Category: English

1 Just out of the clinic, my body still trembling from anesthesia, my phone buzzed. Someone tagged my husband Hugo in our main group chat. “Congratulations, Hugo! You’re finally a dad!” I froze, my mind struggling to process the words. Another notification popped up from Nora, my supposed best friend. “Thank you, everyone! We’ll have you over for drinks once we’re settled.” The chat flooded with messages from mutual friends congratulating them. “She got her happy ending.” “Five years in the shadows couldn’t have been easy.” “Hugo finally gave you his name.” I scrolled down, my eyes burning as I read each message. Then Vivian, my mother-in-law, posted a family portrait of Hugo, Nora, herself, and a newborn. I was completely missing. Sitting in the sterile hospital corridor, my lower abdomen throbbed with heavy pain. My fingers shook so hard I could barely hold the phone. Hugo and I had been married for eight years. He always said he didn’t want children, so I endured procedure after procedure to respect his wishes. But he didn’t refuse fatherhood. He refused it with me. His mother knew. Our friends knew. They kept the secret while celebrating behind my back. I looked at my crumpled discharge papers, then tapped the photo. I zoomed in on Hugo’s smiling face, then out, then in again. A suffocating weight pressed on my chest. Finally, I typed a single message. “Congratulations. Consider my eight years of marriage my gift to your child.” … The moment my message sent, the chat went dead silent. Then, one by one, the messages started disappearing. Deleted. Unsent. Someone quickly muttered something about posting in the wrong group. Others started chiming in with soft lectures, telling me that today was a celebration for the baby and that I shouldn’t ruin the mood. They told me to handle my private drama later, rather than making a scene. I stared at the screen, a bitter laugh bubbling up in my throat. I had just walked out of surgery. The baby in my womb had been gone for barely a few hours. Yet here they were, teaching me how to be polite and telling me not to rain on another child’s parade. It turned out that in my eight years of marriage, even my grief had to wait for a convenient time. Before long, a notification flashed on the screen. I had been removed from the group. A second later, Hugo’s name lit up my phone. “Is the procedure over? How are you feeling?” His voice was steady and calm, wrapping me in that same familiar warmth he always used. Just like every other time. If I hadn’t seen that portrait just minutes ago, I probably would have believed he actually cared. “I’m fine,” I said. “Don’t take what they said in the chat seriously. They were just messing around.” He sighed, his voice smooth. “Nora did have a baby, but it has nothing to do with me. My mom just went over to help, and they forced us into that photo.” I leaned my head back against the cold plastic chair, listening to him spin his lies, thread by thread. My heart was too tired to even break. “Allie? Are you there?” “I’m tired,” I whispered. “I just got out of surgery. I don’t want to talk.” He let out a breath, a sound of pure relief. “Go home and rest, okay? Don’t overthink things. I have a dinner meeting tonight, so I might be late. There’s soup on the stove, make sure you heat it up.” He had done this after every single miscarriage and procedure. He would remind me to take my pills, tell me to stay away from cold water, and tuck me into bed, playing the part of the perfect, doting husband. After the call ended, I sat in the quiet hallway for a long time. The cramping in my abdomen grew sharper, a dull, heavy ache dragging me down. I looked down at the crumpled discharge paper in my hand. The first time I got pregnant, I was ecstatic. I ran to Hugo with the positive test, but he only stared at it in silence. Then he held me tight and said his startup was still too fragile, and we couldn’t afford a distraction. The second time, he said it was a critical year for his career. The third time, his mother held my hand, pleading with me. She said I was young, that there would be other babies, but right now, Hugo needed a stable home so he could build his business. After that, whenever Hugo frowned, I would quietly book the appointment myself. I honestly believed we were making those sacrifices together. But we weren’t. He just didn’t want a child with me. I opened Instagram and scrolled through my feed. Someone had posted a story from the baby shower, complete with a location tag. Cove Haven. Our house. Last year, for our eighth anniversary, he had pressed the keys into my palm and promised me this house would be our fresh start, a sanctuary just for the two of us. I had stayed awake all night, giddy with joy, secretly planning the colors for a nursery. And now, another woman and her baby were living in that sanctuary. While I sat like a ghost in a hospital hallway, watching everyone celebrate their perfect life, I stared at the address and ordered a ride. “Cove Haven, please.” Outside, the city lights blurred into long, distorted streaks, but all I could see was Nora’s face. She had helped me choose my wedding dress. She had helped me pick out my rings. She had driven me to the clinic, holding my hand after every procedure, always the first one waiting for me outside the recovery room. How could she be the one to plunge the knife into my back? When the car pulled up, the house was glowing with light. Laughter, the clinking of glasses, and the soft cooing of a baby drifted through the windows. It felt like a mockery of my entire life. I pushed the door open. The living room was a sea of pastel pink. A massive backdrop for the baby shower blocked half the wall, pushing our wedding portrait to the very edge, hidden behind a stack of presents. Only a tiny corner of our smiling faces was visible. Just like me, squeezed out of my own life until only a pathetic trace remained. The room was packed. In the center of the crowd stood Nora, cradling a baby. She was wearing the brand-new silk dress I had bought last week, the one that was supposed to be sitting in my closet. Hugo stood right beside her, looking down at the baby with a smile so tender it burned my eyes. The truth hit me like a physical blow. No one had intruded on my marriage. They had all simply agreed that I was already gone. The laughter died instantly when they saw me. His mother, Vivian, was the first to scowl. “What are you doing here?” I almost laughed. This was my house, and my presence was treated as an intrusion. A mutual friend tried to play peacemaker, murmuring that they were just visiting the baby and that I shouldn’t overthink things. Don’t overthink things. I pulled the clinic papers from my bag, walked over to the gift table, and set them down. The white medical sheet stood out like a shroud among the pink gift boxes. “Keep going,” I said, looking around the room. “Why did everyone stop talking?” Hugo’s face darkened. He stepped in front of me, his voice a low, warning hiss. “Allie, don’t do this here.” I looked at him, wondering where he found the nerve to say those words. “I just lost a baby today,” I said softly, my voice carrying in the quiet room. “I walked out of the clinic to find a group chat congratulating you on becoming a father. And you’re telling me I’m the one making a scene?” The air turned ice-cold. I looked at the bundle in Nora’s arms. “That’s yours, isn’t it?” Nora clutched the baby tighter, her eyes immediately welling with tears. But before she could speak, someone else spoke up for her, claiming the baby was innocent, and that bringing medical papers to a baby shower was bad luck. Someone even muttered that after so many years of marriage, it was natural for things to fade, and that Nora had had a hard time raising the baby alone. A numb sensation spread through my chest. They all knew. They knew about Nora and Hugo. They knew whose baby it was. They knew about every single surgery I had endured, yet not a single person had warned me. They had just stood on the sidelines, watching me clear the path for someone else. Nora looked at me, her chin trembling. “Allie, I know you hate me. But I swear, I never wanted to take anything from you.” I stared at her. “You never wanted to?” “I just… I loved him too much,” she sobbed, a tear slipping down her cheek. “When I got pregnant, I couldn’t bring myself to end it. I’ve never asked him for anything. I just wanted my baby to have a peaceful life.” I looked at the baby, then at her. It was absurd. She was living in my house, wearing my clothes, hosting a party in my living room, and she claimed she had never asked for anything. Vivian stepped forward, her face twisted in annoyance. “That’s enough, Allie. You couldn’t even keep a pregnancy. Are we supposed to let the family line die out because of you?” I froze, the cruelty of her words sinking deep. But she was just getting started. “Nora gave this family an heir. She’s the one who deserves respect. You’re still the legal wife. If you play your cards right, you can keep your title.” Standing in that room, I felt a bone-deep chill. To them, I wasn’t a wife, a daughter-in-law, or a friend. I was just a piece of furniture that was expected to be quiet, accommodating, and blind. I looked down at the wedding band on my left hand. Eight years, and the metal was scratched and worn. I had always believed that as long as this ring was on my finger, my marriage was real. But I had been clinging to a useless piece of scrap metal. I slowly slid the ring off and placed it next to the clinic papers. “Hugo,” I said, meeting his eyes. “I’m done.” Silence fell over the room. A flicker of panic finally crossed his face, his jaw tightening. “Do you even know what you’re saying?” “I do.” Nora took a frantic step forward. “Allie, please. Blame me, hate me, but don’t divorce him. He’s had it so hard. He’s been caught in the middle for years…” “Shut up.” She gasped, freezing in her tracks. I looked at her, my voice quiet but sharp enough to cut. “You knew exactly how much pain I was in. But you still crawled into my husband’s bed and had his child. Now you stand here playing the victim, acting so delicate and wronged. Nora, doesn’t it make you sick?” Her face drained of color, and she took a step back. Hugo instantly stepped in front of her, shielding her from me. “That’s enough, Allie.” Watching him protect her, the last lingering ember of warmth in my heart died out. He did know how to protect someone. He had just never done it for me. I turned and walked toward the door. “If you leave him, what do you think you’ll have left?” Vivian’s cold voice threw itself at my back. I didn’t stop. “At least I won’t be covered in your filth.” I had barely reached the elevator when Hugo caught up to me. He grabbed my wrist, pulling me into the empty stairwell. “Allie, does everything have to be a scene with you?” I looked down at his hand on my skin and felt a wave of nausea. “Let go of me.” He didn’t. Instead, his brow furrowed with irritation, as if I were a child throwing a tantrum. “I admit, I lied to you. But it’s not what you think.” The classic excuse. I didn’t even bother to ask. He started babbling about how it was a mistake, how they had both had too much to drink after a corporate dinner, and how he was just trying to get her home safely. A mistake. Men always used that word as if it could wash away the dirt. “Then she got pregnant,” he continued, his voice softer now. “I wanted her to get an abortion, but she refused. The baby was innocent, Allie. I couldn’t force her to do it.” I listened, my heart sinking further into the dark. So when I got pregnant, he could let me go through with it. But when it came to Nora, he couldn’t bear the thought. “And what about me?” I looked at him. “When I begged you to let us keep our babies, how could you bear it then?” His frown deepened. “Your health was always fragile. Getting pregnant over and over would have destroyed you. I did it for your own good, Allie.” For my own good. A hysterical laugh threatened to tear through my throat. “And her?” “She was willing to carry the baby, and she didn’t ask for a marriage,” he said, as if it were the most logical thing in the world. “I was only trying to minimize the damage.” “I’m not divorcing you,” he added, his voice turning firm. “I’ll give you the house, the money, the status. I’ll keep the baby elsewhere. She won’t interfere with your life. You just need to look the other way, and we can go back to normal.” I stared at him, completely speechless. How hollow did a man have to be to say something like that and think it was a generous offer? “What do you take me for?” I smiled, though my eyes burned with tears. His perfect solution was for me to sit quietly as his wife while he played family with another woman down the road. “You disgust me, Hugo.” His expression darkened, and his tone shifted, colder this time. “Don’t forget your grandmother is still in that care facility.” My chest tightened. “I’ve been paying the bills there for years,” he said, his eyes drilling into mine. “She needs constant care, and she can’t handle any stress. If you really want a divorce, Allie, make sure you can actually afford it first.” I stood there, frozen. My parents had passed away when I was young, and my grandmother was the only family I had left. She was frail, her mind slipping, completely dependent on that specialized facility. And I, to support Hugo, to build our life, to recover from those endless surgeries, had depleted my own savings long ago. He knew that. He was using the only person I loved to break me. “Are you threatening me?” “I’m reminding you of reality,” he said smoothly. “Once you calm down, you’ll see that divorce isn’t your best option.” Just then, the faint cry of a baby drifted from the apartment. Hugo’s head turned instantly, a purely instinctive reaction. I ripped my wrist from his grip, turned, and walked away. When I got back to my apartment, I didn’t even turn on the lights. I curled up on the sofa in the dark. The pain in my abdomen flared up again, sharp and twisting, and the tears finally came. I wasn’t crying for him. I was crying for the sheer waste of it all. Eight years of marriage, reducing myself to a ghost, only to find out I was the punchline of a joke everyone else had been laughing at for years. I didn’t sleep a wink that night. The next morning, the care facility called. The payment had been declined. I held the phone to my ear, unable to make a sound. He had threatened me yesterday, and today he cut off her care. By the time I reached the care home, my body was aching. But as I approached her room, I froze. Nora was sitting beside my grandmother, cradling her baby and humming softly. Vivian stood nearby, a warm, genuine smile on her face, a smile she had never once given me. And my grandmother, with her faded eyes, was reaching out to touch the baby’s cheek, a gentle smile on her face. My stomach dropped. “What are you doing here?” They all turned to look at me. Vivian spoke first, her tone dripping with irritation. “We came to visit. Is that a crime?” Nora gave me a soft, apologetic smile. “Allie, please don’t be upset. I just thought it would be nice for your grandmother to see the baby. Old people love babies.” I ignored her, walking straight to my grandmother’s side. I knelt down and took her hand. “Gran, I’m here.” It took her a moment to recognize me, but then her face lit up. She pointed a trembling finger at the baby in Nora’s arms. “Whose lovely little girl is that?” “She’s a family baby,” Vivian chimed in quickly. My muscles tensed. My grandmother looked at me, confused. “Do you and Hugo have a baby now, sweetie?” “No, Gran,” I said immediately. “Don’t listen to them.” Nora stepped closer, holding the baby out. “Her name is Sophie, Grandma. The house is going to be so much livelier now.” I looked up at her, my voice dropping to a dangerous whisper. “Get away from her.” She ignored me, taking another step forward. My grandmother smiled at the baby, her eyes softening. She didn’t know that I had been pregnant too. That I had carried life, only for those lives to be quietly erased. Vivian folded her arms, letting out a heavy sigh. “The family finally has an heir. A man works himself to the bone out there to build a legacy for his children, after all.” I stood up abruptly. “Get out.” My grandmother gasped, her hand trembling in mine. “Allie, what’s wrong? What’s happening?” I tried to soothe her, but Nora wouldn’t stop. She stood there with her red eyes, looking fragile and generous. “A woman without children has nothing to hold onto in the end, Allie. I was only trying to help you see that.” I turned to face her. “Say another word.” Her eyes welled with tears, looking as if she might collapse. “Did I say something wrong?” Vivian sneered. “She didn’t say a single lie. You couldn’t produce an heir, so you have no right to stop someone else from doing it.” My grandmother’s memory was failing, but she could sense the hostility. Her breathing grew rapid, her grip tightening on my fingers. “Allie, tell me what’s going on. Who are these people?” I reached out to calm her, but Nora pulled out her phone, tapping on the family portrait and holding it in front of my grandmother’s face. “Grandma, we just want you to know that Hugo is happy now. We aren’t trying to hide.” My grandmother stared at the photo, and the color drained from her face. Her hands shook violently, her chest rising and falling in shallow, panicked gasps. “This… you… how could you!” A warning alarm went off in my head. I spun around to hit the emergency call button, but Vivian stepped in front of me, blocking the wall. “What are you panicking for? She had to find out eventually!” “Move!” I shoved her aside. “Can’t you see she can’t breathe!” In the chaos, Nora stood back, clutching the baby and whimpering that she shouldn’t have to hide. My vision blurred as I scrambled to reach the call button. Just then, the baby began to cry. Nora screamed, “Allie, don’t touch my baby!” In that exact second, Hugo burst through the door. He walked in to see Nora cowering with a crying baby, his mother struggling with me, and my grandmother gasping for air in her wheelchair. He didn’t ask a single question. His first instinct was to pull Nora and the baby behind him, while I threw myself over my grandmother. The medical staff rushed in, wheeling her straight into the ICU. I stood outside the doors, my entire body shaking. But when Hugo walked up to me, the first words out of his mouth were: “Allie, when is this drama going to end?” I stared at him, numb. Nora stood behind him, tears streaming down her face. “I just wanted to bring the baby to see her… but she lost her temper and almost hit Sophie…” Vivian backed her up, claiming I had lost my mind and tried to hurt the child. I couldn’t even find the words to argue. Soon, the doctor came out. He said they had stabilized her, but the stress had taken a severe toll on her heart. She was fragile, and any further shock could be fatal. My knees buckled, and I barely caught myself against the wall. That evening, I went back to the house to pack up my documents. When I opened the bedroom door, I froze. My room had been completely dismantled, turned into a nursery. And in the corner of the balcony, tossed aside like trash, was an old wooden chest. It was the only thing my mother had left me. Inside were her old photographs, her letters, and the tiny baby clothes I had secretly bought over the years. After every miscarriage, I couldn’t bring myself to throw them away, so I had locked them inside that chest. But now, the lock was broken, and my memories were scattered across the concrete. I knelt down, my hands shaking as I gathered the papers and the tiny clothes. Nora stood at the balcony door, holding her baby, looking down at me. “Those dead things shouldn’t be taking up space anyway,” she said softly. The world went completely quiet. I stood up, holding the chest, and walked toward her. “Say that again.” She took a step back, but her voice remained sweet. “We all have to move on…” I lunged at her. But she saw something over my shoulder, screamed, and shoved the baby into the nearby stroller.

