Semua Bab Before We Knew: Bab 1 - Bab 10

I replied:[No.]He asked again:[Then why'd you add me?]I typed back with an icy expression:[You were the one who added me first, remember?]There was a long silence on his end. Then one message appeared.[Oh.]That day, I stared at that single word for some reason, and a tiny smile slipped across my face.After that, we somehow started getting closer.We went from talking about games to school, from school to everyday life, and then from everyday life to saying good night every night before bed.He did not know who I was. He did not know that I was Nevaeh's sister.As for me, it was not until almost a month after we met that I slowly figured out who he was from a class schedule he sent me and some of his complaints about school.Edward.I stared at his name for a long time. My heart was pounding, yet I did not dare ask a single question.I knew what I was doing was wrong, yet I could not make myself let him go.Online, I was not Nevaeh's invisible little sister. I

Almost at the same time, I heard the front door open downstairs.It was Nevaeh.She must have seen the person outside, too. She stood in the entryway for a couple of seconds before frowning and heading downstairs.I hid behind the curtain and watched them talk beneath the tree.They were too far away for me to hear what they were saying, yet I could tell Nevaeh was getting impatient. She stood with her arms crossed, her face cold, saying something I could not make out.Edward stood in front of her. His usual carefree expression was unusually tense. He looked like he was holding back his anger, or maybe trying to confirm something.Finally, he said something in a low voice, and Nevaeh's expression changed slightly.A few seconds later, she let out an icy laugh and turned to leave.Edward stood there, frozen for a moment. Then he stepped forward and grabbed Nevaeh's hand.Under the streetlight, the two of them hugged.I gripped the windowsill, my hands and feet turning cold.T

I thought I had gone far enough, far enough to another state that I was almost ready to leave everything behind and calmly read the occasional scraps of news Nevaeh sent me about Edward.However, apparently, I had not gone far enough.The moment he appeared in front of me, the moment he looked at me like that, everything I had desperately buried came rushing back.Voices drifted faintly through the door. Both families were discussing a date for the engagement.I could not hear everything, only bits and pieces."Next year...""Let's set the date first...""The kids have a stable relationship..."Every word felt like a reminder."Suzanna, it is over. It did not matter whether you had been with him that year or whether he had eventually figured it out. The person sitting outside was now Nevaeh's fiancé. You were nothing more than a member of this family who had come home for a few days during break before leaving again." I thought to myself.I closed my eyes and forced myself to

However, it lasted only for a moment.The next second, he seemed to come back to himself and slowly loosened his grip.I turned my back to him, my heart clenched in a giant hand that kept squeezing and twisting it.When I deleted that account, I had hidden in my room alone in the middle of the night and cried until I could barely breathe.When I left for college out of state, I had sat on the plane wondering if I really would never see him again.Later, every time Nevaeh mentioned him, it took me a long time to calm myself down.However, I could not say any of those things.Not a single one.I carried the bowl of soup out of the kitchen. My hands were shaking so badly that I could barely hold it.For the rest of dinner, I could hardly eat anything while both families continued discussing the details of the engagement, including the date, the hotel, and which relatives to invite.Every word reminded me that the few minutes I had just spent alone with Edward in the kitchen had

Nevaeh did not say a word.I closed my eyes and finally told her everything.How I had met Edward in the gaming group. How we had slowly gotten close. How I had figured out who he was but had been too afraid to tell him. How he had eventually mistaken me for Nevaeh's secret account. How, after the final exams, we had fallen into that brief, ridiculous online relationship.I spoke slowly, my story coming out in a jumbled mess. Several times, I had to stop because my throat closed up.Nevaeh never interrupted me. She simply sat across from me and listened, her expression growing darker and more complicated with every word.When I finally finished, the room fell so quiet that the silence seemed to swallow everything. I kept my head down, overwhelmed by shame and humiliation, my hands trembling uncontrollably.After a long time, Nevaeh finally spoke. Her voice was very quiet."So that is why you suddenly went to college out of state, and then wanted to study abroad?"My nose stung,