Author: Momo Chan

The summer we graduated, Weston decided he was going to be a star. He signed up for a major televised music competition in LA, ready to throw himself into the spotlight. He didn’t ask me to go with him. Instead, he had his roommate tell me to pack my bags. I turned down a prestigious doctoral fellowship and a lucrative corporate offer, following him to California like a shadow. I was there for the grind—from the empty dive bars to the sold-out arenas. I watched him become the country’s most coveted artist. And me? I was just the secret wife he never acknowledged. Harassed by his fans. Mocked by his childhood muse. Until the day I died, he never once stood up for me. I spent years drowning in regret, wondering why on earth I had sacrificed my own career for a man who kept me in the dark. Then, the universe hit rewind. I woke up on the morning of my thesis defense. His roommate knocked on my door with a smug grin: “Weston’s heading to LA tomorrow. You better get a move on and start packing.” I looked at him, completely numb, and said, “I’m not going to LA.” 01 The silence in the room was deafening. My classmates looked back and forth between Weston and me, waiting for me to cave, to take it back. But I just turned to the girl next to me and started chatting about the weather. Weston never asked for anything directly. He used Tyler to do his dirty work, expecting me to anticipate his needs. If I ever felt slighted or expressed hurt, he’d smirk and say, “Didn’t you volunteer for this?” It left me utterly speechless. Like right now. He wanted me in LA to manage his life, but he made Tyler deliver the command. Tyler glared at me. “Cora, if you’re not going to LA, where else could you possibly go?” “I’m thinking of going abroad,” I said, my voice steady. Weston scoffed, a cold chuckle escaping his lips. “Abroad? Since when?” His usual cool, detached facade was slipping. He looked genuinely rattled. “Since now,” I replied. His face hardened. Tyler chimed in with a sneer, “Oh, please. The help’s kid is putting on airs now? Don’t come crying to us when you realize what a massive mistake you’re making.” “The help’s kid.” That was their favorite label for me. My dad was the Drakes’ personal driver; my mother was their housekeeper. My family’s livelihood depended on their charity. To them, I was born to be second-class. But I didn’t let the insult sting. “Give the opportunity to someone who actually wants it,” I said smoothly. “Excuse me.” I grabbed my bag and walked out. Behind me, I heard the whispers. “What crawled up her sleeve today?” “Don’t sweat it, Weston. She’ll come crawling back. She always does.” Weston’s voice floated after me, lazy and arrogant. “Who’s sweating? I don’t care if she goes or not.” He was convinced I was just playing hard to get. I didn’t slow down. My heart hammered against my ribs as I bolted back to the dorm. Sitting at my desk, I opened my laptop. There, sitting in my inbox, was the official offer letter from the Silicon Valley firm. The tears came hot and fast. It was real. I was back. I was twenty-two, and the future was mine to rewrite. 02 In my past life, I followed him to LA. He won the competition, signed with a major label, and became an overnight sensation. I turned down every job offer, every academic path, to become his glorified assistant. Then, we got married. There was no ceremony, no diamond ring, no public announcement. He forbade me from telling anyone. “Just wait,” he’d whisper in the dark. “Once my career stabilizes, I’ll give you the wedding of your dreams.” His fans hated how close I was to him. They called me a social climber, a leech trying to hitch a ride on a star. Even my friends warned me: “He can have any beautiful woman in Hollywood. What makes you think you can keep him?” I swallowed the humiliation. Even my own parents didn’t know we were married. When I turned thirty, we were still a secret. My parents were frantic. My mother wept, begging me to let Weston go and move on with my life. Seeing her heartbroken, I finally begged Weston to at least let us break the news to our families. He sighed, claiming his mother would never accept it. “We have to wait a few more years for the right moment,” he said. “Unless… you want to go tell her yourself?” He knew I wouldn’t. Mrs. Drake was my ultimate terror. I had been a left-behind child in the countryside. Every summer, my parents would bring me to the city to live with them for two months. We lived in the damp basement of the Drakes’ massive estate. My mother constantly whispered in my ear: “Be useful. Keep quiet. Don’t make a sound, or they’ll kick us out.” I grew up terrified of being thrown away. Especially by Mrs. Drake. She’d sit on her plush velvet sofa, looking down her nose at me, criticizing how skinny, dark, and clumsy I was. If she found out I had married her precious son, she would have torn me to shreds. I had no leverage. No spine. I waited year after year, watching Weston collect awards and build a financial empire. I died without ever getting my wedding, or my name next to his. 03 I pulled out my phone and immediately canceled my train ticket to LA. I opened Instagram. Weston had just posted a video of himself playing a violin track. The caption read: “As it always was.” It was a message meant for Scarlett Ward. Five years into our marriage, Scarlett returned from Europe. That was when I realized she existed—the ghost that had always occupied the corners of his mind. When they were together, they laughed and talked endlessly. For the first time, I realized Weston wasn’t cold; he just wasn’t warm to me. Soon, they became partners. From hit singles to music videos, world tours to indie films, they were inseparable. He was the brilliant actor-singer; she was the prodigy violinist. The media called them a match made in heaven. Even his fans embraced her, calling her the “real” Mrs. Drake. And he never corrected them. I had always felt like an imposter next to him. Being married to him felt like a lottery ticket I hadn’t earned. It happened during his third year in the industry, back when he was still struggling. He got a slot to perform at a major gala, but someone spiked his drink backstage. Desperate not to lose his shot, he begged me to help him through it. In that dark backstage room, terrified of losing everything, he clung to me. That night, we crossed a line. The next day, he took me to the courthouse to get registered. I knew it wasn’t out of love. I felt guilty, like I had taken advantage of his vulnerability. So when Scarlett reappeared, my insecurity flared like a wildfire. I threw tantrums, I picketed his studio. He merely shrugged it off. “It’s just PR, Cora. You’re being paranoid.” Once, after they spent the entire night locked in his study, I lost my mind and confronted her in public. Weston was furious. “Cora, do you have nothing better to do with your life? Scarlett lives for her art. Your baseless accusations are bordering on slander!” Scarlett had only smiled, a soft, patronizing thing. “It’s fine, Weston. I don’t hold grudges against housewives.” Her pity was sharper than any knife. It left me raw, humiliated, and utterly silent. 04 I had even secretly taken vocal lessons, foolishly believing it would give us something to talk about. But Scarlett caught me practicing once. She mimicked my awkward pitch and clumsy posture to Weston, giggling behind her hand. “I’m sorry, Weston. Her pronunciation was just so bizarre. I couldn’t help myself.” Weston rubbed his temples, looking thoroughly exhausted. “It’s embarrassing. Like a monkey trying to paint.” I stood frozen outside the door, tears of pure shame burning my eyes. I ran back to my room and tore the sheet music to pieces. Later, Scarlett brought up my “music phase” at dinner parties, prompting polite, mocking chuckles from his industry friends. I had to force a smile and say, “It was too hard. I gave up on it a long time ago.” Within a year of her return, they started playing up their romantic chemistry for the cameras. I used to be Weston’s manager and assistant. I handled everything—booking gigs, managing contracts, dealing with publicists. His rise hadn’t been easy. The Drakes were comfortable in our mid-sized hometown, but their money was nothing compared to the millions required to bankroll a star. I endured the grittiest parts of the hustle with him. But Scarlett insisted he needed a “professional team.” One by one, my responsibilities were handed over to slick agency executives. Until I was locked out entirely. I watched them walk red carpets together, dropping hints about their shared history. I grew bitter, jealous, and unrecognizable to myself. Scarlett would tease Weston about me: “Look at the mess she made. She’s only a liability.” Then she’d turn her pitying gaze to me. “Weston works so hard, Cora. If you can’t help him, at least don’t drag him down. A woman needs her own identity. Clinging to a man never works.” She was a terrible person, but she wasn’t wrong. Back then, I remember wishing with every fiber of my being that if I could do it all over, I would never let Weston Drake into my life. Thank God someone was listening. Now, the tech giant’s offer is still waiting in my inbox. I actually have a choice. 05 I slept terribly that night. Scarlett’s sneering face kept flashing behind my eyelids. “Your marriage was a mistake from the start, Cora. Do yourself a favor and leave with some dignity.” She had spoken with such authority, as if I were the mistress and she the aggrieved wife. I had stared at her, dumbfounded. “Oh, does that hurt? Or are you just bitter? Having sex with him in a filthy backstage bathroom… I don’t know if I should call you desperate or cheap. No wonder he refuses to tell the world you’re his wife.” I hadn’t realized Weston viewed that night with such disgust. Even worse, he had shared our private, intimate moments with Scarlett. It felt like being stripped naked and paraded in front of my worst enemy. My chest felt tight, my face hot, my throat closing up. She had leaned her chin on her hand, smiling like a cat. “Don’t you think that whole ‘spiked drink’ incident was a little too convenient? Weston and I both think the timing was absolutely perfect. It makes you wonder, doesn’t it?” The accusation hit me like a physical blow. He suspected me? How dare he? By then, my depression had already spiraled out of control. I couldn’t remember what she said next. My mind had dissolved into white noise. I remember driving home in a daze, my hands shaking on the wheel. Then, the blinding headlights, the screech of tires against the guardrail, the crushing impact. When my soul detached from my body, I saw my parents. They were sobbing, their faces gray with grief. They had spent their entire lives, breaking their backs, just to raise me. And I had given them nothing but a corpse. The regret was a physical weight. I regretted my weakness, my surrendered career, my obsession with a boy who never loved me. Because my spirit was bound by resentment, I couldn’t cross over. I watched Weston and Scarlett’s lavish wedding. I watched him tell reporters about their “eternal love story,” how they were childhood sweethearts separated by distance but never in heart. They admitted they were essentially dating on the studio’s dime. Scarlett even boasted that the years after her return had been the sweetest of her life. Even in death, the betrayal cut to the bone. 06 I woke up sobbing several times during the night. When dawn finally broke, I gave up on sleep. I got up and washed my face. The dark circles under my eyes were heavy, so I took extra time to apply concealer and makeup. My roommate, Taylor, watched me from her bed, letting out a sharp laugh. “I thought you weren’t going to LA, Cora? Getting up at dawn to put on a full face of makeup? You’re such a hypocrite.” I knew it. None of them had believed me yesterday. I didn’t bother explaining. I packed my bags and got into a cab. Maeve sent me a furious voice note. “Cora! Where is your spine? If I had been in the dorm, I would have locked you in! Are you seriously going to LA?” Maeve had always detested Weston. She thought he was a pretentious, self-righteous snob. She forwarded me a few screenshots. It was a photo Taylor had taken of me packing, posted in their joint group chat—the one that included Weston’s roommates, but excluded me. “Relax guys, she was just bluffing. She’s already on her way.” The replies were brutal. “Lmao, I actually thought she had a spine for a second. The help’s kid trying to act like she’s going abroad.” “And now she’s slinking back to LA.” “Whatever. Weston, don’t be too hard on her. You need someone to do your laundry anyway. Having her around saves you a lot of trouble.” “Make her wait at the station for a few hours. Teach her a lesson.” Maeve was breathing heavily in the audio. “Cora, I want to rip your head open and see what’s inside! Cancel the ticket! They’re literally laughing at you, and you’re just running to them?” I smiled and texted her a screenshot of my actual ticket. “Calm down, babe. I’m on a train to Chicago.” “I have a visa interview.” 07 My job offer was based in Silicon Valley, which meant I needed a visa. The nearest consulate was in Chicago. I slept soundly on the train ride. When I woke up, my phone was practically vibrating off the seat. 99+ missed calls. 99+ unread messages. At first, they were demanding to know where I was. Then, the tone shifted to anger, accusing me of being irresponsible and leaving Weston stranded. I laughed, typing out cold, biting replies to every single person who had insulted me, and then blocked them one by one. I had planned to keep up appearances until graduation, but they had made that impossible. Weston didn’t get his personal assistant. He had to board the flight to LA alone. He didn’t call. He just sent a single text: “?” Typical Weston. Our chat history was a sea of green bubbles on my side—long, frantic paragraphs of me checking in on him—and short, icy fragments from him. This time, I left him on read. I knew what lay ahead for him. In LA, he would meet his mentor. He would sign with a powerhouse agency, release his debut single, and rocket to fame. Later, his looks and brooding intensity would land him leading roles in film, making him an Oscar-winning superstar before thirty. His path was paved with gold. But I wouldn’t be the pavement anymore. 08 The visa interview went smoothly. I took the train back to my hometown that same evening. The moment I saw my parents standing on the platform, the dam broke. I threw my arms around my mother and sobbed. She patted my back, utterly bewildered. My parents were simple, quiet people. They didn’t know how to navigate big emotions, let alone express them. “What’s wrong, sweetheart? Why are you crying?” “Nothing,” I choked out. “I just… I missed you guys so much.” “But we just saw you at Easter,” my mother said, touching my forehead to check for a fever. She had no idea that in my mind, it had been a lifetime since I last held her. In my previous life, after I died, my parents aged ten years overnight. When my mother was packing up my belongings, she found our secret marriage certificate. By then, Weston had already gone public with Scarlett, flaunting their romance on every late-night show. My parents, fueled by a rare, desperate courage, took that certificate to the Drake estate to demand answers. But Mrs. Drake only spat on them. She tore the paper to shreds and screamed, “Your daughter was a shameless leech who drugged my son and forged a fake certificate! Thank God she died before she could ruin him completely!” “Shut up! Our Cora would never do that!” My parents, who had spent their entire lives bowing their heads and telling me to stay humble, fought like wild animals that day. When the security guards dragged my mother away, they broke her wrist, but she refused to let go of the torn pieces of my marriage certificate. She didn’t know the marriage was registered in public records. She just wanted to protect her daughter’s dignity. My father was left bleeding from his temple. Now, looking at their dark, thick hair and their unwrinkled faces, a wave of profound relief washed over me. They were still whole. 09 Three days after I got home, Weston showed up. In my past life, the singing competition lasted for over a month. We hadn’t even made it back for graduation. There was absolutely no reason for him to be in our hometown right now. He walked down the gravel driveway, his tall frame cutting through the afternoon light. But as he drew closer, I noticed something was off. His posture, the heavy, desperate look in his eyes… This wasn’t a twenty-two-year-old boy. This was… “Cora,” he whispered. My brain went completely numb. “What are you doing here?” “You blocked me,” he said, his voice raw. “I had to come find you.” He tried to smile, but his eyes were dark and haunted. That look. I knew it instantly. Before Scarlett had returned in our past life, Weston and I had actually found a rhythm. He started helping me with dinner. He bought tickets to Tahiti because I mentioned I’d never seen the ocean. He’d leave designer handbags on my vanity, and wrap his arms around my waist from behind, whispering my name. We were almost happy. Until Scarlett came back and shattered the illusion. I stared at him, cold and silent. “I’ve been having these… dreams,” Weston said, taking a step closer. “Every night for the past week. Terrible, vivid dreams.” “And when I wake up, my chest hurts so bad I can’t breathe.” “Cora… I regret it.”