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My roommate was a self-proclaimed eco-savior. In the dead of a sweltering hundred-degree summer, she locked the thermostat cover and hid the key. “Everyone sweats in July. Just suck it up and consider it your contribution to saving the planet.” That night, not a single breeze cut through the stifling air. Our dorm room was a literal oven. My head throbbed, sweat pouring off me in waves. When I tried to find the key, she climbed onto a chair and snipped the power cord to the AC unit. “Can’t you see Mother Nature is burning up? You selfish brat, constantly spewing greenhouse gases.” In my past life, that night was the beginning of an endless nightmare. The entire campus hounded and vilified me. They claimed I was pampered, unable to empathize with the environment, while praising her noble sense of mission. In the end, I suffered a fatal cardiogenic shock, dying before I could even dial 911. She wept bitterly in front of the cameras, telling the media my heart gave out because I consumed too much processed junk food. When I opened my eyes again, I was back on the very first day of the semester. She was sliding the key to the thermostat cover into her drawer, looking at me with tear-brimmed eyes. “Gloria, a little heat won’t kill you, right?” I grabbed my phone and my medical records, heading straight for the resident dean’s office. “I’d like to request a single room, please.” If anyone wanted to play the martyr, they were welcome to it. I was busy keeping myself alive. 1 Dean Gable looked up, only halfway through the freshman roster. “Gloria? You just checked in and you’re already asking for a single?” I placed my acceptance letter, ID copy, triple-A hospital diagnostic report, and the housing transfer form neatly on her desk. “Dean, I have a history of severe myocardial ischemia. Extreme heat triggers cardiogenic shock almost instantly.” “Right now, my roommate, Sienna, is refusing to let us turn on the AC or even use box fans.” The office fell dead silent. The student assistant sorting papers nearby paused, wiping a bead of sweat from his forehead, looking completely bewildered. “It’s nearly a hundred degrees out there today. No AC?” Gable frowned. “Gloria, roommate conflicts should be resolved through communication first. Single room approvals don’t just go through in a single day.” A soft, sorrowful voice echoed from the doorway. “Dean, it isn’t a conflict. It’s a spiritual discipline.” Sienna stood by the door, clutching our dorm’s thermostat key tightly to her chest. She wore a faded, scratchy linen dress, her forehead dripping with sweat, her eyes red and puffy as if she were the victim of some unspeakable cruelty. “She wants to bleed the planet dry.” The student assistant’s hand froze mid-wipe. Gable eyed the key in Sienna’s hand. “Why do you have the thermostat key?” Sienna instantly pressed it closer to her heart, guarding it like a sacred relic. “This machine is monstrous. Every breath of artificial cold it spews drafts a death warrant for our rivers and forests.” “Mother Nature is crying.” Tears streamed down her cheeks. “I know everyone thinks I’m crazy. But I just want to stop our world from being poisoned by modern industrialism.” A few passing freshmen had gathered outside the doorway. Someone whispered, “It’s a bit extreme, but her intentions are good.” Others glanced at me, their gazes shifting. That familiar, suffocating weight pressed down on my chest. It was the exact same script from my previous life. The moment Sienna cried and invoked her grand eco-narrative, everyone lined up to pity her. When I mentioned my heart condition, they called me high-maintenance. When she unplugged the fans, they claimed natural air was healthier anyway. When she turned our room into a sauna, they praised her boundless empathy. In the end, as I lay on a hospital bed hooked up to a ventilator, unable to speak, they were still debating whether I lacked social responsibility. This time, I didn’t waste my breath explaining. I looked straight at Gable. “Dean, I have no interest in debating her beliefs.” “I just refuse to live with her.” Sienna’s sobbing faltered. She looked up, tears clinging to her lashes. “Gloria, are you really that addicted to material comfort?” “I have a heart condition,” I replied flatly. She looked thoroughly devastated by my lack of enlightenment, taking a step back with deep sorrow in her eyes. “But children in impoverished regions don’t even have electricity, and they survive. Why can’t you try?” I flipped my medical folder open, pointing to the bolded doctor’s orders: Avoid extreme heat and high-stress situations. “Because I’d like to survive too.” The room went completely quiet. Gable scanned the medical report, her brow furrowing as her expression grew serious. “A single room requires checking vacancies, and we need approval from both the department head and housing services.” Sienna quickly sniffled, stepping forward. “Dean, there’s no need to go to all that trouble.” “I will do my best to guide Gloria with love. Once she experiences the joy of detoxifying through sweat, nature will heal her heart.” I looked at her cold. “I don’t need nature to heal me.” “And I certainly don’t need your guidance.” 2 The request wasn’t approved on the spot. Gable said she had to contact housing to verify empty beds and submit the paperwork. Hearing the word “paperwork,” Sienna wept even harder. “Please don’t involve the university board. They’ll just think I’m making trouble again.” A student outside softened. “Dean, maybe they should just go back and talk it out.” “Yeah, it’s just a few days. They’ll figure it out once they settle in.” Gable looked at me. It wasn’t a look of bias, but of sheer exhaustion with the bureaucratic process. University administration was slow, but moral lynching was lightning-fast. Sienna knew exactly how to play this. She held the key, her voice carrying perfectly down the hallway. “Gloria, I just want you to shed your materialistic greed.” “The glaciers are melting, and polar bears have nowhere to stand.” “If we can’t even endure a little heat, how much longer can the earth survive?” In my past life, those words made me back down. I had thought it was bad form to start the semester with a massive scene, so I followed her back to the room. That night, she locked up the thermostat, unplugged the fans, and told us to listen to the summer cicadas. I was suffocating by 4:00 AM, my heart hammering like a trapped bird, my breathing sounding like a broken bellows. When I reached for my emergency beta-blockers, she cried that Western medicine was full of synthetic toxins that would disrupt my body’s natural aura. In the end, I was on my knees, gasping for air, clutching the bedframe as my vision faded into black. This time, I laid my phone on the desk and tapped record. “Dean, I’m happy to wait for the system.” “But until the single room is approved, I am not sleeping in that dorm. If the school cannot provide temporary lodging, I require a written statement.” “A statement acknowledging that I submitted severe cardiac medical records, and that the university is forcing me to stay in a room where someone has illegally cut the power and refused basic ventilation.” The office went dead silent again. Sienna stopped crying. The way she looked at me was no longer sorrowful; it was the look of a judge condemning a hopeless sinner. Gable remained silent for a few seconds before picking up her desk phone to call the dorm warden. “Davenport Hall, Suite 503. Send someone up immediately.” “A student is reporting that a roommate has restricted AC and fan usage.” A pause as the voice on the other end replied. Gable’s face darkened. “No, I am not joking. One of the residents has a severe heart condition. She cannot be exposed to extreme heat.” Sienna lunged toward me. “Why do you have to make such a big deal out of this?” she hissed, her voice dripping with self-righteous misery. “We could have walked this path of discipline together!” Outside the door, several students raised their phones, recording us. I took a step back. “Get away from me. The smell of your sweat is making me nauseous.” Sienna bit her lip, fresh tears spilling over instantly. “This is the scent of nature! How can you insult me like that?” Weeping loudly, she turned and bolted back toward the dorms. Gable closed her eyes, rubbing her temples, before grabbing her keys. “Let’s go. Davenport 503.” When we reached the suite, the door was half-open. The sound of our other roommate, Tess, sobbing hysterically echoed down the corridor. Gable pushed the door open. A blast of stifling, suffocating air hit us, carrying a bizarre, sour stench. Sienna stood beneath the AC unit, holding a pair of heavy-duty scissors. On the floor lay the cleanly severed power cord of the AC unit. She held her head high, looking like a martyr standing before the flames. “Since the key wasn’t enough to make you understand, I’ve removed the temptation of luxury entirely.” Tess was collapsed on the floor, clutching a small, dead portable mini-fridge to her chest. Inside were several vials of imported insulin, already turning cloudy and useless from the rapid heat. Tess shook with pure rage, pointing a trembling finger at Sienna. “Are you insane?! You unplugged my medical fridge! That was my entire semester’s worth of insulin!” Sienna looked at the ruined medicine with nothing but serene pity. “Tess, such expensive synthetic drugs are a luxury.” “The elderly in remote villages survive diseases through sheer willpower. Material goods cannot bring true health. Why won’t you let your body heal itself naturally?” Tess’s face drained of color. “I have Type 1 diabetes! I will literally die without insulin!” Sienna sighed, shaking her head. “That’s only because you’re coddled by modern medicine. Mother Nature will grant us…” “Mother Nature can go screw herself!” Tess scrambled to her feet, grabbed a heavy textbook from her desk, and hurled it straight at Sienna’s head. Sienna shrieked, ducking behind Gable. “Dean! She’s getting violent! The synthetic poisons have warped her mind!” 3 The dorm warden and the maintenance technician arrived shortly after. The moment the door opened, the heat forced them to take a step back. It was 2:00 PM. The outside temperature was pushing a hundred degrees. The windows were wide open, letting in waves of scorching air. Worse, the dorm floor was slick with dirty, stagnant water. The combination of extreme heat and standing water turned the room into a literal steam bath. The warden’s face twisted in disgust. “Where did all this water come from? Did a pipe burst?” Sienna peeked out from behind Gable, looking entirely innocent. “No, ma’am. I brought that water up from the campus lake.” “I read online that splashing water on the floor cools a room through evaporation. It’s ancient ecological wisdom. Plus, natural water carries natural energy.” The technician stared at the foul-smelling lake water, holding back his temper with visible effort. “Kid, the ancients lived in open-air stone pavilions. This is a sealed brick dormitory!” “Pouring stagnant pond water in this heat just sends the humidity through the roof. Anyone staying in here is going to get heatstroke!” Sienna pouted. “Sir, don’t let modern science blind you. Ancient wisdom is never wrong.” Some students in the hall murmured. Seeing her standing there with such righteous conviction, someone whispered, “It’s bizarre… but she really did it to try and cool the room down.” “Yeah, she’s clearly not playing with a full deck, but her heart’s in the right place.” “She was just trying to help.” Just then, our fourth roommate, Brooke, walked in from the balcony. Her neck was covered in angry red heat rashes, her energy entirely sapped by the humidity. She looked at the ruined insulin, then at the sweat-drenched Sienna, and sighed. “Tess, Gloria, let’s just drop it.” “Sienna came from a really remote rural town; maybe she just doesn’t understand. She was just trying to help us unplug from materialism. She spent all morning dripping sweat writing out environmental quotes for us.” “Let’s all just take a step back, do a good deed, and bear with it.” There it was. She was just trying to help. In my past life, that single, casual phrase had served as a shield for every bit of fatal damage she inflicted. Sienna’s eyes welled with tears of gratitude as she looked at Brooke. “Thank you, Brooke. Thank you for understanding. I just want to rescue everyone from the abyss of consumerism.” I locked eyes with Brooke. “She cut the AC cord, destroyed Tess’s life-saving medicine, and locked someone with a heart condition in a hundred-degree steam room.” “And you call that trying to help?” Brooke flinched under my gaze, her voice dropping to a whisper. “But look at her… do you want to push her over the edge?” Before I could respond, Sienna stepped forward, pulling a dirty rag pouch from her pocket and opening it with trembling hands. Inside was a small pile of crumpled ones and quarters. “Tess, Gloria, I know you’re used to luxury.” “This is thirty dollars I saved from recycling plastic bottles. I’m giving it to you. Go buy some processed ice pops to cool down, just please stop hating me.” She held the money out with both hands, tears dropping onto the dirty bills. With her faded dress and tearful eyes, she looked like a helpless orphan being bullied by wealthy aristocrats. The tide in the hallway turned instantly. “Oh, come on. She gave them her recycling money. Is it really that deep?” “It’s just a little warm. College girls these days are way too fragile.” “Forgive and forget. No need to crucify her.” Tess stared at the thirty dollars, shaking with silent fury, tears of humiliation spilling over as the weight of the crowd’s judgment choked out any words she had. Gable barked at the crowd to disperse, then turned to Sienna. “Sienna, destroying university property and damaging a peer’s critical medical supplies cannot be resolved with thirty dollars. My office. Now.” Sienna clutched her thirty dollars like a martyr carrying her cross, looking back at me with a mix of pity and a bizarre, fanatical zeal as she followed Gable out. 4 Predictably, by that evening, the university’s anonymous confession board was on fire. A post titled Pure-hearted scholarship student bullied by materialistic roommates for trying to save electricity was pinned to the top. It featured three strategically cropped photos. The first showed Sienna writing environmental slogans under the dim glow of a single desk lamp, drenched in sweat. The second was a profile shot of her crying in the hallway, holding out her crumpled bills. The third was of me, standing with my arms crossed, looking cold and unyielding—the perfect portrait of a wealthy, arrogant bully. The caption was pure bait: What is wrong with this world? Someone tries to practice eco-discipline during a heatwave, and her spoiled roommates force her to her knees to pay them back. Do poor people with principles not deserve to go to college? The comment section was a feeding frenzy. The girl with her arms crossed looks like a massive snob. It’s literally just AC. I grew up without fans and I’m fine. Kids today are brainwashed by corporate comfort. My heart breaks for this girl. The way she held out those crumpled bills made me tear up. Expose these spoiled brats. Let’s make sure everyone avoids them. Brooke handed me her phone, looking uncomfortable. “Gloria, look… things are getting out of hand. Maybe you and Tess should just forgive her. Just post a statement on the board, otherwise how are we going to face our classmates?” I stared at the misleading photo. My chest tightened, and my heart rate began to climb erratically. In my past life, this online harassment had destroyed me. I had posted my medical reports, the severed cord, Tess’s ruined insulin. Nobody cared. They only wanted to believe the narrative of the pure, impoverished eco-martyr. I took a deep breath, pushing the phone back. “She posted lies to ruin my reputation. Why should I be the one to apologize?” Gable had arranged for me to sleep temporarily on a spare cot in the warden’s ground-floor office. “Maintenance can’t fix the wiring until tomorrow. Sleep here tonight; there’s a fan. I’ll push the single room paperwork first thing in the morning.” The office only had an old ceiling fan that creaked rhythmically, blowing warm air, but it was paradise compared to the steam room upstairs. At 2:00 AM, just as I was drifting into a light sleep, a sharp, chemical stench assaulted my nose. It smelled like cheap, synthetic temple incense mixed with thick, dirty smoke. I choked, coughing violently as my heart rate spiked to 120. I couldn’t draw a breath. I struggled to open my eyes. Under the faint glow of the hallway light, I saw a figure standing by my cot. It was Sienna. She was holding a metal mug, packed with seven or eight smoldering incense coils, fanning the thick, grey smoke directly into my face. “What… what are you doing?” I gasped, clutching my chest. Sienna looked down at me, her expression terrifyingly serene. “Gloria, Brooke told me your heart was acting up. Your heart is racing because your mind is cluttered with modern anxiety and industrial poison.” “This is sacred meditation incense. Breathe it in. Let the primal smoke cleanse you. Once your mind is still, your heart will heal.” The thick smoke trapped in the unventilated office was suffocating. The sweltering heat, the toxic chemical fragrance, and the rapid loss of oxygen squeezed my chest like a vice. “Get… get out…” I reached out to knock the mug away. Sienna grabbed my wrist with surprising strength, her eyes wide and manic. “Don’t reject the earth’s medicine, Gloria! Breathe! Expel the industrial toxins!” My vision went black, a tearing pain ripping through my chest. With the last ounce of my strength, I grabbed my phone from under the pillow and squeezed the emergency SOS side buttons. The mug shattered on the floor as I collapsed onto the cot. Through the ringing in my ears, I heard Sienna’s panicked, self-righteous shriek. “Gloria! Why would you rather faint than accept nature’s baptism?!”

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1 I spent three years chasing my arranged fiancé. But after he moved to London, his attitude toward me suddenly did an about-face. During our online relationship, his messages grew increasingly bold. “Baby… let me hear you. Just a little whisper.” “I want to show you what you do to me.” I’d bury my face in the pillows, blushing furiously, letting out soft, quiet whimpers into the receiver. Then came his welcome-back party. I was stuck in traffic and running late. Just as I was about to push the door open, Josh’s cold, mocking voice drifted through the heavy oak doors of the private club. “Oh, Rachel? She’s way too clingy. I can barely breathe around her.” “Good thing I had my best bro handle the online stuff for me while I was away. She didn’t suspect a thing.” “She’s chased me since we were kids. Way too easy. There’s zero thrill in it.” “Besides, I’m not ready to settle down yet.” I froze, my hand tightening on the brass door handle. Inside the private suite, the guys burst into laughter. “Damn, Josh, you’re savage.” “But handing Rachel over to Dave? You’ve got some nerve. She’s a sweet girl, she’s no match for a guy like Dave.” Josh flicked his lighter, puffing lazily on a cigarette. “Relax. You know Dave. Good girls aren’t his type anyway.” Someone scoffed. “I wouldn’t be so sure about that.” “With a face like Rachel’s, who wouldn’t want a taste?” “She looks so pure, but her body is insane. Most guys wouldn’t be able to hold back.” “If she were my girl, I’d be grinning from ear to ear.” “Remember back in high school? When those guys harassed her, you chased them off. What if, and I’m just saying what if, Dave can’t resist?” Josh’s brow furrowed slightly. Sensing the shift in the room, another guy quickly laughed and cut in. “What are you even thinking? Hands off Rachel. Besides, her whole world revolves around Josh. Even if Dave stripped naked in front of her, she wouldn’t even blink.” Josh’s tense expression softened. “By the way, Josh,” a friend asked, “you had plenty of fun in Europe. What about Rachel? She is your fiancée.” “When you were kids, you spoiled her so much. You wouldn’t let anyone else date her, and you took her everywhere. Why the sudden shift?” Josh looked down, ashes falling from his cigarette. “Treating her like a little sister was fine. But thinking about her as my wife… I don’t know, it just feels suffocating.” “She was always so controlling. No dating, no getting too close to other girls. I’m a man, not a monk.” “And Rachel is always there, trailing after me. It’s too easy. There’s no challenge. If I marry her now, I’ll feel like my life is already over. I need to see what else is out there.” Someone chuckled. “No wonder you slept your way through London. You were starved.” “If Rachel finds out, she’ll cry her eyes out.” Josh shot him a cold look, his voice dropping. “No need to hurt her. Just keep my wild days quiet.” 2 It took every ounce of my willpower not to slam that door open and scream at Josh. Josh and I grew up together. Our families were from the same wealthy gated community, and our parents were incredibly close. I had realized my feelings for him early on. Ever since I was a little girl, I spent my days trailing after him like a shadow. Josh never seemed to mind. He always looked out for me like an older brother. When my parents told me we were arranged to marry, my first reaction wasn’t embarrassment. It was pure, unadulterated joy. Finally, he was going to be mine. But Josh’s reaction was the exact opposite. He started avoiding me. His texts grew shorter, and whenever I asked to meet up, he was always too busy. Sometimes I would wait outside his house. I knew he was home, but he’d have the housekeeper come down and tell me he was out. Eventually, he fled the country to study abroad. I cried myself to sleep for days. But shortly after he landed in London, his attitude changed. He became warm and attentive, texting me constantly. Sometimes, it felt like he was actively trying to seduce me. As time went on, our chats became incredibly bold. “Baby, just got out of the shower. Only wearing a towel.” “Want to see my abs?” “Do you like it here?” “Want me to drop the towel a little lower?” Unable to resist, my mouth dry, I would type back: “Yes, I want to see. Lower. Drop it a bit.” Staring at those highly charged, sensual photos, I was completely breathless. I never knew Josh’s body was so hot, so incredibly well-built. And even his… well, he was exceptionally gifted. He coaxed me into becoming bolder. I started calling him baby and saying dirty things I never would have dared to utter before. Occasionally, the person behind the screen would ask: “Baby, do you know Dave?” I was always a little confused. “Who? Not really. Why bring him up, baby?” He would stay silent for a long time before replying: “Nothing.” Once, I had a severe asthma attack and collapsed in my apartment. After graduation, I had moved out to live alone. Before losing consciousness, I managed to send a desperate text to Josh’s account. Not long after, I felt strong arms lifting me up. Someone was whispering in my ear, his voice frantic and shaking, but I couldn’t make out the words. When I finally woke up in the hospital, a man was sitting by my bedside. His features were so strikingly handsome he barely looked real. Compared to the men I knew, Josh was attractive, but this man was in a league of his own. I stared at him, dazed. Seeing me open my eyes, his tense shoulders relaxed. “How are you feeling? Any pain?” “Who… are you?” I rasped. He paused, then replied quietly, “Dave. My name is Dave.” I asked how he knew I was in trouble. He explained that Josh had called him and asked him to check on me. I believed him. I didn’t pry any further and sincerely thanked him. From that day on, Dave showed up constantly under the guise of Josh’s concern. He cooked my meals and cleaned my place. He was an incredible cook. Every time I tried to politely ask him to leave, he would stuff my mouth with delicious food. Eventually, I gathered enough resolve to say, “You don’t need to keep coming over. I can take care of myself.” Dave only smiled. “Josh is terrified you’ll get hurt. He asked me to look after you.” I felt a blush creep up my neck. “He really said that?” “Yeah. Ask him yourself if you don’t believe me.” I immediately texted Josh’s account to double-check. The reply came instantly: “Yes, I asked him to. You live alone and have asthma. I can’t rest easy, so let him watch over you.” I fell for it hook, line, and sinker. I had intended to keep things strictly platonic and distant with Dave. Until last night. A massive storm was raging outside. Worried about him driving back in the torrential rain, I insisted he stay the night in my guest room. Late that night, I got up to get a glass of water. As I walked past Dave’s room, I noticed the door wasn’t fully closed. I went to shut it quietly, but the sight inside pinned me to the spot. He was holding a pair of my white lace panties. They were the ones I had lost a week ago and couldn’t find anywhere. Dave’s eyes were tightly shut, his head tilted back. His throat bobbed as he let out low, repressed whimpers. He was holding the lace as if it were my hand, using it to touch himself, doing the very things he was too afraid to ask of me. I stood frozen behind the door, my heart hammering against my ribs. That was the moment I realized Dave had feelings for me. But since he was Josh’s best friend, I didn’t want to cause a scene. In the end, I pretended I hadn’t seen anything. Today, at the welcome-back dinner, I had planned to pull Josh aside, tell him about Dave’s behavior, and ask him to keep Dave away from me. I never expected to hear the truth standing outside that door. My eyes stung. I thought Josh had changed for the better while he was away. I had no idea he found me so annoying that he threw his account to Dave, letting another man play with my feelings. From start to finish, the two of them had conspired to make a fool out of me. 3 I wiped my tears, refusing to let them fall, and walked back to my empty apartment. When I opened the door, I saw Dave in the kitchen, his sleeves rolled up, hand-washing my underwear. The memory of last night flashed in my mind. My head throbbed. I marched over and snatched the lace panties out of his hands. “I told you to just throw them in the washing machine.” Dave looked at me, his gaze gentle and persuasive. “The machine doesn’t clean them properly. Let me do it.” “I can wash my own clothes.” “Be good, Rachel. I do a better job.” The words, I have a fiancé, this isn’t right, hovered on the tip of my tongue. But I swallowed them down. A fiancé? Did Josh even count anymore? He had practically handed me over to Dave to play with. A bitter wave washed over me. Because of my engagement, I had spent years being incredibly careful. I kept a strict distance from any other man. Even when Dave came to look after me, I never crossed the line. I never wore my revealing silk slips around him. I timed my showers so he wouldn’t be near the bathroom. I maintained a careful three-foot bubble around myself. And yet, Josh thought I was too easy. Boring. He wanted to sleep around with all kinds of women to figure out what he liked. If he could play, why couldn’t I? To be fair, Dave was gorgeous and attentive. His family’s influence was even greater than Josh’s. Playing with him wasn’t a loss at all. I tossed the panties back into the basin. “Fine, wash them.” “Since you love doing this so much, you can handle them from now on.” Dave paused, looking up at me in pleasant surprise, as if he had just received a massive reward. “Are you serious?” I smiled. “Of course. You’re doing me a favor, I should be thanking you.” “I’m going upstairs to change into a nightgown. Wash whatever I leave behind, okay?” Dave’s throat bobbed. He let out a low, breathless laugh. “With pleasure.” 