Category: English

1 “Good morning, everyone. Please stop what you are doing. We are from the State Revenue Department, and we are here to audit your accounts.” Our reunion was entirely corporate. I was standing in his family’s high-rise, not as the girl who once begged for his attention, but as the senior tax auditor about to bring his empire down. Soon, he would be facing a prison cell. The Knight family patriarch, Thomas Knight, stepped forward, attempting to offer a warm, familiar smile to soften the tension. I stepped back, avoiding his approach with quiet professionalism. “Serena…” Austin Knight muttered, staring at me as if he were seeing a ghost. “Mr. Knight, in a professional setting, please address me by my title. I am Director Ward.” The sheer bewilderment on his face was almost comical. He was still stuck in the past, operating under the assumption that the moment he called my name, I would come running to lick his boots like a loyal dog. “Thank you for your cooperation, Mr. Knight. We will await the audit results,” I said, offering a polite, empty smile. With that, I turned and led my team out of the Knight Group headquarters. I didn’t expect him to run after me, his heavy footsteps echoing down the marble hallway. “Serena! Wait! You… you’ve changed so much.” I paused, raising a hand to signal my team to head to the cars first. Once they were out of earshot, I turned to face him. “What is it, Austin? Did you expect me to still be that desperate, shameless girl you could summon and dismiss with a snap of your fingers?” I gave him a dry, humorless smile. His eyes rimmed with red. He looked utterly helpless, his lips parting to offer an explanation, but my patience had run out years ago. “I am not your wife anymore, Austin. I am not your cure. Go find someone else to save you.” I turned my back on him and walked away, but the cold wind outside immediately dragged my mind back to the past. Before marrying Austin, my life had been a series of closed doors. I couldn’t afford college tuition, we barely had enough to eat, and my mother was constantly battling chronic illness. I wasn’t blessed with some genius intellect either; my grades were mediocre at best. I scraped through a local vocational school and immediately went to work. So when Thomas Knight first approached me, I thought it was a cruel joke. He promised to pay off all my mother’s medical bills and give me a substantial sum of money. The catch? I would get none of the Knight family fortune, and I had to dedicate my life to caring for his autistic grandson, Austin. At the time, Austin was only sixteen. The first time I met him, he had tripped and fallen on the gravel path. His teeth had cut deep into his lip, leaving a trail of dark blood on the stones. Yet, he seemed entirely numb to it, pushing himself up to keep watering the roses. His face was deathly pale from the shock of the pain, but he didn’t make a sound. My heart ached for him. I immediately called the family doctor. Thomas watched me from the veranda. He made a proposal: one million dollars upon marriage, and another two million once a child was born. He would cover all other living expenses. To save my mother’s life, I accepted. When my former classmates heard the news, their reactions were filled with venom. “So you’re basically a legal escort? For a girl from a vocational school, you sure hit the jackpot!” “I hear that Austin kid is sickly and completely unstable. He’s not even normal.” Some of it was mockery, but most of it was pure jealousy. My impoverished life improved overnight. Looking at that silent, lonely boy, a profound sense of responsibility took root in my chest. He was always quiet, so I spent my days finding small ways to make him smile. Slowly, I learned his language. The first time I tried to touch his shoulder, he flinched like a wild animal, pushing me away with a low, defensive growl. Later, I learned that was a sensory trigger. But I didn’t give up. I prepared three meals a day for him. At first, he would dump the plates in the trash without a glance, so I began sitting beside him, waiting. If the food got cold, I warmed it up, repeating the cycle until he finally took a bite. Eventually, I could read him perfectly. A slight reach of his hand meant he wanted water. A twitch of his brow meant he wanted his sketchpad. In time, he stopped pushing me away. Once, when he had a high fever, I sat by his bed, placing a cool damp cloth on his forehead. He opened his glassy, dark eyes, staring at me for a long time before closing them again. “Thank you,” he whispered. We were married when we turned twenty. Austin stood at the altar with a blank, unreadable face, refusing to say a word. The minister looked incredibly uncomfortable, but the ceremony finished nonetheless. That evening, Thomas gave me a meaningful look. I