[Rae’s POV]
* Three years ago *
Kevin's yoga instructor had better abs. That was the detail my brain kept circling back to while I demolished my third glass of wine on Miles's couch—not the betrayal, not the six wasted months, but the fact that my boyfriend left me for someone who could hold a plank longer than I could hold his attention.
"Her name is Sunrise." I topped off my glass with the coordination of someone who'd stopped counting pours two pours ago. "Sunrise. Like the cosmic event. Who names their child after weather?"
Miles sat at the opposite end of the couch, maintaining his usual careful distance while I combusted. His expression held that particular blend of sympathy and resignation he'd perfected over years of witnessing my romantic catastrophes.
"Technically, sunrise isn't weather. It's astronomy."
"You're defending her?" I pointed my wine glass accusingly, sloshing cabernet onto his beige carpet. "You're defending Sunrise the homewrecker with your semantic precision?"
"I'm defending the English language. Sunrise is innocent in this." He grabbed a napkin, dabbing at the wine stain. "Kevin, however, is garbage. Confirmed garbage. I never liked him."
"You said he seemed 'perfectly adequate.'"
"That's Miles-speak for garbage. I thought you'd learned the translation by now."
I slumped deeper into his secondhand couch, the cushions still holding the shape of all my previous breakdowns. This apartment had witnessed my romantic disasters with the frequency of a therapist's office, except Miles charged nothing and kept better snacks.
"Six months," I said to the ceiling. "Six months of pretending to care about hot yoga and chakra alignment. I learned Sanskrit terms for positions I can't even do. And the whole time he was doing those positions with someone named after dawn."
"You hate yoga."
"I hate yoga," I confirmed. "I hate the incense and the chanting and the way everyone acts like touching their toes is a spiritual achievement. But I tried, Miles. I actually tried this time."
Miles was quiet for a moment, that particular silence he got when processing something he wasn't sure he should say.
"Maybe that's the problem." His voice was gentle, the way people handle unexploded ordinance. "You keep trying to be what they want instead of what you are."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
He shifted on the couch, suddenly fascinated by his beer bottle label. "You date men who want the idea of you. The heiress rebelling against her family, the cool girl who's different from other rich girls, the project they can fix or tame.”
He takes a deep breath. “But they don't want the actual complicated person underneath. And you keep performing for them, changing yourself to fit their expectations, then acting surprised when it doesn't work."
The observation landed like a surgical strike—precise, devastating.
"That's not—" I started, then stopped. Because he wasn't wrong. Kevin had loved my rebellion against my father, the story of dating someone dramatically different from his type.
But he'd flinched at actual business struggles. Changed subjects when I mentioned family pressure. He wanted the highlight reel, not the documentary.
"I'm sorry," Miles said quickly. "That was too much. The booze is making me philosophical."
"No, you're—" I took a breath that felt like swallowing glass. "You're not wrong. I just don't want you to be right."
We sat with that for a moment, silence growing heavier. Outside his window, the city hummed with other people's Friday nights while we dissected my failures.
"Can I ask you something?" The wine had stripped my usual filters, leaving dangerous curiosity behind.
Miles tensed almost imperceptibly. "Within reason."
"Why haven't we ever dated? You and me?" I watched his face cycle through emotions—surprise, something almost like pain, then careful neutrality. "We spend all our time together. You know me better than anyone. You're objectively attractive in that rumpled genius way. Why haven't we ever... you know?"
"Because we're smart," he said too quickly. "Because we know better."
"That's not an answer. That's an evasion."
He took a long pull from his beer, stalling. When he spoke again, his voice had that careful precision he used for complicated spreadsheets and conversations he'd rather avoid.
"I've thought about it." The admission seemed to cost him something. "Of course I've thought about it. You're beautiful and brilliant and you make me laugh even when you're being absolutely impossible, which is most of the time. But thinking about something and acting on it are different categories."
My heart did something unexpected—a flutter, a skip, something my third glass of wine couldn't entirely explain. "What stopped you?"
"Reality. We work together, Rae. Florisight would collapse without both of us, and what happens when the relationship implodes? Because it would implode." He finally looked at me, eyes too knowing.
"You're my best friend. My only stable relationship. I've watched too many friendships turn into romantic rubble, and I can't—" He stopped, swallowed. "I can't lose you over bad timing and worse decisions."
The reasonable part of my brain—currently drowning in cabernet—knew he was right. The other part, noticing how good he looked in this light, wanted to argue.
"I'd hurt you," I said instead, words tumbling out before wisdom could stop them. "I'm terrible at relationships. I self-sabotage, I pick fights when things get comfortable, I run when it matters most. You've seen my track record. I'd inevitably destroy this too, and then I'd lose the one person who actually knows me."
"So we agree." His voice was steady but his beer bottle was almost crushed in his grip. "This would be catastrophic."
"Absolutely catastrophic."
"Friendship-ending."
"Business-destroying," I added.
"World-imploding."
"Metaphor-exhausting."
We both laughed, but it came out wrong—too sharp, too aware.
"So we make a pact," Miles said, and something in his tone shifted from hypothetical to serious. "We never cross that line. We protect what we have. We don't become a cautionary tale about coworkers who ruined everything for mediocre sex."
"Excuse me? Mediocre?"
"I'm being pessimistic to strengthen my argument." His mouth twitched. "For all we know, it could be terrible. Best not to risk it."
"For all we know," I agreed, not believing it for a second but grateful for the escape route.
"Friends," he said, extending his beer bottle.
I clinked my wine glass against it. "Friends. No romantic catastrophes. No crossed lines. No cautionary tales."
"To bad decisions we're too smart to make."
"To Kevin, who's definitely getting a UTI from all that hot yoga," I added.
Miles choked on his beer, laughing despite himself. The tension broke like a fever, leaving us both relieved and somehow disappointed.
I stayed on his couch that night, too drunk to navigate stairs, and Miles took his usual position with a blanket and his laptop, fixing some spreadsheet error I'd probably caused. When I woke at 3 AM, mouth like sandpaper, I found him still awake, blue light casting shadows on his face while he saved my business one formula at a time.
He'd made me coffee by morning. I kissed his cheek like I always did—casual, meaningless, part of our choreography. We never mentioned the conversation again, filing it under things that almost happened but didn't.
We made a pact that night, half-joking but fully serious. Never cross that line. Protect what we have. Don't become a cautionary tale.
Three years later, lying awake after the gala, Dorian's words echoing in my head, I wondered if we'd already broken every promise we made.