Perfect. See the Rest of the Pics in the First Comment… Full Story👇👇👇
It looked perfect. The lighting, the angle, the way the wind caught my hair just right. One of those photos that makes you pause—not because it’s flawless, but because it feels like a moment you want to live inside. I posted it with a caption that felt casual, almost throwaway: “Perfect. See the rest of the pics in the first comment… Full story👇👇👇”
But the story wasn’t perfect. Not even close.
The photo was taken five minutes before everything changed. Before the text. Before the silence. Before the realization that what I thought was real had been edited, cropped, and filtered—just like the pictures.
We’d spent the day together. Him and me. Wandering through a market in Siem Reap, sipping iced coffee, laughing at things that didn’t deserve laughter. He held my hand like it meant something. I believed him. I wanted to.
I took the photos because I wanted to remember. The way he looked at me when I tried on that ridiculous hat. The way the light hit the mangoes in the stall. The way I felt—seen, chosen, maybe even loved.
I posted the best one. The one where I’m smiling like I know a secret. Like I’ve finally found something worth keeping.
Then came the first comment. Not from him. From her.
“Cute. He took me here last week.”
I stared at the screen. Read it again. And again. My heart didn’t drop—it detonated.
I clicked her profile. Scrolled. There they were. Same market. Same stall. Same hat. Her smile was different—less secret, more certain. His arm around her waist like it belonged there.
I didn’t cry. Not yet. I just sat there, staring at the photo I’d called perfect, wondering how something so curated could feel so cruel.
Then came his text.
“I didn’t mean for you to find out like this.”
No apology. No explanation. Just a confirmation that the story I thought I was living was actually a subplot in someone else’s.
I didn’t reply. I didn’t delete the post. I added to it.
I dropped the rest of the pics in the first comment. Me laughing. Him looking away. The mangoes. The hat. The stall. Each one a breadcrumb in a trail that led nowhere.
Then I wrote the full story.
👇👇👇
We met at a café. He asked what I was reading. I said poetry. He said he didn’t get it, but he wanted to. I offered to explain. He listened like he meant it.
We talked for hours. About travel, about dreams, about the kind of love that feels like home. He said he’d never met anyone like me. I believed him. I wanted to.
He asked to see me again. I said yes. We walked through gardens, through temples, through stories. He kissed me like he was writing a sonnet. I let him.
He told me he wasn’t seeing anyone else. I didn’t ask. I trusted.
We planned a trip. Just a short one. A weekend. He said he wanted to show me something beautiful. I said, “I’m already looking at it.” He smiled like he’d never heard that before.
We took pictures. I posted one. Called it perfect.
Then she commented.
Then he texted.
Then I learned that perfect is a performance. And I was the understudy.
But here’s the thing: I’m not ashamed. I’m not broken. I’m not deleting the photos or the story. Because it was real—to me. And that matters.
I laughed in those pictures. I felt joy. I believed. And that belief wasn’t foolish—it was brave.
So here’s the full story, unfiltered:
I met someone. I thought he was special. He wasn’t.
I took pictures. I posted them. I got hurt.
But I’m still here. Still smiling. Still writing.
Because the story doesn’t end with betrayal. It begins with truth.
And the truth is: I’m not perfect. But I’m real.
And that’s enough.
