Man, this week has been rough. When you’re in a relationship for a long time, you get this weird sixth sense, right? A couple of days ago, my partner, Alex, started doing this thing with his phone. Like, suddenly turning the screen away when I walked into the room. Then the late-night texts started—short bursts of tapping, followed by him jumping up to take the call outside. It wasn’t full-blown, fire-alarm panic, but that little sneaky feeling started creeping in, the one that whispers: something’s off. The vibe went from “cozy evening” to “who the hell is he talking to at 11:30 PM, whispering like a cartoon villain?”
I tried to ignore it. I really did. I kept telling myself, “He’s just busy, it’s work stuff, stop being crazy.” But then the excuses started getting thin. He’d “forget” where he parked the car when he had been using it all day. He canceled a dinner plan saying he had a migraine, but then I saw his car wasn’t in the garage an hour later. That’s when I finally hit the wall. I knew I needed to stop guessing and start asking the Universe what the hell was going on, because my own brain was clearly broken.
Setting Up The Sneak-Detector Spread
I went straight to the deck. I didn’t want a complex ten-card mess; I wanted a quick, dirty snapshot of the situation. I needed to see if my paranoia was justified, or if I was just inventing drama. I pulled out my old, slightly battered Rider-Waite and sat down at the kitchen table late Tuesday night. Alex was asleep, which felt kind of appropriate for a reading about sneaking around.
The whole practical process was simple. I focused all my frustration—all the suspicion, all the anxiety—into the cards. I wasn’t asking “Is he cheating?” I was asking the far more Seven of Swords-friendly question: “What is he hiding, and is it hurting us?”
I decided on a simple three-card reading, positioning the answers like this:
- Card 1: The Action – What is he actively doing?
- Card 2: The Perception – How am I seeing this situation? (My side).
- Card 3: The Reality – The unvarnished truth of the situation.
I gave the deck a good rough shuffle, the way my grandmother taught me, cutting it three times with my left hand. I felt the energy charge up; it was almost buzzing. I pulled the cards, flipping them over one by one.
The moment I saw The Reality card, I almost threw the whole deck across the room. It was the friggin’ Seven of Swords, right there in the position of truth.
The Seven of Swords Stole the Show
Card 1, The Action, was the Eight of Pentacles. Okay, that usually means focused work, diligent effort, or being absorbed in a project. That tracks with the late nights and sudden bursts of focus, but it’s not really sneaky. Card 2, The Perception, was the Queen of Swords reversed. That one stung—it was me, feeling bitter, overly critical, and maybe a little emotionally cold because I was guarding myself against hurt. Yep, that was 100% accurate.
But that Seven of Swords in the Reality spot? Man, that card is a punch to the gut. The image is a guy making off with five swords, looking back at the two he left behind. It’s the card of petty theft, avoidance, running away from consequences, and, yes, sneaking. It usually means someone is trying to get away with something without being caught, relying on trickery or slyness. It confirmed my gut feeling, but the weird part was, the other cards weren’t telling me the secret was catastrophic.
I spent an hour just staring at it. I wrote down all the keywords in my notebook:
- Evasion.
- Unfinished business.
- Taking shortcuts.
- Cowardice.
- Mental isolation.
The reading didn’t say “affair.” It said “sneak.” It said “avoidance.” It suggested he was trying to steal something small—like time, or maybe the responsibility of telling me something awkward—not the whole damn relationship.
The Confrontation and The Revelation
I knew I couldn’t just march in and say, “The cards told me you’re a Seven of Swords.” That would just cause a fight. Instead, I waited until the next afternoon. I started the conversation calmly, focusing on the Queen of Swords reversed energy I saw in myself. I told him I was feeling shut out, and that his secrecy was making me anxious, and that I missed him. I mentioned the canceled dinner and the car thing directly.
He got defensive at first. “It’s just work, why are you always grilling me?”
I just kept quiet for a minute. Then I said, “Look, I know you’re hiding something. It’s fine. But the sneaking is what’s messing with me. Just tell me what it is.”
And that’s when the whole crazy, confusing picture came together, just like that Bilibili thing where the complicated tech stack was really about the firing. The sneaking wasn’t about a person; it was about his career.
He confessed that he had been secretly interviewing for a new job. He hadn’t told anyone—not his current boss, and not even me, his long-term partner—because he was terrified of failing. He was ashamed that he might try, fail, and then have to admit he was unhappy where he was. The late-night calls? They were recruiters on the West Coast. The canceled dinner and the car vanishing? He was at a coffee shop doing practice interviews and case studies. He’d forgotten where he parked because his head was so full of stress he was basically dissociated.
That Seven of Swords energy wasn’t him robbing our relationship; it was him robbing himself of accountability and trying to steal a new future without putting in the hard work of honest communication with me. He was taking a shortcut by keeping me in the dark, thinking it would be less stressful than admitting he needed a change.
The Takeaway
Man, sometimes the cards confirm your worst fears, but the reason behind the fear is totally different than you imagined. The Seven of Swords in love isn’t always a dramatic escape artist or an outright cheater. Sometimes, it’s just someone in your life—or maybe even you—trying to avoid an uncomfortable conversation or steal a few moments of peace by being dishonest. It’s the petty lie, the small evasion, the fear of telling the truth that makes things messier than the truth itself ever would. We talked it out, and the immediate relief for both of us was huge. Always check the sneak; sometimes they’re just stealing better opportunities, not hearts.