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When I came home, my father was slamming the door on his way out, fresh off another violent rage. I ran to my mother, sobbing, throwing my arms around her bloodied shoulders, only to be met with a stinging slap across my face. “I endure all of this because of you! If you had just gotten straight A’s, your father wouldn’t have blamed me for spoiling you!” After that day, their screaming matches only grew more frequent, more violent. I didn’t dare stop studying. Not even for a second. Whenever sleep threatened to take me, I drove the sharp metal tip of my drafting compass deep into my thigh. When my focus wavered, I slapped myself hard across the face. I didn’t make friends. I didn’t sign up for extracurriculars. I even condensed my three meals into one rushed sitting, just to squeeze out more hours to study. It wasn’t until the day my Harvard acceptance letter arrived that I finally felt a wave of relief. I went upstairs to find my mother, but as I approached her bedroom, I heard laughter spilling through the crack of the door. “Well, those years of acting weren’t for nothing.” “The specialist was right. Guilt really is the best motivator.” My mother laughed, leaning into my father’s chest, her expression warm and affectionate. “The venue for tomorrow’s celebration banquet is already booked, and some local reporters are coming. We’ll tell her the truth tomorrow.” “When she realizes how much painstaking effort we put in just to get her into Harvard, she’s going to be so moved.” I stood in the hallway, my blood turning to ice. The years of blood, the screaming, the terror—it was all just a carefully choreographed play. A sudden, agonizing cramp seized my stomach, and a thick, metallic taste surged up my throat. To survive the brutal hours of studying, I had spent years abusing painkillers and caffeine pills on an empty stomach. My digestive system was already hollowed out, ravaged by ulcers. Mom, I finally became the perfect daughter you wanted. But I think I’m dying. … My stomach felt like it was being hollowed out with a dull knife, but I couldn’t move. My mind flashed back to the night before my high school entrance exams. They had put on a terrifying show. When I burst into the room, blood was streaming down my mother’s temple, painting half her face a horrific crimson. Screaming, I begged her to let me call an ambulance. But even then, she refused. She wept, saying medical care was too expensive, that every penny had to be saved for my tutoring and prep books so I could secure my future. Driven by agonizing guilt, I spent the entire summer secretly working twelve-hour shifts as a food delivery rider, desperate to buy her an expensive scar-fading cream. I worked through the nights, wearing through three pairs of sneakers. And now, they were laughing about how it had all been a performance? My fingers curled into tight fists. I wanted to fling the door open. I wanted to stand before them, look them dead in the eye, and force them to repeat those exact words to my face. I took a single step forward, but before I could touch the brass doorknob, my mother’s phone rang. Through the wood, I heard the muffled, shaking voice of a young girl weeping on the other end: “Mrs. Campbell… I choked during my Juilliard audition… I ruined everything…” “Is my life over?” My mother sat up instantly. Her voice softened into a gentle, soothing tone—a pitch of warmth she had never once used with me. “Oh, sweetheart, don’t cry. A single audition doesn’t define your worth.” “Listen to me, Zoe. Grades don’t measure the value of a life, and college isn’t the finish line.” “You must never let one setback make you doubt yourself, okay?” Outside the door, the fiery anger in my chest was instantly doused by a bucket of ice water. My mother was a respected dance instructor. She had dozens of students who adored her. She could offer such gentle grace to a student who failed, yet she had never shown a fraction of that tenderness to her own daughter. I remembered my junior year midterms. I had placed second in the entire grade. When I brought the report card home, my mother slammed it onto the coffee table. She didn’t scream; she just stared at me with an expression of profound, crushing disappointment. That look terrified me more than any physical blow ever could. “Mom,” I had whispered, tears welling in my eyes. “I’ll do better next time. I promise…” “Next time?” “Do you have any idea how much misery I endure for you?” “If it weren’t for you, your father and I would have divorced years ago!” Her voice had risen, sharp and scraping, like nails dragging down a chalkboard. “If you can’t even secure the top spot, how can you look me in the eye?” “Don’t you understand? If you mess up your exams like this, your entire life is over!” Standing in the dim hallway, a hollow numbness washed over me. So my mother did know how to be kind. She just chose not to be kind to me. My hand rested on the doorknob. The biting cold of the brass seeped through my skin, traveling straight to my heart. Suddenly, the urge to confront them vanished. What would it even accomplish? Even if I stormed in and laid bare their lies, what would change? She would only knit her brows, looking at me with that familiar contempt. “What is wrong with your attitude? Who do you think we did all of this for?” “If we hadn’t pushed you, do you honestly think you would have ever gotten into Harvard?” They would never see their own cruelty. You cannot awaken those who are determined to keep their eyes closed. After a long, silent moment, I pushed the door open just a crack. When I spoke, my voice was barely a whisper. “Mom… my stomach really hurts. Can you… take me to the hospital?” As I spoke, my eyes instinctively drifted to the faint pink mark on her temple. For three years, I had never questioned why that scar never seemed to fade or change. I had only hated myself for not working more delivery shifts, for not earning enough to buy her the premium treatments. It had never occurred to me that the scar was nothing more than stage makeup. A warm, metallic wave rose in my throat. I forced myself to swallow it down. A deep, aching regret bloomed in my chest. I hadn’t truly lived a single day for myself. I wanted to get well. I wanted to eat a hot meal in a college dining hall, to sit in a library and read a book that had absolutely nothing to do with an exam. Or even just to lie on the grass and breathe clean air without the weight of the world crushing my chest. But my mother merely frowned, her tone dismissive and sharp. “You probably slept with the AC too high last night.” “I’ve told you a thousand times to cover up during the summer, but you never listen.” “I’ll make you some ginger tea in a minute. Make sure you’re ready for the celebration banquet tomorrow.” I stood frozen, utterly numb. But she wasn’t finished. “Getting into college is just the beginning, Hannah. This is the exact moment students lose their drive.” She dropped a heavy stack of textbooks onto my desk. “These are introductory college syllabi and prep materials. Start reviewing them tonight so you don’t lose your edge.” I stared at her, disbelief mingling with the agonizing fire burning in my gut. “Mom… please. I’m really sick.” Before I could finish, her irritation flared. “Here we go again. Every time I ask you to study, you magically get sick.” “Who are you trying to guilt-trip with that face?” “Do you think you’re special just because you got into Harvard? Think you can coast now?” “Let me tell you something, your life has barely started.” With a dismissive wave, she swept past me and headed to the living room. Seconds later, the sharp crash of shattering glass echoed from the hallway. Then came the familiar, theatrical shouting. “Are you out of your mind?!” “Me? I’m losing my mind because you don’t know how to raise our daughter!” “Stop blaming me for everything!” Peering through the crack of my bedroom door, I watched my mother fall to the floor. A fresh streak of bright red blood began to trickle down her temple. I pulled myself up, swaying on my feet, and walked slowly to the doorway. I just stood there, watching them. My parents both turned their heads to look at me. They were waiting. Waiting for me to break down. Waiting for the familiar tidal wave of guilt to swallow me whole. Waiting for me to drop to my knees, beg for their forgiveness, and promise to study until my fingers bled just to keep their marriage alive. But this time, I simply closed the door. Gently. Quietly. Just before the latch clicked, I caught the briefest flicker of confusion in their eyes. I sat down at my desk and pulled open the top drawer. Sitting inside was the drafting compass that had kept me awake through a thousand sleepless nights. I gripped the metal tool and drove the sharp point deep into my thigh. Once. Twice. Three times. Warm blood bloomed through the fabric of my jeans, and the familiar, sharp agony flared up my leg. It worked. The physical pain in my leg began to dull the agonizing burning in my stomach. With trembling fingers, I picked up my pen and opened the college prep book. As the blood dripped slowly down my leg, staining the carpet, I looked down at it and smiled. Tomorrow, Mom. Tomorrow, Dad. The curtain is finally going to fall on your masterpiece. And the perfect daughter you created will remain frozen in this exact moment forever. The next morning, before the sun had even cleared the horizon, my mother pushed my door open. She held a beautiful, flowing white dress in her hands, her voice carrying a rare, cheerful warmth. “Get up and try this on. I bought it specially for today.” I stared at the pristine white fabric, took it from her, and slipped it on. But when I stood before the mirror, my heart sank. The slit of the dress shifted, exposing a patch of skin on my calf. It was a map of my secret torment—crisscrossed with old, silver scars. And right in the middle were the fresh, angry punctures from last night, covered in dark red scabs. I hesitated, then called out to her through the partially open door. “Mom… is there any way I could wear something else?” The warmth instantly drained from her face. “Wear something else? Do you have any idea how much this dress cost?” “I haven’t bought myself a decent outfit in years, all so you could stand on that stage looking beautiful. And you want to toss it aside?” A dull ache throbbed in my chest. I lowered my head, keeping my voice soft. “Mom, you don’t have to sacrifice so much for me. I would have been fine wearing my school blazer.” After all, I was already slipping away. I wasn’t worth the expense of her sacrifices anymore. But her expression hardened, her eyes flashing with hurt and anger. “Are you really going to start acting ungrateful now, Hannah?” “After everything I’ve suffered to get you here, this is how you repay me?” I swallowed the bitter lump in my throat and closed my eyes. “I’m sorry, Mom.” “I’ll wear it.” Once she left, I closed the door and pulled a sewing kit from my desk. I threaded a needle with strong white cotton. Then, taking a deep breath, I pushed the needle straight through the skin of my calf. The thread pulled tight, dragging against my flesh, leaving angry red welts. But pain had been my closest companion for years. I didn’t even flinch. I systematically stitched the inner lining of the white dress directly to the skin of my leg. Secure. Anchored. The fabric wouldn’t slip. No one would see the ugly truth beneath the pristine white hem. The celebration my parents had planned had to be perfect. It was the final gift I could give them. Ten minutes later, I walked out of my room in the white dress to find a guest in our living room. My mother was smiling warmly, tucking a stray lock of hair behind a young girl’s ear. I froze, recognizing her. It was Zoe, one of the star pupils from my mother’s dance class. On the coffee table in front of them sat a stunning bouquet of white lilies and a beautifully wrapped gift box. Zoe looked up and offered me a bright, genuine smile. “Mrs. Campbell, I wanted to congratulate Hannah in person. Getting into Harvard… it’s absolutely incredible.” My mother’s gaze drifted toward me, the warmth fading slightly from her expression. “Oh, she’s just a bookworm. And lately, she’s been getting a bit of an attitude.” My mother waved her hand dismissively, guiding Zoe back down onto the sofa. “But let’s not talk about her.” “How are you holding up, sweetie? Feeling any better about the auditions?” “Did you look over those alternative programs I researched for you?” Watching them sit close, sharing quiet whispers and gentle laughter, a sharp, localized ache spread through my chest. To anyone watching, they looked like the perfect mother and daughter. Sensing my silence, Zoe gave me a polite smile and stood up, walking over to me. “Seriously, Hannah, congratulations on Harvard. I’m so incredibly happy for you.” I stared into her clear, bright eyes. Suddenly, a memory from a lifetime ago surfaced. I was in the fifth grade, and a new girl had transferred to my class. She was bubbly and kind, always dragging me to sit with her at lunch. For her birthday, she had slipped a coupon for a movie night into my textbook. “Let’s go together this weekend,” she had written. It was the first time I had ever been invited anywhere. I was dizzy with excitement for an entire week. But when my mother found the invitation, she had thrown it into the trash, trembling with rage. “I tear my life apart every single day to give you a future!” “And you have the nerve to waste time hanging out with friends? How can you do this to me?” After that, I declined every invitation. I shut out everyone. My world shrunk until there was nothing left but my desk, endless practice tests, and a lamp that stayed lit until dawn. Looking at Zoe’s bright, unburdened smile, a wave of profound sorrow washed over me. I wish I could have had a friend like her. Someone to remember me. Someone to bring flowers on important days. Someone to be happy for my success. But I had spent my entire life completely, utterly alone. “Zoe is always so thoughtful,” my mother’s voice cut through my thoughts. She patted Zoe’s hand affectionately, but when her eyes flicked to me, her forehead creased. “Where are your classmates, Hannah? Why didn’t anyone come to celebrate with you?” “Do you really not have a single friend?” “How do you expect to survive in college if you don’t even know how to socialize?” Her words were like poisoned needles stabbing into my chest. I wanted to laugh. She was the one who had systematically cut every tie I ever tried to make. And now, she stood on her moral high ground, demanding to know why I was so isolated. Sensing the sudden tension, Zoe quickly tried to smooth things over. “Oh, Mrs. Campbell, Hannah worked so hard. She just didn’t have time for distractions.” She gently pressed the bouquet into my hands. “Congratulations, Hannah. Truly.” I took the lilies and whispered, “Thank you.” Shortly after, my parents led me out to the car to head to the venue. The banquet hall was already packed when we arrived. In addition to our relatives, the room was filled with local journalists and anxious parents hoping to learn the secret to raising an Ivy League scholar. My mother stood at the center of the stage, her smile radiant under the spotlight. As soon as the master of ceremonies finished introducing her, she took the microphone. “So many parents have asked me how we did it. How did we raise a Harvard student?” “Today, I want to share our secret with all of you.” The room fell into an eager, expectant silence. My mother offered a knowing smile. “Actually, the secret is quite simple.” “Guilt is the absolute best motivator.” Standing beside her on stage, a deep, bone-chilling cold crept through my limbs. But my mother was energized now, her voice rising with pride. “When a child feels like they owe everything to their parents, they don’t need to be pushed. They will run themselves ragged just to make up for it!” Smiling, she reached into her purse and pulled out a small, transparent plastic bag filled with fake blood. “All those years of violence, the blood—it was all a performance.” “Even the scar on my temple was just professional stage makeup.” Beside her, my father beamed with pride, nodding in agreement. “We sacrificed our peace of mind for our daughter,” he chimed in. “But now that she’s Ivy League-bound, every single act was worth it!” A stunned silence gripped the hall for a fraction of a second, followed immediately by an explosion of thunderous applause. Several parents rose to their feet, clapping enthusiastically, while others eagerly scribbled notes in their journals. The smile on my mother’s face grew wider, basking in the adoration of the crowd. But inside me, a thousand rusted blades were tearing through my stomach. The thick, coppery taste of blood surged into my mouth. I clamped my teeth together, fighting the urge to vomit. Not here. Not now. This is their crowning achievement. I can’t ruin it. But my body betrayed me. A dark thread of crimson began to trickle down the corner of my mouth, stark against my pale skin. Someone in the front row gasped. “Oh my god! Look at her mouth! Is that blood?” My mother’s smile faltered. She stepped closer to me, her voice dropping to a harsh, venomous whisper. “Hannah, what the hell do you think you’re doing? Stop this nonsense right now.” Turning back to the crowd, she forced her face into a warm, reassuring smile. “I’m so sorry, everyone. She just found out about our little secret, and she’s throwing a bit of a tantrum.” She pointed playfully at the fake blood packet on the podium. “She must have gotten her hands on some of the stage makeup to play a prank.” But a concerned parent in the audience stood up. “Mrs. Campbell, she looks incredibly pale. Maybe you should take her to the clinic?” My mother glanced at me, her irritation growing, and waved her off. “No, she’s fine. She’s just being stubborn.” “When she’s older, she’ll understand that everything we did was out of love.” She raised the microphone again, her tone ringing with absolute conviction. “I shared our method today because I want to help other families succeed.” “I truly believe that guilt-driven parenting is the future of education.” “And my daughter is the living proof of that success.” “One day, when she graduates from Harvard and stands at the peak of her career, she will look back and thank me for every tear she shed!” A bitter, silent laugh caught in my chest, drowned in the copper tang of my own blood. But Mom… I’m never going to graduate. The world spun violently, turning into a blur of bright lights and roaring noise. My knees gave out, and I collapsed onto the stage. The room erupted into chaos. Screams clashed with frantic whispers. And for the first time, the triumphant smile on my mother’s face vanished entirely.

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I was trapped in a survival horror game with the heir to New York’s most ruthless empire—the same man who had humiliated me in the real world. Only here, the script was flipped. He was forced to play an NPC hopelessly, tragically obsessed with me. Dean Payne. In reality, he was aloof, arrogant, untouchable. Right now, he was on one knee, trembling so violently it looked like he might shatter. “Please,” he rasped, his voice rough with need. “Just give me…” The System flashing in my peripheral vision demanded that I say yes. But it didn’t give me a script. I leaned in, my lips brushing the shell of his ear, and let out a soft, mocking laugh. “You look absolutely pathetic like this,” I whispered. “It’s sickening.” 01 I won’t lie. Having Dean Payne looking up at me from his knees felt incredibly good. I wanted to savor it for just a second longer. But the translucent red text of the System hovered in the air between us, blinking with escalating urgency. [Say yes.] [Say yes say yes say yes…] I waved a hand through the holographic text, dismissing it. All around us, the eyes of the crowd tracked my movement. Some of them were actual Players; others, like me, were just NPCs. We were all dressed in identical elite prep school blazers, standing in a suffocating circle, staring blankly. This was a high school battle-royale instance. [Love or Death] The lore was simple: A vampire boy falls at first sight for a human girl, pursuing her with terrifying intensity. Because of the barrier between their species, she rejects him, over and over. Finally, crushing under the weight of his obsession, she fakes a confession of love, only to flee and hide among the student body. The boy goes utterly feral. The vampire clan uses her betrayal as an excuse to hunt humans. By day, the campus is a facade of peaceful, tension-filled interactions. By night, the masks drop, and the slaughter begins. The Players were assigned factions. Their only goal was survival. As for Dean and me? Our job was to act out the prologue. We were essentially the unskippable live-action cutscene. Inside the cavernous gymnasium, thousands of white roses had been arranged into a massive, suffocating heart. Dean knelt in the center of it, his head tilted back. The corners of his eyes were flushed with a feverish, sickly red. As his lips parted, the sharp points of his fangs caught the overhead lights. He looked entirely unraveled. Agonized by unrequited love. It was a staggering contrast to the man he was in the waking world. Dean was seven years older than me. The crown prince of the Payne family, a man who looked at the rest of the world as if it were gum stuck to his Oxford shoes. Normally, a scholarship kid like me wouldn’t even breathe the same air as him. But his younger sister, Brooke, happened to be my desk-mate and my only real friend. Right after our final exams, Brooke invited me to the family’s sprawling Hamptons estate to celebrate her birthday. The crushing weight of high school was finally off my shoulders. I let my guard down. I drank way too much champagne, got entirely lost in the labyrinth of their mansion, and stumbled through the wrong oak door. I crashed right into Dean, who had just stepped out of the shower. My face was instantly smothered in damp silk and the heavy, expensive scent of sandalwood body wash. Rubbing my bruised nose, I slurred a dizzy apology, backing away. But Dean didn’t see an accident. He saw a gold-digger playing a cheap trick. He looked down his perfectly sculpted nose at me, his eyes freezing over. “If you’re going to try and climb into my bed, you could at least use a strategy that isn’t so painfully cliché. Is this what they teach you in public school?” Brooke had run in right then, breathless, stepping between us. “Dean, stop! June isn’t like that,” she defended me. “She’s brilliant, she works three jobs, she tutors me for free. She’s my best friend. You don’t get to talk to her like that.” Dean had simply scoffed, a short, ugly sound. “Brilliant indeed. She figured out exactly how to use you to get to me.” The anger had hit me so fast it completely incinerated the alcohol in my blood. I stood tall, looking him dead in the eye, and made a vow right there on his imported rug. “Don’t flatter yourself, Mr. Payne. I could be utterly alone for the rest of my life, I could be blinded, I could throw myself off the balcony of this ridiculous house, and I still wouldn’t look twice at a man like you.” That very night, we both went to sleep and woke up trapped in this godforsaken Game. Back in the gym, Dean was still waiting for my answer. His muscles corded and jerked as he fought his programming. The same mouth that had dripped with aristocratic disdain in reality was now reduced to a broken loop of begging. “Love me. Please. Just love me.” “If I can’t have your love, I’ll wither away and die.” Listen to him. He was practically reciting bad poetry. The System prompt was flashing violently now, demanding I say yes to trigger the bloodbath. But I noticed there was no countdown timer. I reached out, hooking a finger under Dean’s rigid jaw, and forced him to look at me. I leaned in slow. “You really want me to say yes, don’t you?” I murmured. “But every word out of your mouth makes my skin crawl.” “And looking at you like this? It’s repulsive. I wish I had my phone so I could record this and show the board of directors. The great, untouchable Dean Payne, reduced to this.” I smiled, letting the words drip like acid. “You look like a dog, begging for scraps.” All the color violently drained from his face. The heavy knot of resentment in my chest finally loosened. Satisfied, I straightened my spine, ready to deliver my line and advance the plot. But before I could open my mouth, the System prompt expanded, bleeding across my entire field of vision in jagged crimson letters. [Warning: Out of Character behavior detected. NPC [June] task failed. Initiating Punishment Sequence.] [Brace yourself. 