4 I peeled off my restrictive clothes and slipped into a loose, comfortable nightgown. In the past, whenever Dave was over, I’d wear conservative, stifling outfits, making sure everything was properly buttoned up. Now, I didn’t care anymore. At dinner, Dave laid out a feast of my favorite dishes. I kept my head down, eating quietly. Dave reached over with a napkin, naturally wiping a smudge of sauce from the corner of my mouth. “Rachel, can I stay here tonight?” I looked up, meeting his eyes. He quickly explained, “You’ve had two asthma attacks this month. I’m really worried about you being alone.” Before today, I would have rejected him without a second thought. But today was different. I swallowed my food and said, “They have been happening more often lately. I’ve been a bit anxious too.” “It would make me feel a lot better if you stayed.” Dave smiled, a dark, possessive spark flaring in his eyes. Later that night, while he was in the shower, I took the opportunity to unlock his phone. I found his chat history with Josh. Josh: “Where are you?” Dave: “At Rachel’s house.” Josh: “What the hell are you doing there?” Dave: “Her asthma’s been acting up. I don’t feel safe leaving her alone.” Josh: “Fine. But let me remind you, I asked you to watch her, not cross the line.” Dave: “You don’t want to marry her anyway. What’s the matter? Had your fun abroad, and now you want to come back to your old toy?” Dave: “Aren’t you afraid she’ll find out?” Josh: “My business with her is none of your concern.” Josh: “Besides, Rachel is so clingy she can’t survive without me. Even if she finds out, a few sweet words and she’ll be wagging her tail right back to me. I can’t shake her off even if I try.” I stared at those words for a long time. My chest ached, but I forced the tears back. He wasn’t worth a single tear. Ten minutes later, the bathroom door opened. I took a deep breath, locked the screen, and placed his phone exactly where I found it. That night, I took a shower and changed into a sultry, deep red silk slip dress. It was short, barely covering the curve of my thighs, with a plunging neckline. My friend had bought it for me, teasing that my body was too good to waste on flannel pajamas. I had left it in the back of my closet with the tags still on. Tonight, I tore the tags off. I didn’t dry my hair. Water droplets slid down my collarbone, dampening the silk over my chest. The wet fabric clung to my curves. I walked out barefoot. Dave was sitting on the couch, drying his hair. When he looked up and saw me, his movements froze. It was only for a split second before he looked away, but I caught the heavy rise and fall of his chest. His throat convulsed. Pretending not to notice, I walked into my bedroom, leaving the door open, and curled up in the armchair. The hem of my dress rode up, exposing the smooth length of my thighs. I snapped a photo of myself and sent it to Josh’s, no, Dave’s account. “Baby, just got out of the shower. Only wearing this slip.” “Nothing underneath.” “Want to see me pull it up?” The reply came instantly. “Since when did my girl learn to be such a tease?” I smiled, typing back: “You’re the bad influence here. I learned from the best.” We texted back and forth until the early hours of the morning. The next day, when Dave came in with breakfast to wake me up, he saw me still wearing the red slip. His ears turned bright red instantly. 5 Since I had missed Josh’s first welcome-back party, our mutual friends organized another dinner to make up for it. At the restaurant, I sat right between Josh and Dave. The moment I sat down, Josh turned to look at me, his eyes lingering on my face. “You look much better than before.” “Do I?” I asked casually. “Yeah. You used to look so fragile.” He paused, adding, “Looks like Dave has been taking good care of you.” I smiled. “He really has. I have you to thank for sending him to me.” One of our friends, clearly looking for drama, grinned and asked, “Hey Rachel, notice any changes in Josh since he came back?” Josh shot him a warning glare. I set my fork down. “Actually, yes. A huge change.” Both Josh and Dave stiffened. I looked down, playing shy. “He’s been so much sweeter to me. I think I’ve fallen even harder for him. I look forward to our late-night chats every single night.” Josh blinked, looking slightly bewildered, while Dave’s expression turned incredibly dark. Soon, the food was served. Josh started boasting about his wild adventures in Europe. I didn’t care to listen, reaching instead for the spicy shrimp. But I ran into a problem. My freshly manicured nails made it impossible to peel them. Without thinking, I pouted. “Baby, my nails are too long. Can you peel them for me?” Josh frowned, about to reach over. But Dave, sitting closer, naturally pulled the plate toward himself. He picked up a shrimp, his voice dripping with affection. “Of course. I’ve got you. You’re so spoiled.” The table went dead silent. Everyone froze. Sensing the heavy tension, someone laughed nervously. “Rachel was asking Josh, Dave. You must have misheard.” Dave’s fingers stilled. He looked up, his voice cool and even. “Ah. Must have.” But he didn’t put the shrimp down. Josh’s face darkened significantly. His eyes darted between Dave and me, his tone dropping to sub-zero temperatures. “If he wants to do it, let him.” Dave smirked. “If you say so.” He went right back to peeling. For the rest of the dinner, I didn’t have to lift a finger. He peeled the shrimp, dipped them in sauce, and lined them up on my plate. He picked out the bones from the fish before placing it in my bowl. He even blew on the soup to cool it down before sliding it over. Dave did all of this with an ease that suggested it was the most natural thing in the world. And I accepted his pampering without a shred of guilt. I took a bite of the shrimp and smiled at him. “Dave, you’re amazing at this. It tastes great.” To my left, Josh was gripping his silverware so hard his knuckles turned white. He tried to start a conversation with me several times, but I ignored him, keeping my focus entirely on Dave. Dave placed a piece of fish in my bowl. “Try this one. I ordered it specifically for you.” “How did you know I liked this?” Dave’s lips curved into a soft smile. “You ate a lot of it when I made it at your place last week. I remembered.” Josh slammed his chopsticks onto the table. I acted as if I hadn’t heard a thing, quietly sipping my soup. By the end of the meal, I hadn’t spoken a single word to Josh. His face looked like a thunderstorm, dark and suffocating. Finally, as the waiter cleared the plates and brought out the dessert, Josh spoke up. “Rachel, we need to talk about our engagement.” I finally looked at him. “Go ahead.” Seeing my attention on him, Josh’s expression softened slightly, his tone gentler. “I don’t think we should rush into marriage right away.” “We should give each other some space and time. What do you think?” I nodded easily. “Sure. I agree.” He assumed I was just being difficult. “Don’t be childish, Rachel. I always saw you as a sister, so adjusting to the idea of you as my wife is going to take time. It’s only normal…” Then, my words finally registered. He froze. “Wait. You agree?” His face fell completely. “Rachel, what is that supposed to mean?” I tilted my head, looking innocent. “Exactly what I said. You’re right. We need space and time. I agree. Is there a problem?” Josh opened his mouth, but no words came out. He had clearly never expected me to let him off the hook so easily. 6 After dinner, the few glasses of wine I drank began to catch up to me. I felt lightheaded. Dave supported me by my waist. “I didn’t drink. I’ll drive you home.” Josh stepped in front of us, blocking our path. “And why are you the one driving her home?” I blinked at him sleepily. “Josh, you’re being so weird.” “Didn’t you ask Dave to take care of me?” “We’re living together now anyway. Didn’t you agree to that too?” Josh snapped, “I never agreed to—” He cut himself off, swallowing the rest of his sentence. After all, he was the one who had handed his account to Dave. He was the one with the guilty conscience. He had no choice but to watch us walk away, leaving him standing under the neon lights of the club. When we got back to the apartment, I slumped onto the couch. Dave immediately went to the kitchen to pour me some warm water. I curled up against the cushions, a small smirk playing on my lips. I pulled out my phone and sent a text. “Baby, I want to wear a catgirl outfit for you.” “Here are a few styles I like. Help me choose one.” Dave walked back into the living room, holding the glass. Just as he set it down, his phone buzzed. He pulled it out and opened the chat. The sheer visual impact of the photos made his eyes widen. The model in the pictures wore a strapless, tight black dress, complete with a cat tail, black ears, and a delicate gold bell around her neck. Beneath the photos was my text: “Baby, do you want to see me in this?” He looked from the screen to me, his ears turning a furious shade of crimson. His imagination was clearly running wild. He cleared his throat, trying to sound casual. “I’m going to use the restroom.” I smiled. “Go ahead.” Dave stayed in the bathroom for an exceptionally long time. When he finally walked out, his eyes were slightly rimmed with red, and his breathing was shallow and uneven. He looked like a man who had just committed a very delicious crime. I grinned, typing out one last message. “Baby, let’s do a video call. We can choose together.” He froze, panic flashing across his face. He quickly typed back: “Wait.” But I didn’t wait. I hit the video call button. In the quiet living room, Dave’s phone suddenly blared with the incoming call ringtone. He slowly turned his head to look at me, his eyes wide. I waved my phone at him, tilting my head. “Dave, you were in the bathroom for so long. Did your hand do a good job? Why aren’t you answering?”

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1 On my twenty-fourth birthday, a strange app materialized on everyone’s phones in my family. Inside lived another version of me. She went by Tina, too, but she was lightyears ahead of me. Mom’s bakery had been bleeding money for three years. The other Tina casually tweaked a recipe, and the shop sold out by noon. Dad had failed his tenure bid three times; she rewrote his presentation, and the dean called him in for a private meeting the very next day. Tristan’s tech startup was on the brink of collapse; she spent ten minutes restructuring his pitch deck, securing a cool twenty million from venture capitalists. From then on, Mom asked her for new recipes every single day. Dad printed out screenshots of her advice like scripture. Tristan wouldn’t even buy an engagement ring without consulting her first. On my twenty-fifth birthday, before the cake was even cut, Mom stared at her phone and whispered, “Does she have to stay trapped in that screen?” Dad replied in a low murmur, “Can we bring her over? For real?” Tristan tapped the customer service button. [Apply for Parallel Life Exchange?] The prompt read: [Upon exchange, the Tina of this world will be transferred to the alternate world. Confirm?] There wasn’t a shred of hesitation. I watched their fingers press “Confirm.” My nails dug so hard into my palms that they drew blood. I forced a fragile smile. “Since you love her so much, don’t look back.” The next second, red text flashed across the screen: [Exchange protocol initiated. Countdown: 7 days.] The living room fell into a heavy, suffocating silence after the countdown appeared. Mom let out a soft, shaky breath. Realizing I was still standing there, she cut a small slice of cake and held it out to me. “It’s your birthday. Don’t be bitter. Have something sweet.” I stared at her, frozen. For the past year, I had been a ghost in my own home. When I spoke, she looked right through me, her eyes glued to the screen. But it hadn’t always been like this. When I was a kid and caught a fever, she’d hold me through the night. When I complained the frosting was too rich, she’d scrape it off and give me the soft sponge cake underneath. She used to say, “The sweetest bite always goes to my Tina.” I thought those embers of love had died long ago. But as she held out the fork, I still leaned in and took a bite. The cream was velvety, swallowing down with a bitter, suffocating lump in my throat. Mom smiled, thinking I was placated. “Once she gets here, she’ll help scale up the bakery first, get your dad his tenure, and stabilize Tristan’s firm. Once everything is perfect, we’ll bring you back. You’ll be our little princess again.” Princess. I hadn’t heard that word in a year. Dad sat nearby, his tone firm and unyielding. “We aren’t abandoning you. We’re just letting someone more capable handle the heavy lifting for a while. You’ll benefit from this too, in the end.” My head was bowed, picking at my cuticles. The familiar cold tide of abandonment washed over me. Tristan knelt before me, pulling a small box from his pocket. He slipped the ring onto my ring finger. “My heart will always belong to you, Tina.” His voice was a low, comforting rumble. Tears spilled onto his hand. I almost begged him: If your heart is mine, why are you trading me away? But as I wiped my eyes, I saw the ring. Champagne gold, encrusted with a halo of tiny pavé diamonds. It was gorgeous, but it wasn’t me. I loved simple, classic platinum bands. Years ago, standing in front of a jewelry display, he swore he’d remember. Now, he smiled with absolute ease. “She picked it,” he said. “I didn’t ask some random girl. I asked the other you. So it still counts as being faithful, right?” My fingers curled tightly. I rubbed the pad of my thumb against the sharp edges of the diamonds. The stinging pain was a welcome distraction from the hollow ache in my chest. He couldn’t even love me without asking her first. Then, a voice note from the app chimed. “Did I make Tina unhappy? If she’s truly hurting, I don’t have to come.” Mom grabbed her phone instantly. “Tina, sweetheart, don’t think like that!” Dad added, “Choosing the optimal path is never a mistake.” Tristan coos, “She’s always been overly sensitive. Don’t let it get to you.” I sat at the table, the sweet taste turning entirely to ash. My tongue grew numb. An itch began to crawl up my neck, hot and blooming across my collarbone. I finally recognized the subtle fruity tang masked by the heavy cream. “Mom, is there mango in the cake?” Mom froze. “Just a splash of puree. She said it would elevate the flavor… I forgot you were allergic.” She finally remembered. I saw the brief flicker of panic in her eyes. Despite the burning itch on my skin, a pathetic spark of hope flared in my chest: hope that, before I was banished, they might still show they cared. But her next words froze that spark solid. “What if your face scars? Will she be upset when she takes over your body?” I gasped for air, spots dancing before my eyes. Tristan supported me, offering to take me to the ER. But his phone buzzed, and he immediately looked down to text her back: Don’t worry, it won’t affect you. I pulled my hand back from his grip. At the hospital, the ER doctor asked, “Didn’t her family know she has a severe mango allergy?” Mom started to make excuses. I cut her off: “They forgot. A long time ago.” When we got home, the antihistamines made me drowsy. Standing in the foyer, I heard Dad on the phone upstairs: “It has to be fully remodeled within seven days. She likes cream-white. She needs a large desk. Replace the bed and wardrobe. The new Tina will be here soon.” I dragged myself up the stairs and pushed open my bedroom door. Mom was tossing my pillows and blankets into a box. My old star-shaped nightlight was thrown carelessly into a cardboard bin. I rushed over and grabbed it, my hands shaking. Dad had built that for me. He used to stroke my hair and say he wanted me to sleep under the stars every night. “What are you doing?” Mom glanced back. “Oh, you’re back. Good. Pack up your knick-knacks. The contractors are coming to measure the room tomorrow morning.” “Where am I supposed to sleep?” Mom answered naturally. “Isn’t there a cot in the basement study? Stay there for now.” The study had no windows. Just Dad’s old army surplus cot. Stacks of dusty files piled in the corner, a flickering lightbulb. I remembered being terrified of the dark as a child. Dad had lined my walls with warm nightlights. “My little girl’s room should look exactly how she wants it,” he’d said. Now, Dad walked in with a blueprint. “Cream-white is much more sophisticated than this. Your old room was too childish anyway.” I tried to stop him from ripping down the old nightlights. He frowned and shoved my hand away. “You’re leaving for another world in a few days. Why are you clinging to this junk?” My hand was still swollen from the hives. I stumbled against the sharp corner of the wall, a sharp pain radiating up my arm. Mom took a step forward. I thought she was going to help me up, but she just held Dad back and glared at me coldly. “Don’t touch her. Her hives haven’t cleared yet. If you bruise her, what will she think when she gets here?” I froze. Dad grumbled, pointing a finger at me. “Still causing trouble, even when you’re on your way out.” I let out a soft, hollow laugh. “Doesn’t she have her own parents? Her own boyfriend over there? She talks to you guys until midnight every night. Doesn’t that strike you as pathetic?” The hallway went dead silent. Mom’s face paled. “How can you be so vicious, Tina?” Dad’s voice turned ice-cold. “A brilliant girl is willing to bless this family, and you call it pathetic? We should be thanking our lucky stars.” Tristan walked in just then, carrying a takeout bag with breakfast. Seeing me standing in the hallway looking ghostly, he frowned. “Arguing again?” He handed me a warm cup of coffee. “You had a severe reaction last night. Drink something warm.” My fingers brushed the warm paper cup. Tears pricked my eyes again. I thought he at least cared about my health. Then he dropped the hammer. “Don’t go into the office today. I’ve already requested a long-term leave of absence for you.” I stared at him. “What do you mean?” Tristan avoided my gaze. “You won’t be here in seven days. Keeping you on the project isn’t fair to the firm.” I snatched my phone. I had already been removed from the company Slack. A message from my supervisor sat in my inbox from thirty minutes ago: Tina, your family informed us that your mental health has been unstable recently and you can’t continue working. Your resignation has been processed. Please mail back your ID badge. Mental instability. Resignation. Each word felt like a needle driving straight into my temples. “Who did this?” Mom pursed her lips. “I had Tristan take care of it. You’re leaving anyway. No point in hogging the position.” Dad added, “Leave with some dignity. Don’t make a scene and embarrass us.” My hands shook violently. That was a job I had pulled eighty-hour weeks for three years to secure. They threw it away with a casual “you’re leaving anyway.” Tristan reached out to steady me. “Tina, don’t be like this. When you come back, I’ll take care of you.” I stepped back. “Do you honestly believe I’m ever coming back?” Nobody answered. Tristan’s hand hung suspended in the air before slowly dropping. I took the coffee back to the windowless study. The cot was narrow, and my hives throbbed against the warm paper cup. I desperately needed to talk to Cassidy, my best friend. For the past year, while my family revolved around the other Tina, Cassidy was the only one who listened. Last New Year’s Eve, while my parents were on a video call with the other Tina, Cassidy sat with me on the curb outside a 24-hour diner, sharing a plate of greasy fries. If things ever get too bad, you can always crash at my place, she had said. I tapped her contact and held down the voice message button. I cried for sixty seconds straight, pouring my heart out. The moment I let go, a red exclamation mark popped up. Message undelivered. I stared in disbelief. I checked our group chats. Nothing. I had been removed from the college group, the work group, even our casual dinner group. I dialed Cassidy’s number. First time, ignored. Second time, declined. On the fifth try, she finally picked up. She let out a harsh, bitter laugh. “Why are you calling me, Tina?” My throat squeezed. “Cassidy, it’s me.” “I know it’s you,” her voice trembled with cold fury. “Isn’t this what you wanted? You told us you were moving on to a higher tier of life and didn’t want to be dragged down by average friends. Did you really have to post all our secrets in the group chat?” I went rigid. “I didn’t do that.” “You did. Last night. You blasted my family stuff, called Lily’s relationship toxic, said we’re all pretending to be happy while our lives are a mess. Then you told us never to contact you again.” My jaw slackened. I couldn’t make a sound. Last night, I was hooked to an IV at the ER. My phone was in Mom’s purse. “Tina, if you didn’t want to be our friend anymore, you could have just said so,” Cassidy spat. “You didn’t have to drag us through the dirt.” The line went dead. I stared at the black screen, my heart hammering against my ribs. I had nothing left. Not even a friend to turn to. I stormed out of the study. Mom was discussing wardrobe sizes with the contractor. I slammed the phone onto the table. “Why did you use my phone to send those messages?” Mom frowned. “When she gets here, we can’t have random, messy people crowding her space and asking questions.” Dad didn’t even look up from his blueprints. “The simpler your social circle, the smoother the transition.” A hysterical laugh escaped my lips. “So you quit my job, cut off my friends, and kicked me out of my own room.” Mom’s expression soured. “Why must you be so difficult, Tina? You’re leaving anyway. Why do you have to make this harder for us?” Then her eyes landed on my wrist. It was a vintage silver heirloom cuff, given to me by my grandmother right before she passed. Mom grabbed my arm. “Take this off too.” I jerked back. “No! Grandmother gave this to me.” Mom gripped my wrist tight, her fingers squeezing my bones. “Genevieve mentioned she loves vintage silver. She has the grace to pull it off. It’ll look much better on her.” The pain made my fingers tremble. Dad stepped over, pinning my shoulder down with an impatient sigh. “It’s just a bracelet. Stop throwing a tantrum.” Mom poured dish soap over my hand and forcibly yanked the metal cuff down. It scraped against the raw, swollen hives, leaving a weeping trail of red. My vision swam. I watched her slide the cuff into a velvet jewelry box. Something inside me snapped. The last string holding me to them broke. I took a deep breath, and the urge to fight evaporated. Mom closed the box. “See? That’s better. If you just cooperate, this will be easy on everyone.” I looked down at my bare, raw wrist. “Okay,” I whispered, forcing a wide, vacant smile. “I’ll cooperate.” Mom stared at me, suspicious of my sudden compliance. Dad locked the study door from the outside, claiming it wasn’t to punish me, but to keep me from doing something reckless in my unstable state. Tristan stood in the hall, holding my phone. “Just hang in there for a few more days, Tina,” he muttered through the door. “When this is over, I’ll find a way to make it up to you.” I sat on the narrow cot in the pitch black. I touched the bare skin where my grandmother’s cuff used to be. I felt an eerie, beautiful peace. That night, Mom slid a bowl of plain oatmeal through a crack in the door. No spoon, no toppings. “Bland is better for your allergies,” she said. I stared at the lukewarm mush and smiled. When I was sick as a kid, she would slow-cook chicken broth for hours, blowing on each spoonful to cool it down. Now, she was only feeding me to keep the vessel intact. Over the next two days, I listened to them decorate the room through the locked door. “Gen, what kind of scented candles do you like?” Mom cooed into her phone. “Should the desk face the window or the wall?” Dad asked. “Do you want a white or champagne gown for the engagement dinner?” Tristan murmured. They were gentler with her than they had ever been with me. On the final day, Mom unlocked the door, holding a box of ribbons and balloons. “Come out. Stop sulking. Today is the day.” The house was unrecognizable. Soft cream-white flowers, warm champagne lights, and a low-sugar cake sat on the counter. Mom handed me a spool of silk ribbon. “Your fingers are nimble. Tie some bows on the chairs.” I took it, tying them one by one. Dad watched me, his brow furrowed. “Why are you being so quiet?” Tristan paused. “Tina, are you planning something?” I kept my head down, pulling the silk tight until it dug a white crease into my skin. “Didn’t you say so? If I cooperate, it’s easier on everyone.” A flicker of guilt crossed Mom’s face, but she quickly brushed it off. “As long as you understand.” The app chimed. A video call from the parallel Tina connected. Seeing me decorating, she smiled softly. “Thank you, Tina.” Everyone stared at me, bracing for a breakdown. I just smiled back. “You’re welcome. It’s your home now.” When those words left my mouth, there was no pain. Just a vast, liberating emptiness. Mom froze. Dad adjusted his glasses. Tristan’s eyes flashed with sudden panic. “Tina, don’t say it like that.” I tied the final bow, turned, and went back into the study. Before the door closed, I heard Mom whisper, “Her being this quiet makes me uneasy.” Tristan replied, “Keep an eye on her. Don’t let her ruin this at the finish line.” I sat on the cot and pulled out an old tablet I had hidden under the mattress. The app was logged in there, too. The screen popped up with a final prompt: “Do you wish to waive your right to appeal? Once waived, the exchange is permanent and irreversible.” I listened to the joyful laughter floating from the living room. They thought I had finally learned my place. But they didn’t get it. I wasn’t resigning myself to fate. I was abandoning them. I tapped Confirm. [Countdown: 10 seconds.] In those ten seconds, Mom’s giddy voice echoed through the walls. “She’s almost here!” I closed my eyes. For the first time in my life, I didn’t look back.

