It had been ten years since I spoke to Joshua Richter, and I never expected to hear from him again. Not after the threats, the fights, or the fallout. So, when my phone buzzed on the evening of my 30th birthday, his text message was the last one I expected.

Happy birthday, Chibi.

It was a nickname he called me when we were together but not together. A pet name only for me to make me feel special and important. But as time went on and I realized it was just another way he tried to control me and my feelings for him, the more resentful I became and the easier it was when I finally walked away.

But that was ten years ago, right? We both had moved on from our childish angsty feud. We chose to live our own lives and become our own people. I no longer needed Joshua Richter to make me feel special or important. I was better than that girl he knew, so desperate for his love and attention. I didn't need him anymore. And I was going to prove it to him.

Hey, thanks, stranger! How's it going?

He didn't need to know that my boyfriend was downstairs watching television on the couch. Just as I didn't need to ask about his wife or the daughter he had her with. Just simple, casual conversation...

Just thinking about you. Wondering how you were doing. It's been too long since we talked.

Or not.

I gripped my phone harder in my hand as I stared up at the bedroom ceiling. I could end this now. Should end this now. Josh was the best and worst thing that ever happened to me. I left him behind ten years ago and there was no reason to bring him back.

But I was also masochistic and painfully curious. Perhaps even spitefully so.

I'm fine. Just lying in bed. Had a long day.

It wasn't a lie. We had spent a better part of the afternoon and into the evening out and about, celebrating the beginning of my new decade. A walk through the park with our dog, a nice dinner at my favorite restaurant— it was quiet and I was okay with that.

So how many shots did you take before you threw them up?

Some things never changed.

I'm kidding. I'm glad you enjoyed your day. What have you been up to lately?

A part of me felt like Josh already knew. But then that would have meant he took time out of his regularly scheduled life to actually seek me out, not unlike how I had searched for him after our mutual friend updated me on his current social situations.

Josh never cared about anyone other than himself, or if he did, it was only because it would have benefitted him in some way or another. It was why he refused to date me yet had no qualms about allowing me into his bed. I had the apartment, I had the car, and I had the stable job. He could have anything he wanted and get it, and I enabled it for the five years we were within each others' company.

Which was why I was nothing short of surprised when the mutual asked me if I had heard about Josh's news. Either they forgot we had fallen out of touch, or they felt the gossip was too good to keep to themselves.

A few social media searches later, it was clearly the latter.

I should have been ashamed that the curiosity got the better of me, but when I came to find out he got his then-girlfriend pregnant and married her soon after, it occurred to me Mr. I'm-Never-Getting-Married may have taken a different path in life than I would have expected was laid out for him.

My attention returned to the bright screen illuminating my bedroom. He was married, I was happily taken. There was no harm in casual conversation to catch-up after years of silence.

The usual- working, mainly. It seems to take up most of my time.

Still doing that legal stuff?

Yes I am still doing that 'legal stuff'

Cool.

I gritted my teeth as I typed out the next text.

What have you been up to?

The response seemed to take forever to come through, and I knew that was the question he had been waiting for me to ask since we began this back and forth.

Well, I stopped working at that shoe store a few years ago. Now I work at a hardware store traveling around the state as part of their sales department. It's exhausting but it's a paycheck so I can't complain much. I wish I had more time to do things but I have a family to look after now.

The bait. It was how Joshua liked to have his conversations with me. With anyone for that matter. He would always stop with his own little cliffhanger that he knew would lead the person on the other side to ask for more. One of the things he used to do to me that would aggravate to no end was dangle that loose end for me to grab onto and then pull it away so that I'd fall flat on my face. Figuratively, of course, but it was close to the same feeling. It was a game of control and power.

One I hated playing. One I wasn't going to play with him again.

Sounds great! Glad to hear you're finally doing something to better yourself! And congrats on the family! Hope everything is going well enough for you there.

While internally I secretly wished he was miserable. Just so that, for once, he could feel like he wasn't in control of a situation, to realize that there were people in the world who mattered more than him. That could control their lives more than he could for them. Just once...

Not really.

Bingo.

The contented spite had me rolling over onto my side as I got myself comfortable for what I believed to be an amazing evening of redemption and justification.

Oh no, what's wrong?

I get home exhausted. My wife doesn't work and the minute I step through the door after work she expects me to make dinner and take care of our kid because she has made plans to go out with her friends. Without even talking to me about it. Says she's been home all day and needs a break. But what about my break?!

Yeah, that sounds like it sucks. Have you tried talking to her about it?

Too many times. She just brushes me off and ignores me until she leaves. She's nothing like you- at least when we fought I knew you were at least listening to me.

Sounds like you really picked a winner there.

More like she picked me.

Beggars can't be choosers, I suppose.

Really though. We have nothing in common so even if she was home I don't know what we'd do. Lie on the couch and watch stupid reality TV maybe?

Sounds invigorating.

Remember when we used to go out all the time? We always went to the midnight showings of movies and stayed out drinking way too late when we both knew we had to work the next day. We actually had fun together.

Sometimes, sure. Most of the time, too much.

Do you ever miss it?

I almost dropped my phone.

Miss what, exactly?

I could play coy, too.

Everything. The more carefree way of living. When we used to just do what we wanted when we wanted and had no one to answer to but ourselves?

I think everything happens for a reason.

I needed to be diplomatic.

I think everything happened the exact way it needed to be.

In that, he needed to break my heart one too many times for me to learn and finally realize that I could do better. That I needed to do better than Joshua Richter. That I had done better than Joshua Rickter, and he was doing worse off without me.