10, 9, 8, 7…] I froze. “Wait, what the hell—” “It’s too late.” I didn’t even see him stand up. Suddenly, Dean was just there, towering over me. I took a panicked step back, but he matched it, stalking forward. His eyes were glowing a dim, terrifying crimson. The fangs I had mocked were now fully elongated, resting against his lower lip. “If you refuse to love me,” he whispered, his voice dark and entirely devoid of the game’s programming, “then you can die with my love instead.” And then, he lunged. 02 Night fell instantly. The prep school warped into a hunting ground. I shoved my hands hard against his chest, breaking his grip, and turned, running as fast as my legs could carry me. Screams erupted behind me. Players and NPCs were already scattering as the slaughter began. I blended into the panicked herd, taking sharp lefts and chaotic rights until I found myself in an abandoned music room in the old wing of the campus. I threw myself behind a rotting grand piano, pressing my back against the chipped wood. My heartbeat was a physical assault against my eardrums, throbbing with a sickening rhythm. My chest heaved. I pulled my knees to my chin and clamped both hands over my mouth, terrified to even draw breath. I stayed completely frozen until the sounds of tearing flesh and screaming faded into the distance. Only then did I let out a shaky exhale. My nerves were completely fried. I needed a plan. Hiss… A sharp sting bloomed on my calf. I looked down in the gloom. I had caught my leg on something during the sprint. A thin scratch, about the length of my hand, was weeping blood. The crimson drops slid down my ankle, gathering at the bone before falling, heavy and dark, onto the floorboards. Instantly, a voice drifted down from the ceiling, light as a ghost. “Found you.” The hairs on the back of my neck stood up. I screamed, scrambling backward on my hands and knees, desperate to run. Too late. My lower back slammed into the piano keys, unleashing a heavy, atonal groan into the silent room. Dean’s hand clamped around my ankle. His grip was absolute iron, squeezing so hard I felt the bones grind together. He leaned down, his mouth open, ravenous. A violent shudder ripped through me. I kicked out with my free leg. “Dean! Snap out of it!” I yelled, my voice cracking. “Look at me! Remember who I am! If you don’t want to wake up and hate yourself, let me go right now—agh!” “Don’t—don’t bite—” It was useless. The man was gone. He was nothing but predatory instinct now. The pain hit like a lightning bolt, making me convulse. My body temperature plummeted, my strength evaporating into the cold air. The darkness pulled me under. When I opened my eyes again, the heavy velvet ceiling of the Hamptons guest room stared back at me. Was it a nightmare? I sat up, pushing the heavy duvet aside. I needed to wash my face. I swung my legs over the edge of the bed and put my weight on my feet. My right leg buckled immediately, sending me to my knees. I gasped, looking down. My right calf was covered in a sprawling, angry red rash. And right around my ankle, perfectly shaped like a hand, was a ring of dark bruises. I reached out, tapping the skin tentatively. I blinked in shock. “It doesn’t hurt?” “So… last night was real. But if I died, why did I wake up here?” And what about Dean? What the hell was happening to him? I had promised Brooke I would stay the night for her birthday weekend. I couldn’t just bolt without causing a scene. I moved mechanically, showering, dressing, and heading downstairs. I walked into the sun-drenched breakfast room and froze. Dean was sitting at the head of the long oak table, dressed in soft, grey loungewear, sipping a black espresso. Thank god he wasn’t wearing a white shirt. I took a deep breath, lifted my chin, and met his eyes. “…” “…” Absolute silence. We both snapped our heads away at the exact same second. Perfect. That confirmed it. It wasn’t a dream, and he remembered everything just as clearly as I did. Well, this was a special kind of hell. I walked to the absolute farthest end of the twelve-seat table and sat down. A moment later, Brooke wandered in, yawning and stretching. “Morning, Dean,” she mumbled, before seeing me. “June! You’re up.” She padded over, dropping into the chair next to me and leaning her head on my shoulder. “Do you have a headache? How did you sleep?” My eyes flicked to the head of the table. I caught Dean looking our way, his jaw tight. I swallowed the heavy, complicated truth sitting on my tongue. Instead, I casually reached down and rubbed my right leg. Exactly as planned, Brooke noticed. “Oh my god, why is it so red?” she gasped, dropping to a crouch to examine my calf. Her fingers brushed the skin lightly. “Does it hurt? What happened?” “It’s fine, really,” I said, pulling her back up into her chair. I raised my voice just enough to ensure it carried to the other end of the room. “I think I was just bitten by some obnoxious, blood-sucking pest.” Dean let out a harsh scoff. He pushed his chair back, the wood scraping loudly against the tile, and stood up. He walked out without touching his food. Ah, the luxury of the rich. Unlike us working-class mortals, who couldn’t afford to waste a meal. I took a massive bite of a warm dumpling, washed it down with sweet soy milk, and closed my eyes in pure, carb-induced bliss. “Maria.” Dean’s voice cut through the room. He had turned back in the doorway. “Bring a plate of dumplings and coffee up to my study.” Me: … Suddenly, the dumpling tasted like cardboard. Dean turned on his heel, his footsteps noticeably lighter as he took the stairs. He would never admit it out loud, but just a few moments ago in that dining room, he had almost lost the war with his own body. He curled his hands into fists as he walked, but the phantom sensation of soft, bruised skin beneath his fingers refused to fade. The memories of the night before slammed into his brain. The dissonant, jarring crash of the piano keys. The broken, quiet sound of her crying. And that scent. That maddening, intoxicating scent. When June had walked past him toward the end of the table, it had taken every ounce of his legendary self-control not to vault over the mahogany wood and tear into her throat. Dean closed his eyes, pinching the bridge of his nose as he let out a ragged breath. “…This is going to kill me.” 03 I politely declined Brooke’s desperate pleas for me to stay the rest of the weekend, rented a Citi Bike, and pedaled back to my reality. I say “home,” but it was a cramped, fourth-floor walk-up in Queens. I grew up in the foster system. The minute I aged out, I packed a duffel bag and never looked back. I survived high school on state grants, tips, and sheer spite. Now, I needed to build a war chest for my college tuition. My days were a blur of delivery bags, commercial dishwashers, and balancing trays of drinks. By the time I staggered through my front door, I was dead on my feet. I collapsed onto my mattress and was gone. I closed my eyes. I opened them. And I was back in the Game. After a few of these cycles, I had finally cracked the algorithm. Rule one: The transition only happened when I fell asleep at night. Rule two: An instance lasted for five in-game days. After that, we got a two-day “weekend” in reality before the next round began. Honestly, it just felt like picking up another shift, only this one offered a weekend off. Plus, Dean and I were basically glorified cutscene actors. Once we delivered our prologue lines, our shifts were over. We spent the rest of the time as background scenery, completely ignored by the Players. This time, the setting was a sprawling, Gilded Age estate. Inside a cavernous ballroom dripping with crystal chandeliers, aristocrats in heavy velvet and silk milled around long tables groaning with roasted meats and overflowing wine. And me? I was standing against the wall in a stiff, itchy maid’s uniform. God, I’m so tired. I couldn’t even escape the service industry in my nightmares. The theme of this instance was a locked-room murder mystery. A wealthy Duke was hosting a private gala, but by morning, he would be found dead in his study. The estate gates were sealed. The Players—guests at the party—couldn’t leave. They had to find the killer while surviving whatever lurked in the manor’s shadows. Dean, naturally, was playing the Duke. He stood near the fireplace in a flawlessly tailored three-piece suit. A gold-rimmed monocle caught the firelight, and the pigeon-blood rubies on his cufflinks were darker than the burgundy wine swirling in his glass. He caught my eye from across the room and gave a faint, lazy nod of acknowledgment. At that exact moment, the System pinged. My cue. I picked up a silver tray. On it rested a porcelain plate holding a delicate, gold-leaf-dusted mousse cake. It smelled incredible. My stomach gave a violent, embarrassing rumble. I had been running between jobs all day in the real world and hadn’t eaten a thing. Now that I was standing still, the hunger was a physical ache. I walked over. Dean dabbed the corners of his mouth with a linen napkin and spoke, his tone unhurried and dripping with condescension. “Allow me to remind you, you are currently a maid.” “You don’t want to get punished for breaking character again, do you?” I: “…” I took a slow, deep breath. “Please.” Dean’s eyes narrowed slightly. “Unacceptable. Where is the title? My status here is quite obvious.” He’s really getting into this, the pretentious bastard. I kept my face entirely blank. “This was prepared specifically for you. Please taste it.” Dean looked at me with faux pity. “So slow. Tell me, are you only capable of memorizing textbooks?” He leaned in slightly. “Repeat after me.” “Please enjoy, Master.” I shot him a look that could have shattered glass. This was petty, targeted revenge, wasn’t it? Dean met my glare with absolute calm. “Don’t forget the expression. You need to smile. Say it. Now.” I ground my molars together until my jaw ached. My lips twitched into a horrifying, rigid smile. “Please enjoy… M-Maste—” Before I could force the word out, the System prompt violently flashed red. [Dining phase concluded. NPC [Dean] failed to complete mandatory action. Task failed.] [Initiating Punishment Sequence. Rolling random penalty… Penalty selected.] [NPC [Dean]: Lethal Poison Experience activated.] A split second later, all the rigid aristocracy vanished from Dean’s posture. His knees buckled, and he pitched sideways. I caught him by the shoulders, plastering on my brightest, most venomous retail smile. “Do you require assistance…?” “Master?”

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Everyone thinks I’m a social climber trying to trap Bobby Welles into a marriage. A gold digger desperate to secure the bag. In reality? The man has a severe cognitive disorder. He doesn’t see me as a woman. He thinks I’m a cat. My System and I are at our wits’ end. Once again, I try proposing to him. Bobby sighs, his voice dripping with endless patience. “Sweetheart, humans and cats can’t legally marry.” Hearing this for the hundredth time, I lose my temper. I slap him across the face. He winces, his sharp jaw clenching as those deep, dark eyes narrow in slight pain. I feel a spark of hope. Did I finally snap him out of it? Then he gets up to grab the nail clippers, muttering under his breath, “Looks like somebody needs her claws trimmed.” I scream internally. “System! His affection meter is at a hundred percent! Why do we have to get married to clear this stupid quest?!” System: “You’re the one who wanted the shortcut, remember? I told you we should have cured his cognitive glitch first.” Bobby scoops me up and sets me on his lap. He gently holds my hand, carefully trimming my nails. The afternoon sun filters through the window, catching the absolute devotion in his eyes. To anyone else, it would look incredibly intimate. But to Bobby, this is just a routine chore for a dedicated pet owner. As long as I sit still, he’ll praise me, calling me his “regal, precious little champion.” I let out a bitter, breathless laugh. “I am a human.” … Bobby’s expression softens with that complicated look you give a kitten who has suddenly started pondering the universe. He’s proud, yet reluctant to shatter my illusions. “If you want to believe that, sweetheart, then you are.” A moment later, he pauses, looking puzzled. “How come I’ve never heard you meow?” Hope flares up in my chest. I stare at him, practically begging him with my eyes to put the pieces together. He just chuckles, going back to trimming my nails. There is a quiet, secret pride in his smile. “Of course. A genius kitten doesn’t need to meow.” System: “I’m out of ideas. The man would literally believe in a talking cat before he believes you’re a human. I can’t watch this anymore. I’m going to the shop to see if there are any useful items.” A few months ago, I was laid off from my dead-end marketing job. I was sitting on a plastic crate by the curb, chewing on a cold sandwich, when a rogue System bound itself to me. It told me my target was Bobby Welles—a man worth billions. I looked down at my split ends, my pilled sweater, and my scuffed sneakers. I blinked. “Me?” System: “Yes. He’s about to walk past.” I thought it was a joke. But then Bobby stopped in front of me. His usually cold, aloof gaze melted into pure, ecstatic wonder. He practically scooped me up, threw me into his car, and took me home. A filthy, unemployed human is a nuisance. But a scruffy, abandoned stray? You better grab her before someone else does. At first, I thought I was just a natural seductress. Until the night he dragged me to the bathroom door and immediately started trying to pull my clothes off. I reacted on instinct and punched him right in the jaw. He made these soft, shushing sounds, turning on the shower head. “Don’t be scared. It’s just bath time.” It was terrifying. I snatched the shower head and sprayed him straight in the face. He ended up completely soaked, his white shirt clinging to his chest and abs in a highly distracting way. Water dripped down his brow and jawline. He went silent, turned around, and walked out. I followed him, only to find him on his phone, googling: “What to do when a feral rescue refuses to bathe.” …? After a series of tests, the System and I concluded that Bobby wasn’t insane, nor did he have some bizarre roleplay kink. He genuinely had a cognitive blind spot. He truly believed I was a cat. Even when I tried to run away, he just assumed I was having a stress response. He’d gently coax me back, whispering sweet nothings. To break the illusion, I once dragged him to a cat cafe. I picked up a calico and held it right next to my face. “Look at me! Do we look the same to you?!” Bobby’s face flushed. He stumbled backward, waving his hands. I pressed closer. His breathing grew shallow, and tiny red hives started breaking out on his arms. The terrified staff rushed over with allergy medicine and ushered him out. Right. Bobby, the ultimate cat lover, was severely allergic to cat dander. Because of this, he spoiled me twice as hard. Thanks to him, I stepped foot into a luxury boutique for the first time in my life. By then, I had already given up on trying to prove my humanity. Honestly, Bobby was great at this. If you ignored the cat thing, he treated me like royalty. I had free rein of his credit cards, I could make a mess of the house, and I didn’t even have to dress up or wear makeup to win him over. I just lounged around in my pajamas, scavenging for snacks, and his affection meter would skyrocket. Occasionally, when I got annoyed by his constant cuddling and smacked him, he’d just chuckle and say, “My fierce little girl.” As I sat there, he draped one diamond necklace after another around my neck. “Wrap them all up,” he told the sales associate. Then he looked at me, entirely earnest. “Every single one looks beautiful on my little kitty.” Under the sales associate’s shocked-turned-knowing gaze, I wanted the ground to swallow me whole. I clamped my hand over his mouth and dragged him out. Before long, rumors spread that Bobby was keeping a pampered mistress. Meanwhile, I looked at the progress bar and accepted my fate. I let him take endless photos of me sleeping to use as his lock screen. I let him collect my stray hairs after blow-drying my hair, muttering about how “shedding season requires better nutrition.” I got used to waking up to him kneeling by the bed, watching me open my eyes, letting out a soft, adoring sigh. I even stopped resisting when he insisted on taking me to his office. He was a permissive pet parent, and I was a spoiled pet. So when I ran into my former tyrannical manager at Bobby’s corporate headquarters, I didn’t hesitate to point a finger. “He’s an animal abuser. Are you going to let him slide?” But running wild like this eventually brought its own karma. Lately, Bobby had been acting strange. No more hugs. No more kisses. He would cook dinner, slide my plate across the table, and immediately walk away. Sometimes I’d catch him muttering to himself in dark corners, wrapped in a heavy, suffocating cloud of self-loathing. When did this start? I think it was the night he picked me up, weighed me in his arms, and sighed miserably about why he couldn’t get me to gain weight. Then he desperately begged me to sleep in his bed. But why should I? If I could clear this quest lying down, why should I do any work? I had struggled against his solid chest, suffocating in his muscles. He held me tight, kissing the top of my head repeatedly. A bed. A man and a woman. Hugs and kisses. All the ingredients of a romance. But there was zero sexual tension. Nobody tries to set a mood by rubbing your hair into a bird’s nest. As I was lost in thought, a sudden splash of hot coffee hit my thigh. The searing heat made me gasp, tears instantly welling in my eyes. The assistant shrugged carelessly. “Oh, sorry. You should really watch where you’re standing, Ms. Mercer.” I knew this guy. I’d overheard him in the breakroom once, laughing with some coworkers, calling me a gold-digging parasite who would get dumped the second Bobby got bored. So that was it. He thought because Bobby had been distant lately, I was easy prey. I stood up, gritting my teeth, and called out, “Bobby!” Usually, whenever I called his name, he’d appear in a flash, looking thrilled, and fix whatever problem I had. I had grown soft relying on him. But this time, there was only silence. In the quiet, tense office, my face burned with humiliation. The assistant smirked. “Mr. Welles didn’t tell you? He’s out with Miss Davenport. Their families are discussing an alliance. She’s actual old money. Not like some people who think a little attention means they’re getting a ring.” He sneered, turning on his heel and walking out. The System returned to find me sitting on the sofa, looking hollow. A red, angry burn was blooming on my thigh, and my white dress was stained with brown coffee. It gasped. “Host, what happened?” I shook my head. I used to be an orphan who spent her life walking on eggshells, reading the room. But in just a few months, Bobby’s endless spoiling had made me weak. I had gotten used to him fighting my battles, used to his unconditional warmth. I had forgotten how to defend myself. “System, if I forfeit the quest now, do I still get the ten thousand dollar consolation prize?” “Yes, but the completion reward is a million.” I stood up. When I walked out, the main floor was mostly empty. The remaining staff looked at me in surprise. I only asked where that assistant’s desk was. Once I found it, I saw his files and a fresh cup of coffee sitting there. I reached out and swept my hand across the desk, letting out a soft laugh. The coffee drenched his chair and his expensive wool coat. If being a social climber meant behaving badly, then in Bobby’s mind, I was just a kitten acting out. System: “Host… I actually managed to buy the cognitive correction item. Do you want to use it?” When Bobby returned, he carried the faint scent of a woman’s expensive perfume. But the moment he saw me, the exhaustion melted from his face. Then his eyes fell on my stained dress and the red burn on my skin. His expression darkened instantly as he rushed over. “What happened? Who did this?” My anger, which had finally cooled, flared up again at his sudden warmth. I turned my head away, snapping, “Why do you care?” Bobby immediately began apologizing, promising he would find out who did it. He leaned down, burying his handsome face against my stomach. I tried to push him away, but he only clung tighter. “Don’t be mad at me, Kitty,” he murmured, his voice muffled. “Please don’t leave. You were so thin when you lived on the streets. Last night, I dreamed I was a stray again, with no one to love me.” I looked down at the correction item in my hand, suddenly hesitating. Maybe I should just let it go. Was going back to cheap takeout, terrible bosses, and a cramped apartment really better than being Bobby’s pampered cat? But if Bobby married someone else, what would I be? I tested the waters. “What did you do today?” His fingers twitched, and he pulled back slightly. “…I met with a family friend. Lately, I’ve been thinking… maybe it’s time I settle down.” I fell silent. Over the next few days, I quietly packed my bags, whispering a tearful goodbye to the beautiful clothes and jewelry in the closet. Bobby truly had impeccable taste. I had never looked healthier, my skin glowing and my hair shining. Then, I had the System activate the item. I braced myself for the next morning, when Bobby would wake up, realize he was harboring a grown woman, and throw me out. I spent the night calculating the value of the things I could take with me, deciding I’d still come out ahead. The next morning, I took a deep breath and opened the bedroom door. Bobby was already gone.

