My best friend was green with envy because I married into wealth. She lured me into going hiking, orchestrating a deadly trap to steal my place. But the universe had other plans. In a chaotic twist of fate, we both tumbled over the edge of the cliff together. When I opened my eyes again, we had both been reborn, returned to the very eve of our college graduation. Without wasting a second, she rushed straight to my ex-husband, showering him with desperate affection. She was hell-bent on stealing the life I once lived. I simply shrugged and let out a quiet laugh. “Since you’ve made your choice, don’t you dare regret it.” 1 My husband, Matt Fabian, was the illegitimate son of the billionaire chairman of the Fabian Group. Shortly after our wedding, the Fabian family suddenly took him in. Later, he even became the CEO of the entire conglomerate. And I went from a soul-crushing corporate grind to a wealthy socialite overnight. My college roommate, Sally, had the opposite trajectory. She was our campus queen, blessed with a striking face. Right after graduation, she threw herself into the entertainment industry, finding temporary fame on a reality survival show. Unfortunately, she had nothing but her looks. Singing, dancing, acting, she was mediocre at all of them. In an industry overflowing with beautiful faces, Sally was quickly washed away by the next wave of fresh talent, fading into obscurity. Everyone envied my luck, whispering about how I had hit the jackpot with a perfect husband. Hearing of my fortune, Sally grew bitter. After all, Matt had liked her first. But back then, Matt was dirt poor, completely beneath her notice. When he confessed his feelings to her in college, she hadn’t just rejected him; she had humiliated him ruthlessly. Now, she was eating her heart out with regret. Using a college reunion as an excuse, Sally reconnected with me. She started calling me daily, calling me her darling, her sweetest friend. At first, I thought she just wanted to use my connections to secure some roles and revive her dying career. I never imagined her real target was my entire life. The day of the accident, Sally invited me to go hiking. As we neared the peak, she lured me toward an isolated ledge and gave me a violent shove. In a desperate panic, I grabbed her ankle, dragging her down into the abyss with me. When I opened my eyes, I was lying in my old college dorm bed. Everything felt surreal. Just moments ago, Sally’s vicious screams were ringing in my ears: “Go to hell, Andrea! You don’t deserve him!” My body ached with phantom pain. As my mind cleared, I realized this wasn’t a nightmare. I had been reborn. “Sally, you look gorgeous today. Do you have a date?” A roommate’s voice snapped me out of my trance. I turned and saw Sally standing in front of the mirror. Through the glass, our eyes met. She curled her lips into a smug, provocative smile. A cold shiver ran down my spine. She had returned too. We were back in our senior year. Seeing me awake, Sally hurriedly grabbed her bag and left the room. Where was she rushing to? I checked my phone to look at the date. Today was the eve of our college graduation. In my past life, only one significant thing had happened on this day. Matt had confessed his love to Sally. Back then, Matt didn’t go by Matt Fabian. His name was Matt Mercer. He only took the Fabian name years later when the family acknowledged him. At this moment, nobody knew his true lineage. To our classmates, he was just a charity-case student living on financial aid. I remembered how Sally had returned to the dorm that night in our past life, mocking him to us. “You guys wouldn’t believe how hilarious that guy is! Wearing knockoff Nikes and actually having the nerve to ask me out! What a joke!” But look at her now. To meet Matt, she had spent hours doling herself up. Even though she had left minutes ago, her expensive perfume still lingered in the air. I suppose it made sense. In our first life, Sally always believed I had merely stumbled into a goldmine by picking up the Fabian family’s abandoned heir. She thought that as long as she married Matt, she would automatically inherit a life of endless luxury. So she ran to him, desperate to claim her prize before I could steal him. But she was dead wrong. Heaven had granted me a second chance, and I wasn’t going to waste it. This time, I had absolutely no intention of stepping foot into the viper’s nest of the Fabian family. 