swallowed my pride, put on a lace nightgown, and slipped into Austin’s bedroom. But that night, he threw a pitcher of ice-cold water directly into my face. 2 I had no idea he would react so violently. His teeth were clenched, his voice dripping with venom. “Have you no shame?” I was young, and the sudden rejection burned my face hot with embarrassment. A deep, suffocating wave of humiliation washed over me. He didn’t stop there. His words sliced through me like small knives. “Get out! You disgust me! They give you some money and you act like a whore!” “You think you’re worthy of being my wife? Get out of my sight, and don’t ever come back!” I fled the room in tears. From that night on, Austin stopped speaking to me entirely. I became a ghost in his house, completely ignored. Thomas told me to take things slow and not to rush him, warning me that giving up would mean breaching our contract. My mother called me too, her voice sharp with desperation. “Can’t you just slip something in his drink? You think they want you? They want a child!” “Do you want to see your mother die in this hospital bed before you actually try?” I placed a hand over my flat stomach. My mother had congenital heart disease, and her surgery was incredibly expensive. For her sake, I had to keep trying. Over the following months, I made myself indispensable. No one knew how to anticipate his needs better than I did. Perhaps his memory of the incident faded, or perhaps my quiet presence wore down his defenses, but his outbursts grew less frequent. Sometimes, when I did something right, he would offer a faint, awkward smile. Sometimes he would softly call me Serena. Once, when I burned my hand while making him an omelet, he silently brought over the first-aid kit and dabbed ointment onto my skin, his movements clumsy but gentle. Eventually, we developed a routine. If I didn’t turn on the living room lamps at exactly nine o’clock, he would pace the floor, his breathing shallow and anxious. The moment the warm light filled the room, he would freeze, slowly calming down. One morning, I caught a bad cold. Fearing I would pass it to him, I wore a mask and tried to slip out of his study as soon as I set down his breakfast. Austin, who usually kept his head buried in his art books, suddenly looked up. For the first time, his eyes locked onto mine, holding my gaze for several long seconds. Those empty, distant eyes seemed to carry a faint flicker of confusion, as if asking: Why are you different today? My heart skipped a beat. But the real shift happened on a stormy night. The thunder was deafening, shaking the glass panes of the villa. I was in my own room when I heard a low, whimpering sound coming from next door, like a wounded animal. I rushed in to find him curled into a tight ball at the corner of his bed, his head buried under a heavy duvet, his entire body shaking. I called his name softly, keeping my distance so I wouldn’t startle him. The shaking only intensified. After a moment of hesitation, I left the main lights off. I sat down on the carpet a few feet away from the bed and began to hum a soft lullaby my mother used to sing to me when I was small. I hummed for a long time, until my throat felt dry and raspy. Slowly, the thunder rolled away into the distance. A small gap appeared at the edge of the duvet. In the darkness, I could feel his eyes watching me. He didn’t tell me to leave. The next morning, everything returned to normal. He didn’t even look at me. But when I went into his room later, I noticed he had placed a soft, velvet throw pillow on the exact spot on the carpet where I had sat the night before. It was his silent invitation. Small gestures began to build between us. When I swept the floors, he would quietly slide his books to the side of the sofa to give me space. He would eat the meals I experimented with, even when they were so salty they were barely edible. He still rarely spoke, limiting his vocabulary to “yes” or “no.” But we developed our own silent code. A finger pointed at his throat meant the tea was too hot. Sliding an empty cup toward me meant he wanted more. And I always understood. When Thomas came to visit, he was astonished by how stable Austin had become. My mother’s calls grew less frantic, filled with a desperate hope. “He’s warming up to you, isn’t he? There’s light at the end of the tunnel. Keep pushing, Serena. Get pregnant soon.” During those quiet, ordinary moments, my heart began to soften, like ice melting in warm water. I even began to allow myself a foolish thought: perhaps this quiet, gentle life was enough for us. 3 I began to view him as a wounded creature, and myself as the only person allowed close enough to bring him peace. I almost believed that this isolated island of ours was finally growing green. We spent five years in this comfortable