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1 Three days after my mother disappeared, I received her organ donation contract. Her heart, kidneys, and corneas were all marked. At the bottom, the authorized signature was my husband Xavier Knight’s. I rushed home to confront him, but he sounded as calm as if he were discussing dinner. “She was going to die sooner or later. Instead of letting her rot, it is better to use her to save someone with real value.” I shook with a rage so violent I could not speak. His phone lit up with a message from his first love Jessica. It was a selfie from her recovery room. Xav, the doctor says my recovery is perfect. I can finally see your face again. In the photo, she flashed a peace sign, white gauze taped near her eye, her smile sweet and triumphant. Three years ago, when she had kidney failure, Xavier borrowed my entire life savings. Two years ago, when her eyesight failed, he complained that my mother’s illness drained our finances. For Jessica, he exploited my dying mother. I gripped the donation papers until they crumpled. Xavier glanced at me and lit a cigarette. “Your mother suffered while alive. I helped her find peace. You should thank me.” He flicked ash into the tray. “Jessica is discharged next week. Prepare a generous gift for her recovery.” I let out a soft, humorless laugh and pulled out my phone. I dialed a number I had not called in six years. “Christian, I need a divorce. Can you help me?” … “Where are you? I’m coming with my men right now.” Christian’s deep, urgent voice crackled through the receiver. I gave him the address and hung up. Xavier drove me to the hospital. The doctor looked at me, hesitating for a long moment before offering a quiet, sympathetic condolence. My steps felt incredibly heavy as I walked down the corridor, finally leaning against the cold, sterile white wall outside the morgue. The blood in my veins felt as though it had frozen solid. The medical examiner pushed open the heavy steel door. A sharp, pungent wave of formalin mixed with the metallic scent of blood washed over me. “Family, please identify the body.” The white sheet was pulled back just a fraction. It was my mother, whom I had spent three agonizing days and nights searching for. Her deflated chest and abdomen had been hastily stitched back together with thick, black thread. Her eye sockets were deeply hollowed out, resembling two dried-up, empty wells. The examiner handed me a copy of the surgical records. Under the authorization line, Xavier’s signature was written in a bold, sweeping scrawl. My stomach churned violently. I clamped my hand over my mouth, rushing to the trash can in the hallway and dry-heaving. The stomach acid burned my throat, and hot tears splashed onto the cold linoleum floor. A tissue was suddenly held out in front of my face. Xavier stood there, half-bathed in the harsh fluorescent light. He was wearing a perfectly tailored grey suit, carrying his usual scent of expensive sandalwood. Clinging to his arm was Jessica, who was dressed in a pristine white patient gown. The corner of her eye was covered with clean medical gauze, and her lips were curved into a delicate, helpless pout. “Gwen, please don’t blame Xavier.” Jessica leaned her fragile body against his shoulder. “Your mother wandered off into the wilderness. By the time the search party found her, she was already brain-dead.” She raised a hand, gently touching the edge of her bandaged eye. “Xavier said that your mother always adored me when she was alive. He knew she would want me to have her eyes so I could keep looking at this beautiful world.” I stared at the gauze on her face. Those were my mother’s eyes, violently carved out of her body. Three days ago. Xavier had dismissed my mother’s private nurse under the guise of taking her to the park for some fresh air. He had returned alone that night, casually claiming she had wandered off and gotten lost. I had searched for her in the pouring rain for three days and three nights like a lunatic. Meanwhile, he was sitting in a sterile operating room, keeping vigil over his first love during her transplant surgery. “You left her in that unmonitored wilderness on purpose, didn’t you?” I forced myself to stand upright, leaning against the trash can for support. My fingernails dug so deep into my palms that beads of blood began to seep out. Xavier’s brow furrowed. He pulled back the hand holding the tissue, slowly smoothing the cuff of his sleeve. “Gwen, your mind is always so incredibly twisted.” His voice was entirely devoid of emotion. “Your mother had severe Alzheimer’s. Even if I had watched her twenty-four hours a day, she only had a few years left anyway.” “Now, her heart is beating in someone else’s chest, and her corneas have allowed Jessica to see again.” He reached out, wrapping his arm around Jessica’s waist. “The continuation of life is a beautiful thing. Why can’t you see that?” I lunged forward, swinging my hand to slap him across the face. But my wrist was caught in mid-air, gripped in a vice-like hold. My bones let out an ominous creak under his pressure. “Have you thrown enough of a tantrum?” Xavier’s eyes turned icy. “A hospital is not the place for your hysterics.” With a harsh shove, he threw me off balance. I fell hard onto the cold floor, the contents of my purse scattering across the linoleum. A crumpled ultrasound sheet drifted through the air, landing right at the tip of Xavier’s leather shoe. The printed numbers of the gestational sac were clearly visible. I scrambled to reach for it. But Jessica’s foot stepped onto the paper first. “Oh, what’s this?” She deliberately ground the heel of her shoe into the paper twice before slowly drawing her foot back. A dirty, black boot-print now covered the page, completely obscuring the words early pregnancy. “Gwen, are you pregnant?” Jessica gasped, covering her mouth in exaggerated shock. Xavier glanced down at the soiled paper. His eyes didn’t show a single flicker of warmth. “Since you’re pregnant, stay home and behave yourself.” He pulled a black card from his wallet, tossing it onto my lap. “I’ll have my assistant handle the funeral arrangements.” The sharp plastic edge of the card swiped across my cheek, leaving a thin red scratch. I looked at the card on my lap and let out a broken laugh. “Xavier, you bribed the medical examiner to falsify the brain-death report so you could illegally harvest her organs.” I looked up, my teeth clenched so hard they nearly shattered. “I’m going to the police.” Xavier looked down at me as if I were a petulant child throwing a useless fit. “Suit yourself.” He turned around, carefully shielding Jessica as they walked toward the exit. “But you might want to think it through first.” He stopped, casting a cold glance over his shoulder. “If you’re locked up in a cell, who is going to sign the authorization form to cremate your mother’s body?” Jessica turned back, offering me a sweet, mocking smile. “Gwen, once I’m discharged, I’ll be sure to visit your mother’s grave and burn some incense for her.” … The automatic lights in the hospital corridor flickered twice before dying completely. I sat alone outside the morgue for the entire night. By the next morning, Xavier’s assistant arrived, handing me a thick stack of legal documents. “Mrs. Knight, Mr. Knight says that if you sign this voluntary donation confirmation form, the deed to the historic family cottage will be officially transferred back to your name.” That cottage was the only piece of property my father had left behind. It was the place my mother had cherished most in the world. Years ago, when I chose to marry the penniless Xavier, I had severed all ties with my wealthy family. To help him launch his startup, I had sold all my stocks and personal assets. The only thing I had refused to touch was that historic cottage. And now, Xavier was using it to blackmail me. If I signed this paper, his illegal organ harvesting would be completely wiped clean in the eyes of the law. “And if I refuse?” I didn’t take the pen. The assistant adjusted his gold-rimmed glasses, his voice professional and detached. “Mr. Knight said that if you refuse, he will sell the cottage to developers this afternoon. They plan to level the entire property to build a golf course.” A thick, metallic taste rose in my throat. I closed my eyes. I remembered that freezing winter years ago. Xavier’s company was facing bankruptcy, and his creditors had chased him to the edge of the river. I hadn’t hesitated for a single second before diving into the icy water to save him. The extreme cold had ravaged my body, and the doctors had warned me that I would likely never be able to bear children. I had stayed awake outside his ICU room for three days and three nights. But when he finally woke up, Jessica was sitting by his bedside in dry, warm clothes, weeping beautifully. From that day on, Xavier treated Jessica as his savior. No matter how many times I tried to explain the truth, he simply brushed it off as petty jealousy. And now, the miracle child I had finally managed to conceive was something he couldn’t care less about. I snatched the pen from the assistant’s hand and scribbled my name across the page, the metal tip tearing through the paper. That afternoon, I dragged my exhausted body back to the cottage. When I pushed open the carved wooden gate, my heart shattered. The ancient trees in the courtyard had been violently chopped down, and several workmen were trampling over my mother’s prize orchids as they hauled furniture out of the house. “What do you think you’re doing?” I rushed forward, shoving one of the workers away. Jessica, wearing a vibrant red dress, stepped gracefully out of the front door. She was casually tossing a small green object in her hand: my mother’s vintage jade amulet, something she had worn close to her heart every single day. “Oh, Gwen, you’re back,” she purred, walking down the steps. “Xavier said the air here is wonderful for my recovery.” She gestured to the workmen. “I thought the garden looked a bit too plain, so I’m having them tear out all these boring plants to put in red roses.” My eyes locked onto the jade amulet in her hand. “Give that back to me.” I lunged forward to grab it. Jessica stepped back, raising her hand to hold the amulet high out of my reach. “Gwen, don’t be so stingy.” “Your mother is dead anyway. Keeping her old junk around will only bring bad luck to the house.” She opened her fingers. Clack. The priceless jade amulet struck the cobblestone steps, shattering into a dozen pieces. I froze, the last thread of my sanity snapping. I threw myself forward, delivering a stinging slap to her face. “Who do you think you are!” Jessica let out a sharp cry, collapsing onto the sharp fragments of jade, her palms instantly sliced open and bleeding. “Stop!” Xavier’s furious roar echoed from the gate. He stormed into the courtyard, grabbing my shoulder and shoving me away with terrifying force. My lower back collided violently with the edge of the stone table. A sharp, white-hot agony shot up my spine. Xavier carefully scooped Jessica into his arms. “Xav, I just thought the amulet was pretty and wanted to look at it,” Jessica sobbed against his chest, her tears flowing freely. “I don’t understand why Gwen is so angry.” Xavier looked up, his eyes filled with a lethal coldness. “Gwen, have you completely lost your mind?” I clutched my agonizing lower abdomen, cold sweat drenching my back. “She broke my mother’s amulet,” I gasped, my voice trembling violently as I pointed at the broken jade. “That was the only thing my mother left me.” Xavier glanced at the green shards on the ground, his frown deepening. “It’s just a piece of stone. I’ll buy you ten more.” He turned, carrying Jessica toward the gate. “This cottage has already been transferred to Jessica’s name.” He stopped, without even turning his head to look at me. “Pack your bags and get out immediately.” … The dull ache in my abdomen rapidly intensified. I felt a warm, thick liquid begin to trickle down my thighs. I gripped the edge of the stone table, my knuckles turning stark white. “Xavier,” I called out, my voice so weak it was nearly swallowed by the wind. “I’m pregnant.” Xavier’s footsteps paused. He slowly turned around, his gaze falling onto my skirt. The brilliant red stain was rapidly spreading. His eyes lingered on the blood for barely a second before returning to their usual detached coldness. “Gwen, playing the same pathetic trick twice is just sad.” He let out a dry, mocking chuckle. “You’re actually desperate enough to make up a pregnancy just to get my attention?” Jessica whimpered in his arms, shivering. “Xav, I’m scared.” “Let’s go. My hand hurts so much.” Xavier tightened his grip around her, never looking back at me. “Clean up the courtyard yourself,” he threw the final command over his shoulder, walking out of the gate. The roar of his car engine gradually faded into the distance. My legs gave out, and I slid down the side of the stone table onto the ground. My blood stained the stone patio, mixing with the shattered fragments of my mother’s jade. The pain felt as though a thousand hot needles were tearing through my organs. With the last of my fading consciousness, I dialed emergency services. When I finally opened my eyes again, I was greeted by the sterile white ceiling of a hospital room. The scent of antiseptic filled the air. The nurse was changing my IV drip. Seeing me wake up, she let out a quiet sigh. “You’re awake.” She avoided my gaze. “We couldn’t save the baby. Your body was already severely weakened. I’m afraid it will be very difficult for you to conceive again.” I listened to her words in absolute silence. There were no tears. I couldn’t even feel the weight of my own grief. I felt like an empty, hollow shell. The door was pushed open. Xavier walked in, looking immaculate in his tailored suit. The nurse quietly gathered her tray and slipped out of the room. He pulled up a chair and sat down beside the bed, looking down at my pale face. “The doctor said you had a miscarriage.” His tone carried no trace of sorrow, as if he were reviewing a routine business report. I turned my head to look out the window at the gray, overcast sky, remaining silent. “Jessica suffered a mild concussion from your slap.” He picked up the medical chart at the foot of my bed, flipping through it idly. “A person who just had major surgery shouldn’t be subjected to that kind of stress.” He tossed the chart back onto the table with a dull thud. “The loss of this baby was probably a blessing in disguise.” “Don’t bring your bad luck around her.” I slowly turned my head to look at him. I stared at the face of the man I had loved with every fiber of my being for seven years. For him, I had abandoned my family, my pride, and my future. And all of it had been dismissed as a blessing in disguise. “Get out,” I whispered, my voice raw and dry. Xavier’s brow furrowed, clearly taken aback by my coldness. “When are you going to fix that miserable attitude of yours?” He stood up, adjusting his tie. “Stay in the hospital for the next few days.” “I’ve already sent workmen to begin renovations on the cottage.” “Tomorrow, I’ll have my assistant deliver your mother’s ashes to the suburban cemetery.” He checked a message on his phone. “Jessica wants some soup from the uptown diner, so I’m leaving.” Just as he reached the door, he paused. “The hospital bill has been taken care of.” “Don’t call me.” The door clicked shut, cutting off the noise from the hallway. I reached down and ripped the IV needle from the back of my hand. Blood immediately welled up, dripping onto the clean white sheets. I slid off the bed, my legs trembling like paper. But I couldn’t fall. I had to get my mother. I couldn’t let her ashes fall into the hands of those monsters. I changed into my clothes, leaning against the wall for support as I slowly made my way out of the hospital. The autumn wind was freezing, biting deep into my bones. I waved down a cab. “Take me to the South Hill Crematorium.” … The air inside the crematorium office was damp and heavy. I dragged my aching legs to the front desk. “I’m here to collect the ashes of Evelyn Pierce.” The clerk flipped through the registry, a look of hesitation on his face. “The ashes of Evelyn Pierce were collected by her family ten minutes ago.” My entire body went rigid. “Who took them?” “A Mr. Knight. There was a very elegant lady with him.” I turned and ran toward the exit. As I burst through the glass doors of the lobby, I saw Xavier’s black luxury car parked by the curb. Jessica was holding the dark wooden urn in her bare hands, tapping her manicured fingers playfully against the lid. “Xav, the psychic said that if we bury these ashes in the old dried well of the estate, it will ward off our bad luck and bring us wealth.” She smiled up at him, her eyes bright with malice. Xavier opened the passenger door for her. “Whatever makes you happy.” “Don’t you dare touch her!” I screamed, throwing myself forward and snatching the urn out of Jessica’s hands. Jessica gasped, stumbling backward. Xavier caught her quickly, his eyes flashing with lethal fury. “Gwen, have you not embarrassed yourself enough today?” I clutched the heavy urn to my chest, my body still raw from the surgery, standing purely on adrenaline and hatred. “This is her ashes!” I glared at him. “When she was alive, you drained her blood and stole her organs.” “And now that she’s dead, you want to use her ashes as a stepping stone for this woman?” Xavier’s face darkened. He lunged forward, his hand clamping around my throat, slamming me hard against the car door. “I don’t need a child like you telling me what to do.” The grip on my neck tightened, cutting off my air. My face burned, and I clawed desperately at his iron wrist. Jessica stood nearby, a cruel, satisfied smirk playing on her lips. “Xav, the way she’s glaring at me is terrifying,” she whimpered, pretending to shrink back. Xavier’s grip tightened further. “Drop the urn.” His voice was a low, menacing growl. “Never,” I gasped through my teeth. Jessica stepped forward, reaching out to pry my fingers off the wooden box, one by one, her sharp nails digging deep into my raw flesh. “Gwen, your mother loved me so much. I’m sure she’d be happy to protect me.” With a violent wrench, she tore the urn from my grip. Crash. The heavy wooden box slipped from her hands, striking the concrete pavement. The wood split open, and a cloud of gray-white ash spilled across the dirty ground, catching in the wind. The world went silent. “Mom!” A primal, agonizing scream tore from my throat as I fought my way out of Xavier’s grip. I dropped to my knees on the cold concrete, desperately clawing at the dust, trying to gather the scattered ashes back together. But the wind was too strong, carrying her away from me. “Please… don’t leave me…” I sobbed, my tears mixing with the gray dust on my face. A sharp high heel suddenly came down on the back of my hand. The pointed heel punctured my skin, pinning my hand to the pavement. Blood immediately pooled around the gray ashes. “Oh, my goodness, I’m so sorry!” Jessica squealed, grinding her heel deeper into my flesh. “The wind was just so strong, I lost my balance.” Xavier stood by, watching me grovel in the dirt without a single ounce of pity. “Get her out of here,” he ordered his men. Two burly bodyguards stepped forward, grabbing my arms and dragging me away. The violent movement tore open my surgical wounds, and a fresh wave of blood began to seep through my trousers. The guards shoved my face down into the dirt, holding me pinned against the scattered ashes. My vision began to blur, and darkness crept in at the edges of my sight. Xavier brushed a speck of dust from his sleeve. “Dump her somewhere far away. Don’t let her ruin Jessica’s mood.” But just as the guards prepared to drag my limp body into the shadows, the screech of burning rubber sliced through the quiet air. A sleek, black Rolls-Royce swerved sharply around the corner, blocking Xavier’s car. The heavy door was kicked open.