2 The next day. With graduation behind us, everyone was busy packing up, eager to chase their futures. Once our other two roommates left, Sally finally dropped her sweet facade. She grabbed my wrist, her grip painfully tight, glaring at me with raw venom. “Andrea, I’m warning you. Matt is my boyfriend now. Stay the hell away from him, and don’t even think about making a move.” “Otherwise, I won’t hesitate to kill you again.” “This time, I am taking back everything that belongs to me.” Hearing her pathetic threats, I couldn’t help it. I laughed. In our past life, she was the one who despised his poverty and refused to be with him. I hadn’t even started dating Matt until six months after graduation. They were two entirely unrelated chapters. Yet, the way she spoke, she made it sound like I was the home-wrecker who snatched her destiny. “Everything that belongs to me”? Did she think she was the star of some cheap melodrama? I wrenched my hand free from her grip, keeping a calm smile on my face. “Are you absolutely sure you want to be with Matt?” “Of course! Only I am worthy of him! Only I deserve to be the wife of the Fabian Group’s CEO!” Sally shrieked, her face flushed with ambition. Seeing her so resolute, I nodded with genuine satisfaction. “Since you’ve made your choice, don’t you dare regret it.” With that, I grabbed my suitcase and walked out of the dorm without looking back. I knew a brand-new life was waiting for me. And I had waited for this freedom for far too long. Two years passed. I became a jewelry designer. My latest collection won first place in an international competition, earning me a handsome cash prize. I used that prize money as seed capital to launch my own independent studio. This had always been my dream. Unfortunately, in my previous life, due to the Fabian family’s relentless pressure, Matt and I could barely catch our breath during those first two years. Dreams were a luxury we couldn’t afford. When you can’t even afford groceries, survival is the only thing on your mind. And yes. The Fabian family had always known Matt existed. But they had ignored him for over two decades. Simply put, they never wanted to acknowledge him. Worse, there were members of the family actively working behind the scenes to keep him down. I only learned these ugly truths after surviving a near-death experience in my past life. 3 That turning point had occurred in the third year after graduation in my past life. Matt and I were already married by then. Though those three years had been a constant struggle, I hadn’t suspected anything sinister, assuming we were just plagued by bad luck. Until the day Matt was fired. The company accused him of leaking highly classified trade secrets to a competitor for a massive payout. The moment I heard the accusation, I knew it was a lie. I knew Matt. He was timid, submissive, and utterly terrified of conflict. He didn’t have the spine to pull off a corporate heist. But no matter how much I begged him for answers, he refused to tell me what was happening. Because of the leaked data, his former employer suffered catastrophic losses. Blaming Matt, the vengeful business owner hired thugs to set fire to our apartment in the middle of the night. We were nearly burned to ashes. The place we rented was a dilapidated unit in a sketchy neighborhood. The streets were pitch black, devoid of any security cameras. The police investigated for a night and found absolutely nothing. As a result, all the damages fell squarely on Matt and me. In a city like New York, real estate was astronomically expensive. Even a run-down apartment carried a debt that would take us lifetimes to pay off. I would never forget that freezing winter morning. Matt and I sat on the rooftop of our charred building, shivering in our tattered pajamas, without a single penny to our names. Matt smoked eight cigarettes in thirty minutes. Finally, he whispered in a raspy, broken voice, “Andrea, I’m so sorry. We can’t get out of this. Why don’t we just jump? It’ll all be over…” “Matt, you are a pathetic excuse for a man!” I had married him because I thought his quiet nature meant he was decent and reliable. Only then did I see his true colors. He was a coward who ran from his problems, choosing suicide over facing reality. I screamed at him, unleashing years of pent-up frustration. Under my relentless pressure, Matt finally broke down and confessed everything. He told me about his illegitimate status and the toxic civil war raging within the Fabian family. Only then did I realize the truth. The reason my career had been systematically ruined was because I was married to a man who was standing in the crosshairs of billionaires. Matt hadn’t leaked those secrets. But someone powerful wanted him to be the scapegoat, so he was. Recalling those dark days, my heart still pounded with lingering dread. But mostly, I felt a profound sense of relief. I no longer had to deal with that nightmare. Someone else was carrying that heavy cross for me now. Knowing that Sally was currently cramped up in that dingy apartment with Matt, screaming at each other over pennies, the thought filled me with an exquisite sense of satisfaction. I stood by the floor-to-ceiling window of my studio, looking out at the glittering New York skyline. Suddenly, a bright flash of light caught my eye. I thought my eyes were playing tricks on me. But as I squinted, I realized it was real. A few blocks away, a building was engulfed in roaring flames. 