rhythm, becoming silent partners who understood each other’s every move. But Thomas was growing impatient for an heir. Terrified that Austin would retreat into his shell if I pushed him, I kept delaying. Finally, losing his patience, Thomas took matters into his own hands and drugged both of our drinks one evening. That night was a blur of confusion and sharp pain. Austin was clumsy, rough, and entirely out of control. I felt as though my body were being torn apart, the metallic smell of blood hanging heavy in the dark room. When I woke up the next afternoon, the room was in ruins. Austin had smashed everything in sight. He shattered the clay figures we had sculpted together, broke my phone, and in his blind rage, grabbed me by the shoulders, shoving me violently until my head slammed against the wall. He didn’t speak a word, but his eyes were filled with a wild, terrifying fury. Only when I lay dizzy and bruised on the floor did he finally let go. He threw a single word at me before storming out. “Divorce.” He didn’t return that night. A torrential rainstorm hit the city, but despite my aching body, I went out into the cold night to look for him. I searched the streets of New Haven until dawn, my clothes soaked through, but there was no sign of him. Exhausted and running on empty, I finally dragged myself back to the villa, only to find Austin sitting on the sofa. He was holding a girl named Brooke Davenport. She was lovely, with the effortless grace and poise of a girl born into high society. Brooke was whispering in his ear. “You’ve changed so much since we were kids. You actually have expressions now. I was so surprised when you showed up at my house.” The rain had splattered her hemline, and Austin was gently, clumsily dabbing at it with his handkerchief. Brooke smiled, accepting his touch naturally. That was when I realized he had run to Brooke the moment he left. Their families were old friends; they had been childhood sweethearts. Whenever he felt overwhelmed or unsafe, he would go to her garden and wait for her. They talked about art, music, childhood memories, and mutual investments. Even when Brooke spoke quickly, Austin exerted all his energy to form sentences, trying desperately to keep up with her pace. He even poured her water without being asked, remembering that she took her tea with a single slice of lemon and no sugar. The very attentiveness I had spent five years trying to foster in him was on full display. But it was directed entirely at her. It was like a dozen small needles driving straight into my heart. He wasn’t incapable of caring for someone. He simply had never chosen to care for me. In front of Brooke, he wasn’t a helpless patient who needed constant care. He was a man. And I was just the uneducated girl who couldn’t understand a word of their sophisticated conversation. Eventually, Austin noticed me standing in the doorway, his eyes instantly turning cold and dismissive. Brooke blinked, looking at me. “Is this the girl from the news? Your wife, Serena?” Austin gave a tight, reluctant nod. Then he added, his voice dripping with disgust. “I don’t like her. Grandpa forced her on me.” “She’s desperate. She crawled into my bed to trap me.” “We’re getting a divorce.” I stood frozen in the hallway, the humiliation burning through my veins, leaving me completely hollow. Brooke offered a polite, strained smile, refusing to comment. She quickly checked her phone, made an excuse about a call, and stood up to leave. “Let’s catch up again soon, Austin. Bye.” She didn’t look at me once as she walked past. Her complete dismissal of my existence was the most humiliating part of all. 4 After that day, Austin began leaving early and returning late, treating me like an absolute stranger. On his birthday, I spent nearly one hundred thousand dollars, using almost all the savings I had, to buy him a rare sketch by a renowned master artist. I handed it to him, offering a small, hopeful smile. “Can we try to start over?” Austin’s face remained dark. He pulled out his lighter and set the edge of the sketch on fire, watching it burn to ash in the fireplace. “Divorce,” he repeated, his voice cold. “I don’t want cheap trash.” “Isn’t three million dollars enough for you to leave?” My mouth opened, but no words came out. My mother’s surgery had cost seventy thousand, and she had taken the rest to secure her own life, leaving me with barely ten thousand. But I didn’t say a word. His phone buzzed on the table, the screen lighting up with a message from Brooke: Thank you for the beautiful necklace, Austin. I love it. I saw his fingers, and my eyes fell on his hand. He was already wearing a custom platinum band. The matching one, no doubt, was on Brooke’s finger. I realized then that what we had wasn’t love. It was just a routine he had grown used to. Austin ordered