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Charles’s friends made a bet with him: “Win over the Barnett heiress, and I’ll write you a check for ten million.” His childhood sweetheart, Victoria, literally wrote him a ten-thousand-word playbook on how to seduce me. With a smug smirk, Charles accepted. The plan? Make me fall madly in love with him, dump me at the altar, and then turn around and marry Victoria. For nearly two years, he broadcasted our entire relationship, live-updating his group chat with every intimate detail. When my brother, who holds the financial lifeline of the Kingsley empire in his hands, asked me what I wanted to do about it, I just smiled. “Let’s remind them,” I said, “that you don’t play games with a Barnett.” …… Charles and I were finally engaged. The moment the announcement went public, our entire social circle erupted. The notoriously hard-to-please Barnett heiress had finally been tamed by the golden boy of the Kingsley dynasty. Charles had spent a year and a half pursuing me, and he had done it with the kind of grand, cinematic intensity that made headlines. Everyone in the city knew just how desperately devoted he was. When I casually mentioned wanting to escape to a spa, he chartered a private jet that very night to fly us to St. Barts. Whenever I pulled late nights at the office, he’d be waiting downstairs in the biting cold, holding a warm cup of my favorite chamomile tea and a fresh, flaky croissant tucked inside his cashmere coat to keep it warm. Once, I offhandedly remarked how much I loved the quiet melancholy of golden hour. To celebrate our first anniversary, he rented out an entire gallery in Chelsea, commissioning artists to paint the sunset in ninety-eight different cities around the world. My parents were thoroughly charmed. “He’s steady, Caroline,” my father had told me, patting his shoulder. “He’s the kind of man I can trust to take care of you.” “In this life, sweetheart,” my mother whispered, tears in her eyes, “marrying the right person is everything.” And I believed them. I believed him. I thought the fierce, breathtaking way he cared for me was because I was the only thing in his universe. Until his phone lit up on the nightstand. “Congrats, babe. The show is finally coming to an end. Wait until she’s in her wedding dress to dump her—it’ll be so much more dramatic. Once the bet is settled, you can finally come back to me.” I stared at the screen for what felt like an eternity. “Wait until she’s in her wedding dress to dump her.” “Once the bet is settled.” “The show is finally coming to an end.” My hand was remarkably steady as I picked up the device. He had set his passcode in front of me once, looking deeply into my eyes and promising that every password he owned would always be my birthday. I typed in the digits. The screen slid open. Pinned at the very top of his chat list was a group message. The title read: “The Playbook: Mission Seduction 3”. There were seven members, all hiding behind cartoon avatars and pseudonyms. I tapped into it and scrolled all the way back to the beginning. The group had been created nineteen months ago. Just a few days before I met Charles Kingsley. The group description read: “Dedicated entirely to Charles’s strategic pursuit of Caroline. Strictly confidential. Anyone who leaks screenshots dies single.” The very first message was from an account with a white tulip avatar. Victoria: @everyone Hey guys, got some great news. Charles lost a bet to Tyler, so now he has to seduce Caroline Barnett. To help him win, I’ve put together a step-by-step playbook. I’ll drop the strategies in here as we go, so make sure to back him up.” Tyler: Lmao holy shit, Charles, you’re a madman! Caroline is notoriously cold. Are you sure you can pull this off?” Wes: Why wouldn’t he? He’s got Tori’s playbook. Tori practically knows Caroline’s bra size at this point.” Victoria: @Wes Gross, shut up. I don’t care about her. I’m just doing the background research for Charles.” Charles: @Victoria Thanks, Tori. When I win, we split the money fifty-fifty.” Victoria: I don’t want the money, Charles. I just want you to get this over with so you can come back to me.” As I scrolled down, my fingers began to tremble, the chill creeping up my spine. Every single detail of our relationship had been a choreographed performance. The “chance” encounter at the university library. His opening line. The specific vintage roses he bought for our first date, the indie French film we watched, the rooftop proposal under the stars. All scripted by Victoria. I scrolled to the messages from just a few days ago. Victoria: I picked out the engagement ring. Tell her you spent months designing it yourself—she’ll eat it up. Also, she loves grand gestures, so make a scene when you propose. She’ll definitely cry.” Charles: She did cry. Thanks, Tori.” Victoria: Anytime. When are the engagement photos?” Charles: Next week.” Victoria: Perfect. Once the photos are done, you can pull the plug a week before the wedding.” Tyler: Oh man, I cannot wait! Caroline is going to be standing there in her white dress waiting for her groom, only for him to completely vanish. Comedy gold!” Wes: You guys are sick, but I love it. Make sure to livestream her reaction!” Victoria: Don’t be cruel, guys. Let her keep a little dignity.” Charles: Don’t worry, I won’t make it too brutal. I’ll just tell her I fell out of love and walk away. A ‘clean break.’” Victoria: I trust you, Charles. I’ll be waiting.” I carefully set the phone back on the nightstand, exactly where it had been. In the adjoining bathroom, the sound of running water hummed steadily. I sat on the edge of the bed, feeling the warmth drain from my limbs until my blood felt like ice. Every memory that had ever made my heart flutter flashed before my eyes, tarnished and hollow. The first time he took me to the movies, choosing that obscure, melancholic romance film I adored. Victoria: According to her private Tumblr, she’s watched that movie three times. If you ask her to watch it, she’ll think you’re soulmates.” The way he would walk me to my brownstone door, kiss my forehead, and whisper, “Goodnight, Caroline. See you tomorrow.” Victoria: Don’t be too clingy, but don’t be distant either. Just say goodnight every single day. Make it a habit. The moment you skip a day, she’ll feel the void.” The first time he held my hand, during the first snow of the season. Victoria: The weather channel says it’s going to snow next Tuesday. Take her for a walk. When the flakes start falling, casually take her hand and say, ‘Your hands are freezing, let me warm them up.’ It works every single time.” Every flutter of my heart, every breath caught in my throat—all of it had been calculated down to the decimal point. The next morning, he left early, citing an urgent meeting at the office. The moment his car pulled out of the driveway, I opened my laptop. I didn’t just guess his password; I bypassed his cloud security to mirror his message logs. I scrolled through the history of that group chat, reading from the very beginning. The further I read, the colder I became. I watched Victoria dissect my personality like a specimen on a tray. Victoria: Caroline Barnett looks like a spoiled, untouchable princess on the outside, but she’s actually starved for affection. Her parents adore her, but they’ve been married to their careers her whole life. She grew up lonely. If you pay attention to the tiny details, if you pretend to be hyper-focused on her, she’ll fall. Nobody has ever given her that kind of undivided attention before.” Then came the dissection of my daily life. Victoria: I found her anonymous Instagram account under ‘caro_blue_98.’ She posts her raw thoughts there. Everything she loves, everything she hates—it’s all there. Just stick to the playbook, Charles, and you can’t fail.” She had found my private sanctuary. The thoughts I typed out in the dead of night—my insecurities, my loneliness, my desperate hope of finding someone who truly saw me. It was all just raw material for her script. I saw their dialogue filled with mockery. Tyler: Seriously, Caroline used to be so untouchable. She wouldn’t even look at us back in college. Now Charles has her completely wrapped around his finger. It’s hilarious.” Wes: Doesn’t matter how wild the filly is, she’ll eventually bow to a skilled rider.” Wyatt: To be fair, she’s absolutely stunning. That body is insane. You got a sweet deal, Charles.” Charles: @Wyatt Watch your mouth. It’s strictly business.” Victoria: @Charles You’d better remember that.” Charles: Don’t worry. You’re the only one I care about.” I closed my laptop. I walked into the bathroom, leaning over the marble sink, and stared at my reflection. My eyes were bloodshot. My makeup was smudged. I turned on the faucet, splashing freezing water onto my face over and over again until my skin stung. Then I looked up and looked myself in the eye. “Caroline Barnett, who used to be?” You were the daughter of one of the most powerful families in New York. You were raised to hold your head high, to never tolerate disrespect, to cut off anyone who dared cross you. You were fierce, unapologetic, and sharp. But what had you become over the past nineteen months? You learned how to cook his favorite meals. You learned how to swallow your pride, how to compromise, how to mold yourself into whatever made him happy. You thought it was love. And what was it really? You were just a trophy in a rich boys’ bet. Over the next week, I systematically exported and saved every single message from that chat. One evening, while we were watching a movie on the sofa, Charles turned to me, his gaze swimming with affection. “Caroline, meeting you is the absolute best thing that’s ever happened to me.” Immediately, Victoria’s notes flashed in my mind: “This line is critical. Look directly into her eyes when you say it. Be sincere. She’s incredibly susceptible to intense eye contact.” He did look directly into my eyes. He looked so sincere it was terrifying. I forced a soft smile and leaned into his chest. “Have you ever said that to anyone else, Charles?” His hand, which had been stroking my hair, paused for a fraction of a second. “Of course not. You’re the first. The only one.” Before the movie even finished, Charles stood up, claiming he had urgent work to finish in his study. In the past, I would have quietly let him go, careful not to disturb his focus. Now, I opened my mirrored logs. Sure enough, he was online, syncing his progress with Victoria. Victoria: Charles, if Caroline asks if you’ve ever said those things to anyone else, tell her she’s the first. She’s possessive and needs to feel like she’s unique.” Tyler: Lmao, even though you and Tori have literally done everything under the sun?” Charles: @Tyler Fuck off.” “You’re the first.” He had delivered the line perfectly. Word for word. Every intimate moment we shared was immediately packaged and broadcasted to his friends. The hollow ache in my chest turned into absolute numbness. I began noticing details I had previously been blind to. The comforting hot tea he brewed for me when I had cramps—always the exact same temperature, the exact same hint of honey—was because Victoria had written down the precise recipe in his notes. The weekend getaways he planned—every single destination had been handpicked by Victoria because she knew “they were the perfect backdrops to foster intimacy.” The handwritten letters he sent me, which I kept locked in my vanity drawer like sacred relics. Reading them now, I could see Victoria’s cadence in every line. I had once told him I loved the golden hour. He had claimed he did, too. Now I realized it was only because Victoria told him that pretending to share my love for twilight would make me feel like we were destined. I took a slow sip of my coffee. The notifications on my screen kept flashing. Victoria: @Charles Did you guys finish the wedding photos? I’m flying back to New York next week. Want to meet up?” Charles: @Victoria She’s at home right now, can’t talk. I’ll definitely see you before the wedding next week.” Victoria: Okay. I’ll be waiting.” Tyler: Holy shit, the grand finale is almost here! I’ve already ordered the champagne. Once Charles dumps Caroline, we’re celebrating in style!” Wes: Count me in!” He was supposed to dump me a week before the wedding. Which meant I had exactly seven days left. Seven days until the wedding. My bridal gowns arrived, delivered by three different haute couture ateliers. As I tried them on one by one, Charles stood by, his eyes glistening with what looked like unshed tears. “Caroline, you are absolutely breathtaking.” “Am I?” I twirled slowly in front of the tri-fold mirror. “Which one do you like best?” “You look gorgeous in all of them.” In his head, he was reciting Victoria’s advice: “When she tries on dresses, don’t give too many opinions. Just tell her she looks stunning in everything. When a woman tries on wedding dresses, she wants praise, not critiques.” “Then I’ll go with this one,” I said, pointing casually at a lace gown. He stepped forward, wrapping his arms around me from behind. “Caroline, being able to marry you is the greatest gift of my life.” I looked at our reflection in the mirror. One of us was performing. The other was watching the show. “Charles,” I said softly, “do you love me?” “Of course I love you.” “How much?” “More than my own life.” I smiled. “What would you be willing to do for me?” He paused, clearly caught off guard by the intensity of the question. “Anything. Absolutely anything.” “Oh?” I turned around in his embrace, looking directly into his eyes. “What if I asked you to never speak to Victoria again?” His expression froze. It was barely a flicker—a momentary hitch in his breathing—but I caught it. “Victoria?” He chuckled, forcing a casual shrug. “Where is this coming from?” “Nothing. I just heard she’s your childhood sweetheart, and quite beautiful. I suppose I’m just paranoid that once you see her again, you won’t want me anymore.” “Silly girl,” he murmured, pulling me tight against his chest. “She’s ancient history. You’re the only one in my heart.” I gently untangled myself from his arms, keeping my voice light. “I’m going to use the restroom.” The moment the bathroom door clicked shut, I leaned against it. My hands were shaking. My chest burned with a quiet, dangerous rage. I pulled out my phone and dialed my brother, William. “Will, I need you to look into something for me.” “What’s up?” “Find out what kind of bet Charles Kingsley made with Tyler and their friends about nineteen months ago.” The line went dead quiet for a long second. “Why are you asking about that now, Caro?” “Don’t ask questions, just find out. I need it as soon as possible.” “…Alright. Let me make some calls.” By the following afternoon, William called me back. “Caroline… I found what you were looking for.” “Tell me.” “Nineteen months ago, Charles was drinking with Tyler’s crowd. Tyler provoked him, saying there was no way in hell he could ever land Caroline Barnett. Charles slammed his glass on the table and said, ‘No way? Not only will I get her, but I’ll make her completely, hopelessly obsessed with me, and then I’ll dump her at the altar.’” “How much was the bet?” “Ten million dollars.” “And?” “They brought in Victoria to write the playbook. She’s Charles’s ex-girlfriend from college. They’ve been off-and-on for years.” I could hear the fury rising in William’s voice, but I kept my own tone remarkably level, warning him to keep quiet for now. “Caroline,” William said, his voice deep and dark. “What do you want to do?” “What do I want to do?” I looked at my reflection in the window, my lips curving into a cold, sharp smile. “I want to teach them exactly what happens when you try to play a Barnett.”

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I listed our World Cup final tickets on a resale app, and in less than five minutes, a buyer messaged me. “Hey girl, I’ll pay seventy thousand for the pair.” “If you aren’t happy with that, I can go higher.” I stared at the offer for a few seconds, my chest tightening. I typed back: “No need. That’s way too high. I’ll transfer them to you at face value.” Her reply came instantly, bubbling with gratitude: “Oh my god, thank you so much! I’ve been looking everywhere and couldn’t find tickets anywhere.” “My husband told me that as long as I’m happy, money doesn’t matter.” My throat went dry, a bitter taste rising in my mouth. Those two tickets were supposed to be our fifth-anniversary present. I had spent months planning this. But Jack, my husband, had scoffed at the price and insisted I sell them. The night of the final, Jack was away on another “business trip.” During the eighty-seventh minute of the match, my phone lit up with a text from him. “Hey babe, I’m going to have to pull an all-nighter at the office. Go to sleep early.” I had just typed back “Okay” when the game-winning goal was scored on screen. The stadium erupted. People were screaming, embracing, lost in the collective madness. The camera panned across Section C of the crowd, capturing a man fiercely wrapping his arms around a young woman and kissing her deeply. The shot lasted only a second, but it was long enough for the glow of the television to wash over my suddenly bloodless face. Section C, Row Seven. Consecutive seats. The exact tickets I had hand-delivered to the buyer on the resale app. And the man who was holding her—the one who, a minute ago, told me he was stuck at the office—was Jack. … The referee’s final whistle blew. Around the world, millions cheered. But my world went completely, terrifyingly quiet. To capture the raw energy of the stadium, the broadcast slowly zoomed back in on Section C. There, amidst the sea of screaming fans, Jack was dropping to one knee in front of the girl. She was wearing an oversized jersey, but it couldn’t quite conceal the gentle curve of her belly. I watched the replay all night. I played those short three seconds twenty-seven times. There was no mistake. It was him. At dawn, a notification popped up. The girl from the resale app had sent me a friend request on Instagram. My fingers felt numb as I accepted it. Instantly, a barrage of voice notes flooded my inbox. “Thank you again! My husband just proposed to me right there in the stadium!” “If you hadn’t sold us those tickets, I would have missed the most magical night of my life!” I stared at the screen, my mind completely blank. I typed out a hollow reply: “Congratulations.” Perhaps my easy transaction made her feel like she could confide in me. “I’m so sorry, my voice is practically gone today. He was just so excited last night. Once we got back to the hotel, he didn’t care about the baby at all—he kept me up until dawn…” A raw, bitter laugh escaped my throat. I remembered frantically calling Jack last night, my chest tight with panic, only for every call to be instantly declined. All I had gotten in return was a cold, text-message brush-off: “I’m in the middle of something. Stop acting crazy.” Jack didn’t come home until the following evening. He looked exhausted as he walked through the front door, immediately pulling me into his arms. “Babe, I am so sorry,” he murmured, his voice thick with simulated fatigue. “This launch has been brutal. I’ve been running on nothing but coffee, and I can’t believe I missed our anniversary.” I hadn’t slept in over thirty hours. I didn’t even have the energy to push him away. But as my cheek rested against his shoulder, my nose caught it—the distinct, lingering scent of another woman’s perfume on his collar. After a moment, Jack pulled back and slipped a cheap, plastic soccer-ball keychain into my hand. “Things were so crazy, I didn’t even have time to run to a proper store,” he said, offering a weak, apologetic smile. “I saw you were keeping up with the tournament, so I grabbed this as a little souvenir.” He kissed my forehead. “I’m exhausted. I’m going to wash off the flight.” He turned and disappeared into the bathroom. Before I could even process the weight of the plastic keychain in my palm, my phone buzzed. It was Melanie. “Hey girl! I just landed back in the States! I’d love to take you out for lunch to say thank you in person.” Directly below the text, she sent a photo of herself holding an iced latte. My eyes locked onto the ring finger of her left hand. A massive, brilliant-cut diamond ring. A month ago, I had accidentally stumbled upon the receipt for that exact ring in Jack’s email. Fifty thousand dollars. I had spent the last four weeks quietly believing it was my fifth-anniversary surprise. Now, I looked down at the plastic keychain in my hand. The price tag was still stuck to the back. “$5.” A moment later, the bathroom door opened and Jack stepped out, towel-drying his hair. “What’s wrong? You look like you’re miles away.” I looked up at him, the question finally tearing through my chest. “Jack. Were you at the game last night?” A flicker of pure, unadulterated panic flashed across his face, gone as quickly as it came. “Why would you ask that? Did you hear something?” “No,” I said, lowering my eyes to hide the shattering of my heart. “Just wondering.” He visibly relaxed, his shoulders dropping. “Babe, I was buried under a mountain of spreadsheets. I barely had time to eat, let alone go to a game.” He came over, squeezing my shoulder. “Don’t let your mind wander. I’m going to head into the study to answer a few quick emails. You should get some sleep.” Once the study door clicked shut, I went into the bedroom. There was another message from Melanie. “By the way, I’ve been meaning to ask—why did you sell those tickets? They were practically impossible to get.” A sharp ache bloomed in my chest. To surprise Jack for our anniversary, I had spent ten months waking up in the middle of the night to enter ticket lotteries. It was a miracle when I finally secured them three months ago. But when I had excitedly told him, his only reaction was to snap at me for spending fourteen thousand dollars on “something so trivial.” Yet he had happily dropped fifty thousand on a ring and seventy thousand on tickets for Melanie, just to make her smile. I took a slow, trembling breath and typed: “I was planning to go with my husband. But… I think he just didn’t want to go with me.” The screen remained silent for two minutes. Then, Melanie sent a long, earnest voice note. “Honestly, girl, I’ve always believed that if a man really loves you, he’ll make the time. No excuses.” “Last week, I had terrible stomach cramps, and my husband postponed a ten-million-dollar board meeting just to fly back and sit by my bed.” Another message popped up—a photo of a breathtaking sunrise over a private beach. “I casually mentioned that I wanted to see the sunrise on the coast, and he chartered a private jet to take me there the next morning.” Reading her words, I remembered the agonizing stomach cramps I’d had the previous week. I had called Jack, unable to even stand, and his only response was to send a pharmacy courier with a box of painkillers. I had asked him so many times if we could just take a weekend to drive down to the coast and watch the sunrise. Every single time, he told me he was too busy at the firm, adding that we were “an old married couple” and didn’t need to chase cheap thrills. It turned out he wasn’t incapable of romance. He just didn’t want to waste it on me. I stared at the screen for a long time before replying: “You’re right.” I paused, my fingers hovering over the keyboard before typing: “Are you two married?” The status changed to “typing…” and remained there for a while. Finally, she responded, her tone laced with a touch of performative guilt. “To be honest… he actually has a family.” “But I’m not some home-wrecking mistress! They don’t love each other anymore. The spark died years ago.” A cold shiver ran down my spine. I forced my shaking fingers to type: “If there’s no love left, why hasn’t he filed for divorce?” A few minutes later, Melanie sent a screenshot of her conversation with Jack. It was his face. His work account. In the screenshot, Melanie had written: “If you can’t let her go, we should end this. I don’t want to make things difficult for you.” Jack’s reply was immediate: “Mel, don’t say that.” “What I have with her isn’t love anymore. It’s just history, duty, and routine. But you… you are the one I actually want to love.” “I’ll give you everything you could ever ask for. Everything except that piece of paper.” I sat in the dark, unable to move. Ten years. Ten years of building a life together, of weathering storms, of quiet sacrifices. And in his eyes, it had all boiled down to “duty and routine.” If this was where we stood, then it was time to let the curtain fall. The next morning, before Jack could leave for the office, I