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1 Just before launch, Brooke gave Austin a glance. Silently, they unbuckled and ran, leaving me frozen in the seat. Austin stood behind the yellow line, smirking. “Brooke says you’re too timid, Tessa. Face your fears. Have fun alone!” The machine roared, hurling me skyward. Wind whipped past as Brooke doubled over laughing, snapping photos of my terror. Austin steadied her phone, his indulgent smile saying it all: Don’t tease her; she’s pitiful. Yes, I was a coward. For twenty years, this was their “help.” Brooke baited stray dogs, leaving me screaming as Austin lifted her to safety. In high school, she yanked the vault mat; I crashed onto concrete, knees torn, while he laughed. During a night hike, she lost me in the dark; he stalked the brush, growling, as I sobbed alone. Every time, her triumph; his empty warning: “Don’t do it again.” His “next time” was always her green light. Sixty feet up, weightlessness clawed my throat. But staring at their tiny figures, I felt no fear. When the ride ended and they reached for me, I pushed them away. “I don’t need either of you to build my courage anymore.” … Austin laughed, reaching out to ruffle my hair. “Tess, did you get scared out of your mind? Your courage didn’t grow, but you definitely look a little dazed.” Brooke chimed in with her usual playful banter. “Well, I’m more than willing to take my time and help her grow.” I pressed my lips together, looking at the two of them acting in perfect harmony. “This isn’t helping me. It’s bullying.” Brooke’s smile instantly froze. “Tess, that actually hurts. I spend my free time trying to help you, and you call it bullying?” She sighed, crossing her arms. “Fine, how about I go ride the rollercoaster, the one thing I’m absolutely terrified of? That way, we’re even.” She turned and began walking toward the coaster. Austin frowned, casting a brief, annoyed glance at me before catching up to Brooke and grabbing her wrist. “Don’t force yourself. You cried on that ride last time. I’ll go with you.” I stood there, watching their retreating backs. Just minutes ago, right before the drop tower launched, Austin had looked at me and said, “You can’t be this childish, Tessa. It’s just a theme park ride, you don’t need someone to hold your hand.” When the coaster finally came to a stop, Brooke was practically vibrating with excitement. “Having someone next to you makes it so much better! See, Tessa? It’s really not that scary at all!” But there was never anyone next to me. Austin looked at my expressionless face. “If you’re still throwing a tantrum, how about we go on the drop tower again? We can all do it together.” But this time, they had chosen the double-rider drop tower, often called the “couples’ line.” It required the riders to sit face-to-face, holding onto each other tightly so the seats wouldn’t tilt during the rapid ascent. The metal archway of the ride bore a cheesy slogan: “Give your deepest trust to the person closest to you.” When the ride operator pointed out that they only had seats for two, Austin looked at me. “Tess was just terrified up there anyway. Let’s not push her. I’ll go with Brooke this time.” They sat down, facing each other with bright, easy smiles. It was so strange. When they wanted entertainment, I wasn’t allowed to be afraid. But now, suddenly, my fear was a convenient excuse to leave me behind. I stared at them as they buckled their safety harnesses. “Austin, the engagement party in five days, let’s call it off.” Austin’s face paled as he registered the cold sincerity in my voice. “Tess, stop making a scene! We’ll talk about this when I get down!” When the ride ended, they practically chased me all the way to the entrance of my apartment building. My mother was sitting on a bench downstairs, chatting with some neighbors. When she saw me, her brow furrowed. “What’s with that face? Didn’t you have fun?” Brooke immediately rushed over, wrapping her arm around my mother’s shoulders with a pout. “Aunt Margaret, we were just trying to help Tessa work on her anxiety, but she accused me of bullying her. Now she’s even telling Austin she wants to call off the engagement.” Austin caught up, trying to smooth things over. “Margaret, it’s fine. If Tessa doesn’t want to go, we won’t force her. But calling off the engagement is a bit extreme.” My mother’s face went completely dark. She marched over, grabbing my ear in a vice grip. “Calling off the wedding just like that? Who do you think you are, throwing a tantrum like this?” With the neighbors watching and whispering, my mother raised her voice, wanting everyone to hear. “This girl has always been a coward. Austin and Brooke are kind enough to help her, and this is how she repays them? She’s completely ungrateful!” “Do you plan on hiding in your room like a useless hermit for the rest of your life?” Hearing the neighbors’ hushed judgments, my face burned as if I had been slapped in public. Austin stepped in, blocking me from my mother’s view. “Margaret, please, it’s fine. Even if Tessa stays like this, I’ll protect her.” His words only fueled my mother’s rage. She dragged me upstairs by my arm, slamming the front door behind us. The moment the door closed, my tears finally spilled over. “Mom, why is it that even though I’m your daughter, you always take everyone else’s side?” My mother let out a cold, sharp laugh. “I gave birth to you, do you think I don’t know what kind of useless child you are?” “Ever since you were little, you’ve been terrified of everything. You’re nothing like Brooke. You can’t get a single thing right, you’re just like your spineless father!” Her words cut deep, carving straight into my bones. But I had wanted to be brave, too. When I was small, money was tight. My mother was proud and ambitious, and she viewed my father’s gentle, quiet nature as cowardice. She screamed at him constantly, blaming his lack of backbone for our poverty. So, she decided to “train” the fear out of me from a young age. When I was three and afraid of the dark, she locked me in the dark utility closet. I cried until my voice went completely hoarse, and when she finally let me out, she beat me. When I was afraid of water, she shoved my face into a basin full of it, and if I struggled, another beating followed. She called it exposure therapy. But it didn’t cure me. It only made me more terrified. Because making a mistake meant punishment, and punishment was proof of my worthlessness. When I was eight, my father chose to divorce my mother, leaving everything behind, even me, just to escape her. From that day on, I didn’t dare to do anything. I was terrified that if I made another mistake, my mother would abandon me too. But Brooke, who grew up alongside me, was graceful, sweet-talking, and effortlessly adored by adults. My mother used to say constantly, “If only Brooke were my daughter.” Eventually, she even took Brooke in as her goddaughter. My mother pointed toward my bedroom. “Get in your room and think about what you’ve done. If you leave Austin, tell me, who else would be charitable enough to take you in?” She then dialed Brooke and Austin, her voice instantly shifting into a warm, gentle tone I had never received. “Brooke, sweetie, I’m going to make Tessa apologize to you both. Come over for dinner tonight, okay?” I leaned against my bedroom door, wiping away my tears. I unlocked my phone and dialed a friend’s number. “Skyler, that volunteer teaching program heading into the mountain communities in five days, do you still have an open slot?” Skyler sounded surprised. “Are you sure, Tess? There’s no signal up there, no internet, and the woods are full of snakes. Aren’t you terrified of all of that?” “I’m not afraid anymore.” “But what about your engagement? How are you going to explain this to your mother? She’ll tear you apart.” I gripped the phone tightly. “Skyler, I need to run away. Just once, I want to be brave for myself.” … Brooke and Austin arrived early, carrying heavy bags of groceries. Austin was the first to approach my door, offering an apology. “Tess, we bought all your favorite foods. Don’t be mad anymore, okay?” I didn’t answer. At the dinner table, the dishes spread before Brooke were all of her favorites: sweet glazed pork chops, garlic butter shrimp, and peach cobbler. Brooke gasped happily. “These are all my favorites! Thank you, Austin, for going out of your way to buy them, and thank you, Aunt Margaret, for cooking them exactly how I like!” But placed directly in front of me was a single, white porcelain bowl. I lifted the lid. Inside was a fully intact, stewed bullfrog. I nearly knocked the bowl off the table. In elementary school, some boys had stuffed a live toad into my backpack. When I reached in to grab my notebook, my fingers closed around its cold, slimy skin. My terrified screams became the joke of the school, and they nicknamed me “Frog-girl.” Ever since, frogs and toads had been my worst phobia. But when my mother found out, she started forcing me to eat bullfrog. “You’re only afraid because you haven’t eaten enough of it. Eat more, and you’ll get over it.” Once, she forced a spoonful down my throat, and I threw up so violently I ended up in the emergency room. Austin had snuck into the hospital that night, quietly slipping a roasted chicken leg into my hand. “Tessa, when we grow up, you can come live with me. I promise I will never force you to eat anything you’re afraid of.” “It’s okay to be a little scared.” The absolute sincerity in his eyes back then was the reason I had fallen in love with him. But now, Austin picked up his chopsticks, plucked a piece of the frog meat, and dropped it into my bowl. “It looks a bit intimidating, but it’s actually highly nutritious. Eat up.” I stared at the pale meat in my bowl, then picked it up and placed it into Brooke’s bowl. “If it’s so good, she should have it.” Austin immediately blocked her bowl with his chopsticks. “No, Tess, Brooke thinks frogs are disgusting. Just looking at them gives her goosebumps.” My mother slapped her chopsticks down against my knuckles. “Stop playing with your food. Who are you putting on this miserable face for?” I looked down at the table for a long, silent moment. Then, I picked up the piece of meat and put it in my mouth. My stomach churned, and I felt the urge to gag. But I forced myself to swallow. And in that moment, I realized: it really wasn’t that terrifying after all. They looked at me with smug satisfaction, like scientists admiring a successful experiment. The chatter at the table resumed. Austin carefully picked the bones out of the fish for Brooke, while my mother ladled soup into her bowl. I sat there like an invisible, decorative piece of furniture. Halfway through the meal, Austin suddenly spoke up. “By the way, Tess, about your team’s project presentation tomorrow, why don’t we let Brooke handle the pitch?” “You get so nervous in front of crowds, you might start stuttering.” For once in my life, I saw right through him. He claimed he was worried about my anxiety, but he knew exactly how important this project was. He wanted to hand the career-defining opportunity to Brooke on a silver platter. But I had stayed up for three consecutive nights working on those slides. I didn’t care about the spotlight, but I wanted to try. Just once, I wanted to stand at the front. “I want to do the presentation myself.” The table fell dead silent. Austin’s brow furrowed. “Are you sure? There will be a lot of executives there tomorrow. Don’t freeze up on stage.” My mother glared at me with deep disappointment. “You can’t even speak properly in front of your own relatives. What are you going to do up there?” “It’s fine if you want to embarrass yourself, but don’t drag Austin’s reputation down with you.” I looked at them both, my voice quiet but steady. “Haven’t you both always wanted me to be bolder?” Brooke quickly stepped in to play the peacemaker. “I think it’s wonderful that Tessa wants to take this step. I support you, Tess.” That night, I stayed up until two in the morning, practicing my delivery in front of the slides over and over again. But the next morning, when I stood on the stage, I realized several key data slides had been completely wiped clean. I froze, staring at the blank screen. Austin sat in the very front row, watching me with a calm, detached expression. “Having the courage to stand on stage is only the first step,” he spoke up from the crowd, his voice carrying across the room. “But professional capability is about mastering your data and handling unexpected situations.” At the same time, my phone buzzed in my pocket. It was a text from Brooke. “Austin and I deleted those two slides on purpose! In the real world, clients will throw all kinds of curveballs at you. Once you learn how to think on your feet, you won’t be scared anymore!” Dozens of eyes stared up at me from the audience. My hands began to tremble. There were no slides, no data charts. I closed my eyes and took a deep, steady breath. I began to speak. It was rocky, and I stumbled over my words three times. It wasn’t a flawless performance, but I didn’t run. I finished the pitch. When I concluded, the smug smiles on Austin and Brooke’s faces completely vanished. As I walked off the stage, my phone vibrated. It was a message from Skyler. “We leave for the mountains tomorrow. Have you made up your mind?” “Yes. I already bought my ticket.” At the celebratory dinner that evening, Brooke had a few drinks and began sharing my childhood embarrassments with the table. “You guys have no idea how pathetic Tessa is,” she giggled. “In middle school, someone locked her in the gym equipment room overnight. She just sat there crying until her voice went hoarse, too chicken to even knock on the door.” A colleague laughed, wiping a tear from his eye. “Tessa, that is seriously pathetic.” Brooke nudged Austin with her elbow. “Austin, tell them, am I lying?” Austin looked at my strained expression, hesitating for a fraction of a second. But when Brooke tugged on his sleeve, he spoke up anyway. “Yeah. When the teacher finally found her, she was so terrified she just hid behind my back and wouldn’t even look up.” The table erupted into laughter. My fingernails dug deep into my palms. I gathered every ounce of strength I had and spoke. “Could you please stop? I don’t like being the butt of your jokes.” The laughter died instantly. A colleague leaned over and whispered in my ear. “Don’t pick a fight with Brooke. She has serious connections here, the boss specifically told everyone to look after her.” She paused, looking at me in confusion. “Wait, if you and Brooke grew up together, you must know the boss too. Why are you…” I froze. I had worked myself to the bone to pass the interviews for this company, all because I wanted to be closer to Austin. But when we ran into each other in the lobby on my first day, he had walked right past me without a single word of acknowledgment. “I don’t want people giving you special treatment just because of me, Tessa,” he had told me later. “You need to learn to stand on your own feet.” I pulled my lips into a tight, humorless smile. “We’re just old classmates. We aren’t close.” Later that evening, someone suggested going to a horror-themed escape room. It was a hospital concept, rated five stars for terror. It was clearly aimed at me. When it came time to split into groups, everyone actively avoided me. One colleague joked half-mockingly, “We don’t want to get dragged down by having you in our group.” Eventually, only Austin, Brooke, and I were left. Austin looked at me with a performative display of reluctance, then took his place next to Brooke. “Tess, this is a great opportunity to build your character. Try going through it on your own.” The groups filed in, one by one. Except for me. Sitting there alone, I felt like I had been thrown back into my childhood. My mother didn’t love me, and the neighborhood kids didn’t want to play with me. Whenever we played games, I was always the one left out. I had wanted to go home back then, but my mother would drag me back to the playground, forcing me to stand there. “You always shrink back like a sewer rat! If you behaved more like Brooke, maybe people would actually want you around!” I had stood alone under the shade of a tree. Eventually, Austin had walked over and said, “I’ll play with you.” But the moment Brooke’s partner left, he had abandoned me to run to her side. Ten years had passed, and I was still the one left standing alone. I used to believe Austin was the savior who would pull me out of my ocean of self-doubt. But in reality, he had been holding Brooke’s hand the entire time, casually watching me drown. The staff member at the entrance looked at me sympathetically. “Are you going in alone, miss?” I clenched my fists. “Yes. Alone.” The door pushed open, and I was plunged into total darkness. The sterile smell of bleach filled the air, accompanied by flickering red lights and hanging white sheets covering mannequins. At a sharp turn in the corridor, Brooke suddenly jumped out from the shadows. Startled, my foot slipped on the slick floor, and I went crashing down, my forehead slamming hard against the metal leg of a prop gurney. The lights in the room suddenly flooded on, and a chorus of laughter echoed through the space. “Tess, you are way too easy to scare!” My knee was scraped and bleeding, and a large, painful knot was already forming on my forehead. I slowly brushed the dust off my clothes, turned around, and walked out of the building. Austin ran out after me. “Are you angry? Brooke only did it for your own good.” I swallowed the throbbing pain and shook my head. “I’m not angry.” He reached out, gently touching the bruise on my forehead with a soft smile. “Tess is always the most obedient.” When the night finally ended, Austin prepared to drive Brooke home. “Her apartment is in a pretty secluded area, and she’s terrified of being alone in the dark,” he explained casually. “You can just call a cab back.” I looked directly into his eyes. “Why is it that when it comes to Brooke, you never think her fears are something she needs to ‘get over’?” His mouth opened slightly, but no sound came out. Suddenly, the answers I had spent years searching for didn’t matter anymore. “Forget it. Just go.” When I got home, my mother was sitting on the sofa, eating sunflower seeds. “Did Austin drop you off?” “He went to drop Brooke off.” My mother tossed a handful of shells into the trash. “Look at you, absolutely useless.” “Austin comes from a good family, has a great job, and Brooke is such a perfect match for him. He must have been blind to choose you, and yet you still aren’t satisfied.” I looked at her, my gaze steady and calm. “You’re right, Mom. Brooke is a much better match for Austin than I am.” “And she’d make a much better daughter for you, too.” My mother slammed her hand on the table and stood up. “You’ve learned to talk back now? Do you honestly think anyone actually likes you?” “You have the exact same pathetic attitude as your father. You’ll never hold a candle to Brooke.” I went into my room and shut the door. She stood outside, screaming insults through the wood until past midnight. I put on my headphones and quietly began packing my bags. The next morning, I went out to buy supplies for the mountain village: snake repellent, bug spray, and a first-aid kit. When I returned, the front door was slightly ajar. The sound of laughter floated out from the living room. First, it was Brooke’s voice. “Hey, during the engagement party, right when Tessa walks onto the stage, let’s drop something on her from above to test her courage.” “What do you think? A fake snake, or maybe a dead rat?” Austin remained silent for a long time. Brooke’s tone grew irritable. “What’s with that face? If you’re going to take her side, then just stop talking to me altogether!” Austin finally let out a heavy sigh. “Fine… but this is the absolute last time. I don’t want Tess to get too traumatized.” He spoke as if he cared, and yet, he still agreed. My mother joined in on the laughter. “A good scare will do her some good. She’s been full of attitude lately, this will teach her a lesson.” The afternoon sun was scorching, but I felt a sudden, icy chill seep into my bones. My own engagement party was nothing more than a stage for their cruel prank. It was fine. It really was fine. When the laughter inside subsided, I pushed the door open and walked in. Austin quickly stood up, wrapping an arm around my shoulders with a nervous smile. “Tess, we were just planning the perfect engagement party for you.” “Okay,” I replied softly. Brooke leaned in close. “Tess, I’m throwing a little pre-wedding bachelor night for Austin tonight. You don’t mind, do you?” “I don’t mind.” But at two in the morning, my phone rang. I had to go pick up the two of them, both completely wasted. Brooke’s makeup was smudged with tears as she clutched Austin’s sleeve. “If you hadn’t refused to go to the same college as me… if you had just confessed to me back then, I wouldn’t have stubbornly told you I didn’t like you.” Austin covered his eyes with his hand, his voice raspy and broken. “I regret it too… I shouldn’t have gotten drunk and kissed Tessa just to spite you. I shouldn’t have stayed with her.” “But she… she just looked so pitiful when she smiled…” I leaned against the doorframe, my knees suddenly feeling weak. On the night of our high school graduation, we had all had our first drinks. Austin, completely drunk, had pulled me into his arms on the street corner, kissing me as he whispered, “I love you so much.” That was the first time in my life anyone had ever told me they loved me. I had felt like the luckiest girl in the world, my head spinning with joy. He had fallen asleep with his head on my shoulder, and I hadn’t dared to move a single inch, my heart racing through the entire night. Ten years of my life, built entirely on a mistake. I let out a silent, self-deprecating laugh. Of course. How could someone like me ever be truly loved? I dragged the two of them back into the apartment. The next morning, Austin and Brooke came to pick up my mother, saying they were heading to the hotel early to set up. I knew they were going to set up the “surprise.” Austin smiled warmly at me from the door. “Take your time getting ready, Tess. Don’t rush.” I nodded, watching them drive away. Skyler was already waiting for me at the train station. By the time I arrived, Austin had sent me a text: “Don’t come just yet, we aren’t fully ready.” In the background of his call earlier, I had overheard Brooke shrieking, “No, this dead rat looks too fake! Go find another one!” So that was their grand plan. I didn’t reply. My mother sent a voice note to our family group chat. “Our Tessa has always been timid and easily embarrassed. The engagement party will start a bit late to give her more time to prepare.” I smiled, muted my phone, and boarded the bus with Skyler. Right before my signal cut out entirely, I received one last voice note from Austin. “Where are you? You can come now, we’re ready.” In the background, Brooke was laughing. “Hurry up, hurry up! The surprise is waiting!” I turned my phone off and never looked back. Meanwhile, at the hotel banquet hall, Austin and the others waited. The heavy doors were suddenly pushed open. Brooke shrieked, throwing her prop forward. But the only person standing at the entrance was the hotel manager. “Miss Tessa asked me to inform you that she won’t be coming. She wishes you all a wonderful evening.” The smile on Austin’s face shattered instantly. My mother stood frozen in place, unable to believe her ears.