me to stay out of his bedroom. But the very next day, Thomas demanded that I install a hidden security camera in Austin’s room. The old man had realized I was losing my grip on his grandson and wanted to monitor him directly. “He told me to stay out,” I pleaded with the butler. “Can’t you have one of the maids do it? I don’t want him to hate me any more than he already does.” But Thomas’s instructions were absolute: if I didn’t do it, it would be considered a breach of contract. I was quietly installing the device when I heard the door click. Austin had returned early to retrieve some files. Seeing me in his room, his face twisted into a mask of pure rage. He stepped forward and slapped me hard across the face. “Disgusting,” he spat, turning to the maid standing in the hallway. “Sanitize the room. Throw away anything she touched.” I clutched my burning cheek, staring at him. For nine years, I had been treated like a puppet. Thomas controlled me, my mother used me, and Austin despised me. What had I been fighting for? “Why is Brooke allowed to come and go as she pleases?” I whispered, the question slipping out before I could stop it. He looked at me as if the question itself were absurd. Yet, a small, foolish part of me still hoped for a different answer. Austin’s expression remained icy. “I love Brooke. It’s that simple.” Nine years of devotion, summarized in a single sentence. I stepped back, my heel catching on the edge of the velvet throw pillow he had placed on the carpet for me. He grabbed my arm and shoved me away roughly, my hands scraping against the sharp corner of the desk. “Get out, you leech.” “Why are you so stupid? Do you not understand plain English?” “None of this belongs to you.” Every word felt like a physical blow. My classmates and my teachers had always looked down on my poverty. I wasn’t some brilliant student. My father had died when I was young, and I had spent my entire life craving financial security, craving a real family. I thought that if I had a child with Austin, our baby would at least have two parents who stayed. But fortune had never been on my side. I hadn’t gotten pregnant that night. Seeing me stand there in a daze, Austin’s frustration turned into disgust. “What will it take for you to sign the papers?” “I don’t love you, and this isn’t your home.” Yet, as I turned to leave, he looked at the maid and muttered, “She looks pale. Call the family doctor.” It was always the same. A cruel blow, followed by a small, confusing act of concern. I wiped the dust from my hands, looking into his cold eyes. Nine years of companionship, reduced to nothing. I nodded slowly. “Fine. I agree to the divorce.”

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1 Chloe Kensington and I met while working a part-time job in college. It was at a small coffee shop right next to campus. I noticed her the moment I walked in. She wore a simple white button-down shirt. With her delicate, striking features and pale skin, she looked exactly like the quintessential hardworking, low-income college girl you’d read about in a romance novel. We slowly got to know each other, exchanged numbers, and started hitting the library and working our shifts together. Thanks to Chloe’s stunning looks, everyone on campus soon knew about the beautiful, struggling girl at the local coffee shop. Guys lined up endlessly to ask for her number. At first, she handled it well, but when it got too annoying, she eventually shoved me into the spotlight and claimed I was her boyfriend. I was caught completely off guard. Just as I was about to deny it, I saw the pleading look in Chloe’s dark eyes. Like I was under a spell, I swallowed my correction and silently played along with her lie. Eventually, it naturally transitioned into reality. She confessed her feelings, and we went from fake dating to a real couple. After graduation, we immediately rented a small apartment and moved in together. She told me she was an orphan. I grew up deep in the Appalachian Mountains, raised in poverty, which made me value every dollar. The cost of living in the city was high, and as fresh graduates, our labor was cheaper than anything else. On our days off, Chloe and I would pick up extra side gigs to earn some cash, slowly adding bricks to the little savings fund we were building for our future wedding. So, when I landed a temporary catering gig that paid two hundred dollars an hour, I was thrilled for days. But when I walked into the banquet hall and saw Chloe—who was supposed to be working mandatory overtime at her corporate job—my joyful expression instantly froze. 