called out to him. “Jack. I want a divorce.” He was standing in front of the mirror, adjusting his tie. He didn’t even turn around, just frowned slightly. “Nadine, are you seriously still throwing a fit because we didn’t go to the game?” “I’m serious.” “Look, I have a massive client meeting in thirty minutes,” he said, checking his watch before giving me a quick, dismissive kiss on the forehead. “Stop playing games. I’ll come home early tonight and we can talk.” He hurried out the door. I watched him go, a hollow laugh escaping my lips. I pulled out a suitcase and began packing, but before I could finish, my phone rang. It was the hospital. My mother had suffered a massive, sudden cardiac arrest. She was in critical condition. By the time I rushed into the ICU, the doctors told me she needed to be transferred immediately to the specialized heart unit at the city’s private medical center. If she didn’t get in, she wouldn’t survive the night. But the private wing had a waiting list miles long. Terrified and desperate, I called Jack. “Jack, my mom… she’s dying. They need to transfer her to the private wing at Presbyterian. You know the chief of medicine there. Please, can you just call him? Just ask for a bed…” On the other end of the line, Jack let out a long, irritated sigh. “Nadine, calling in a massive favor like that for a routine transfer? It’s really not worth the political capital.” My voice cracked, tears finally spilling over. “Jack, she’s dying! I’m not asking for a favor, I’m begging you to save her life!” “Look, I’ve already had my assistant call Mercy West,” his voice hardened, brooking no argument. “Their cardiac unit is perfectly fine. It’s more than enough. I’m in the middle of a board meeting. I have to go.” “Jack, please—” The line went dead. A second later, a notification banner popped up on my screen. Melanie had posted on her story. It was a photo of a small Golden Retriever puppy with a tiny pink cast on its leg. “My poor baby fell off the bed and fractured his paw. I’m literally crying.” “Thankfully, my amazing husband pulled some strings to get the head of orthopedic surgery from the private hospital to do an emergency house call.” I stared at the image, the room spinning around me. My mother’s life was a minor inconvenience. A puppy’s sprained paw was a crisis worthy of a medical director’s personal intervention. My mother didn’t make it through the afternoon. She passed away in the back of the transfer ambulance, her hand turning cold in mine before we ever reached Mercy West. In the days that followed, the sheer weight of the funeral arrangements and the suffocating grief crushed me. During a meeting with the funeral director, my vision went black, and I collapsed. When I woke up in the hospital bed, the doctor handed me a thin slip of paper. I was pregnant. I held the paper in my trembling hand, feeling nothing but a profound, sickening sense of irony. When I finally went back to the house that evening, Jack was actually in the kitchen, cooking dinner. He smiled warmly, guiding me to the table. “Nadine, try not to worry so much,” he said, pouring me a glass of water. “I made sure everything was set up at Mercy West. Your mom is in good hands there. She just needs rest, and she’ll be back on her feet in no time.” He didn’t even know. He hadn’t bothered to check. I didn’t correct him. I just stared at him, my voice completely devoid of emotion. “The doctor asked me today if we were planning on having kids soon.” The spoon in his hand paused mid-air. “Nadine, honestly, I hate the thought of you going through the physical toll of pregnancy,” he said, his tone dripping with protective concern. “And with my workload right now, I wouldn’t have the energy to support you. Let’s put that on the back burner for a few years.” I slowly folded the pregnancy test results in my pocket, my fingers squeezing the paper tight. “Okay,” I whispered. Late that night, Jack slept soundly beside me. I lay awake in the dark, my phone illuminating the room. Melanie had posted another update—a photo of a half-assembled crib. “Our little miracle gave me a kick today!” “My husband is the sweetest—the second I texted him about it, he literally walked out of his afternoon executive meeting to rush home and feel the baby move!” “An important meeting.” The exact excuse he had used to let my mother die. At 4:00 AM, while Jack’s breathing remained deep and even, I quietly got out of bed, took my keys, and drove to the women’s health clinic. I lay on the cold sterile table, letting the tears stream silently into my hair. I didn’t want this child. I didn’t want this marriage. I wanted to burn every bridge that connected me to him. As the procedure began, a sudden, blinding agony tore through my abdomen. “Wait, we have a problem! Severe hemorrhaging! Get the clamps, now!” The room erupted into chaos. The pain was a physical wall, crushing the air from my lungs. My vision began to dim. Through the panic of the nurses, my phone on the tray began to ring. A nurse, frantic, swiped it open and hit speakerphone. Jack’s voice came through, sounding annoyed. “Nadine, where the hell are you? Why aren’t you home?” The doctor barked into the phone: “Is this Nadine’s husband? Your wife is currently undergoing an emergency procedure at the medical center and is hemorrhaging severely. You need to get here immediately!” Silence fell over the line for a heartbeat. “Nadine…? What do you mean hemorrhaging? What happened?” Jack’s voice finally cracked with panic. “I’m getting in the car right now! Tell her to hold on!” His desperation gave me a fleeting anchor of consciousness. But five minutes passed. Ten minutes. Thirty minutes. The cold was seeping into my bones. My body felt weightless. Just as I felt myself slipping under, the phone rang again. The nurse answered. This time, Jack’s voice was filled with a frantic, frustrated helplessness. “Nadine, I’m so sorry! There’s a massive pileup on the bridge. Traffic is completely gridlocked. Just hang on, please! As soon as the lanes open up, I’m coming!” The call disconnected. I lay there, a final, cold clarity washing over me. He was lying. The clinic was barely two miles from our house. There was no bridge between here and there. Due to the critical blood loss, they rushed me onto a gurney to transfer me to the main emergency room. I stared at the ceiling tiles flying past, gasping for air, feeling my life slowly draining away with every beat of my heart. The double doors of the ER lobby burst open. As the gurney screeched to a halt, I turned my head slightly. And there, standing in the middle of the crowded waiting room, was Jack. He was holding Melanie in his arms, cradling her as if she were made of glass. Melanie was whimpering, holding up a finger adorned with a tiny pink band-aid. “It hurts so much, Jack…” Jack’s face was a mask of sheer panic as he yelled at a passing nurse. “Someone look at her hand! She cut herself while slicing fruit! It’s bleeding!” My gurney jolted forward, the paramedics pushing through the crowd. “Make way! Critical hemorrhage! Trauma room one!” The shouting caught Jack’s attention. He turned, looking in our direction. But he didn’t recognize me. He didn’t see the woman covered in blood as his wife. Instead, his brow furrowed in distaste, and he quickly pulled Melanie back several steps, shielding her face. “Don’t look, babe,” I heard him whisper, his voice carrying over the din. “It’s too graphic. It’ll upset you and the baby.” As the heavy doors of the trauma room swung shut and the harsh surgical lights blinded my eyes, I closed them. And in that quiet, freezing dark, the Nadine who had loved Jack for ten years finally died. ### Chapter 2 The medical team fought for four hours to pull me back from the edge. By the time the anesthesia began to wear off, my phone was blowing up with missed calls and texts from Jack. “Nadine, the clinic said you had a hemorrhage? What the hell is going on?” “Answer me, Nadine. Are you okay?” I stared at the screen, my expression flat. I didn’t reply. Half an hour later, another text arrived. “An emergency came up at the firm. I have to fly out of state for a couple of days. I’ll be back the day after tomorrow. Take care of yourself.” An emergency. Before I could even lock my phone, a message from Melanie popped up. “Hey girl! My fiancé is throwing me an engagement party tomorrow! You absolutely have to come!” Attached was a digital invitation. Emblazoned in elegant silver script were the names: “Jackie & Melanie”. The “emergency” he had to fly out for was his own engagement party to another woman. For the rest of the day, Jack’s calls and texts were relentless. “Nadine, what is this attitude?” “I am incredibly busy right now. Can you please stop throwing tantrums?” I muted his notifications. I didn’t offer a single word. The next evening, I discharged myself from the hospital. I spent an hour doing my makeup to cover the hollow, bloodless pale of my skin. I put on a sharp, floor-length black silk dress, slipped the signed divorce papers into my bag, and headed to the venue. Just outside the private club, I texted Melanie. “I’m here. I’m wearing a black dress.” Melanie replied instantly: “Come on up! We’re in VIP Suite 8!” I pushed open the heavy oak doors of the suite. The room was loud, filled with laughter and the clinking of expensive crystal. At the head of the long table, Melanie caught sight of me. Her eyes lit up. “Oh my god, you’re finally here!” She beamed, pulling Jack up by his arm. “Babe, let me introduce you. This is the amazing girl I told you about from the resale app!” Jack turned, a polite, practiced host’s smile on his face. But the moment our eyes met, his smile shattered. His hand seized, and his champagne flute slipped through his fingers, crashing onto the hardwood floor.

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High society is built on a scaffolding of silent, suffocating rules. When we walked out of the boutique, Willie strode shoulder-to-shoulder with my best friend, Cathy, while I was expected to walk exactly half a step behind him. “Willie, you promised you’d charter a private jet to take me to see the Northern Lights. Don’t you dare back out!” Cathy turned back, flashing me a sweet, dimpled grin. “Don’t worry, Zoey. I know how much you love the auroras. I’ll take tons of photos and send them right to you.” My feet froze on the pavement. My throat felt as if it were stuffed with dry cotton. “You two are going to see the Northern Lights… but what about me?” No one answered. They were already in the car. Cathy sat in the passenger seat of his low-slung Ferrari, looking at me with faux-contrition. “Oh, Willie, your sports car only has two seats! There’s no room for Zoey. What should we do?” Willie leaned over to click Cathy’s seatbelt into place. “She’s the future Mrs. Hogan. My mother is sending a town car to pick her up for her deportment class.” But he had forgotten—or ignored—the fact that his mother despised my working-class roots. There was no town car coming. I stood in the freezing rain for hours, waiting. And as the water soaked through my thin coat, something shifted inside me. If he wanted to walk shoulder-to-shoulder with my best friend, then I would simply step out of the frame and let her have him. … When I finally got back to our penthouse that night, Willie was sitting in the living room, waiting. “You skipped your etiquette lessons at the estate today. Mother is furious.” I said nothing. I just flipped on the light. His eyes swept over my dripping wet clothes, his brow furrowing. “Look at you. You’re a mess. Is this how the future Mrs. Hogan behaves? You have no sense of decorum.” I had been standing in a downpour all day. My skin was burning with a high fever, yet his only concern was that I was embarrassing him. “Willie…” I started, my voice cracking. But before I could finish, his phone chimed. It was a high-pitched, childish ringtone—a nursery rhyme melody. It was Cathy’s custom ringtone. Three days ago, when she had whined and begged him to set it, Willie had scoffed and called it childish. Yet, he had never changed it back. Willie raised a finger to his lips, signaling me to shut up. “Willie,” Cathy whimpered on the other end, her voice thick with tears. “I cut my finger. It hurts so bad.” He immediately grabbed his leather jacket from the coat rack. “Hang tight. I’m on my way.” As he brushed past me, I reached out and grabbed his sleeve. My voice was a dry rasp. “I have a fever, Willie.” He paused, pulling out his phone to make a quick call. “Have Dr. Gallagher head over to the penthouse. The future Mrs. Hogan is sick.” I bit my lip, a faint warmth blooming in my chest. But a second later, Willie gently but firmly pried my fingers off his sleeve. “I’ve got the doctor and my assistant on the way to look after you. But Cathy needs me right now.” I stared at him, numb. “Willie, I am your fiancée.” “I know,” he said, his expression flat. “Which is exactly why I can’t stay.” “A Hogan man is meant to rule the boardroom, not play nurse to a sick wife. You know the family rules.” Always those rules. To marry Willie, I had to mold myself into a ghost. At dinner, I had to wait for him to take the first bite. The moment he set his fork down, I had to stop eating too. In the beginning, when I lay awake at night, starving, Willie would sneak into my room with takeout, wrapping his arms around me. ‘Just bear with it a little longer, for me,’ he’d whisper. I bore it. For three years. But those sweet midnight visits had long since stopped. When I lay awake starving now, Willie was thousands of miles away. His Instagram location tag was set to a luxury resort in Malaysia. So was Cathy’s—my best friend of ten years. Cathy had posted a photo of the two of them on her feed. The caption read: ‘Day one of testing out Willie’s husband potential on behalf of my girl Zoey.’ Beneath it, she added: ‘I mentioned wanting to see the ocean, and he whisked me away to paradise.’ My phone buzzed. It was a direct message from Cathy: ‘Zoey, it’s my first time seeing the ocean! It’s so beautiful. I know you always wanted an island wedding, but with the strict Hogan rules, you probably won’t ever get to come here. Don’t worry, though—I’m enjoying the view for both of us!’ In the photo she attached, Cathy wore a flowing white sundress. Willie stood beside her in a tailored white linen suit. It wasn’t a wedding, but it looked exactly like one. And while they were sipping cocktails on a beach, I had been standing in his mother’s salon, a heavy book balanced on my head, my palms raw and bruised from the wooden ruler his mother used to correct my posture. During a brief five-minute break, I had pulled out my phone, desperate to cry to my fiancé about how much I hurt. Instead, I saw their vacation photos. The words ‘it hurts’ died in my throat. Every time after that, he chose her. When Cathy wanted to travel the world, Willie booked the flights. When Willie wanted to drag race down dark coastal highways at midnight, Cathy was the one laughing in his passenger seat. They lived out a wild, reckless youth together, singing at the top of their lungs to heal their phantom regrets. Meanwhile, I was kneeling on the cold marble floor of the Hogan private chapel, reciting their ancestral codes of conduct over and over, terrified of making a single mistake. I wasn’t blind. I knew something was deeply wrong, but I had been too afraid to look closer. How do you throw away a twenty-year friendship and a seven-year relationship? But tonight, the thread finally snapped. I stared at Willie’s retreating back, my eyes burning. “If you walk out that door to go to Cathy, we’re over.” Willie stopped in his tracks, his shoulders stiffening. “What is wrong with you? Don’t start throwing tantrums.” “I’m doing this for you. Cathy is your best friend. If something happens to her, won’t you be the one crying?” But they had crossed the line of friendship a long time ago. Willie still didn’t understand. I wasn’t angry because he was helping Cathy; I was angry because, in every single moment that mattered, he never chose me. The passenger seat next to him always belonged to her. I looked at him, my voice barely a whisper. “So you can’t stay to take care of your sick fiancée, but you can run to take care of her?” “Why are you comparing yourself to her?” Willie said, his tone entirely reasonable, as if explaining something to a child. “You’re going to be Mrs. Hogan. She is just a friend. The family rules don’t apply to friends.” If being “just a friend” meant receiving your devotion and protection, then I would rather be your friend. But I wasn’t. I lowered my head, hiding the raw vulnerability in my eyes. “If that’s how you see it… then go.” “Being understanding is the grace expected of a Hogan wife,” Willie remarked, offering his usual critique. As he opened the door, he looked back one last time. “Dr. Gallagher is the family’s private physician. He’s the best there is. A minor fever is nothing to him. You’re in good hands.” I gave a faint nod, silent. He took my quietness as stubbornness and let out a cold laugh. “You still haven’t learned your place, have you? To think you’re actually giving me attitude. I’ll have Mother give you a proper lesson tomorrow.” There wouldn’t be a tomorrow. Willie, the moment your foot crossed that threshold, we were done. I opened my mouth to say it, but the elevator doors had already slid shut, whisking him away. I let the words dissolve. It didn’t matter anymore. I called Dr. Gallagher and told him not to bother coming. I found some generic ibuprofen in the medicine cabinet, swallowed them with cold water, and dragged myself into a hot shower. When I came out, my phone was buzzing on the counter. It was a text from Cathy: ‘Zoey, I am so incredibly jealous of your fiancé! By the time he got here, the scratch on my finger was already scabbing over, but he was still so worried that he practically dragged me to the ER anyway.’ A sharp, physical pain bloomed in my chest. My fever was a “minor illness,” but her tiny scratch deserved an emergency room run. Quiet tears slipped down my face. I wiped them away with the back of my hand. Cutting out infected flesh is always agonizing, but I didn’t have another seven years to waste on a man who didn’t love me. I pulled a suitcase out of the closet and began to pack. It took less than ten minutes. The penthouse held almost nothing of mine. Willie had always told me: ‘You are going to be Mrs. Hogan. The family’s legacy has no room for cheap, unrefined trinkets from your past.’ Yet, on his nightstand sat a cheap plastic bunny Cathy had bought him at a dollar store. Hanging from his Ferrari key fob was a tacky two-dollar keychain she had given him. Only my gifts—like the intricate, hand-woven cord bracelet I had spent days making—had been taken off his wrist and left to gather dust in a drawer. I grabbed the bracelet and threw it into the fireplace, watching the threads blacken and curl into ash. Beside the jewelry box was the cherrywood charm I had hand-carved. The year he went to London for his MBA, I couldn’t bear the thought of being apart from him. There was a trend on campus back then—gifting a ‘bleeding heart’ charm, a hollowed-out wooden cube with a single red seed sealed inside, symbolizing a love carved deep into the bone. I had spent nights sanding that tiny piece of wood, my fingertips raw and bleeding, just to hollow it out and slip a single scarlet seed inside. When Willie received it, he had nearly cried. ‘Zoey, if you don’t want me to go, I won’t.’ And he didn’t. He stayed, while I worked three different part-time jobs, running myself ragged trying to keep us afloat. Cathy had sipped her iced coffee, offering with a sweet smile, “I’ll look after him for you, Zoey. I won’t let any social climbers get close to him.” I had believed her. Back in the orphanage, when the older kids used to bully me, Cathy was the only one who stood up for me. She would take the punches, her face bruised and swollen, but she never let go of me. When we aged out, I worked double shifts to pay for our apartment and college tuition. Willie had scoffed back then. ‘Is Cathy helpless? She’s a grown woman—can’t she take care of herself?’ ‘Don’t talk about her like that!’ I had snapped back. ‘I promised I would take care of her forever. Even if she never gets a job, I’ll support her.’ Back then, I thought I was the luckiest girl in the world to have them both. But in the end, the two people I would have died for were the ones who stabbed me in the back. I threw the carved cherrywood charm into the trash can. I was throwing them away, too. When I changed, I didn’t touch any of the designer clothes Willie had bought me. Instead, I pulled out an old flannel shirt and a faded pair of jeans from the back of the closet—the exact clothes I had been wearing the day I moved in. I looked at the suitcase. It was completely empty. After a moment of silence, I shoved the suitcase back into the closet. I walked out of the penthouse carrying nothing but the battered backpack I had arrived with. My phone buzzed in my pocket. A text from Willie: ‘Family dinner tomorrow night. Don’t leave after your etiquette class. I’ll have the driver pick you up to get your hair and makeup done.’ I stared at the screen, hesitating, before typing back: ‘Can you transfer me five thousand dollars?’ The day I became his fiancée, Willie’s mother had declared that a Hogan woman does not work in public. I was forced to quit my job. Worried about Cathy’s living expenses, I had given her every penny of my savings. When Willie found out, he had handed me a black card linked to his account. ‘From now on, use your husband’s money for whatever you want.’ Back then, I had been deeply moved. I never realized that once we broke up, I wouldn’t even have enough money to rent a basic apartment. Within seconds, Willie replied: ‘1’. But no money was transferred. I stared at the screen, a hollow laugh escaping my lips. I realized that for months, no matter what I texted him, Willie always replied with a simple, automated ‘1’. It meant ‘read.’ He saw the notifications, but he never actually read the words. A dull ache throbbed in my chest. I typed again: ‘I’ll sign a promissory note. Please, just lend me five thousand dollars. I really need it.’ Willie’s reply was instant: ‘1’. I stared at that single digit. A self-deprecating laugh escaped me. Cathy used to gush about it. ‘He replies instantly, Zoey! A man in his position—whose time is literally worth millions—drops everything to answer you. That is true love!’ But he never gave me anything besides that automated response. He saved his actual time, his actual presence, for her. With trembling fingers, I sent one last text: ‘My mistake, Willie. I’ll never ask you for anything again.’ This time, the reply wasn’t a ‘1’. He texted: ‘I’m at the hospital waiting on Cathy’s x-ray results. Can you please stop suffocating me?’ Fine. I wouldn’t suffocate him anymore. Never again. With no money for a hotel, I walked down to the public park, curling up on a cold wooden bench with my backpack as a pillow. In the shivering dark, memories of the day I was abandoned at the orphanage drifted back. It had been an overcast day just like this one. I could still hear my father shouting at my mother: ‘If we don’t dump this useless girl, how are we supposed to afford a son?’ My mother had been sobbing, but she still let go of my hand and left me on the orphanage steps. Watching her walk away, I had sworn to myself that I would make them regret it. I studied until my eyes bled. I worked until my bones ached. I did everything to prove I wasn’t useless. But look at me tonight. A park security guard tapped my bench with his flashlight. “No sleeping on the benches, miss. Move along.” I scrambled up, heat burning my cheeks. I looked down at my faded jeans and worn sneakers. You failed, Zoey. You’re right back where you started. As I stumbled out of the park gates, I ran right into them. Cathy was clinging to Willie’s arm, whispering something that made him chuckle. The moment Willie saw me, the smile died on his face. “Zoey?” Cathy waved excitedly. “Willie told me you had a fever! I bought a fresh durian from the market—I know how much you love it. We were just heading to the penthouse to see you. What a coincidence!” My lips twisted into a bitter smile. “Are you sure I’m the one who loves durian?” Cathy was the picky eater. She loved exotic durian. Back in college, when we had no money, I would skip meals for a week just to buy her one because she said she was craving it. I did it every single time, even if it meant living on dry ramen for days. Cathy pouted, her eyes welling with instant tears. “Zoey, you’ve changed. You never used to speak to me like that. Back then, when you bought me durian, I knew you wanted some too, but you always insisted on giving me the whole thing. Now that I have my own money, of course I wanted to buy one for you.” Willie chimed in, his voice dripping with pride. “Cathy took over your old position at the firm, Zoey. She’s a completely independent, modern career woman now.” “She took over my old position?” I stared at him, hollowed out by the betrayal. “You forced me to resign so I could learn Hogan etiquette, but you hand-delivered my job to her?” “Is there a problem with that?” Willie stepped protectively in front of Cathy. “You’re going to be my wife. You don’t need a job. But Cathy does—she doesn’t have anyone else to protect her. I pulled some strings at your old agency, handed them a few major accounts, and got her the Creative Director position you had to turn down.” Cathy smiled sweetly, stepping around Willie to loop her arm through mine. “Honestly, Zoey, you are so lucky. You get to be a lady of leisure while someone else pays for your entire life.” Her voice held a thin, sharp edge of jealousy. “Unlike me. I actually have to work for what I want.” I looked at her, quiet for a long moment. “You’re wrong,” I whispered. “A man who truly loves you doesn’t clip your wings. He helps you fly.” Just like Willie had done for Cathy. She leaned in closer, her voice dropping to a cruel whisper against my ear. “And what do you call a woman who stays in a house where she isn’t loved? A mistress?” The slap echoed in the quiet street before I even realized my hand had moved. “Cathy! We can stop being friends, but how dare you—” How dare she desecrate twenty years of shared history! I was shaking so hard I could barely stand. Black spots danced across my vision. Cathy collapsed onto the pavement, her hand landing squarely on the spiky husk of the durian. She let out a sharp cry of pain, immediately looking up at Willie with tear-filled eyes. “Willie, please… it’s just a little blood. Don’t be mad at Zoey. She didn’t mean it.” Willie’s face darkened instantly. He knelt down and scooped her into his arms. “Okay, okay, I won’t. Let’s get you to the hospital.” As he turned to leave, he barked an order to the security detail trailing behind him. “Take Zoey back to the estate. Lock her in the reflection room until she learns some goddamn discipline.” The reflection room was a windowless, cramped panic room in the basement of the Hogan manor, barely large enough for a person to curl up in. Once the heavy steel door was locked, there was nothing but suffocating darkness. During my years of being molded by Willie’s mother, I had been locked in here for days at a time. But I wasn’t Willie’s fiancée anymore. What right did he have to imprison me? I hammered on the cold steel door until my knuckles bled, drifting in and out of a feverish consciousness. But Willie never came. I bit my cracked lip, tasting copper. “Willie… please. I have a fever. Let me out.” From the other side of the door, a guard sighed. “Save your breath, miss. Mr. Willie took Miss Cathy on a private flight to Norway. He’s trying to make up for her hand injury by showing her the Northern Lights.” I froze. With trembling fingers, I pulled my phone from my pocket. In the dim blue glow of the screen, Cathy’s Instagram post loaded: ‘A trip just for me. Private jet, endless skies. Heading to see the auroras with the man who ruins me.’ The comments underneath were filled with congratulations from our mutual friends. ‘Willie taking his girl out again!’ ‘One at home, one on the road—how do you pull this off, man?’ ‘What do you mean ‘on the road’? Willie and Cathy are the real deal. I heard they’re planning to get their marriage license soon while the other one is still stuck in deportment class.’ My heart felt like it was being shredded. I dialed one of those mutual friends. “What do you mean, getting a license?” The girl on the line gasped. “Zoey? You… you saw her post? Did she forget to block you? Look, we didn’t want to keep you in the dark, but you’ve been “learning the rules” for three years. Everyone figured if you found out Willie was going to marry Cathy instead, you’d make a scene.” A yawning chasm opened up in my chest. “How long?” I managed to choke out. “How long has it been going on?” There was a pause on the other end. “Three years? Maybe four? Honestly, we lost track.” While I was working myself to the bone, giving Cathy every cent I had so she wouldn’t suffer, she was sleeping with my fiancé behind my back. Hot tears spilled over, stinging the cuts on my raw hands. The seven years of devotion, the humiliating etiquette classes, the endless sacrifices… they were all a joke. Willie, you ruined me. My phone battery died, plunging the room into absolute pitch black. I pulled my knees to my chest, sobbing until my throat was raw, eventually slipping into unconsciousness. When I finally woke up, I had lost all sense of time. My stomach was cramping violently from hunger. Over the last three years, I had learned to ignore hunger. But this pain was different—sharp, white-hot. Cold sweat drenched my clothes, leaving me unable to make a sound. Suddenly, the heavy steel door screeched open. Bright light flooded my eyes. I squinted, shielding my face as Willie stormed in, grabbing my arm and wrenching me to my feet. “Zoey! When the hell did you become a thief? Is this the kind of trash my mother is trying to turn into a Hogan?” I gritted my teeth against the pain in my stomach, barely whispering, “What… what are you talking about?” He sneered, shoving his hand into my jeans pocket and pulling out a small plastic card. “This is Cathy’s debit card! She saved her very first paycheck to buy you a nice gift, and you stole it from her!” “I didn’t,” I sobbed, shaking my head weakly. “I don’t even know her PIN.” Willie let out a harsh laugh. “Her PIN is your birthday, Zoey. It wasn’t hard to figure out.” Cathy slinked into the room behind him, looking small and helpless. “Willie, please, I’m sure Zoey didn’t mean to. Don’t be too hard on her. She must have been desperate when she asked you for money. Since you were with me and didn’t see her texts, she probably just… panicked and made a mistake.” Hearing her words, Willie’s rage flared even hotter. “I gave you a black card! Was that not enough? You had to go and steal the money Cathy worked so hard to earn?” He let go of my arm with an expression of deep disgust. “When did you become so pathetic, Zoey?” I gritted my teeth, forcing the words out. “I didn’t steal it. She must have slipped it into my pocket when we were at the park.” “Enough!” Willie barked. “Kneel down and apologize to Cathy right now, or I will have the police arrest you. Once you have a criminal record, you can forget about ever marrying into this family.” I collapsed back onto the floor, coughing violently as my stomach cramped. “I didn’t do it. I will never apologize.” I looked up at him, my eyes burning with pure, unadulterated hatred. “I don’t want to marry you anymore, Willie. Your threats don’t work on me.” For a fraction of a second, he looked stung, taking a step back. Cathy burst into noisy tears. “Please, stop! You two are the most important people in my life. Don’t fight over me!” Willie’s expression hardened again. He turned to his guards. “Take her to the police station.” The guards grabbed my arms, dragging me down the cold stone corridor. As we reached the grand entrance of the Hogan estate, a sleek black Maybach pulled up to the curb. A man stepped out. It was him. With every ounce of strength left in my feverish body, I wrenched myself free from the guards’ grip. I fell to the ground, reaching out to grasp the hem of his dark trousers. “I’ll marry you,” I gasped, my voice raw. “Please, save me.” I couldn’t go to prison. I couldn’t let them ruin my life. Willie came rushing out of the double doors. “Have you finally decided to apologize to Cathy?” But the man didn’t look at Willie. Instead, he bent down, lifting me effortlessly into his arms. His gaze flicked up, locking onto Willie’s stunned face. “Have you forgotten how to greet your older brother, Willie? Or do you not know how to address your sister-in-law?”

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My girlfriend, who used to pinch every single penny as if her life depended on it, threw a black card with four million dollars on it directly at my face on the eve of our college graduation. Ida snuggled into Chase’s arms, her tone venomous and mocking. “Let me tell you the truth, Alex. I was never poor. Playing broke, pretending to be sick—it was all just a game to see how low you’d crawl for me.” “But I’m bored now. And I have Chase.” She tossed the card, a sharp smirk cutting across her face. “Four million dollars. To buy out the last four years of your life. That should be more than enough, right?” A wave of cruel laughter erupted around us. “God, this is hilarious. Ida played the pauper for four years, and he didn’t suspect a thing?” “How could he? When Ida said she couldn’t afford dinner, he literally ate dry toast for a week just to buy her medicine. When she said she was sick, he went and sold his plasma.” “The absolute funniest part? He was working four different part-time jobs last week to buy her a birthday present. Almost fainted in a convenience store from sheer exhaustion.” “A nobody like him actually thought his cheap, pathetic love could buy his way into a billionaire’s family?” Everyone in the room knew I’d been Ida’s plaything for four years. They were waiting for my breakdown. They wanted to see me weep, to watch me beg her on my knees like a dog. Instead, I simply leaned down, picked up the card, and looked up at her with a quiet smile. “Four million dollars for four years. That’s a million a year. Quite the bargain.” After all, during those four years, my love for Ida Douglas hadn’t even been worth two cents. … 1 “If that’s all, I’ll be taking my leave.” I pocketed the card and turned to walk away. But before I could take a single step, Catherine, one of Ida’s inner circle, blocked my path. “Oh, come on, Alex. Don’t act so high and mighty. You snatched that card pretty fast. I know your type—pretending to be tough during the breakup, only to go home and cry your eyes out.” Catherine sneered, her eyes dripping with condescension. “If you’re really that desperate, just bow your head and apologize to Ida right now. Maybe if she’s in a good mood, she’ll keep you around as a sidepiece.” “Though don’t expect a title,” another friend chimed in, throwing a suggestive look at Chase. “Chase is the official boyfriend now. You? You’re just the discarded stray.” Chase wrapped his arm tighter around Ida’s waist, offering a faux-sympathetic sigh. “Hey, guys, go easy on Alex. He’s sensitive. He can’t handle this kind of heat.” The room roared with laughter. I looked at them, my voice completely devoid of emotion. “Are you done?” “If you’re done, get out of my way.” The air in the room instantly chilled. Ida finally looked at me, her eyes filled with cold, superior judgment. “Alex, who are you putting on this show for?” “Do you think by taking the money and pretending you don’t care, I’ll respect you?” “I know exactly who you are.” “You’re hopelessly in love with me. Without me, you won’t survive three days.” I looked up, meeting her gaze calmly. “Really?” “Then you clearly don’t realize how cheap your own affection actually is.” Ida’s face hardened instantly. The room fell into a dead silence before erupting into chaos. “Is he insane? Did he actually just speak to Ida like that?” “He just got dumped and he’s still acting tough?” “Fine,” Catherine scoffed, clapping her hands to stoke the flames. “Let’s place a bet. How long until Alex comes crawling back to Ida, begging for a second chance?” “I bet three days.” “Two days.” “I say tonight. A parasite like him won’t survive the night.” “He’ll probably be crying over his phone on the way home, drafting a ten-page essay about how much he misses her.” “Or begging Chase on his knees to let him have her back, haha!” Laughter filled the room. Catherine turned to Ida. “Ida, what’s your bet?” Ida stared at me with absolute certainty, her eyes filled with the mockery of a master looking at a dog trying to escape its leash. Finally, she let out a harsh laugh. “By tomorrow night, at the latest.” “He will be back, begging me.” It was as if my four years of quiet devotion, compromise, and sacrifice were nothing more than her favorite trophies. Catherine smirked, tilting her chin at me. “Hear that? Ida has spoken.” “So, Alex, why don’t you tell us? When are you planning to bow your head?” Every eye in the room was on me. Mocking, patronizing, waiting for a pathetic display of desperation. I remained quiet for two seconds, feeling the crisp edge of my approved study-abroad application in my pocket. Suddenly, I smiled. “How about I make a bet of my own?” “On what?” Catherine asked, caught off guard. I looked up, my eyes sweeping across every face in the room, finally locking onto Ida. “I bet that for the rest of my life, I will never look back at her again.” 2 Four years ago, when I got accepted into Hudson University, I couldn’t even afford the tuition. When I was at my absolute lowest, Mrs. Douglas approached me. She had only one condition—get close to Ida, keep an eye on her, and make sure she finished her four years of college without causing any scandals. Now, the four years were up. The five million dollars Mrs. Douglas promised had been wired to my account right on schedule. Combine that with the four million Ida had just thrown at me, and I had more than enough to leave the country and build the life I actually wanted. When my words fell, the room went dead silent for a moment. Then, Catherine let out a loud laugh. “Listen to him! ‘For the rest of his life.’ Alex, you really talk a big game.” Ida stared at me, her eyes dark and menacing. She let out a cold laugh. “Fine.” “Alex, remember what you just said.” She took a step closer, lowering her voice to a whisper only I could hear. “I hope you don’t come back crawling on your knees.” I looked at her and smiled. “Don’t worry. Even if you were the one begging on your knees, I wouldn’t spare you a second glance.” Ida’s face flushed with fury, her anger barely contained. “Get out.” Without another word, I turned and walked away. But I knew this wasn’t over. A pampered princess like Ida couldn’t stand being humiliated in public by someone she believed was beneath her. The retaliation began the very next morning. The owner of the convenience store where I had just resigned called me. He accused me of theft out of nowhere, using it as an excuse to withhold my last two weeks of pay. Rumors began spreading across campus. People said I had been freeloading off Ida while hunting for other rich targets, calling me a “high-end gold digger” with a price tag. Someone even dug up old photos of me—donating plasma at the clinic, working graveyard shifts at the convenience store, handing out flyers in front of clubs—and compiled them into a malicious collage on the university forum. The headline was vicious: [The Rich-Girl Hunter’s Playbook: How a Broke Scholar Faked Innocence and Played the Victim for Four Years] The post went viral overnight. The comments section was flooded with mockery and disgust. “No wonder Ida dumped him once she got bored. She saw right through him.” “Why is he still acting proud? He’s trash to the bone.” “I heard he’s trying to study abroad? Laughable. Who’s he trying to con next?” My phone buzzed. I looked down. It was a message from Ida. “Did you see the post?” I didn’t reply. A second later, another notification popped up. “Chase’s ideas really do work wonders.” “How does it feel? Being called a parasite and a gold digger by the entire school. Not so great, is it?” My eyes lingered on the words “Chase’s ideas really do work wonders,” a dull ache blooming in my chest. Not from heartbreak, but from the sheer exhaustion of having my dignity trampled. Before I could close the app, more texts poured in. “If you apologize to me right now—on your knees in front of my friends—and agree to be my little secret on the side…” “I might consider having the post taken down.” I stared at the screen and let out a soft, humorless laugh. Then, I took a screenshot. Ida wanted me to regret. She wanted me cornered, desperate, until I had no choice but to beg her. Unfortunately for her, she had miscalculated. I closed the forum app and dialed a number I hadn’t called in years. “Mrs. Douglas,” I said when the call connected. “Our deal was for me to play the dutiful boyfriend for four years. It didn’t include cleaning up your daughter’s petty messes.” “Now she’s coming after my reputation.” “How do you plan to handle this?” 3 Mrs. Douglas’s voice came through the line, cool and detached. “I don’t.” I froze. “Alex, your money has been transferred. Our contract is officially over.” “The forum, the rumors… they are nothing but temporary noise.” “For the past four years, you stayed by Ida’s side. To put it nicely, it was a transaction. To put it harshly, I paid for a well-behaved watchdog.” I remained silent. She didn’t care about my silence, adding in her characteristically flat tone, “A stray is still a stray, even if you pave its path with gold. Alex, you should know that better than anyone.” With that, she hung up. The sharp, empty dial tone rang in my ear. I stood there for a long time before slowly lowering the phone. For the next two days, I barely left my apartment. I organized my documents, checked the status of my passport and visa, and quietly transferred my funds to my new offshore account in Scandinavia. I also finalized the last draft of my personal statement with my senior, Tyler. On the third night, I headed to a quiet bar near campus to meet him. Tyler texted me that he was stuck in traffic and told me to grab a table first. But the moment I walked through the door, I ran straight into Ida and her entourage. Catherine was the first to spot me. She immediately raised her voice, laughing. “Well, look who it is! Isn’t this Alex? Didn’t you say you’d never look back for the rest of your life? Regretting it already?” The eyes of everyone in the private booth turned to me. Ida sat in the center of the plush leather sofa, draped over Chase. When her eyes met mine, a flicker of smug satisfaction crossed her face. “Come here,” she said, gesturing with her chin. She pushed a row of shot glasses across the table toward me. “Drink these.” “Do it, and I’ll take you back. I’ll even have the forum posts deleted.” My voice was flat. “I’m not here for you.” A chorus of sneers erupted from the booth. “Not here for Ida? What, did you just happen to wander in?” “Who are you trying to fool, Alex?” Chase tightened his grip on Ida’s waist and smiled condescendingly. “Hey, man, if you want to apologize, just say the word. Ida’s tough on the outside, but if you show some humility, she won’t keep holding a grudge.” Catherine smirked from the side. “Ida’s throwing you a lifeline and you’re still playing hard to get? Who do you think you are?” Others joined in: “Your reputation is already trashed on the forum. Stop pretending you have dignity left.” Chase sighed, a look of faux pity on his face. “Alex, Ida’s being incredibly generous here. With your name dragged through the mud like this, who else would ever want you?” I didn’t want to waste another breath. I turned to leave. But a second later, a hand clamped tightly around my wrist. Ida stood up, stepping directly into my personal space. Her eyes were dark, burning with a volatile mixture of anger and possession. “Alex, have you forgotten where you came from?” she whispered, her voice dropping to a menacing, freezing register. “Selling plasma, working graveyard shifts, hand-delivering flyers in the freezing cold… you were so broke you couldn’t even pay your tuition.” She stared into my eyes. “A guy like you would sell his own life for a buck. And now you’re pretending you’re too good for a few drinks?” The booth erupted into cruel laughter. “A table of drinks is probably worth half his life, anyway!” “Maybe just one glass!” I looked at her, finding the entire spectacle incredibly pathetic. “Are you finished?” I asked quietly. “If you are, let me go.” Those words shattered her remaining restraint. The last drop of Ida’s composure snapped. She grabbed a glass of whiskey from the table and threw it directly into my face. 4 The icy liquid splashed over my hair and ran down my neck, soaking my collar in an instant. Before I could wipe it away, a second and third glass followed. The sting of alcohol burned my eyes, making them water. Chase feigned alarm, whispering, “Ida, stop, he can’t handle this…” Yet, despite his words, he handed her another glass, the triumph in his eyes entirely undisguised. “Alex, why be so stubborn? Just apologize, and it all ends.” Catherine was thoroughly enjoying herself. “What’s the fun in just splashing him? Since he won’t drink, let’s just hold him down and pour it down his throat!” Before I could react, someone grabbed my wrists from behind. Another pair of hands shoved my shoulders down, forcing me to my knees. My knees hit the hard floor with a dull thud, and a sharp pain shot up my leg. “Let me go—” I was cut off as someone yanked my hair back, forcing my head up. Ida gripped my jaw, her fingers digging in so hard I felt my bones would crack. “You won’t drink?” she hissed, her voice trembling with cold rage. “Alex, let’s see how tough you really are.” I clenched my teeth, refusing to make a sound. As I struggled, my messenger bag slipped from my shoulder, spilling its contents across the floor. An official document slid right next to Ida’s boots, its corner quickly soaking up the spilled alcohol. The bold letters at the top were unmistakable: “International Research Program Application” Ida’s eyes flickered. She looked down, her brows knitting together in sudden confusion. But before she could process what she was seeing, Chase quickly bent down, picking up the paper and sliding it under an empty glass. “Still carrying your homework to a bar? How studious,” Chase joked smoothly, effortlessly diverting everyone’s attention. Catherine laughed. “Typical. Always trying to look like the perfect student.” A strange, fleeting sense of unease washed over Ida. But it was quickly swallowed by her anger. Catherine handed her a freshly opened bottle of hard liquor, her eyes wide with excitement. “Ida, don’t tell me you’re getting soft on him?” Ida’s grip tightened around my throat, cutting off my breath for a terrifying second. “Soft? For a street dog like him? Please.” With a cruel glint in her eyes, she forced my jaw open and began pouring the strong liquor down my throat. The burning liquid choked my lungs, searing its way down to my stomach. Tears streamed down my face. She didn’t stop. Her hand on my throat tightened further, her voice shaking with a manic intensity. “Keep pouring.” “I want to see how long he can keep up this act.” As the alcohol kept flooding in, my vision began to fade to black. My strength dissolved, and I stopped fighting. Through the haze, I could hear their laughter, their jeers, and Chase’s soft, mocking voice: “Don’t be so stubborn, Alex.” To them, I was nothing more than an object to be played with, a stray to be kicked into the dirt. Suddenly, the heavy door of the booth was shoved open. “Get off him!” Tyler rushed in, his face pale with fury. He threw himself over me, shielding me from the group. “Are you all insane? This is assault!” Ida’s hand froze. Taking advantage of the momentary shock, Tyler hauled me up from the floor. I could barely stand. My wet hair clung to my face, and I trembled as I tried to draw a breath. “I’ve recorded everything that just happened,” Tyler barked, glaring at the room. “If anyone touches him again, I’m calling the police.” The room went dead silent. Ida stood frozen, her expression dark and unreadable, but she didn’t try to stop us. Tyler supported my weight, guiding me toward the exit. As we passed her, I didn’t look at her once. — The next afternoon, after the alcohol had worn off, the image of my pale, lifeless face kept flashing through Ida’s mind. Agitated, she rubbed her temples and finally dialed my number. When the call connected, she kept her voice cold and commanding, as if she were offering a grand favor. “I won’t hold last night against you. Come back, and I’ll have the forum posts taken down.” There was a brief silence on the other end. The voice that answered wasn’t mine. It was the dorm supervisor. “Alex? He moved out yesterday. He cleared out his entire room.” Ida froze, her voice instantly dropping. “What did you say?” “Didn’t he tell you?” the woman asked, confused. “He boarded an early morning flight today. He left the country.”