Look...

The wait for the next text was almost torture. Was he going to argue with me and tell me I was wrong like I always was when it came to conversations I had with him? Was he going to tell me I was right? Or was he going to insist I was wrong and ghost me after informing me that reaching out was a mistake and to return to forgetting he existed? Which I knew would have been another mind game because you don't just bounce back into someone's memory and expect to be so easily wiped.

It had taken me a good portion of those ten years to do just that, and now...

I'm sorry I reached out. I don't mean to bother you. I'm just... alone. And needed someone to talk to.

No, he didn't get to do this. He didn't get to play the poor-me card and then try to backpedal when he didn't get what he was looking for.

Swallowing, I leaned up on my elbow as I furiously typed my response.

Look, I've been here for the last 10 years. Was there for longer. You could have reached out at any point, at any time. For some reason, however, you're choosing to do so on my birthday, so I'm sorry if I'm caught a little off-guard and not giving you the attention you were craving.

I know, you're right.

He would never have admitted I was right. Ever.

I screwed up before. I know this now. I've known it for years.

I gave myself a moment to calm my heart and slow my breathing before I asked my next question.

So what are you looking for Josh? What do you need from me right now?

I just want to know if you've thought of me. If you ever thought about what things would have been like if you never left those years ago. If you think we'd have been better off than we are right now?

Well, I'm not the one reaching out to—

What was I? I wasn't his ex. I wasn't even his friend, present or former. He was just a guy I knew once. And I was just...

—you after years of not speaking to each other. You reached out to me, remember? How do you know if we'd be better off if we couldn't even keep in touch?

I think of you. I think we could have made it work. I think we would have been happy.

Speak for yourself. All we did was fight.

I think we fought so much because we were too good for one another.

I think we fought because I wanted a hell of a lot more than you wanted to offer.

We fought because you wanted something I wasn't ready to give.

A snicker escaped me as I read his message. I scrolled up and reread the whole conversation before I could wrap my mind around a response.

And you have something to give now?

More than you know.

I wanted to scream.

Answer me one question.

Anything.

Why did you refuse to be in an actual relationship with me when we were together?

Because he owed me that. At the minimum, I deserved to know why he treated me like crap for so long and felt none the worse for it. And why he thought that messaging me for the first time in ten years on my birthday was warranted, and not just because he was lonely and wanted someone to talk to.

To be honest, because all you wanted to do was fight. I don't know how much you remember but it was constant. And you were always jealous for no reason and even when I talked about another girl around you it was like you immediately turned into this super-bitch and it wasn't something I wanted to be involved in. Sometimes there were good days, and I would stop and think that maybe it was a turn for the better and we could have made it work, but then the next day you'd start a fight over the most trivial things and it was like starting back at square one with you. Does that make sense?

I don't know what I was expecting when I asked, but I wasn't necessarily that.

I remember. I remember more than I probably should be at this point. And It does make sense. We clashed a lot. But at the same time, I think you strung me along. Because you knew how I felt. And then when I stopped worshipping the ground you walked on, you realized it then. Or at least you said you did. I remember that was the basis for our drifting. I stopped pining and you didn't like it.

Maybe you think it was you pining over me, but you changed when you got that boyfriend of yours to the point where we didn't have the same relationship at all. You stopped talking to me in the same way, you stopped confiding in me, you closed off to me, so I probably didn't know how to get that part of our relationship back. It almost felt like it was all or nothing. To me, I thought you getting the boyfriend and planning to move would make us closer but instead, it seemed like you pushed away. And I had no idea how to deal with that.

And now?

I let you get away and now I want you back. I never should have let you go. I know this now.

No, he realized that he lost. That he was the one who screwed up. That he had someone who, at the time, would have given him anything he wanted if he only asked and he took her for granted. And now that he's finally realized how good he had it, regardless of him thinking all we did was fight, he actually had the audacity to think that by texting me on what he was certain to consider an emotional day, he could work his way back under my skin and actually convince me to give him another chance.

But I wasn't that girl he knew ten years ago. I had ripped Joshua Richter out of my life like a bad bandaid. I had moved on because I deserved that. I deserved to be better, to be treated better. To receive as much as I gave. To be happy.

And if anything reconfirmed that Joshua Richter did not make me happy, it was the dark cloud that now settled upon me at just the thought of ever being in a relationship with him ever again.

So, what do you say, Chibi?

I may have been the one that got away, but he was the one I threw back to be eaten by the sharks.

Goodbye, Joshua.

I threw my phone across the length of the bed before I could see if he responded. The fury and the frustration took over and I could no longer control the emotions that bombarded me like waves crashing upon the breakers. My self-worth was more than a text conversation and I would be damned if some prick from five-hundred miles away was going to ruin ten years or work.

My breath caught in my throat as the hall light flicked on and I heard the telltale sounds of my boyfriend's heavy footsteps making their way up the stairs. I furiously wiped at my eyes but knew it would be in vain, especially as he turned on the bedroom light.

"You came up to bed over an hour ago," he observed as he sat on the edge of the bed. As expected, my red and swollen eyes immediately caught his attention and he frowned. "I expected you to be asleep by now."

I sat up straighter at that, hugging my knees as I leaned against the headboard. I watched him as he watched me and I knew I deserved this. And he deserved the truth.

It wasn't exactly how I imagined spending the remainder of my birthday, but...

"Did I ever tell you about Joshua Richter?"