Valentines Mistake

Valentine’s Day was supposed to smell like roses. Instead, it smelled like betrayal. Cofie Thorne stood in front of her mirror for the fifth time in ten minutes, smoothing invisible creases from her dress with trembling hands. The red fabric hugged her body in all the right places — elegant without trying too hard, seductive without being obvious. She had chosen it carefully. Tonight mattered. Her phone buzzed on the dresser behind her, making her jump slightly. Her heart lifted when she saw his name across the screen, only for the hope to settle into something smaller when she read the message. Running late. Don’t be mad. Cofie stared at the words for a moment longer than necessary. He had been running late a lot lately. But she swallowed the thought down, forcing herself to smile at her reflection. Love required patience. Love required understanding. And relationships weren’t always perfect. That’s what she had told herself every time he canceled a date in the past month. That’s what she had told her best friend when she mentioned that something felt off. That’s what she had told her own instincts when they whispered that distance didn’t grow without reason. Tonight was Valentine’s Day. People didn’t cheat on Valentine’s Day. She grabbed the small bouquet of roses from her bedside table and slipped her heels on, her excitement returning in nervous waves as she stepped out into the cool evening air. The city was alive with laughter and perfume and soft music drifting from restaurant patios. Couples walked hand in hand beneath glowing streetlights, sharing secrets and kisses as if love itself had decided to bless the night. Cofie’s heart raced as she made her way toward his apartment building. She wanted to surprise him. Maybe he had planned something big. Maybe he was nervous too. Maybe— The main door to his apartment was unlocked. That was the first thing that felt wrong. The second was the laughter. It floated down the hallway in soft, breathy bursts. Familiar. Intimate. Not just his. Her steps slowed as her grip tightened around the roses. Her pulse began to pound in her ears, drowning out everything else as she moved toward the half-open bedroom door. Whispers. A giggle. Her stomach dropped. Time didn’t stop when she pushed the door open. It shattered. The roses slipped from her fingers, scattering red across the floor in silent surrender as her eyes landed on the two figures tangled together on the bed. Her boyfriend. And her best friend. For a moment, no one moved. No one spoke. They stared at her the way guilty people did when they hadn’t yet decided which lie to tell first. “Oh my God—Cofie, I—” he began, scrambling upright. Her best friend gasped, clutching the sheets to her chest as if modesty mattered now. Cofie didn’t hear the rest. Didn’t feel the tears that refused to fall. Didn’t register the way her hands had begun to shake violently at her sides. Her world didn’t explode. It went cold. “You?” she whispered. Not to him. To her. Her best friend’s face twisted with something that might have been shame. Or maybe it was just fear of getting caught. “It didn’t mean anything,” she said quickly. Cofie laughed. The sound didn’t belong to her. It was sharp and hollow and broken in places she hadn’t known existed. Suddenly, everything made sense. The late nights. The canceled plans. The distance. The way he stopped looking at her the same way. She had been standing in a burning house, convincing herself the smoke was just her imagination. “Cofie, please,” he tried again, reaching for her. She stepped back before he could touch her. “I hope she was worth it,” she said quietly. And then she left. The hallway felt longer on the way out. The city louder. Crueler. Couples passed her on the street, laughing and kissing beneath neon signs and fairy lights, their happiness cutting into her skin like glass. Somewhere nearby, someone was singing. Somewhere else, someone was promising forever. Cofie couldn’t breathe. Her phone rang. His name. She declined the call. It rang again. And again. Then her best friend’s name lit up the screen. Cofie blocked them both. Rain began to fall in thin, icy drops, clinging to her lashes and mixing with tears she hadn’t realized had started to spill. “Fine,” she whispered to no one. If love wanted to humiliate her, she would humiliate it right back. The bar sat on the corner like a bad decision waiting to happen. Dark lights. Loud music. The scent of alcohol thick in the air. Cofie walked in anyway. The first drink burned. The second numbed. By the third, the anger had melted into something reckless and dangerous. She laughed too loudly at nothing. Stopped caring who watched. Stopped caring about everything. Except the eyes on her. She felt them before she saw him. A man sat alone at the far end of the bar, his posture relaxed in a way that suggested control rather than comfort. His suit was expensive enough to pay someone’s rent for months, his expression unreadable beneath the dim lighting. He wasn’t smiling like the other men who looked at her. He was studying her. When their eyes met, something shifted in the air between them. He approached slowly. Confidently. “You don’t look like someone celebrating,” he said. His voice was low. Calm. Controlled. “And you don’t look like someone who cares,” she replied. A faint smirk touched his lips before he took the seat beside her. “Who hurt you?” “Why do you assume someone did?” “Because anger like that doesn’t come from nowhere.” The way he said it unsettled her. As if he could see through every lie she was telling herself. Her glass was empty again. So was her judgment. When she stood, the room tilted violently beneath her feet. His hand caught her arm before she could fall. It lingered. “Are you sure you want to make tonight worse?” he asked. Cofie met his gaze, her vision blurred but her resolve dangerously clear. “It can’t get worse.” His expression darkened almost imperceptibly. “That,” Mathias Chaw said quietly, “is where you’re wrong.”