There it was, like a slap to the face: some half-naked girl with blown-up tits, fire-engine pumped lips, and a face that looked as sculpted and unnatural as a plastic doll’s. The window was still open, like a little neon sign screaming, SURPRISE, KATE! YOUR BOYFRIEND’S A SLIMEBALL! She stood there, numb, until the horror thawed enough for her fingers to start clicking through his tabs.
In a daze, she clicked through a few tabs. Each click was like peeling back another layer of Derek’s hidden life. Photos, videos, live feeds of women who looked straight out of some exaggerated fantasy—their skin plastic-smooth, their lips puffed up like someone had shoved bike pumps into them, and breasts so large they practically defied gravity. Fake nails, fake eyelashes, fake everything. And then, she saw it. The chat. Lines of text that burned themselves into her mind.