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My father made five million dollars a month working overseas. My monthly allowance was thirty dollars. My mother claimed she fought tooth and nail to get me more, to the point where they almost divorced over it. My sister, eyes red with tears, would secretly slip me cash under the table—only to be caught and beaten fifty times with the heavy family cane. So, every time hunger clawed at my stomach and my gut twisted in painful spasms, I hated my father. I hated his cold, arbitrary cruelty. I hated that he had brought me into this world only to starve me of both food and love. Then, I received a video call from myself ten years in the future. The moment the screen connected, my heart leaped. “How am I doing in ten years?” I blurted out, unable to contain the hope in my voice. “Did I finally cut that old bastard out of my life?” But the future me on the screen had bloodshot eyes, hollow and burning with a mixture of raw grief and absolute fury. “You idiot,” he rasped, his voice cracking. “That ‘old bastard’ is the only one who ever loved you. When your mother and sister poisoned you and left you in complete kidney failure, he didn’t hesitate for a single second. He gave you his own kidney!” “And to keep them from destroying you further, he signed away his entire net worth just to buy out your relationship with them. After the surgery, he couldn’t even afford a ten-dollar pack of anti-inflammatories. He died of a massive infection, screaming in pain in a cold hospital bed.” I stared at the screen, my breath catching in my throat, paralyzed by disbelief. The future me let out a laugh that sounded more like a sob. “Your $150,000 monthly allowance? They pocketed every single cent except for the thirty dollars they threw at you. The rest went to her secret love child.” “If you don’t believe me, go to the estates at Westwood Heights. See for yourself.” … I went. The midsummer sun beat down mercilessly, baking the asphalt as the security guard stopped me at the iron gates of Westwood Heights. His eyes narrowed with sharp, elitist suspicion. “This is a private community. Who are you looking for?” Clinging to a tiny, desperate shred of hope, I whispered, “I’m looking for Victoria Prescott. I’m her son.” The guard burst out laughing. “Are you out of your mind, kid? Ms. Prescott only has a daughter and a son named Hunter. In fact, she just took him out yesterday to buy him a brand-new phone.” “Where did you crawl out of? Trying to scam your way in?” He tossed a glossy community newsletter onto the marble counter. My blood ran cold. The world tilted on its axis as I looked at the photograph on the page. My mother and sister stood smiling, their arms wrapped affectionately around a teenage boy. I knew him. Hunter Prescott. The golden boy in my class. Two weeks ago, he’d bragged to everyone at school about his parents buying him a custom-built villa in the hills. When asked about the price, Hunter had merely smirked. “Not much. Just around five million.” My thirty-dollar allowance had started the year I entered high school. Three years. Five million a year. My hands shook so violently I could barely grip the paper. When I got home, my mother and Caroline were sitting in the living room. Neither of them noticed the deathly pale color of my face. My mother walked over and handed me a twenty and a ten-dollar bill. “Jesse, here’s your allowance. Your father just wired it. Make sure you stretch it.” I stared at the crumpled cash in my palm, then slowly looked up at her. Her face wore that same familiar expression of maternal pity and tenderness. My eyes burned. A bitter, jagged laugh escaped my throat. “Thirty dollars a month. Do you really want to see me starve that badly?” Her brow furrowed, a flash of annoyance crossing her face. “You know what your father’s temper is like. If I dare ask him for more, he’ll send over another stack of divorce papers.” “Is that so?” I raised my voice, my chest heaving. “Maybe I’ll ask him myself the next time he calls.” Caroline immediately rushed to my side. She smoothed my hair down, gently pressing a hundred-dollar bill into my hand. “I’ll take the blame,” she whispered, giving me a conspiratorial wink. “Just don’t turn on the AC in your bedroom this month. We can pretend we didn’t notice if you sneak it on.” Ever since my father moved to Australia, the house had “rules.” I only had the right to use the electricity and my phone, for which I supposedly owed the household rent. Since I had no money, my usage was restricted to the first and last days of the month. I spent countless sweltering summer nights doing homework in the dark by the weak flashlight of a dying phone, crying as I poured cold water over my head just to lower my body temperature. In the past, Caroline’s hundred dollars would have filled me with intense gratitude. But now, all I could think of was Hunter bragging about his villa’s advanced climate-control system. “It keeps the air at the perfect temperature all year round,” he’d said. His arrogant laugh echoed in my head, sharp and agonizing. I pushed the hundred-dollar bill back into Caroline’s hand, leaving only the thirty dollars. “No thanks,” I said, pronouncing each word with heavy deliberation. “I only want what actually belongs to me.” I walked into my bedroom, grabbed my ID, and headed to the nearest Chase bank branch. “I need a complete statement of all accounts under my name for the past three years.” The printout was hundreds of pages long. I stood in the quiet lobby, going through the ledger page by page. Since my freshman year, at precisely midnight on the first of every month, my father had wired $150,000. Sometimes there were extra deposits, always with notes attached: Happy birthday to my boy. Good luck on exams, buy yourself some extra tutors. Merry Christmas to my favorite son. But within five minutes of arriving, the money was always transferred out in massive, lump-sum withdrawals. Leaving exactly thirty dollars. My throat tightened. I couldn’t breathe. My parents practiced a modern, separate-living arrangement. Caroline took my mother’s surname, Prescott, while I took my father’s, Ellington. Despite this, my mother had always acted like she favored me, constantly telling Caroline she had to sacrifice for her brother. I remembered when I was six and fell critically ill. My mother spent a week on her knees at St. Jude’s Chapel, praying for my recovery. Caroline had sobbed, begging the doctors to take her own organs if it would save my life. That was why I had believed their lies so blindly. Tears fell onto the paper, blurring the printed numbers. I bit my lip to keep from crying out loud, my hands trembling as I carefully packed the statements away. The next day at school, a crowd of students surrounded Hunter’s desk. He was showing off a brand-new, limited-edition phone. “My mom bought it for me the second I asked,” Hunter boasted, his face beaming. “She got a $150,000 commission check yesterday and surprised me with it.” I sat at my desk, quietly chewing on a dry, day-old bagel. On thirty dollars a month, a single dry bagel was the only meal I could guarantee myself each day. Hunter suddenly thrust the phone in front of my face, his eyes glinting with smug satisfaction. “Nice, isn’t it, Jesse?” I looked at the malicious triumph in his eyes and smiled faintly. “Sure. It’s always easy to enjoy things you didn’t have to work for.” A classmate sneered. “Ignore him, Hunter. He’s just broke and bitter because his own parents won’t spend a dime on him.” Hunter laughed magnanimously. “It’s fine. I heard Jesse’s monthly allowance is only thirty bucks. I’d be bitter too.” The classroom erupted into cruel laughter. “Thirty bucks? My dog’s food costs more than that.” “Was he adopted from a shelter?” I didn’t let their jeers get under my skin. I swallowed the last dry crumb of my bagel, stood up, and looked directly into Hunter’s eyes. “You know, yesterday was the first of the month. The day my dad always transfers my allowance.” Hunter blinked, momentarily thrown off. I let out a slow, deliberate smile. “My dad transfers my money, and your mother suddenly gets a massive ‘commission check’ on the exact same day. Funny coincidence, isn’t it?” The color drained from Hunter’s face. Before I could sit down, my homeroom teacher appeared at the door, looking deeply uncomfortable and refusing to meet my eyes. “Jesse… the results for the academic scholarship are in.” My heart sank. I followed him to the principal’s office, where I was informed that my $3,000 scholarship had been reassigned to Hunter—supposedly at my “father’s request.” I didn’t try to argue with the principal’s clumsy lies. I just stared at the certificate on the desk. Three thousand dollars was pocket change to Hunter, but to me, it meant a month of hot meals and a hotel room with working air conditioning. Without saying a word, I reached over and picked up my teacher’s phone from the desk. The principal gasped. “Jesse, what are you doing?” I dialed three digits, my voice perfectly calm. “Calling the police. Even if they’re my family, they don’t have the right to steal my academic merit.” The principal’s face went white. He scrambled for his own phone, frantically dialing. The police arrived within fifteen minutes, closely followed by my mother and sister, who rushed into the office, sweating and breathless. My mother tried to grab my arm. “Jesse, stop this dramatic nonsense. Let’s go home and talk.” I stepped back, out of her reach, and looked at the lead officer. “Officer, I have been severely neglected at home for three years on a thirty-dollar-a-month allowance, and now my guardians have illegally forged my signature to transfer my academic scholarship to another student.” The officer’s face darkened as he turned to my mother and sister. “Are you his legal guardians? Is what he’s saying true?” Caroline tried to smooth things over, but I spoke over her. “Officer, they claim my father authorized all of this.” The officer immediately ordered his partner, “Contact the father and verify this statement.” The blood drained from my mother’s face. She cast a desperate, pleading look at the principal. The principal immediately stepped forward with a nervous laugh. “Officers, this was entirely a clerical error! We are reinstating Jesse’s scholarship immediately. It’s all a big misunderstanding!” Caroline grabbed my hand, her voice softening into a gentle, pleading coo. “Jesse, Dad’s discipline was definitely too harsh, but we’re a family. We shouldn’t air our dirty laundry in public.” My mother nodded frantically, her hands shaking as she pulled out her phone and venmoed me $5,000. “Yes, look, I’m transferring you some emergency funds right now. Your allowance is back to normal, I promise.” Seeing the immediate financial transfer, the officers’ expressions softened, though they still gave my mother and sister a stern lecture about neglect before departing. The ride home was dead silent. My mother’s grip on the steering wheel was white-knuckled. The second she pulled into the driveway, she slammed on the brakes, turned around, and glared at me with cold, dark eyes. “You know.” It wasn’t a question. Caroline reached into her designer purse and threw a stack of paper into the backseat. It was my Chase bank statements. “Did you really think your little investigation was a secret, Jesse?” Caroline sneered, her sweet sisterly act completely gone. I bit my tongue, my pale face betraying my fear. My mother let out a cold laugh. “Your father did send more. But we kept it so you wouldn’t squander it. Besides, he’s halfway across the world and doesn’t care about you. Caroline and I are the only ones who actually tolerate you.” Caroline leaned back, looking completely unbothered. “If you think we’re so terrible, go live with your precious dad.” The sheer, burning injustice of it made my eyes sting. According to the future me, they would eventually succeed in completely cutting off my contact with my father, leaving me to die. I swallowed my anger, forcing my voice to tremble with submission. “I’m sorry, Mom. I was wrong.” Seeing me back down, their expressions relaxed. As soon as we walked into the house, I locked myself in my bedroom. I crawled under the bed and reached into the deepest corner, pulling out a broken wooden bracelet my father had given me before he left. The future me had told me: There is an emergency GPS transponder inside. Break it, and it will alert his private security detail. I had smashed it the day of the video call. Now, the tiny green indicator light was flashing. The signal had been received. The next morning, I walked downstairs to find two unfamiliar figures sitting on our velvet sofa. Hunter was sitting next to a middle-aged man who shared his sharp, arrogant features. The man was casually smoking one of my father’s imported Cubans, looking entirely at home. “Pack his things,” the man barked at our maid, not even looking at me. He turned his arrogant gaze toward me and smiled. “My boy likes the natural light. He’s taking your bedroom. You can either move into the school dorms or sleep in the basement. I don’t care which.” My fingers dug into the wooden banister, my chest tight with rage. “This house belongs to my father.” The man didn’t flinch. “Your mother gave me full authority over this estate. If you have an issue, take it up with her.” My mother and sister walked down the stairs, immediately wrapping their arms around the man and calling him “Uncle Greg.” My mother smiled at me, a hollow, plastic expression. “Your uncle is just trying to help you become independent, Jesse. Besides, today is your eighteenth birthday. I brought you a gift.” At her nod, Caroline stepped forward and handed me a thick legal packet. I flipped through the pages, and my vision went blurry. It was an itemized bill for fifteen million dollars. “What is this?” I asked, my voice cracking. “The cost of raising you,” Caroline said, her voice devoid of any warmth. “You carry the Ellington name, not Prescott. It’s only fair that you reimburse us for our expenses.” Hunter leaned over, his eyes wide with greed, before throwing himself into my mother’s arms. “Mom! Is this the fifteen-million-dollar trust fund you promised me for my birthday?” “Yes, sweetheart,” she cooed, stroking his hair. “Exactly that.” She looked back at me, her eyes cold as ice. “I’ll let you pay in installments. I’ll even give you a generous interest rate.” Hunter smirked at me, his eyes gleaming. “You were right, Jesse. It really does feel better when it’s bought with someone else’s money.” The sheer, sickening absurdity of the moment washed over me. I gripped the papers and tore them into shreds, letting the pieces flutter to the floor. “I’m not signing.” The living room went dead silent. Greg’s eyes narrowed, and he gave Hunter’s wrist a sharp nudge. Hunter immediately took the cue, screaming at the top of his lungs, “My phone! My limited-edition phone is gone! Mom, Jesse stole it! He’s jealous of me!” Without a word, my mother dialed a number on her phone. Within ten minutes, three heavily built men in uniform from a notorious “troubled teen” reform school were standing in our foyer. The leader eyed me like a piece of livestock, smiling at my mother. “Don’t worry, ma’am. We specialize in breaking the stubborn ones.” My mother nodded, her eyes completely devoid of maternal warmth. “Keep him as long as you need. Just ensure he stays breathing.” The men lunged forward, grabbing my arms and dragging me toward the door. As they pulled me past my mother and sister, I spat out, “You will regret this. I promise you.” Just as they dragged me to the threshold, the heavy oak front doors were violently kicked open, slamming against the walls. A cold, commanding voice cut through the air. “Victoria, who gave you the authority to send my son to a reform school?!”