2 Chloe, who was always so frugal and plain around me, had completely transformed. She was wearing a stunning, strapless red designer gown. The bangs that usually hid her brow were styled elegantly pushed back. She looked absolutely breathtaking. If it weren’t for that familiar face, I might not have even recognized her. The trust-fund kids at the banquet were practically tripping over themselves to shower her with attention. She looked down at their fawning faces with the cold indifference of a goddess. Seeing me frozen in place, Ben, a guy working the gig with me, nudged my shoulder. He looked concerned and asked what was wrong. I shook my head. Staring at Chloe, who was surrounded like a star, a bitter taste filled my mouth. “Who is she?” I asked. Ben glanced over and lowered his voice. “Rumor has it she’s the princess of the Kensington family—old money elites!” Looking at this utterly foreign version of Chloe, an indescribable cocktail of emotions surged in my chest. The girlfriend I had lived with day and night for four years had, in the blink of an eye, morphed from a pitiful orphan into a high-society heiress. I instinctively pulled out my phone and shot her a text. Chloe was sitting lazily on a velvet sofa, surrounded by a crowd, when her phone buzzed. Everyone looked at her and teased, “Ooh, who is it, Miss Kensington?” Chloe picked up her phone, gave the screen a token, uncaring glance, and casually dismissed it. “Nothing. Just spam.” Hearing those words, I felt like I had been plunged into an ice bath. My entire body trembled. So, in Chloe Kensington’s eyes, I, Noah Sterling, was nothing more than disposable spam. It made sense. We had been together for four years, and I didn’t even know her real identity. A sudden wave of pathetic self-pity washed over me. All my hard work and sacrifices felt like a complete joke. I stood in the shadows, silently watching the roaring, glamorous crowd. Sitting right next to Chloe was a handsome man in a tailored suit. They were openly flirting, completely ignoring everyone else around them. They had the effortless chemistry of a deeply in-love couple. Ben rolled out the massive, five-tier custom cake that the kitchen had spent five hours preparing. It was covered in fresh fruit, and the sickeningly sweet smell of frosting wafted across the room. The guests began presenting their gifts to the man. Chloe went last. With a grand wave of her hand, she had staff bring out 999 red roses. The man looked incredibly moved and pulled her in for a passionate kiss. While the rich kids cheered and whistled, I stood there in my goofy, oversized uniform, clumsily holding a tray, watching them. My eyes felt dry, but I couldn’t cry. I couldn’t even find the words to describe what I was feeling. Looking at Chloe Kensington, I felt like I was truly seeing her for the first time. 3 On our first Valentine’s Day together, we were walking down the street when I saw a vendor selling roses. I wanted to buy her a bouquet. When I held the flowers out to her, I thought she would be happy. She wasn’t. Chloe just frowned, a look of distinct disgust crossing her face. What was it she said back then? “Roses don’t symbolize love. It’s just corporate marketing brainwashing women to spend money.” “It’s so tacky. Who even gives roses these days?” Seeing her reluctance to accept the flowers, I joked, “Tacky? I don’t think so! If my baby bought me flowers, I’d cherish them forever! Even when they dried up, I’d still think they were beautiful!” She furrowed her brow and scoffed, “Who would ever buy you roses? Keep dreaming.” Before I could even feel hurt, Chloe plucked a long blade of grass from the park lawn and wove it into a crude, makeshift ring for me. I was so incredibly moved at the time, even feeling guilty for my superficial desire for roses. Now, watching the scene unfold before me, I just felt ridiculous. She never actually thought giving roses was tacky. She just didn’t want to give them to me. 4 The party was lively and loud, but none of it belonged to me. I just watched them quietly until the event ended, collected my paycheck, and left. By the time I got back to our apartment, it was past midnight. Chloe wasn’t home yet. I collapsed onto the couch, utterly exhausted. Today was my birthday, too. I had originally planned to finish the gig and use the extra cash to buy myself a small cake and a present. But the walk home had been a blurry, numb haze. I didn’t stop anywhere. I just walked straight home. I looked at the furniture and the layout of our apartment. We had built this life piece by piece over the years we lived together. We even made a promise that once we saved enough, we would put a down payment on a place exactly like this. That was why I worked so relentlessly to save money. Even though it was my birthday, the moment I saw a gig paying two hundred dollars an hour, I took it without hesitation. And a good thing, too. What if I hadn’t gone? If I hadn’t gone, I wouldn’t have seen the truth. Would I have just lived a lie forever? I sat hugging my knees on the