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1 As the business owner, I had just announced a $1,000 monthly raise for our entire staff at the morning meeting. Before the cheers of my employees could even fade, a post on social media from the landlord of the surrounding rental properties shattered the mood: Effective this month, rent is going up by $1,200. New flat rate: $2,200 a month. I immediately dialed the landlord, Tabitha. “Tabitha, what is this? When you practically begged me to set up my office here, we shook hands on a fixed rate of $1,000 a month for my staff, with a promise of no hikes.” “We give them a raise, and you instantly raise the rent? Your hike is $200 more than the raise I just gave them. What is the meaning of this?” Tabitha sneered through the phone. “Marcus, honey, times change. This district is booming now. Your company isn’t the only game in town anymore. If your people don’t want to pay, there is a line of eager tenants waiting. Too expensive? Pack up and leave.” I looked out the window at the bustling business park. Dozens of supplier and partner companies had set up shop here just to be close to us. I hung up the phone and typed a message directly into our corporate announcement channel: “Pack your bags. Next Monday, the entire company is moving to our new headquarters.” Let’s see if your precious properties are still in high demand when my company is gone. Right after I hung up, Tabitha posted an update on her feed. I was trying to be nice to my loyal tenants by not raising it too much. But since some people don’t know how to be grateful, rent is going up another $300. Flat rate of $2,500 a month starting now. Suppressing my anger, I opened the main company group chat. It was already in chaos. “Marcus, is this raise for us or for the landlord?” “How does she expect us to live? We get a $1,000 raise, and she instantly demands an extra $1,500!” “At this rate, we’re just working for her. We won’t even have money left for groceries.” Another text popped up from an employee. “She’s not even waiting until next month. She’s demanding we pay the $1,500 difference right now. I asked her for a two-day extension, and she cut off my electricity.” My heart sank. The next morning, I pushed open the office doors. The lobby lights were off, and the scent of instant ramen hung heavy in the air. I frowned, walking deeper into the workspace. A few figures were curled up under their desks, surrounded by a messy pile of suitcases. I had always banned pointless overtime. Why were people sleeping in the office? “What is going on here?” I knocked on a glass partition. Daisy, who was sleeping closest to the door, bolted upright in panic. “Marcus! I’m sorry, we’ll pack up right away.” I looked at her bloodshot eyes and the exhausted faces of the other employees waking up around her. “Why are you sleeping here, Daisy?” She looked down, her eyes welling with tears. “We haven’t received this month’s paycheck yet, so none of us had the $1,500 to pay the rent difference. Tabitha came by with a couple of guys in the middle of the night and threw us out.” Another young woman wiped her tears. “The moment we got off work yesterday, all our things were dumped in the hallway. They even threw our blankets on the floor and stomped all over them.” “What about your security deposits?” I asked, struggling to keep my voice steady. “She kept them,” Daisy spat, clenching her fists. “She said we breached the lease by leaving early, so she’s keeping the deposits as a penalty.” I let out a cold laugh. Breached the lease? She was the one price-gouging, yet somehow my employees were the ones at fault. Looking at the clutter on the floor, a heavy stone settled in my chest. I had chosen this location specifically because the rent was affordable, wanting to ease the financial burden on the team who worked so hard for me. Who could have known Tabitha, once so pleasant and cooperative, could turn this greedy? “Go wash up and get yourselves sorted,” I said, pointing toward the restrooms. “Marcus… are we causing trouble for the company?” Daisy asked, anxiously tugging at her shirt. “No,” I said, looking them in the eye. “Don’t worry. As long as I’m here, the company has your back.” I patted Daisy’s shoulder. “Meet me in the lobby in ten minutes. We’re going to get some answers.” “Tabitha, kicking people out and keeping their deposits? Don’t you think you’ve gone too far?” I marched into the property management office, several employees behind me. Tabitha was lounging on a leather sofa. “Well, well. Marcus is here to start a riot bright and early? I’m just following the contract. They couldn’t pay, so I took my property back.” I slammed a stack of printed lease agreements onto her desk. “It says right here, in black and white, a fixed rent. What right do you have to unilaterally raise it?” Tabitha sneered, sitting up. “Are you blind, Marcus? Didn’t you see the fine print? ‘The landlord reserves the right of final interpretation.’ Besides, this is the market rate now.” She stood up and walked over to Daisy. “If you’re broke, don’t rent. Go sleep on the streets. It’s free.” Daisy shook with anger, her fists trembling. I pulled her behind me and stared coldly at Tabitha. Her smirk vanished, replaced by a vicious glare. She leaned in close. “If you want the apartments back, fine. Get down on your knees, give me three good apologies, and beg. If I’m in a good mood, maybe I’ll give your losers a ten percent discount.” I laughed from sheer anger. I grabbed Daisy’s arm and turned around. “Not a chance. There are plenty of places to live. I don’t believe we can’t find a single decent landlord in this city. Daisy, get everyone. The company will cover a hotel for a week while we look for a permanent solution.” Just as I turned to walk out, my foot caught on something. One of the security guards standing next to Tabitha had slipped his leg out. Caught off guard, I tripped and fell forward, my knees slamming heavily onto the hard tile floor. A sharp, white-hot pain shot up my legs. “Marcus!” Daisy gasped, rushing to help me up. Tabitha looked down at me, laughing mockingly. “Oh, Marcus, you didn’t have to get on your knees so fast! But I’m afraid you’re too late anyway.” Her voice dripped with spite. “Those apartments? Rented them out this morning to employees from the other tech firms in the park. Three thousand a month. People are practically begging for them.” I forced myself up, ignoring the throbbing pain in my knees, and glared at her. “Three thousand? Do you think everyone is an idiot?” Just then, a few people walked out of the back office. The woman leading them gave us a disdainful look. “So what if we rented them? If you can’t afford it, step aside. Plenty of people can. Tabitha’s places are right next to our office. Our team jumped at the chance.” Daisy’s eyes widened. “Marcus, that’s her cousin!” I immediately saw through Tabitha’s little game. She had hired her own family to play the role of eager tenants, creating a false illusion of high demand to scare the remaining renters into signing expensive renewals. Tabitha wasn’t even embarrassed to be caught. She just smirked and waved her hand. “Get these bums out of here. They’re ruining the view.” The security guards shoved us out the door. Daisy was crying tears of frustration, wanting to go back and fight. I held her back, dusting off my pants. “Don’t bother. You can’t reason with people like that.” By the time we got back to the office, my knee had swollen into a dark, angry purple bruise. No sooner had I sat down than my desk phone began ringing off the hook. Several department managers called, their voices tight with panic. “Marcus, Tabitha has lost her mind. She just posted notices in all the buildings. She’s demanding every tenant sign a one-year lease today. And she wants a six-month deposit upfront.” “And if they don’t sign?” I asked coldly. “She said anyone who doesn’t sign by next Monday will be evicted immediately.” The manager sounded utterly defeated. “Marcus, the team is panicking. They’re asking if we’re really moving next Monday. If we are, they say they’ll grit their teeth and get through this week.” Without hesitation, I opened the all-hands chat. My fingers flew across the keyboard. “To all staff: ignore the landlord’s demands. Under no circumstances should you sign a new lease.” “Just hang in there for a week. The company will fully reimburse all hotel and temporary accommodation costs for this week.” Just as the message sent, my office door burst open. Simon, my assistant, ran in, pale and holding a tablet. “Marcus, we have a problem!” “Yesterday, when you went to confront Tabitha, she secretly recorded it. She edited the footage and posted it online. It’s already trending locally!” I took the tablet and played the video, which already had over a million views. The video showed absolutely none of Tabitha’s arrogance. It only showed me storming into her office with a crowd of employees, and then me falling to the floor, followed by Daisy looking like she was about to attack the guards. A voiceover of Tabitha, sniffling and crying, played over the footage. “These corporate bullies think they can run this town. I’m just a simple, honest landlord who tried to adjust the rent slightly to match the market. This boss, Marcus, brought dozens of thugs to wreck my office and threatened to ruin my life.” In the second half, her cousin made an appearance, tearfully complaining about how our company was blacklisting the apartments and bullying local residents. I scrolled through the comments. They were filled with venomous outrage. Greedy corporate scum deserve to rot! Using his employees to bully a helpless landlord? Boycott this company! Simon looked close to tears. “Marcus, the PR department just called. Because of this viral video, our stock price dropped at the opening bell. Several partners we were supposed to sign contracts with this morning have put things on hold.” Tabitha had twisted the truth. Not only did she want to bleed my employees dry, but she wanted to use our company’s reputation as a stepping stone to play the victim. I tossed the tablet onto the desk and took a deep breath. “Get legal on this immediately. Tell them to gather everything and prepare a defamation lawsuit.” Simon nodded and hurried out. I leaned back, closing my eyes to clear my head. Tabitha’s move was dirty, but it was sloppy. She thought she could ride a wave of internet outrage to destroy me, but she forgot how quickly the internet can turn. Once we moved out, her little empire of cards would collapse. I picked up the intercom and called facilities. “Is the inspection on the new office complete?” “Yes, Marcus,” came the quick reply. “Everything is signed off, the air systems are fully tested, and we’re ready for move-in.” I tapped my desk, my eyes cold. “Good. Contact the moving company privately. This weekend, we pack up all core servers, equipment, and files.” That afternoon, Tabitha walked right into my office. “Well, Marcus, saw the video yet? How does it feel?” She smirked, sliding her phone across my desk. On screen was a screenshot of my message in the main group chat telling everyone not to sign the leases. Clearly, she had a mole in our lower ranks. However, she hadn’t seen the executive-level planning chats about the move. “Marcus, you really thought you could stage a rent strike against me?” Tabitha sneered. “Since you want to play games with your employees’ housing, let’s talk about your corporate lease.” I looked at her coldly. “Tabitha, don’t push your luck. This land lease was signed with the local municipality, not you.” Tabitha laughed. “Oh, Marcus. Did you really forget? When you first arrived here, clueless and eager, who do you think paved the way and handled the government paperwork for you?” “I secured the master agency lease for this entire plot first. Legally speaking, your lease is with me.” My stomach tightened. When I first came here, her apparent community-minded attitude had charmed me into choosing this location over better options in the city. I never realized she had set a trap from day one. Tabitha tapped the desk. “So, here is your official notice. Starting next month, your corporate land lease is going up eighty percent. From one hundred thousand a month to one hundred and eighty thousand.” “And on Monday, you will pay the eighty-thousand difference for this past month.” I stared at her greedy face and let out a cold laugh. “This is extortion.” Tabitha shrugged. “It’s just business. You’re the one clinging to a verbal agreement about fixed rates. If you think it’s too expensive, I have other company owners coming to look at the site on Monday. If you don’t pay, I’ll have them move in.” “I built this office building with my own capital,” I pointed out. Tabitha laughed so hard she practically cried. “So what? You want to tear it down? Go ahead, try! Otherwise, I’ll just let the new tenants use your state-of-the-art building for free. What are you going to do about it?” I looked at her smug face, and a strange calm washed over me. “Fine. Come see me on Monday.” Thinking she had won, Tabitha stood up, victorious. “Smart choice, Marcus. Be reasonable, and we all win.” For the next few days, Tabitha was nowhere to be seen. I saw on social media that she had flown out of town for a luxury vacation. Her caption read: No matter how big the boss is, they still crawl when you squeeze them. Raised the rent, and he didn’t even dare to whisper a complaint. I took a screenshot of the post and sent it to my leadership team chat with a single sentence: “Begin the move.” Over the weekend, the entire company executed a silent, flawless evacuation. By Monday morning, I stood alone at the entrance of the commercial park, waiting for Tabitha. She had just come straight from the airport, dragging her designer suitcase toward me. “Marcus! Out here waiting for me so early? I guess you’ve made up your mind.” She smirked, chin held high. “But I’ve changed my mind. It’s now a hundred percent increase. You owe me an extra hundred thousand today.” I didn’t say a word. I simply stepped aside, clearing her view of the road ahead. Tabitha’s eyes followed my movement. The next second, the smirk froze on her face. She stared at the empty space ahead, her voice trembling. “What… what did you do?”

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1 Five years after I altered my face and faked my death, Nolan walked into my flower shop. “A bouquet of white bellflowers, please. Pack them carefully. My late wife was very particular about these things.” My hand froze in the middle of trimming a stem. Only then did it strike me, with a dull, echoing ache, that today was the anniversary of my death. White bellflowers. Their language was hopeless love. Once, he had despised these pale, muted blossoms. During our worst arguments, he had even mocked me, saying I was just like them: bland, uninteresting, and entirely lacking the vibrant warmth of Yvonne. And now, he was buying them to mourn me. As he turned to leave, a small voice called out from the back room. “Mommy, I’m hungry.” Andy toddled out, rubbing his sleepy eyes. The moment Nolan’s gaze fell on the boy’s face, his pupils shrank. The child looked almost exactly like him. The memory of Yvonne’s threats from five years ago flashed vividly in my mind. Instinctively, I pulled Andy behind my back, shielding him from Nolan’s intense stare. “The boy was born without a father, sir. He is very timid. Please don’t frighten him.” It wasn’t a lie. The Nolan I had once loved was long dead. Nolan clearly did not believe me. His eyes searched my face, burning with a desperate curiosity. I lowered my head, avoiding his gaze. Seeing my reflection in the dark glass of the counter, I breathed a quiet sigh of relief. I had a completely different face now. There was no way he could recognize me. But Andy was a different story. Ignoring my protest, Nolan knelt in front of the boy, gently taking his small hand. His voice trembled with an urgency he couldn’t hide. “How old are you, little guy?” I quickly pulled my son back, offering a polite, practiced smile to mask my rising panic. “He is the child of my late husband. My husband had terrible luck, passing away just days after the boy was born.” Nolan froze. The light in his eyes flickered, caught between devastating disappointment and lingering doubt. Before he could press further, the shop door chimed. “Nolan, what is taking you so long?” Yvonne stepped into the shop, sliding her hand intimately through Nolan’s arm. But the moment her eyes drifted to my face, her expression hardened. Unlike Nolan, Yvonne knew exactly what I looked like after the reconstructive surgery. Remembering the terrifying promises she had made to me five years ago, my heart skipped a beat. Nolan didn’t seem to notice her tension. He subtly took a half-step back, creating a polite distance between himself and me, though his eyes remained glued to Andy. “The wind is strong outside,” Nolan said softly to Yvonne. “Why didn’t you wait in the car?” “I was too impatient,” she cooed, leaning closer to him. “I wanted to accompany you to see my sister. Even though today is the anniversary of her passing, it is also the final day of our five-year pact.” She looked up at him, her eyes bright and filled with tears, but I could hear the sharp, mocking triumph beneath her sweet tone. “You promised me back then that once she was gone for five years, you would marry me. Surely you haven’t forgotten? Besides, we have already been living as husband and wife for years.” She gently pressed her hand against her stomach, a blush creeping up her cheeks. “The entire high society of Port Vista is waiting for our wedding. Not to mention, the little one in my belly cannot wait much longer.” I felt a quiet jolt of surprise. Five years had passed, and they still hadn’t married? The air in the small shop grew suffocatingly still. Only when Yvonne’s smile began to fray did Nolan finally speak, his voice thick and raspy. “I haven’t forgotten.” He pulled two hundred-dollar bills from his wallet and laid them on the counter. “My apologies. I lost my composure earlier. You may keep the change. Your bellflowers are beautiful.” He swallowed hard. “My… my late wife would have loved them.” With those words, he took the bouquet and guided Yvonne out of the shop. My eyes drifted to his hand. When we used to walk together, he would always use his thumb to gently rub the back of my hand. It was a soft, comforting habit that used to make my heart race. Nolan, do you share those same quiet habits with Yvonne now? Just as the door swung open, Yvonne paused and looked back. She cast a chilling, warning glare in my direction, her eyes lingering with venom on Andy. Once the door clicked shut, the shop returned to silence. The strength drained from my legs, and I collapsed into my chair, pulling Andy tightly against my chest. Looking at the crisp bills on the counter, a bitter, hollow smile touched my lips. I understood her warning perfectly. It was time for me to move to another city. 2 After putting Andy to bed, I sat in the dim light of the back room, my mind drifting to the events of six years ago. Back then, I was the darling of Port Vista’s high society. My parents adored me, allowing me to pursue my passion as a runway model. I lived for the bright lights of the stage, enjoying the confidence of a girl who had never known hardship. My biggest worry in those days was deciding the size of the diamond for my engagement ring, or choosing which designer would craft my wedding gown. Until the day my parents brought a thin, sun-baked girl into our living room, their eyes red with tears. “Giselle, this is your sister. She is… our biological daughter.” I had immediately welcomed her, pulling her into my massive closet and offering her my most beautiful dresses. “Yvonne, we are sisters now. What is mine is yours.” I truly felt a sense of guilt, wanting to make up for the twenty years she had spent in poverty. I took her with me everywhere, sharing everything I owned. But I never realized that my generous promise would become the curse that stripped me of my life. With Yvonne’s return, the arranged marriage between our family and Nolan’s faced a major obstacle. Nolan’s grandfather visited our estate, his tone unyielding. “The future daughter of our family must be the true, biological heiress of your estate.” My parents remained silent. They loved me, but when balanced against the survival of our massive family empire, an adopted daughter simply carried no weight. That night, I locked myself in my bedroom and cried. Suddenly, there was a soft tap against my window. Nolan was standing in the garden below, his white shirt stained with dirt, his face bright with youthful determination. “Giselle, don’t be afraid.” He climbed up to the balcony, holding me so tightly it felt as though he wanted to press me into his very bones, gently kissing the tears from my cheeks. “I don’t care about their alliances. Even if I have to forfeit my inheritance, you are the only woman I will ever marry.” The night breeze had been cold, but his promise had been incredibly warm. With my family’s wealth, Yvonne quickly shed her awkwardness, growing more beautiful by the day. And gradually, the way Nolan looked at her began to change. One afternoon, as I was showing Yvonne a new skincare routine, Nolan had watched from the doorway, offering a casual remark. “Don’t overwhelm her with all that makeup, Giselle. She looks quite charming just the way she is.” We all froze, the air turning awkward. That was only the beginning. Nolan had always been fiercely protective of his personal space. Once, when I accidentally used his coffee mug, he hadn’t gotten angry, but he never touched that mug again. Yet during a movie night with Yvonne, when she complained of being thirsty, she grabbed his soda and took a sip. He simply took the cup back and continued drinking from it without a second thought. In the past, he wouldn’t even eat fruit unless I sliced it and fed it to him myself. But during a family dinner, he quietly put on gloves, peeling shrimp and placing them in Yvonne’s bowl. Meeting my stunned gaze, he quickly looked away, offering a low explanation. “Yvonne had a difficult life before she came back. She has never even tasted fresh seafood. I am just looking out for her.” “Giselle, you have always been a generous, kind girl. Surely you aren’t going to be jealous of your own sister?” His words felt like a heavy stone, crushing whatever right I had to feel hurt. I kept forcing myself to believe him, telling myself he was only acting out of pity. Until the day I cut my modeling trip short to surprise him for his birthday. The moment I pushed open his front door, I found a trail of clothes scattered from the foyer to the bedroom. His designer shirt, which I had bought for him. Her silk slip, which she had admired during our shopping trip and he had paid for. My mind went entirely blank. I walked toward the bedroom, and every last bit of my self-delusion was shattered by the sight of their tangled bodies on the bed. 3 That afternoon, I lost my mind, smashing every object in the bedroom. But Nolan didn’t show the panic or remorse I had expected. Instead, his eyes held a flicker of irritation at being interrupted. “Giselle, just be sensible for once and try to understand my position.” “Do you have any idea how much pressure our families are putting on us? If I give Yvonne a title, all our problems disappear.” “But you are the only one I truly love. Once we are married, we can still be together just like before. Isn’t that enough?” I refused to accept his terms, causing a massive scene and taking the matter directly to my parents, foolishly believing they would stand up for me. But my father