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My daughter and I bought a few extra bags of potato chips, so Willie locked us in the basement. For four agonizing hours, my daughter ran a fever of a hundred and four, while I begged on my knees behind the heavy iron door. He said, “You waste money, you get punished.” I had always believed he was just incredibly frugal. Both of our families came from nothing, and the weight of our mortgage and car payments felt like a suffocating physical pressure. Willie wouldn’t even buy himself a new shirt. My heart ached for him, so I pinched pennies right alongside him. But the day his first love showed up with her son, I realized what a fool I’d been. The boy was wearing a pair of limited-edition sneakers—six thousand dollars. Willie didn’t even blink when he swiped his card. When I asked him why, he just frowned. “He’s my actual son. You and the girl are just dramatic.” Nydia, his first love, stood by the door with a sweet, knowing smile, looking at me as if I were some squatter living in a house that belonged to her. It hit me then: in our five years of marriage, Willie had never introduced me to a single friend. I wasn’t his wife. I was just his compromise. I didn’t cry. Instead, I dialed a number. “Mom, that arrangement you mentioned years ago… is it still on the table?” There was a heavy silence on the other end. “He lost his wife recently, and he has a daughter,” my mother said quietly. “But he’s a good man, Georgia. He’s been waiting for you to say yes.” I squeezed my burning daughter tighter against my chest and closed my eyes. “I’ll do it.” … The line went dead quiet. My mother was probably terrified by my sudden shift. She cleared her throat, her voice dropping to a sharp, anxious whisper. “Did Willie hit you?” I didn’t answer. Mona shivered in my arms again, looking like a little sparrow drenched in a cold rain. Her forehead was burning hot, her eyelids tightly shut, her lips cracked and peeling. I wiped the sweat from her face with my sleeve, but she didn’t even make a sound. “What’s wrong with the child?” my mother’s voice cracked. “A fever. I’m taking her to the hospital in a bit.” “What do you mean ‘in a bit’?! Take her now!” I hung up. Willie was sitting in the living room watching TV, the canned laughter from some sitcom washing over the room in waves. I wrapped Mona in a blanket, lifted her up, and walked past him. He didn’t even look up. As I reached for the front doorknob, his voice drifted over: “Where are you going to blow money now?” “The hospital,” I said. “For what? A fever isn’t going to kill her.” He munched on his chips, the plastic bag rustling loudly. “That kid of yours is so high-maintenance. Just like her mother.” I didn’t look back. I just opened the door and walked out. On the way to the hospital, Mona started seizing. The Uber driver took one look in the rearview mirror, slammed on the gas, and blew through two red lights. In the ER, the nurses ran out with a gurney, wheeling her inside. The doctor checked her pupils, asking how long she’d been burning up. “Since two p.m.” “What time?” “Two.” The doctor glanced at the clock on the wall, his face darkening. It was almost six. He didn’t ask another question; they just rushed her through the double doors. I sat on one of the plastic chairs in the waiting room, still clutching the blanket I’d wrapped her in. Nearby, an elderly woman was hooked up to an IV. The older man sitting next to her handed me a small packet of graham crackers from his pocket. “Here,” he muttered. I held the crackers, not opening them. The texture of the plastic wrapper pressed hard into my palm. My phone rang. It was my mother. “I spoke to him,” she said. “He says he can meet whenever you’re ready.” “Okay.” “Are you absolutely sure about this, Georgia?” In the background, I could hear a man’s voice talking to my mother about dinner plans. My mother answered him quickly, then asked me, “Tell me the truth. Why now? What happened?” I thought about it for a second. “Nothing. I’m just done.” She was quiet for a long moment. “His name is Jack. He’s forty-two, runs a construction supply business. His wife passed away from pancreatic cancer last year, and he has an eight-year-old girl. I’ve met him. He’s decent, just a man of few words.” “Fine.” “Don’t just say ‘fine.’ You actually have to meet him.” “I will,” I said, and hung up. The fluorescent lights in the hallway buzzed, casting my long, dusty shadow against the linoleum floor. I looked down at my shoes. The soles were worn practically flat. And then I thought of the six-thousand-dollar sneakers on Nydia’s son. It wasn’t that I knew high-end streetwear. It was just that when Willie knelt down to tie the boy’s laces, the sales associate had said, “Great taste, sir. This is our last limited-edition pair. Six thousand dollars.” Willie had stood up and pulled out his card without a second thought. In five years of marriage, he had never bought me a pair of shoes that cost more than thirty dollars. One winter, when my feet were covered in painful chilblains, I wanted to buy a decent pair of insulated winter boots. He literally dragged me out of the store in front of the clerk, muttering, “You’ve got athlete’s foot anyway, don’t ruin their stock.” I didn’t have athlete’s foot. He just didn’t want to spend the money. The ER door swung open. A nurse came out to tell me Mona’s fever had spiked to a hundred and four point three. They had given her an IV antipyretic and were keeping her under observation. I nodded, but I couldn’t bring myself to stand up. At the far end of the hallway, orderlies wheeled a gurney past, its wheels squeaking rhythmically. The figure on it was completely still, a white sheet pulled all the way up to their chin. I stared at the sheet for a long time, suddenly thinking how nice it would be if I were the one lying under it. My phone buzzed. A text from Willie: “Get back here.” I didn’t reply. Another text came: “Who’s making dinner?” Still, I didn’t reply. The third came immediately: “Don’t play these fucking games with me.” I flipped the phone face-down on my knees. The elderly man walked back over and handed me a cup of water from the cooler. “You look pale, sweetheart. Do you need a doctor to look at you?” “I’m fine. Thank you, sir,” I whispered. He sighed and shuffled back to his wife, his slippers scraping softly against the floor. Around eight o’clock, Mona woke up, murmuring “Mommy” under her breath. I leaned over, and her small hand gripped my finger. Her fingernails were tiny, a pale pink. “Mommy, it hurts,” she whispered. “Where does it hurt, baby?” “My hand.” The nurse told her it was just from the IV and to keep it still. I leaned down and kissed her forehead. It was still warm, but no longer terrifyingly hot. Mona closed her eyes, murmuring something else. I bent closer to hear. “Mommy… can we please not go back there?” I didn’t say a word. I just squeezed her little hand a fraction tighter. When they finally discharged her, I called an Uber and typed in an address. It wasn’t our apartment. When my mother opened the door, she froze. She looked at me, then at the sleeping child in my arms, and her eyes welled up instantly. My dad was in the kitchen, the sizzle of garlic and onions in the pan echoing down the hallway. Without turning around, he called out, “You did the right thing coming back. There’s always a place for you at our table.” I carried Mona into my mother’s bedroom and tucked her under the covers. My mother followed me in, standing by the edge of the bed for a long time before whispering, “Did that bastard Willie really never spend a single dime on her?” “He did,” I said quietly. “For her last birthday, he bought a five-dollar sheet cake from the grocery store clearance rack. And then he spent the whole night complaining about how bakers rip people off.” My mother bit her lip, silent. In the kitchen, my dad turned off the stove. He threw his apron onto the counter with a soft thud. “Tomorrow, I’m going to go have a word with him.” “Don’t,” I said. “I’ll handle it myself.” I sat on the old sofa in the living room and dialed a number. When the line connected, I said, “Hi, Aunt Bea. It’s Georgia.” “Georgia, sweetheart! I’ve been waiting for this call for a long time,” she replied. Aunt Bea was a distant cousin of my mother’s who had set me up with Willie in the first place. “Aunt Bea, I need a favor. I want a divorce, but I don’t have any concrete proof.” She chuckled, a dry, knowing sound. “What do you mean, no proof? That first love of his is back in town with a kid, isn’t she? A kid that old means they never really stopped. You have that card in your hand, Georgia. What is there to fear?” After I hung up, my mother walked over and pressed something into my palm. I looked down. It was a debit card. “Your father saved it,” she whispered. “He wanted it to go toward Mona’s college fund. There’s about twelve thousand dollars on it. Take it for now.” I didn’t argue. I gripped the card so hard it dug painfully into my skin. My screen lit up. It wasn’t another barrage of texts from Willie, but an unknown number. “See you tomorrow.” I initially thought it was spam, but then I scrolled up on my chat with my mother and saw her previous text: “I gave Jack your number.” So, it was him. I didn’t reply. From the kitchen, I heard my mother’s hushed, trembling voice: “…that bastard Willie is truly subhuman… letting the child burn up like that…” My dad mumbled something in response, too low to make out, and my mother fell silent. Mona coughed in the bedroom. I slipped inside; she was already asleep again. She had kicked her blanket to the side, her tiny fists clenched tight. I pulled the covers back over her and sat on the edge of the mattress for a long time. My phone vibrated. A voicemail from Willie. I didn’t play it. A text followed immediately: “Fine, Georgia. Don’t come back. I’m tossing your junk into the dumpster tomorrow.” I stared at the screen, set it face-down, and switched off the bedside lamp. In the darkness, Mona’s breathing was slow, warm, and steady. I stared up at the ceiling, my eyes wide open. The streetlight outside bled through the blinds, casting pale lines across the room. I closed my eyes. When I opened them again, the tears were gone. There was only a cold, quiet clarity. The next morning, my mother made blueberry pancakes and scrambled eggs. Mona woke up with her fever mostly gone. Her little face was still pale, but she was sitting up on her own, ready to eat. My mother fed her forkful by forkful. Mona opened her mouth obediently, remembering to whisper, “Thank you, Grandma,” after each bite. My mother’s eyes filled with tears again, and she quickly turned her face away to brush them off. My dad left immediately after breakfast. As he reached for his coat, he said, “I have an appointment with your Uncle Bob this afternoon. I’m heading over there.” I knew exactly what he was doing. Uncle Bob was a divorce attorney. I didn’t stop him, but I did say, “Dad, don’t get into a physical fight with him.” “Yeah,” he muttered, closing the door behind him. Just before ten, my phone rang. It was Willie. I answered but stayed silent. He launched into a furious tirade. When he finally ran out of breath, I asked quietly, “Is your first love busy today? Is that why you finally found the time to call me?” There was a sudden, stunned silence on the other end. Willie was completely caught off guard. He hadn’t expected me to be so blunt. After a few seconds, his voice spiked. “Are you tracking me?” “I don’t need to track you,” I said. “Your son is practically grown. I was just the only blind person in the room.” He didn’t reply to that. “Do you want a divorce or not?” I asked. “You’re the one asking for it. Fine. But you better think this through. Who’s going to want a divorced woman with baggage?” “Tomorrow morning, ten o’clock, county clerk’s office. Don’t be late.” I hung up. My hands didn’t shake. My heart didn’t even skip a beat. My mother, who had overheard everything from the kitchen, walked out carrying a mug of warm chicken broth. She stood by the doorway, looking at me for a long moment, opening her mouth to speak before thinking better of it. She set the mug on the table and quietly walked back inside. The next day, I got up early, pulled on a clean cream sweater, and tied my hair back into a neat ponytail. My mother insisted on coming with me, but I refused. “What if he gets violent?” she worried. “Not at City Hall. He wouldn’t dare.” When I arrived, Willie was already waiting outside. He was wearing a jacket I had bought him, his hair styled with pomade, his leather shoes polished to a high shine. He looked me up and down, his mouth twisting into a sneer. “You wore “that”?” Without a word, I walked past him and went inside. The clerk at the window asked how we planned to divide our assets. Willie pulled out his phone to do the math: the house would be split fifty-fifty, he would keep the car, and we would split the savings evenly. “How much is in the savings?” I asked. “Twelve thousand,” he said. “That’s wrong. It was eighteen thousand at the end of last year.” Willie’s expression hardened. “You’re misremembering.” “The bank statements don’t misremember.” The clerk looked at him and asked him to pull up the digital statements. He stalled, tapping on his phone for several minutes before finally admitting he had withdrawn six thousand last year to help his parents renovate their house. I didn’t call him out. We both knew exactly where that money had actually gone. I got full custody of Mona. Child support was set at three hundred dollars a month—the absolute legal minimum. Even then, Willie tried to bargain. “Can we do two-fifty? Money is really tight right now.” The clerk gave him a look of pure disdain. “This is the statutory minimum, sir. We cannot go lower.” With a scoff, he signed the papers. The entire process took less than twenty minutes. The marriage certificate was dissolved, replaced by a certified divorce decree. Willie stood up first. Near the exit, he paused and looked back at me. “If you can’t survive out there, don’t come crawling back to me.” “Don’t worry,” I said. When I stepped out of City Hall, the sun was blindingly bright. Standing on the concrete steps, I opened the divorce decree. On my filed ID photo, my expression was perfectly blank. It was a stark contrast to the photo we’d taken for our marriage license five years ago, where my smile had reached my ears and the naive hope in my eyes had been painfully obvious. My phone rang. It was Aunt Bea. “Is it official?” “Yes.” “I’m free.” “Good riddance,” she said sharply. “Listen, I found the address of Willie’s little first love. I also managed to get bank records showing he transferred a significant amount of cash to her. On top of that, the house he owns back in his hometown was bought before your marriage, but you two used joint funds to pay down the mortgage. You are legally entitled to a portion of that equity.” “I don’t want his money,” I said. “Are you losing your mind?” Aunt Bea snapped. “Even if you don’t want it, what about your daughter? What is three hundred dollars a month going to do? It barely covers groceries for a week.” I stood in the sunshine, the breeze cool against my skin. My eyes felt dry and heavy. “I know,” I said. “I’ll think about it.” I hung up and dialed the other number. It rang twice before a deep, slightly gravelly voice answered. “Georgia.” “Jack. Are you free today?” “Yes. Where are you? I’ll come pick you up.” I gave him the address of the courthouse. “I’ll be there in fifteen minutes,” he said. As I tucked the phone away, it occurred to me that despite my mother describing him as a man of few words, he certainly didn’t waste any time. A clean, black SUV pulled up to the curb. The window rolled down, revealing a square jaw and dark, quiet eyes that held a steady intensity. He wore a neat, dark blue utility jacket, the collar pressed perfectly flat. He got out to open the door for me, his gaze polite but brief, not offering a superficial smile. Once I was buckled in, he finally spoke. “Have you had breakfast?” “Yes. You?” “Yes.” And then, silence. He didn’t turn on the radio; the car was wonderfully quiet. I looked out the window, watching the city pass by. People were bustling along the sidewalks, a coffee cart steamed in the morning chill, and an old woman held a little boy’s hand as they crossed the street, the kid clutching a warm, soft pretzel. We pulled up to a quiet neighborhood diner. He slid the menu over to me first and ordered a pot of black tea. When the waitress came to take our order, I told him to choose. He didn’t hesitate, ordering three plates to share—mac and cheese, roasted chicken, and a side of seasoned green beans. When she walked away, he looked at me. “I didn’t know what you liked. We’ll start with this, and we can always get something else.” I poured him some tea. When he reached out to take the cup, I noticed his fingers were long, his knuckles prominent and strong. “How old is your daughter?” he asked. “Four and a half.” “Mine is eight. Wild as a stray cat. Her teacher calls me every other week.” The corner of his mouth twitched slightly as he spoke. It wasn’t quite a smile, but the hard lines of his face softened. When the food arrived, he gently set a portion of green beans onto the small side plate next to mine. I blinked, slightly surprised. He didn’t offer an explanation, simply bowing his head to eat. When we were nearly finished, he reached into his pocket, pulled out a thick manila envelope, and slid it across the table. I didn’t touch it. “What’s this?” “Your mother mentioned you don’t have a place of your own right now. I have a townhouse that’s currently empty. Here are the keys.” I sat still. The envelope lay right next to my hand, stamped with the logo of a local real estate agency. “I didn’t say I was going to move in with you.” “I’m not asking you to,” he said, his voice level. “I just want you to take a look at it. If you like it, we can get married. If you don’t want to get married, that’s fine too—you can just stay there.” He stood up to pay the bill. After a couple of steps, he paused and looked back over his shoulder. “Don’t overthink it. I don’t have an agenda. I just think… a woman raising a kid alone has it hard enough.” I stared at the envelope, then picked it up, feeling its weight in my hands. It was heavy. There was definitely more than just a set of keys inside. The waitress cleared our plates, the quiet clatter of silverware grounding me. Through the window, I could hear children laughing as they ran down the sidewalk. I slipped the envelope into my purse, stood up, and followed him out. His pace was steady, neither too fast nor too slow, keeping a perfect rhythm so I never had to rush to keep up. On my third day living in Jack’s townhouse, Willie showed up. I didn’t let him past the threshold. He stood on the porch holding a mesh bag of oranges, wearing the same utility jacket I had bought him, the collar frayed and faded. He used to hate wearing it, always complaining that the color made him look poor. “I came to see Mona,” he said, lifting the oranges slightly. “She’s not here.” “I know she’s at your mom’s. I came to see you.” I leaned against the doorframe, blocking the entry. The porch light flickered once, buzzing softly in the evening air. Willie’s face looked slightly swollen, and there was an angry red scratch running down his jawline. “What happened to your face?” He touched his jaw, offering a weak, pathetic smile. “Nothing. Just tripped.” I didn’t call him out. The scratch was clearly from a woman’s manicured nail—long, sharp, and deliberate. “You dropped off the fruit. You can leave now.” He pressed his hand against the door. He wasn’t pushing hard, but I didn’t slam it. He peered past my shoulder into the living room. It was practically empty, save for a worn-in leather sofa that Jack had moved in for me. Willie stared at the sofa for a few seconds, his eyes narrowing. “Did your new guy rent this place for you?” “That’s none of your business.” “Georgia, we’ve been divorced for three days. Are you already living with someone else?” His voice rose, and across the hall, the neighbor’s door cracked open. An elderly woman peeked out before quickly shutting it. I looked at Willie. Really looked at him. He had lost weight, his cheeks sunken, his lips dry and chapped. I remembered how I used to constantly nag him to drink water whenever his lips looked like that, and how he would snap back, “I know, I know, shut up.” Now his lips were bleeding, and there was no one left to nag him. “Where is Nydia?” I asked quietly. He shut his mouth. Slowly, his hand slid off the door and into his pocket, his shoulders slumping. “Did she leave?” I pressed. “She went back,” he mumbled, staring down at his scuffed leather shoes. The toes were worn grey, no longer polished. “Back to her husband?” Willie snapped his head up, his eyes bloodshot—not from sorrow, but from raw, wounded pride. “Did you have someone dig up dirt on me?” “I didn’t need to dig,” I said. “A man like you… who else but me would ever tolerate you?” The words surprised even me. For five years, I had walked on eggshells around him, doing whatever he wanted, too terrified to ever talk back. Willie stared at me, his eyes rimmed with red. His Adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed hard. “Georgia… let’s get back together.” A neighbor walked by down the hall, carrying a grocery bag that rustled softly. The hallway light went out, plunging Willie’s face into shadow, before snapping back on. “I won’t be like that anymore, Georgia,” he pleaded. “I was only trying to save money for our future. And as for Mason… I didn’t have a choice. She insisted on having him, what was I supposed to do? I—” “When did you start seeing her again?” “What?” “I asked, when did you and Nydia start up again?” His lips trembled, but no sound came out. “You never actually stopped, did you?” I said. Willie’s mouth twitched, his expressions shifting rapidly before settling into a pathetic, hollow smile. It was a smile that looked worse than crying. “Fine. Since you already know, why even ask?” he muttered. “The only reason I married you back then was because her family wouldn’t approve of us. She married someone else, and I was devastated. I just found someone to fill the space. I admit… I did you wrong.” I listened to his words, feeling strangely hollow. “Are you done?” “Georgia…” “If you’re done, please leave.” I pulled the door to close it, but he shoved his hand against the wood, using significantly more force this time. The heavy wood caught my forearm. A sharp pain shot up my arm, and I let out a soft gasp. Willie immediately let go, taking a half-step back. “You’re not serious about this guy, are you?” he asked. I didn’t answer. “Is he rich?” Still, silence. “Georgia, we just got divorced and you already have a backup plan. You had this set up all along, didn’t you?” I looked at his face. The face I had stared at for five years. His eyebrows, his eyes, his nose, his mouth—I knew every detail well enough to draw them from memory with my eyes closed. But looking at him now, he was nothing more than a stranger. “Get out,” I said. I shut the door, and the lock clicked into place. I leaned my back against the wood. I could hear Willie lingering in the hallway for a moment before his heavy footsteps headed toward the stairwell. He didn’t take the elevator. He walked down. The sound grew fainter and fainter until it vanished entirely. My phone lit up on the counter. A text from Jack: “What do you want for dinner? I can bring it over.” I didn’t reply. I walked into the kitchen and poured a glass of water. It was cold, freezing my throat all the way down to my stomach. The kitchen window was cracked open, and the evening breeze blew the curtains, their edges sweeping over the clean, empty countertop. It looked completely untouched, as if no one lived here. The doorbell rang again. Thinking Willie had returned, I froze near the door. It rang a second time, followed by a polite, rhythmic knock. Tap, tap, tap. A pause. Tap, tap, tap. “Georgia?” It was Jack’s voice. I opened the door. He stood on the porch holding a grocery bag in one hand and a gallon of milk in the other. He looked at me, his gaze dropping instantly to my arm. “What happened to your arm?” I looked down. Where the door had pinched me, the skin was already swelling and turning a dark shade of blue. “It’s nothing. Just clumsy.” He didn’t pry. He walked in and set the groceries on the kitchen counter—some fresh potatoes, celery, and a pack of pork chops. “Was Willie here?” he asked. I stayed quiet. He began unpacking the groceries, placing the pork chops in the fridge, washing the celery, and standing the stalks upright in a glass of water to keep them crisp. When he finished, he turned around to look at me. “If he comes back, call me.” “It’s fine. I can handle him.” Jack watched me for a moment, then let it drop. He put the milk in the fridge. The shelves were barren, the carton sitting lonely on the top rack. “Is potato soup okay for dinner?” he asked. “Yes.” He tied an apron around his waist and turned on the faucet, the water rushing into the sink. I stood at the kitchen doorway, watching his broad shoulders and straight back. He washed the vegetables slowly, meticulously cleaning each leaf. “Jack,” I called out. He turned off the tap and looked back at me. “Why are you looking to be with a divorced woman who has a kid?” He thought about it for a couple of seconds before replying, “Because I’m a single father raising a kid, too.” With that, he turned the tap back on and went back to washing the greens.

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