couch for God knows how long until I heard the turn of the lock. Chloe was back. She had taken off the luxurious designer gown and changed back into her worn-out, cheap clothes. She had morphed straight from the dazzling high-society princess back into a struggling, ordinary office worker. I looked at her without saying a word. Chloe walked over and immediately tried to wrap her arms around me. I shrugged out of her embrace. Noting the slight fatigue on her face, I asked, “Why didn’t you text me back?” Chloe’s expression stiffened for a fraction of a second before returning to normal. “I’m so sorry, baby, I didn’t even see it. You have no idea how crazy it was at the office tonight, they dumped so much overtime on me.” She looked so genuinely exhausted and wronged. If I hadn’t seen her being worshipped like royalty at that banquet with my own eyes, her acting would have completely fooled me. “Do you even remember what today is?” My voice came out hoarse. “Today is my birthday.” A small, pathetic part of me had hoped her excuse about overtime was real, that maybe she was going to surprise me. We had been together for four years. The first three, she spent every birthday with me. Now, it seemed she simply forgot. Or maybe she was just bored of me. She forgot the birthday of her actual boyfriend, ran off to celebrate another man’s birthday, and casually dropped money on 999 roses—something she had never once given me. My nose stung. I wanted to cry, but I forced the tears back down. Chloe had clearly forgotten. She frowned, quickly apologized, and promised she would make it up to me with a gift tomorrow. I didn’t respond. She assumed I was just throwing a tantrum about the lack of a present, offered a few half-hearted words of comfort, and went to bed. I sat there, neither yelling nor fighting, just watching her sleep. I had traced the lines of her face thousands of times in my mind, but right now, she looked like a total stranger. We had fought before. We had even broken up briefly over heated arguments. But this time was different. Chloe Kensington, this time, I am truly done with you. 5 I handed in my resignation at work. Without telling Chloe, I booked a one-way ticket to Seattle. As I left, I looked out at the city skyline. It was a city that held all the dreams I had built since meeting Chloe. I had been young and naive, foolishly believing I could spend the rest of my life with her, desperately hoping we could carve out a little home of our own in this massive metropolis. But from the very beginning, it was a dream I was having all by myself. Now, I was awake. I grabbed my suitcase and boarded the train. Sitting in my seat, I stared at Chloe’s profile picture. Driven by some final, phantom impulse, I sent her one last message. Then, I blocked her on every single platform. [Chloe, the game of playing poor stops here.] 6 Real life isn’t a movie. No one throws their life away and wallows in misery for years over a failed relationship, myself included. Time moves forward. I gathered myself, updated my resume, and started looking for a new job. Since I was no longer a fresh grad, and the market was saturated with college degrees, my bachelor’s didn’t give me much of an edge. It was a grueling cycle: send resumes, interview, send more resumes, interview again. Thankfully, during the years I was with Chloe, my obsession with saving for our future meant I had a decent safety net. Being temporarily unemployed didn’t push me into poverty. The relentless exhaustion of job hunting left me with zero free time to dwell on Chloe. Soon enough, I landed a position at a solid company and truly settled down. My life became a simple, peaceful straight line between the office and my apartment. I foolishly believed the world was vast enough that, having moved across the country, my path and Chloe’s would never cross again. But fate apparently had a twisted sense of humor. Because while I was presenting a project report, I saw Chloe again. And she was sitting directly in the chair of our newly appointed department manager. I hadn’t seen her in months. She had shed her “poor girl” disguise and returned to her true form as the Kensington princess. She was wearing a custom-tailored power suit, looking exactly as untouchable as she did the night of the banquet. Of course. The struggling girl named Chloe never actually existed. I looked at the newly parachuted manager, pretended I didn’t know her, and professionally handed her my files. Just as I turned to walk out of her office, a hand grabbed my wrist in a vice grip. I looked down at the hand. Chloe. She yanked me back into the office.