simply delivered a heavy slap across my face in front of all the household staff. “Screaming like a common street harlot over a man? Is this how we raised you?” “Yvonne is the rightful bride of his family. As her older sister, you should be stepping aside, not trying to ruin her happiness.” To teach me a lesson, Nolan and my parents agreed to lock me away in a remote villa in the suburbs. The weight of their betrayal kept me awake night after night. I began to lose my grip on reality, wondering if I really did owe Yvonne everything. I had lived her comfortable life for twenty years, so perhaps returning Nolan to her was simply balanced justice. One evening, they arrived at the villa. From my locked room, I was forced to listen to them together through the thin wall. During the night, Yvonne accidentally knocked over a scented candle. By the time I realized what was happening, the room was already filled with thick, suffocating smoke. With his clothes in disarray, Nolan cradled a terrified Yvonne in his arms and rushed out of the burning building. I was left behind in the flames. No one had realized I was still inside. By the time the firefighters pulled me out, my face was entirely destroyed, and my vocal cords were severely damaged by the smoke. When I woke up, I was lying in a private sanitarium. My head was wrapped in thick bandages, and the doctors prepared me for extensive reconstructive surgery. Before I was taken to the operating room, I heard Yvonne instructing the surgeon. She told him there was no need to preserve my original features, suggesting they make me look as plain as possible. The brilliant, beautiful Giselle was reduced to a faceless ghost. I could no longer model, and I could barely care for myself. My career, my love, and my future had been systematically erased. On the day the bandages were removed, it took me thirty minutes to find the courage to look in the mirror. Fortunately, the surgeon had been kind, refusing her cruel instructions and leaving me with a simple, ordinary face. My parents, terrified I would cause more trouble, confiscated all my electronic devices and left me with an old flip phone that could barely access basic web pages. Even then, a foolish part of me believed Nolan would search for me. We had grown up together, sharing over a decade of memories. He knew I was in that villa. Every day, despite the pain in my scarred fingers, I searched his name. Nolan. Giselle. Fire. Missing. On the first day, there was nothing. On the fifth day, only stock updates for his family’s group. On the tenth day, still nothing. Finally, after two weeks, his name appeared across every major entertainment site. The alliance of two great families. Nolan purchases a flawless pink diamond for his fiancée, Yvonne, as their wedding date approaches. The photos showed Nolan in a tailored suit, looking down at Yvonne with a tender expression, a massive diamond gleaming on her ring finger. My hand shook, and the cheap phone slipped from my fingers, shattering against the linoleum floor. The last spark of hope in my heart went out. That same month, I discovered I was pregnant. Yvonne arrived at the sanitarium the moment she received the medical report. She looked down at me with absolute victory. “Giselle, Nolan is marrying me next month.” “From the moment we told him you died in the fire to the day he agreed to marry me, it only took him two weeks.” She let out a soft laugh. “Your ten years together couldn’t even stand against my two weeks.” She tossed a document renouncing my inheritance and a falsified death certificate onto my lap. “Sign these, take your bastard child, and disappear forever. Don’t try any tricks. Making a real death certificate for you would be incredibly easy.” I felt no anger, only a hollow silence. I took the pen and signed my name. On that day, the old Giselle truly died in the ashes of that fire. 4 A torrential rain began to beat against the shop windows. Andy was sleeping deeply in my arms. Just as I laid him down on the small cot in the back room, my phone rang. It was the landlord. “I am canceling your lease. I will return your deposit, but you need to pack your things and leave tonight.” I froze. “We have a signed contract. How can you simply throw us out? It is pouring outside. Where am I supposed to take a five-year-old child?” “Someone purchased the entire building for ten times its value,” the landlord explained, his voice defensive. “They specifically demanded that you be evicted immediately. There is nothing I can do.” He hung up. A cold dread settled over me. Yvonne’s retaliation was swifter and more ruthless than I had imagined. “Andy, wake up, sweetheart. We have to go…” I walked into the back room, and the air left my lungs. The cot was empty. The window was wide open, letting the cold rain spray onto the floor. My son was gone. I bolted toward the front door, ready to scream for help, but the door swung open and Yvonne stepped inside, flanked by several heavy-set bodyguards. She tossed one of Andy’s small sneakers onto the floor, wiping her hands with a look of disgust. Panic turned into pure rage. I lunged at her, but the guards quickly pinned me to the floor, forcing my face against the cold tiles. “Where is my son? He is only a baby! If you have a problem, take it out on me!” Yvonne smiled, pulling out her phone and tapping a video. On the screen, Andy was locked in the back seat of a car, sobbing hysterically and banging his small fists against the rain-streaked window. My heart broke. Tears mingled with the dirt on my face. He was the child I had nearly died to bring into this world. I had endured the agony of a back-alley clinic, biting my lip until it bled, just to hear his first cry. I had named him Christian, hiding a small piece of his father’s name in his own, a final, secret connection to the man I used to love. And now, he was being tormented because of me. I stopped struggling, letting my body go limp under the guard’s grip. “I will leave,” I rasped, my voice raw and broken. “I promise I will never return to Port Vista. Just give me my son.” I looked up at her, offering the words I knew she wanted to hear. “Yvonne, I am a dead woman. My face is ruined, my body is out of shape. Even if you stripped me bare and threw me in front of Nolan, he wouldn’t look at me twice. I will not get in your way.” I pressed my forehead against her shoes, begging for the life of my child. Yvonne watched my humiliation with a satisfied smile. “Is that so? Then why don’t you listen to how happy we are without you?” She dialed Nolan’s number and put it on speaker. “Yvonne? Are you home yet?” Nolan’s voice sounded distracted over the line. “I am still wrapping up some business, but I will be home soon. Stay safe.” “I am fine, darling,” Yvonne cooed, her eyes locked onto me. “The baby just kicked. We both miss you so much.” Listening to their exchange, I felt nothing. My heart had been hollowed out long ago. But neither of us had noticed the sound of heavy rain over Nolan’s receiver, or the slight tremor in his voice. Once the call ended, Yvonne raised her high heel and stamped it down hard onto my hand. A sharp, blinding pain shot up my arm. I bit my lip, refusing to give her the satisfaction of a scream. “That’s better. This is exactly where you belong, Giselle. You owe me so much more than this.” Before she could say another word, the glass door was suddenly shattered.

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1 After Dad vanished into the parallel dimension, Mom dumped every single penny we had into quantum portal research. To keep me alive and out of her hair, she bought a nanny bot to handle my daily routine. But Mom’s so-called best buddy, Uncle Felix, hacked the robot’s system and locked it into pet mode. Every day, it dispensed exactly ten pieces of dry cat kibble for me to eat. I was so starved I could barely whisper when I finally called Mom begging for help. Her voice over the phone was sharp and cold. “Can you just grow up for once? You are absolutely useless. You couldn’t even keep your own father from leaving!” “I asked Felix to drop by and check on you every single day! Who is teaching you to tell these disgusting lies?” Terrified, I hung up the phone and crawled deep into my bedroom closet. I hid there because the shadows still smelled like Dad. Just as the last bit of warmth was leaving my body, a strange, echoing voice whispered right into my ear. [Would you be willing to give up your life in exchange for your father’s return?] I gave a weak, tiny nod. I would do it. I would do anything as long as Mom and Dad could be happy again. … I curled up on the hardwood floor of the closet, desperately burying my face in the flannel shirts Dad left behind, breathing in the scent of cedarwood and old spice. His clothes were still neatly hanging there, and just looking at them made me feel safe. I kept my head wrapped in his jacket, quietly feeling my life slip away. The closet was pitch black, exactly like the night Dad disappeared. Only this time, I wasn’t scared at all. That strange voice promised me. It said that as long as I let go of my life, Dad would come back. And if Dad came back, Mom wouldn’t have to hurt so much anymore. I closed my eyes, and my mind slowly drifted away into a heavy fog. By the time I realized what was happening, I was floating in the middle of the living room. The nanny bot was humming in standby mode. I drifted through the air and curiously patted its metal head. It had a perfectly round dome and spoke with a voice that sounded just like mine, so Mom had named it Orbit. Mom used to tell me she was going to bring Dad back, so Orbit would be in charge of watching me eat, sleep, and do my homework. I had been so happy. With Orbit around, Mom wouldn’t have to work herself to the bone anymore. But the very next day, Orbit changed. It stopped cooking my favorite meals. Instead, a little hatch on its metallic belly popped open, dropping a few brown pebbles onto a plastic plate. Orbit’s voice was still sickeningly sweet. [Here is your food for today.] “Orbit, I don’t want this. I want Dad’s scrambled eggs with the secret sprinkle of sugar.” [Ben, as a little kitty cat, you must only eat your kibble.] I figured Orbit was just glitching, so I tried pressing the reset button on its back. But Orbit merely tilted its round head and played a pre-recorded message on a loop. [Pet mode engaged. Please contact the administrator to adjust settings.] I called Mom’s cell phone. It rang forever before she finally picked up. The background noise was deafening. I could hear adults shouting over the roar of massive generators. Mom’s voice was hoarse and dripping with impatience. “Ben, didn’t I tell you not to call me unless it’s an emergency?” “Mom, Orbit is broken. It’s only giving me…” Before I could even finish my sentence, she cut me off. “Didn’t I ask Felix to go see you every day? Why are you making up stories, Ben?” I opened my mouth but the words died in my throat when I heard the sudden crack of a sob in Mom’s voice. Everything went wrong when Dad decided to cross over to the other world. He couldn’t stand how close Mom and Uncle Felix were getting. After that, Mom turned into a completely different person. She cut ties with Uncle Felix and practically locked herself inside the underground lab. She lost her mind trying to find a way to drag Dad back to our reality. Uncle Felix didn’t take it well. Whenever he came over to check on me, the look in his eyes was pure poison. And then… My tiny brain was spinning, trying to piece everything together, when a loud click echoed from the front door. The heavy deadbolt turned. Footsteps echoed in the hallway, and my eyes instantly lit up. Mom was home! I floated eagerly through the living room, watching her kick off her heels. “Ben?” “Mom! You’re finally back!” I threw my arms open and lunged at her, only to pass right through her chest. I stared blankly at my own transparent hands. Right. I forgot I was already dead. “Ben? I am not in the mood for hide and seek today. Come out right now!” I pouted, instinctively wanting to argue that I wasn’t playing games. But no matter how loud I screamed, not a single sound reached her ears. All I could do was watch helplessly as Mom walked over to Orbit to check its system logs. “Orbit, where is Ben?” The robot’s oversized digital eyes flashed blue, and its mechanical voice chimed through the quiet room. [Administrator voice recognized. The kitty cat is currently napping in the bedroom closet.] [Breathing is steady. Sleep mode engaged.] Mom paused, letting out a heavy sigh before turning toward the bedroom hallway. My heart felt like it was going to beat right out of my invisible chest. I wanted her to find me, but I didn’t want her to know I was dead just yet. Dad wasn’t back yet. I couldn’t let Mom’s heart break all over again. Just as her fingers brushed the bedroom doorknob, her cell phone suddenly started screaming in her pocket. “Professor Sarah! We are getting massive energy spikes from the multiverse grid! The experiment is stabilizing!” Mom yanked her hand back from the door, spun around, and practically ran out of the house. Watching the door slam shut behind her, I let out a breath I didn’t know I was holding. Mom and Dad were going to be together soon. That was a good thing. I looked down at my pale, shriveled body lying in the closet and realized how ugly I looked. If Dad saw me looking like a pile of bones, he would be so upset. I swallowed the lump in my throat and floated back to the living room. A massive portrait of our family of three hung right in the center of the wall. Mom had specifically framed it after Dad left. I had asked her why she put it up. She just looked at me with those hollow, haunted eyes and kept whispering that it was all her fault. Mom thought I was too young to understand. But I remembered everything. I remembered how Mom took down all our family photos just because Uncle Felix casually mentioned he didn’t like looking at them. Dad and Mom had a screaming match over it, throwing things until I burst into tears. When Dad heard me crying, all the fight drained out of him. He looked utterly defeated. “If it weren’t for you, Ben, I would have walked out on your mother a long time ago.” “But nobody should be caged like this.” I didn’t really understand what being caged meant, but being buried in Dad’s warm chest always made the scary things go away. I floated up to the gallery wall, looking at the smiles frozen in time. We looked so happy back then. Mom’s eyes were bright, and she looked like she was glowing from the inside out. Dad was grinning like a teenager, wrapping his big arms around both of us as if we were his entire world. I remembered that specific day so clearly. Dad made me his famous scrambled eggs with that secret sprinkle of sugar. Mom sat on the couch with me, binge-watching The Powerpuff Girls until midnight, and then she helped Dad wash the dishes while humming a silly pop song. I reached out, wanting to touch Dad’s smiling face one last time. My phantom fingertips slipped right through the glass. I couldn’t feel a thing. Right at that moment, Orbit whirred to life. Its blue eyes blinked, and Mom’s voice suddenly crackled from its built-in speakers. [Ben.] [Mommy didn’t see you when she came home. If you hear this message, please call me back, okay?] [I know it gets lonely being in that big house all by yourself. I know you’re such a good boy and you never want to cause trouble.] [I’m going to bring Dad home to see you. We’ll all go out and get those giant strawberry milkshakes you love, okay? Mommy promises. I won’t flake on you this time.] [Ben, Mom and Dad love you so much.] The living room fell dead silent. I just floated there, staring blankly at Orbit’s shiny shell, my mind completely empty. Mom must have noticed that the message had been played, and when I didn’t immediately call her back, her voice echoed from the robot again. [Ben? Are you still mad at me?] The house was completely still. No echoes. No footsteps. Mom’s voice grew frantic. I could hear her typing furiously, trying to manually override Orbit’s camera. [Orbit, locate Ben.] Seeing the robot pivot its wheels toward the bedroom hallway, I panicked and threw myself in front of it. But I was already a ghost. If Mom saw my dead body now, Dad would never come back! Orbit rolled right through my transparent chest, its mechanical voice chanting like a metronome. [Locating kitty cat. Locating kitty cat.] I focused every ounce of energy I had, desperately mashing my ghostly fingers against the callback button on Orbit’s interface. Come on, Ben! Just push it! You can’t let it go into the bedroom! Maybe the universe took pity on me, because for a split second, I felt the cold, hard plastic against my fingertips. Without wasting a breath, I slammed the call button. Instantly, Orbit froze in place. [Kitty cat located. Override sequence cancelled.] On the other end of the line, I heard Mom let out a shaky exhale. [Ben, you scared me half to death.] She let out a long, exhausted sigh and cut the connection. I drifted over to the living room window, staring up at the night sky. The stars were popping out one by one, twinkling brightly. They looked exactly like Dad’s eyes when he smiled. Dad used to tell me that when people pass away, they turn into stars so they can watch over the people they love. Was I going to turn into a star now? Would Mom and Dad look up, recognize me, and wave hello? I looked down at my fading, see-through hands and managed a small smile. As long as Dad came back, Mom wouldn’t have to lock herself in that freezing lab anymore, staring at Dad’s photos until her eyes bled. She would smile exactly like she did in the pictures. She would take me and Dad to the diner for those strawberry milkshakes. She would sit on the rug and watch The Powerpuff Girls with me over and over again. She would… I stopped my own thoughts. Right. I was dead. There was no more Ben. I let out a soft giggle. It was totally fine. As long as Mom and Dad were happy, everything was perfectly fine. I lost track of how long I drifted around the empty house. Orbit dispensed my rations two more times. I hovered over the brown kibble, sniffing at it, but I couldn’t smell a thing. Finally, the heavy thud of boots echoed from the stairwell. My heart leaped into my throat. It had to be Mom bringing Dad home! I zoomed toward the entryway, staring intensely at the heavy security door. Dad, are you really back? But as the voice outside grew louder, a wave of crushing disappointment washed over me. It was Uncle Felix. “Sarah acts like I’m a freaking burglar. Changing the passcode every damn day. What a joke!” “Spending all her time on that bullshit research. Does she really think playing mad scientist is going to bring a dead guy back to life?” That’s a lie! Dad isn’t dead! He’s coming back! Uncle Felix is the bad guy! Every time he showed up, Mom and Dad would end up screaming at each other. He always wore these stiff white dress shirts, practically bathing in cheap, overpowering cologne. Whenever Mom was around, he would flash this perfect smile and say, “You must be Ben. You’re just as cute as your mom said.” But the second Mom turned her back, Uncle Felix would secretly pinch my arms until they bruised. When I finally burst into tears and screamed that I hated him, he would look at Mom with these big, victimized eyes. That was the first time Mom ever yelled at me. “Why are you acting exactly like your father? So jealous and petty! I’ve told you a million times, Felix and I are just friends!” “If you can’t behave around adults, you can just stay in your room!” Mom dragged me to the lab that night, and I didn’t see Dad for an entire month. When I finally saw Dad again, something inside him had broken. The light in his eyes was completely gone. Uncle Felix finished scrolling through Orbit’s app data on his phone. He scooped up the uneaten cat kibble from the plate and dumped it straight into the trash. Then he flopped onto our living room couch, pulled a black marker from his pocket, and started scribbling over Dad’s face on the framed family photo. He wiped it off, then did it again. “A big worthless loser raises a little worthless loser. Once the little brat is out of the picture, this whole house, and Sarah, will be mine.” He was humming a cheerful tune when his phone started buzzing. His whole demeanor instantly shifted. “Felix, is Ben okay?” It was Mom! Uncle Felix’s voice melted into a pool of sickening sweetness. “Ben is doing fantastic, Sarah. I just cooked him a big plate of scrambled eggs. He even told me it tasted exactly like the way Arthur used to make it.” Liar! Uncle Felix is a dirty liar! I put my hands on my hips, glaring daggers at his smug face. Ever since Mom locked me in the lab that time, the whole vibe in our house had rotted away. Dad stopped smiling altogether. Mom started coming home later and later. Meanwhile, Uncle Felix basically made himself at home. He would bring me cheap plastic toys, smiling that greasy smile while squeezing my cheeks way too hard. Dad just watched it all happen from the kitchen counter, his eyes filled with an emotion I was too young to understand. It wasn’t until much later that I realized what I had seen. It was the absolute, crushing despair of a man watching his family tear itself apart from the inside. And then came the day Dad triggered the portal and vanished from our world. Nobody knew where he ended up. Mom absolutely lost her mind, harassing everyone we knew, tearing the city apart looking for clues. Uncle Felix was the first one at our door. He pulled Mom into a tight hug as she sobbed, whispering, “Don’t do this to yourself, Sarah. Arthur is probably fine.” Back then, I thought Uncle Felix was genuinely sad. I thought he actually cared about Dad. Now, just thinking about it made me want to throw up. Uncle Felix opened his mouth to say something else to Mom, but she abruptly hung up the phone. “If that bastard hadn’t shown up, Sarah would have been mine years ago.” He muttered under his breath, his face twisting into an ugly scowl. He yanked his phone out, spitefully adjusted Orbit’s pet mode down to just five pieces of kibble, and stormed out the door. “Let’s see how long it takes for you to starve!” I watched the door click shut and scoffed. Mom and Dad love each other! A slimeball like you could never break them apart! The living room slowly faded into pitch darkness, leaving only Orbit’s glowing blue eyes illuminating the dust in the air. Eventually, even the robot powered down, its eyes fading to black. I drifted aimlessly through the shadows of the house. Whenever I got tired, I would curl up inside the closet, trying to breathe in Dad’s scent. But no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t smell a thing anymore. … As my consciousness started to blur, I hallucinated Mom running around the lab. She and a dozen other scientists were glued to a massive bank of monitors, sweating, waiting for something big. I stared greedily at her face. I couldn’t remember the last time she actually slept. The dark circles under her eyes looked like something out of a comic book. “Professor Sarah! We finally locked onto Arthur’s energy signature! It’s him!” Mom’s lips trembled, but no sound came out. The wavelengths on the giant screen hitched for a second before spiking violently into the red zone. Suddenly, the glass containment pod hissed open, and the man lying inside gasped for air. His eyes snapped open. Dad! It was really Dad! I practically did backflips in the air, zooming around his pod in circles. “Dad, you’re finally back!” “Dad, are you going to make me scrambled eggs? Don’t forget the sugar, please!” “Dad, you and Mom have to stop fighting now, okay? You have to take care of each other. Don’t miss me too much!” Maybe my endless rambling actually reached him. Dad blinked against the harsh fluorescent lights, his chest heaving, and spoke his very first words since crossing back over. “Where’s Ben?” Mom froze. She stared at Dad’s pale face as he repeated himself, louder this time. “Where is my son?” She instinctively blurted out, “Ben is waiting for you at home.” “At home?” Dad chewed on those two words, a deep crease forming between his brows. “You left a little boy in that house all by himself?” “He’s not by himself.” Mom rushed to explain, her words stumbling over each other. “He has the nanny bot. And Felix is checking on him… Ben literally just called me a little while ago. He said he misses you so much.” Dad took a slow, agonizingly deep breath. When he opened his eyes again, the warmth I remembered was completely gone. The look in his eyes was like freezing rain. “Take me home.” I tagged along right behind Dad, completely oblivious to the suffocating tension radiating between them. My head was spinning with nothing but pure joy. Dad was back. Neither of them said a single word during the entire drive. The cramped interior of the car was filled with nothing but my ghostly chatter. “Mom, Dad is back now! You better not bring up Uncle Felix ever again.” “Dad, Mom knows she messed up. You guys have to be good to each other now!” “But hey, Dad, if Mom breaks your heart again, I totally support you doing whatever makes you happy! I won’t hold you back anymore!” Mom kept stealing nervous glances at Dad in the rearview mirror. She opened her mouth to speak a dozen times but always swallowed the words. She kept telling herself that once they walked through the front door and saw Ben, everything would fix itself. The house would go back to being a home. They would be a happy family again. Yes, everything will be fine once Arthur sees Ben. Mom slammed her foot on the gas pedal, the SUV speeding through the empty streets toward our apartment complex. Out of nowhere, Dad broke the silence. “Did Ben grow any taller?” Mom’s knuckles turned stark white as she gripped the steering wheel. “Yeah. He grew a little.” Liar! Ever since Dad left, she hadn’t bothered to measure my height against the kitchen doorframe once. “Did he cry a lot while I was gone?” Mom choked on the air. She didn’t answer. The car lurched to a halt in front of our building. Mom and Dad both stared up at the familiar brick facade. It was eight o’clock at night. Every single window in the building was glowing with warm, yellow light. Except ours. Our windows were dead black. They walked up the stairs, Dad a few paces behind Mom. Mom reached out, her hands shaking slightly as she punched the code into the electronic lock. Feeling Dad’s heavy gaze burning into her back, she rushed to justify herself. “I change the passcode every single day. Felix only comes over when I specifically give him permission.” “Ever since you left, I never let him—” “Just open the door,” Dad cut her off sharply, pushing past her into the suffocating darkness of the hallway. The apartment was terrifyingly quiet. There was no soft, excited voice screaming “Daddy!” from the living room. Dad furrowed his brows. He opened his mouth to call my name. But then, he froze. A faint, sickeningly sweet stench of rotting meat was wafting through the stale air…

