomach clench every time she looked at it. One thousand eight hundred dollars. The deposit alone was six hundred. Six hundred dollars was almost a month of rent in the cheap off-campus room she shared with two other girls. Six hundred dollars was grocery money, bus fare, textbooks, winter boots. Six hundred dollars was the emergency fund she had spent an entire year building out of tips, extra shifts, and meals she pretended she wasn’t hungry enough to eat. But Ethan had once looked at a navy tie in a shop window and smiled like a boy who had forgotten, just for a moment, that life had been cruel to him. Emma had remembered. So she had saved. The sales associate softened by a fraction. “I’ll make a note. No promises, but we’ll do what we can.” “Thank you,” Emma said quickly. “Really. Thank you.” She paid the deposit before she could lose courage. Her phone buzzed the moment the transaction went through. For one wild second, she thought it might be a fraud alert from her bank. That would have been embarrassing, but not surprising. Instead, Ethan’s name lit up the screen. Ethan: Just landed. Exhausted. Might sleep a bit before I see you tonight. Emma stared at the message. He had told her his flight from Paris landed in the late afternoon. It was not even noon. Another message appeared. Ethan: Missed your cooking. Tell me you’re making that chicken stew. Despite everything, despite the ache in her feet and the hollow place behind her ribs where breakfast should have been, Emma smiled. She hated that she smiled. Emma: Already bought everything. Happy almost-birthday to you. Happy actual birthday to me. Three dots appeared. Disappeared. Appeared again. Ethan: I didn’t forget. Emma waited. No second message came. She put the phone away before the sales associate could see her face. The woman handed her the receipt in a cream envelope embossed with the store’s gold logo. “Please keep this safe.” Emma tucked it carefully into the inner pocket of her tote bag, the one without holes. The sales associate tried very hard not to stare. Emma Carter noticed anyway. She noticed the woman’s perfectly shaped brows, the polite curve of her mouth, the way her eyes dropped for half a second to Emma’s faded T-shirt, then to the frayed hem of her jeans, then finally to the pair of white canvas sneakers Emma had scrubbed so many times the fabric had gone thin at the toes. Emma also noticed the grocery bags in her own hands. Plastic. Cheap. Awkwardly full. One of them held a whole chicken wrapped in butcher paper. Another carried potatoes, carrots, onions, and the little glass jar of imported mustard Ethan once said reminded him of Paris. The bags did not belong in Harrow House. Nothing about Emma belonged in Harrow House. The store smelled like money. Not perfume exactly, though there was plenty of that too. It smelled like polished marble, soft leather, chilled champagne, and the kind of silence only rich people could afford. Emma stood in the middle of it with grocery bags cutting red marks into her fingers. “Miss Carter,” the sales associate said, her voice smooth again, “the custom tie will take approximately two weeks. We’ll send the final sketch to the Italian workshop tonight, and they’ll begin production once the design is approved.” Emma’s fingers tightened around the receipt. “Is there any way to make it faster?” The woman blinked. Emma heard how desperate she sounded and hated herself for it, but she pushed on. “It’s for my boyfriend’s birthday. I know it’s last minute. I can pay the rush fee.” The sales associate glanced down at the order screen. Italian silk. Hand-finished. Midnight blue. A tiny silver thread woven into the back of the tie, hidden where only the wearer would know it was there. E.S. Ethan Sinclair. Emma had drawn the design herself over three sleepless nights, hunched over the desk in her dorm room after closing shifts at the diner. She had wanted it to look elegant. Understated. Like something Ethan could wear when everything finally got better. When he graduated. When his debts were paid off. When his mother’s medical bills stopped haunting him. When he could stop pretending he was fine. The total price made her stomach clench every time she looked at it. One thousand eight hundred dollars. The deposit alone was six hundred. Six hundred dollars was almost a month of rent in the cheap off-campus room she shared with two other girls. Six hundred dollars was grocery money, bus fare, textbooks, winter boots. Six hundred dollars was the emergency fund she had spent an entire year building out of tips, extra shifts, and meals she pretended she wasn’t hungry enough to eat. But Ethan had once looked at a navy tie in a shop window and smiled like a boy who had forgotten, just for a moment, that life had been cruel to him. Emma had remembered. So she had saved. The sales associate softened by a fraction. “I’ll make a note. No promises, but we’ll do what we can.” “Thank you,” Emma said quickly. “Really. Thank you.” She paid the deposit before she could lose courage. Her phone buzzed the moment the transaction went through. For one wild second, she thought it might be a fraud alert from her bank. That would have been embarrassing, but not surprising. Instead, Ethan’s name lit up the screen. Ethan: Just landed. Exhausted. Might sleep a bit before I see you tonight. Emma stared at the message. He had told her his flight from Paris landed in the late afternoon. It was not even noon. Another message appeared. Ethan: Missed your cooking. Tell me you’re making that chicken stew. Despite everything, despite the ache in her feet and the hollow place behind her ribs where breakfast should have been, Emma smiled. She hated that she smiled. Emma: Already bought everything. Happy almost-birthday to you. Happy actual birthday to me. Three dots appeared. Disappeared. Appeared again. Ethan: I didn’t forget. Emma waited. No second message came. She put the phone away before the sales associate could see her face. The woman handed her the receipt in a cream envelope embossed with the store’s gold logo. “Please keep this safe.” Emma tucked it carefully into the inner pocket of her tote bag, the one without holes.