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1 It was the New Year’s holiday weekend, and I had been invited to the city’s annual Comic-Con. The transit bus was packed to the gills. I had just squeezed my way on when a sharp, hysterical shriek pierced the air right next to me. The girl beside me was sobbing, pointing a trembling finger at my face. “What do you think you’re doing? You pervert! Get your hands off me!” The words acted like a match to a powder keg. The surrounding passengers swarmed us instantly. Before I could even process what was happening, several heavy hands grabbed my shoulders and slammed me hard against the cold glass of the window. “Scumbag! Doing that in broad daylight!” I struggled against their grip, my chest tight with a mix of panic and fury. “What are you talking about? I didn’t touch you! You’re making things up!” “Yes, you did!” she wept, her voice trembling with theatrical distress. “You reached right under my clothes! Why else would my zipper be down?” That was all the crowd needed to hear. “Shameless creep!” “Disgusting trash! Someone take a video of his face!” Amid the sea of curses and aggressive shoves, I managed to slip a hand into my pocket, desperately trying to pull out my phone to dial 911. This was completely insane. The “victim” crying her eyes out was a guy. And I? I am a girl. Who was assaulting whom, exactly? “He did it,” the college girl sobbed, pointing a finger at me. “The second I got on, I felt someone groping my back. I turned around, and he was pressed right against me! Who else could it have been?” The air in the bus seemed to freeze. Every eye in the carriage locked onto me, heavy with judgment. “Oh, sweetheart, it’s okay. Don’t cry.” An older woman in a heavy winter coat pushed through the crowd, handing the girl a tissue before turning a venomous glare in my direction. “Broad daylight, and you’re pulling this crap on a public bus? Do you think the rest of us are dead?” “Exactly! Don’t let him get away with it!” someone shouted from the back. “Don’t worry, honey, we’ll all testify for you!” Being the target of all that collective rage made my skin crawl, but the sheer absurdity of the situation almost made me want to laugh. “Everyone shut up!” I roared, my voice cutting through the noise. I pointed directly at the weeping student. “Are you all blind? Look at her! Does that look like a woman to you? Why would I even want to touch her?” The bus went quiet for a split second. People instinctively looked closer at the girl’s face. Behind the smeared makeup, her skin was thick and coarse, and her shoulders were broader than the older woman standing next to her. Her face flushed a deep, angry crimson. “What is that supposed to mean?” Her voice pitched into a screech that nearly split my eardrums. “Just because I’m on the heavier side, I’m not a woman? First you grope me, and now you insult me? You absolute bastard!” Before the last word even left her mouth, she lunged at me. Terrified, I ducked quickly, slipping behind an elderly man standing nearby. Smack! A loud, wet slap echoed through the bus, landing squarely on the old man’s cheek. He let out a sharp cry of pain. His reading glasses flew off, clattering onto the floor as he stumbled backward. “My tooth! Oh, my tooth!” The old man collapsed onto the floor, clutching his jaw and groaning in agony. The girl froze, quickly pulling her hand back. She knelt down in a panic to help him. “Sir! Oh my god, I am so sorry! I didn’t mean to hit you! Are you okay? Let me help you up.” Still shaking from the adrenaline, I peeked out from behind the seat. “You all saw that, right? She’s the one who threw the punch! That has nothing to do with me!” “Bullshit!” She stood back up, tears streaming down her face again. “If you hadn’t coward out and hid behind him, would I have hit him? Everyone, look at this guy! He gropes me, insults me, gets an innocent old man hurt, and now he’s trying to wash his hands of the whole thing! Is he even human?” Her words reignited the crowd’s anger like gasoline on an open flame. “You’re full of crap!” I snapped, my head pounding with frustration. “You’re not even a wo—” “Shut your mouth!” The bus driver, who had been silent until now, slammed on the brakes and glared at me through the rearview mirror, his eyes cold. “You assaulted the girl, the evidence is clear, and you’re still trying to lie your way out of it? I’m not stopping at the next station. I’m taking this bus straight to the local precinct! Let the cops deal with you!” “Good!” “Thank you, driver!” “Send the creep to jail!” The passengers erupted in cheers, punctuated by more curses directed at me. I stood there, utterly speechless, a heavy lump of frustration settling in my chest. Today was New Year’s Day. I was supposed to be at Comic-Con, dressed up as my favorite male character. The button-up shirt, the cargo pants, and the short, styled wig were all carefully chosen to bring him to life. But under all of this, I was undeniably, biologically, a girl. 2 “Sir, wait,” the