Redline Revenge — The Renaming of Promise

They were crushed. But they always forced a smile and told me, It's fine. Young people, careers come first. Next time is the same. That next time. They'd been waiting on it for a long time. Then my phone lit up with a notification. It was Lena's personal account. I'd never once looked at it, but this time for some reason I tapped in. My hands started shaking. I couldn't stop them. Every time Sebastian bailed on meeting my parents, it wasn't because the team had something come up. The night he said he was meeting sponsors. He was shopping for dresses with Lena. The day he said he had an emergency meeting. He was walking her through an amusement park. The day he said the training data was

There he was in a photo, sitting at Lena's family dinner table, eating with her Lena was leaning into his shoulder, smiling sweetly. The comments were full of future husband material right there, and when's the Sebastian had never denied a single one.

He'd even liked every post. My breath got tighter and tighter, until I scrolled to the latest post, a close-up of a I recognized it in an instant. That was my bike, Lena's caption read.

He said he wants to give me a special birthday gift. From today, our team's throne, Promise, is officially renamed Little Bell. I stared at the photo. In it, the letter P that Sebastian had carved into the bike with his own hands was sanded off. In its place, a brand new Little Bell. I finally understood. Giving Lena my bike