4 I saw Matt and Sally on television again. A news reporter was doing a live broadcast from the scene of the fire. The two of them appeared in the background, standing just a few yards behind the reporter, screaming at each other until their faces turned red. What a pathetic spectacle. The fire from my past life had happened even earlier this time. I immediately grabbed my keys and drove over. A show like this was too good to miss. But as I drew closer to the burning building, the dark amusement faded. Before me, a massive inferno consumed the old apartment complex, its orange flames painting the night sky in a sickening hue. This fire was far worse than the one in my past life. Sirens wailed as police cars, ambulances, and fire trucks jammed the narrow, crowded street. The sidewalk was packed with displaced tenants, their faces covered in soot, shivering in thin sleepwear against the biting wind. They looked exactly as I had years ago. I overheard a group of elderly neighbors muttering angrily nearby. “Everything is gone! My whole life, burned to ash! What am I supposed to do now?” “We have to make those two pay! If they hadn’t been screaming and throwing things in the middle of the night, this never would have happened!” An older woman pointed furiously toward the end of the block, cursing under her breath. Following her gaze, I saw those two familiar faces. Just a few feet away, Sally was shrieking at Matt, who kept his head low, utterly silent. They say poverty breeds misery in a marriage. Moreover, Sally had tasted the high life as a minor celebrity. Now, forced to endure squalor with Matt, her facade of a loving partner had cracked. I knew her sweet act wouldn’t last. I stepped closer to the complaining neighbor. “Excuse me, what did those two have to do with the fire?” “Oh, honey, you have no idea!” the woman cried, eager to share the gossip. The others quickly chimed in, crowding around me. “Ever since those two moved in, they’ve done nothing but scream at each other day and night!” “Tonight was the worst of it. I live right next door. I heard her screaming at him.” “She said if he didn’t take her to see his real family, she was going to light a fire and burn them both to death!” “Honestly, I feel bad for the boy. He seems quiet and harmless, but he ended up tied to an absolute psycho.” The former starlet, once adored by thousands, had now become the neighborhood psycho. This was the life Sally had fought so hard to steal. The real family the neighbors mentioned was, of course, the Fabians. It seemed Sally had finally lost her patience and forced Matt’s hand. She couldn’t stomach the poverty anymore, demanding he take her to the Fabian mansion to claim her rightful throne. How hilarious. Two years in, and she was still dreaming of a fairy-tale ending. How could a spineless coward like Matt ever force his way into the Fabian estate on his own? “Sally, long time no see.” Since I was here to watch the show, I might as well play my part. I walked right up to her. She stood there in a charred, dirty nightgown, while I wore a pristine, warm wool coat. When Sally turned and saw me, something in her snapped. She lunged at me like a feral animal, grabbing my collar with filthy, ash-stained hands. “Andrea! You did this to me! You ruined my life!” “Tell me! What did you do? Why is everything different this time?!” Her eyes were bloodshot, her face twisted with the same manic rage she had shown when she pushed me off the cliff. She blamed me for her misery, yet she was the one who had made every single choice to get here. Nothing had changed about the world. She was simply too blind to see the traps. I didn’t bother answering her. I merely glanced down at her hands on my coat, my voice cold. “You’re getting ash on my wool coat. It’s expensive.” Hearing the word “expensive,” Sally recoiled as if stung. She looked at her hands, then at the black smudges she had left on my collar. She swallowed hard, her eyes darting away, unable to meet my gaze. It seemed two years of harsh reality had successfully beaten some of the arrogance out of her. The proud campus queen had finally learned what it felt like to be humbled by poverty.
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