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<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
The screaming stuck in my throat, turning into a choked sob. The woman on the couch scrambled to cover herself, her hair messy and face flushed. But she didn’t need to turn around for me to recognize that hair. Or that shirt\u2014because I was the one who bought it for her last Christmas.<\/p>\n
She turned slowly, eyes wide with terror.<\/p>\n
It was Maya. My best friend of 15 years.<\/b> The maid of honor for the imaginary wedding I had been planning in my head.<\/p>\n
“Jasda, wait,” my boyfriend, Alejandro, stammered, holding up his hands as if to physically stop the reality crashing down on us. “Let me explain.”<\/p>\n
“Explain?” I managed to wheeze out. “Explain why you’re in Mexico with my best friend? Maya told me she was on a ‘digital detox’ camping trip in Oregon!”<\/p>\n
Maya started crying immediately. “Jas, please. It just… happened. We started talking when you guys were having that rough patch last November. I was trying to give him advice on how to fix things with you, and then… we just connected.”<\/p>\n
The room spun. November? That was six months ago<\/b>.<\/p>\n
“So,” I said, my voice shaking with a rage I didn’t know I possessed. “While I was working double shifts to afford this flight to surprise you, you were flying my best friend out here on my dime?”<\/p>\n
Alejandro looked down. That was the kicker. He didn’t have a job; I had sent him money for ‘rent’ last month. Money he clearly used to fly Maya out here.<\/p>\n
I looked at Maya. “You sat on my couch last week and watched me pack for this trip. You told me to wear the red dress because he\u2019d love it.”<\/p>\n
“I didn’t know how to tell you,” she whispered.<\/p>\n
I didn’t scream again. I didn’t attack them. A cold calm washed over me. I realized in that split second that I wasn’t looking at my boyfriend and my best friend. I was looking at two strangers who had been laughing at me behind my back for half a year.<\/p>\n
“Keep the dress, Maya,” I said, my voice dead flat. “And keep him. You deserve each other.”<\/p>\n
I turned around, walked out the door, and got right back into the taxi that was, miraculously, still turning around in the driveway.<\/p>\n
“Aeropuerto. Ahora,” I told the driver.<\/p>\n
I blocked both of their numbers before the taxi even hit the highway. I cried the entire four-hour flight home, but by the time I landed, the tears had stopped.<\/p>\n
The Aftermath:<\/b> It\u2019s been three months. I found out later through a mutual friend that Alejandro cheated on Maya two weeks after I left with a local girl in his neighborhood. Maya tried to reach out, sending a long email begging for forgiveness, saying she “made a mistake.”<\/p>\n
I didn’t reply. I just hit delete.<\/p>\n
That trip to Mexico cost me $800 and two years of my life, but honestly? It was a bargain. I paid $800 to remove two toxic snakes from my life forever. Best surprise I ever bought myself.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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