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On the first day of high school, Chloe sprang from behind and threw her arms around my neck, hugging me tight. Suddenly, a flood of red text exploded across my vision— [Oh my god, this is the 387th time. She still doesn’t realize her best friend is the problem!] [Duck! Get away from her! Just one hug and her beauty stat drops another three points. She was such a pretty, fair-skinned girl in middle school, and now she is being drained dry.] [Exactly. She had straight A’s in middle school and then her grades just vanished. I could literally cry for her.] The text crowded my vision, line after dense line. My entire body went rigid. How did they know? In middle school, I was consistently at the top of my class. Over the last two years of high school, I plummeted straight to the bottom. My skin had become rough and dull, my brain felt sluggish, and I hated even looking in the mirror. Everyone whispered the same thing: Maya peaked in middle school. High school ruined her. She just stopped trying. But I was trying. I never stopped trying. Chloe rested her chin on my shoulder, pulling me from my thoughts. “Maya, you have to promise to be my best friend this semester too, okay?” The floating text said it was because I hugged her. So… what if I got everyone else to touch her instead? 1 I instinctively bent down, pretending to tie my shoelace, forcing her to let go. “Whoa.” She stumbled slightly. “Why did you randomly crouch down?” “Shoelace came undone,” I muttered, keeping my head down. The text was still scrolling furiously above me. [Wait, did she dodge that? Did she figure it out?] [No way. She has been clueless for two years. She is not going to suddenly have an epiphany.] My nails dug into my palms. In that single instant, it felt like a bomb went off in my head. Everything that hadn’t made sense over the last two years suddenly snapped into place. If what this text was saying was true… I didn’t just ‘lose my touch’. I was being robbed. When I stood back up, Chloe grabbed my sleeve and pulled me toward the cafeteria kiosk. Walking beside her, I stared at her profile. Her skin was practically glowing, porcelain white, and her eyes were huge and brilliant. In middle school, I used to look exactly like that. More text drifted past. [Look at her. Half of Chloe’s face was literally stolen from Maya.] [Right?! Chloe used to have yellowish, uneven skin. Suddenly she is Snow White? Who actually buys that?] We reached the kiosk. Chloe bought a strawberry yogurt, pierced the foil with a straw, and pushed it right to my lips. “Take a sip. It’s your favorite.” The text went absolutely ballistic. [Do not drink it! Sharing a straw counts as intimate contact!] [Indirect mouth-to-mouth transfers stats just the same! Dodge it, quick!] I took a half-step back and waved my hand. “I am not thirsty.” Chloe froze. A flash of something unrecognizable darted through her bright, pretty eyes. “What is wrong with you today?” She pushed the straw closer. “Just one sip.” “My throat is sore. The doctor said no cold drinks.” She stared at me for two solid seconds before her bright smile returned. “Okay, fine. Next time I will get you a hot cocoa.” I nodded. Right now, the only thing I could do was play dumb. I had to act like I was still the slow, ugly, clueless Maya. I mentally etched every single phrase the text had revealed into a draft paper tucked in my mind. 387th time. Beauty dropped by three. Intimate contact. Indirect counts too. I stared at the words I wrote on the corner of my notebook during class. If this was how my life had been slowly siphoned away over the past two years— Then what I lost wasn’t just good grades and clear skin. It was two entire years of my life. I folded the paper tight and shoved it into the deepest zipper of my pencil case. Watching Chloe’s back from a few desks away, a crystal-clear thought formed in my mind. I had to figure out exactly how the mechanics of this theft worked. The text seemed to hear my thoughts. A final line floated past. [Ooh, look at those eyes. That is a dangerous look.] [Is Maya… finally going to do something about this?] I didn’t know exactly what I was going to do yet. But I knew one thing for certain: starting today, everything changes. 2 To play my part convincingly, I had to sift through the last two years of my life, frame by frame. I lay on my bed, staring at the ceiling. Who was I in middle school? A regular in the top ten of the entire grade. I had skin so pale and flawless the kids nicknamed me ‘Vanilla Bean’. I could run the 800-meter dash and place in the top three. I could memorize vocabulary lists just by glancing at them. Back then, my mom bragged to anyone who would listen that I was a natural-born scholar. But then came the first midterms of freshman year in high school. I dropped from the elite tier straight to dead average. My mom’s first reaction was to scream at me. “Are you dating someone?! Are you playing on your phone all night?!” I told her I wasn’t. She didn’t believe me. By sophomore year, my grades had stabilized at the absolute bottom of the class. The girl in the mirror became a stranger. My skin turned sallow and broke out in cystic acne. My eyes lost their spark, and my face bloated. During P.E., I couldn’t even run half a lap without gasping for air. My homeroom teacher pulled me aside for a serious talk. “Maya, you had such a phenomenal foundation in middle school. Why are you regressing? Have you gotten lazy?” The school nurse prescribed me multivitamins, claiming it was just normal teenage hormonal imbalance. Everyone found a convenient excuse for my downfall. Lazy. Gluttonous. Undisciplined. Puberty. Not a single person considered that my life was being stolen. Chloe transferred to our school on the first day of freshman year. When she arrived, she was utterly average. Middle-of-the-pack grades, plain features. We sat next to each other, and she clung to me. She was constantly holding my hand, throwing her arm around my shoulders, pressing her cheek against mine for selfies. Back then, I was thrilled. I thought I had made a best friend for life. But somewhere along the line, she transformed. Her skin turned luminous. Her eyes widened. Her grades skyrocketed with every exam. By the second semester of sophomore year, she was ranked number one in the grade. The teachers worshipped her. The students idolized her. That was when the title of ‘Genius Beauty Queen’ started circulating. And I? I became the ugly, slow sidekick who hovered in her shadow. As I lay there remembering, the text popped back up to join the pity party. [All that light she shines with? It is yours.] [The most toxic part is, the harder she leeches off you, the nicer she pretends to be.] No wonder every time I bombed a test, she was the first to comfort me. “It is okay, Maya. Just study harder next time.” Then, right in front of the whole class, she would generously lend me her perfect study notes. The teachers would praise her: “Chloe is such a supportive classmate.” The other students would say: “Maya, you must have saved a nation in your past life to get a best friend like her.” I would take her notes, feeling a mix of warmth and deep, crushing guilt. Looking back, it was a sick, twisted joke. The memory that hurt the most was from last month. My mom found a photo of me from middle school and let out a long, heavy sigh. “Maya, look at how beautiful you used to be.” She tapped the photo angrily. “Look at yourself now. Are you not embarrassed?” I stood in front of the mirror, completely unable to speak. I cried until the sun came up that night. I genuinely believed I had ruined my own life. I believed I wasn’t trying hard enough, that I lacked discipline, that I deserved to fail. Now I understood why the text appeared exactly when I was at my lowest. Because I was at rock bottom. If someone hadn’t told me the truth, I would have fully accepted the identity of the ‘ruined, worthless Maya’. Since the truth was finally out, I wasn’t going to hold back. I rolled out of bed and pulled the folded paper from my backpack. Under the desk lamp, I re-read the rules I had noted down. 387th time. Beauty -3. Intimate contact. Indirect counts. I grabbed a pen and added a new line: She transferred here freshman year. My downfall started exactly then. To steal it all back, I need to find the fatal flaw in her system. I folded the paper into an even tinier square and shoved it back into the secret lining of my pencil case. For the first time, I felt a deep, unwavering certainty. The ugly, slow Maya wasn’t the real me. The real me was just waiting to come back. 3 To find the system’s fatal flaw, I had to rely on the floating text. It leaked info, complained, and insulted people on my behalf. If I watched it closely and recorded every anomaly, I could piece the puzzle together. For the next few weeks, I became extremely ‘cooperative’ with Chloe. If she wanted to hold my hand, I gave it to her—but I pulled my sleeve down so the fabric separated our skin. If she wanted a cheek-to-cheek selfie, I tilted my head so my hair created a barrier between our faces. If she threw her arm around me, I conveniently shifted my backpack to act as a shield. Every single time, the text tallied the score. [Ooh, skin-to-fabric contact. She only lost a fraction of a point. Interesting.] [Smart! She is secretly minimizing her own damage.] Now I knew for sure. The more direct the physical contact, the harsher the theft. If there was a barrier, the transfer was drastically reduced. That was the first thread I untangled. The second clue arrived purely by accident. During the school sports festival, Chloe signed up for multiple events. After finishing the 100-meter dash, she was swarmed by a massive crowd of students. Someone threw an arm around her shoulder, another patted her back, and half a dozen others pushed in to high-five her. In that exact moment, the text hovering in my vision glitched aggressively. The words overlapped, flashed violently, and spat out a string of garbled code. [L… Lagging?] [Too many people touching her at once! Is the system bottlenecking?] [Holy crap, the screen is tearing! It is going to crash!] I stood up straight, my heart hammering in my chest. When the crowd finally dispersed and Chloe walked out alone, the text slowly stabilized. I stared at the smooth red letters, my pulse racing. It couldn’t handle crowds. I immediately wrote it down in my notes. Multiple simultaneous contacts → System lag. I drew a heavy, dark circle around it. From that day on, I started testing the theory. When the photography club took a group picture, twenty or thirty people squished together around Chloe. The text stuttered, but recovered quickly. [Not too many people this time. It held up.] During a surprise birthday party the class threw for her, over twenty people took turns giving her a hug. The text merely shivered. It didn’t break. This proved that simultaneous contact and rapid consecutive contact had the exact same effect on the system’s bandwidth. A number slowly began to take shape in my head. Twenty or thirty people? It could handle that. But what if there were more? What was the absolute limit? Did it crash the second it hit the ceiling, or did it need a massive overflow to completely break? The text seemed to read my mind, drifting by at a leisurely pace. [This girl’s observation skills are getting terrifying.] [Is she… counting the crowd?] [Shh—do not spoil it. Let her figure it out.] I ignored them. I just added one more line to my notes. It has a hard cap. If the crowd exceeds a specific number, it will crash. To find that exact number, I had to bide my time. The perfect opportunity arose during the midterm awards assembly. Chloe was called to the stage as the top student in the grade. The crowd went wild, and students rushed the stage, demanding group selfies with her. A massive mob of about forty students swarmed her at once. The text began vibrating violently, the words blurring into an illegible, pixelated mess. I stared at it intensely. At peak density, I counted roughly forty-five or forty-six people touching her in some capacity. The text was so distorted it was practically unreadable, but the screen never went completely white. When the crowd cleared, it slowly stitched itself back together. I let out a long breath. Forty-five or forty-six. It could barely endure it. The breaking point had to be hovering right around fifty. I scribbled the number down. As I wrote it, my hand was shaking. I had finally found the door. All I had to do was get more than fifty people to physically touch Chloe at the exact same time— And the system that had leeched off my life for two years would gorge itself until it exploded. A final line of text drifted quietly by. [Maya, you are not stupid at all, are you?] I smiled. Now that I knew the fatal flaw, I just needed a completely justifiable, public event where everyone would willingly swarm her. 4 And most importantly, I could not be anywhere near her when it happened. If the stolen talents snapped back to me, I needed to be in proximity, but far enough away that she wouldn’t immediately suspect me. I flipped through the school calendar. The Annual Arts Gala. It was the most prestigious event of the year. Awards, performances, bouquets of flowers, absolute chaos on and off the stage. And Chloe was essentially guaranteed to win this year’s ‘Campus Star’ award. It was a title voted on by the entire female student body. Beauty, academics, popularity—she ranked first in all three. I stared at the date on the calendar, a slow smile spreading across my face. Over the next two months, I executed three specific tasks. First, I kept playing the fool. I was clingier with Chloe than ever before. If she wanted to hold hands, I held them. If she wanted a hug, I gave it to her. Except every single time, I sneakily ensured there was a layer of clothing between us, keeping the stolen stats to an absolute minimum. The text scrolled by, laughing at my sabotage. Second, I built her hype. I actively pushed Chloe’s campaign for ‘Campus Star’. I praised her in the class group chats and canvassed for votes on the school forums. “Chloe is beautiful inside and out. She deserves this.” “She is the pride of our class! Everyone vote for her!” My classmates constantly talked about how fiercely loyal I was to my best friend. Chloe was so moved she teared up, pulling me into a tight hug. “You understand me better than anyone, Maya.” I hugged her back, making sure my thick winter coat was wedged between us. The text drifted by: [The higher you build the pedestal, the harder the fall. Fatten the pig before the slaughter.] Third, and most importantly, I executed the final move. I tracked down the student council member in charge of the Gala’s itinerary. I pitched an idea. “For the Campus Star award this year, why don’t we add an interactive segment?” “Let the winner stand center stage, and have the entire grade line up to hand her flowers, give her a hug, or shake her hand.” “We can film it as one massive, continuous panoramic shot. It would be an unforgettable memory for the yearbook.” The council member’s eyes lit up. “That is brilliant! It is engaging and super wholesome.” And just like that, the segment was officially added to the schedule. I stared at the printed itinerary, my heartbeat slow and steady. Campus Star Interactive Congratulatory Segment — Entire Grade Participation. The entire grade. That was a hell of a lot more than fifty people. The night before the Gala, Chloe came to my room. She was holding a bouquet she had prepared, her eyes sparkling with excitement. “Maya, if I actually win tomorrow, you are the very first person I am going to hug.” I smiled warmly. “I will be waiting.” She leaned in, arms open to embrace me. I twisted sideways, letting my backpack take the brunt of the impact, allowing her to graze only the fabric of my sleeve. The text cheerfully reported a microscopic decimal of a stat loss. [No biggie, just a drop in the ocean.] Chloe didn’t notice a thing and skipped away happily. I stood there, watching her bounce down the hallway. Tomorrow was going to be the absolute peak of her life. I went back to my desk and opened my notebook. Hard cap is highly likely 50 people. Exceeding the cap guarantees a crash. I took my pen and pressed hard into the paper, writing the final line. Tomorrow, the entire grade will line up to hug her. We will see exactly which number blows the system to pieces. I closed the notebook. The text drifted slowly across my vision. [Is tomorrow the season finale?] [I am literally rubbing my hands together in excitement.] [Good luck, Maya.] 5 The auditorium was packed on the day of the Gala. Chloe had applied a flawless, light layer of makeup. Under the stage lights, her skin looked translucent and radiant. The text mocked her: [Tsk, that entire foundation was robbed straight from the girl sitting in the back row.] I kept my expression perfectly blank. The performances cycled through, one after another. I only cared about one thing: when the award ceremony was going to start. Finally, the host stepped up to the mic and called her name. The auditorium erupted in thunderous applause. Chloe covered her mouth, acting utterly shocked, and gracefully walked up the stairs to the stage. The spotlight hit her, and she smiled like a blooming flower. The girls cheered, the boys whistled. She took the trophy and leaned into the microphone, delivering a perfectly humble, rehearsed speech. “Thank you all so much… I am just lucky to be surrounded by people who constantly help and support me…” The text fired up again. [People who help you? You mean the host you drained dry?] [Keep acting, sweetheart. The curtains are about to close.] I smiled gently at her from the crowd. The host took the mic back. “And now, for a very special segment this year—” “We invite the entire grade to come up to the stage, present a flower, give our Campus Star a hug, and capture the most beautiful group photo in school history!” The crowd roared in approval. The hospitality team, already prepped, took their places on both sides of the stage holding baskets of individual roses. The student council began directing the traffic, forming a massive, winding line. The crowd surged forward. Chloe stood center stage, slightly overwhelmed by the sheer scale of it, but her radiant smile quickly returned. She probably thought this was her absolute coronation. The first student walked up, handed her a flower, and hugged her. A number popped up on my screen. [1.] The second, the third. [2, 3…] The line stretched longer and longer. Some handed her flowers, some hugged her, some shook her hand, others slung an arm around her shoulder for a quick selfie. The text started ticking upward, digit by digit. [15, 16, 17…] [Ooh, we are cooking now.] When it hit the twenties, the font on the text began to vibrate slightly. I stared unblinking at Chloe on the stage. She was still smiling, hugging person after person, completely oblivious. No one in that auditorium knew that every single embrace was dragging my stolen life back to me. The numbers ticked faster and faster. [35! Incoming visual glitches!] [Look at the text! It is getting pixelated!] The crowd kept pushing forward. The student council members were shouting into megaphones, “Do not push! Single file! One at a time!” But the excitement was completely out of control. Everyone wanted to touch the ‘Campus Star’ and get some of her good luck. [42! 43!] [It is gonna blow! It is actually gonna blow!] Chloe’s smile began to stiffen. She probably felt something was wrong—a heavy, suffocating weight, like something anchored deep inside her was violently rattling loose. She instinctively took a half-step back. But the center of the stage was mobbed. She was trapped. [48! 49!] I shot up from my seat. The fiftieth student handed her a flower and stepped away. The entire wall of text in my vision began flashing blinding white, like a television losing its signal. [50! Max capacity reached!] [One more and it—] The fifty-first student, grinning ear to ear, threw her arms wide open and tackled Chloe in a massive bear hug. In that exact fraction of a second. The entire wall of text shattered with a deafening, silent SNAP and went completely, blindingly white.

🌟 Continue the story here 👉🏻 📲 Download the “MotoNovel” app 🔍 search for “513563”, and watch the full series ✨! #MotoNovel