college girl said softly, wiping away tears that weren’t actually there. “Thank you for standing up for me, but maybe we shouldn’t go to the police? I just wanted an apology. If he gets a criminal record, I’m terrified he’ll hunt me down and retaliate.” She sounded incredibly fragile and sweet, but I caught the quick, calculating look she shot me. I wanted to scream in sheer frustration. If I hadn’t seen her on the platform before we boarded, frantically stuffing two heavy silicone inserts down her dress and gluing on thick, crooked false eyelashes in the shadow of the station, I probably would have believed her Oscar-worthy performance too. “Hold on,” I interrupted, raising my voice. “You keep claiming I groped you. But where’s the proof? This bus is packed, yet did anyone actually see my hands on you? Or does a simple accusation make me guilty?” The question made a few passengers pause. It was true. No one else had actually stepped forward to say they saw me touch her. Seeing the shift in the room, the girl’s tears flowed even faster. “How can you keep lying like this?” She clutched her skirt tightly. “It was you! The moment you got on, you squeezed in right behind me. You started by rubbing my back, and then you reached lower. The bus was crowded, and the more I tried to pull away, the closer you pressed, until I finally screamed!” “That’s enough!” The older woman in the winter coat stood up, her face flushed with rage. “You shameless pig! You do something that disgusting, and then you force this poor girl to relive it in front of everyone? Have you no shame?” Her outburst rallied the crowd once more. “Scumbag!” “Degenerate!” “Driver, step on it! Don’t let this trash slip away!” The girl collapsed back into the older woman’s arms, sobbing so hard she looked like she might faint. The anger inside me finally boiled over. “Where is the proof?” I shouted, my voice cutting through the noise. “Which hand did I use? Left or right? How long did I touch you? Aside from your words, who can back you up? This bus has security cameras. When we get to the police, I’m demanding they pull the footage! We’ll see who’s lying then!” “You’re still denying it!” She looked around wildly, as if driven to the brink of despair. “Fine! You want me dead? I’ll show you!” Without warning, she bolted toward the closed doors of the moving bus, looking as if she was actually going to throw herself out. “Oh my god! Stop her!” “Grab her!” The bus fell into complete chaos. Several passengers rushed forward, grabbing her arms and pulling her back from the doors. The older woman wrapped her arms around the girl, her voice trembling. “Sweetheart, don’t do this! A piece of trash like him isn’t worth your life! He’s the criminal, not you! Don’t do anything foolish!” This dramatic display wiped out any remaining doubts the passengers had. A wave of collective fury directed itself entirely at me. “Look at what you’ve done!” “You monster!” “This is basically attempted rape!” “Do you have to kill her to be satisfied?” “Driver, drive faster! Get him locked up!” The insults rained down on me. The girl was led to a seat, her shoulders still shaking with heavy, dramatic sobs. I didn’t understand why she was so intent on destroying me. But if she was going to drag me down, I wasn’t going to make it easy for her. I took a deep breath, staring directly at her tear-streaked face. “You keep saying I assaulted you. Fine! Let’s say I did. But that’s assuming you’re actually a woman in the first place!” 3 I stepped closer to her, ignoring the cheap foundation and smeared mascara running down her face. “Are you absolutely sure you’re a woman?” The entire bus fell dead silent. Everyone’s gaze bounced back and forth between us, confused by the sudden turn of events. “What are you saying? Of course I’m a woman! Do you want me to strip naked right here to prove it? How can you be so incredibly cruel?” she shrieked, her voice cracking. “Oh, my poor girl!” The older woman held her tighter, glaring at me. “You sick kid! Your heart is black! You should be put away for life!” I ignored her. My eyes remained locked on the pale, sweating face of the accuser. “There’s no need to take off any clothes. It’s simple. Just take off that scarf. Men have an Adam’s apple. Let’s see yours, and we’ll settle this right now.” “You shameless creep!” a young woman with a ponytail yelled, pointing at me. “Exactly! How is this any different from assaulting her all over again?” “Can’t you see her chest? Are you blind?” “Her chest?” My eyes drifted down to her front. The two massive curves were sitting unevenly, one significantly higher than the other. It was a bizarre, unnatural shape, but the crowd was too blinded by anger to notice. Seeing that she was clutching the scarf tightly and refusing to move, I took a step forward and reached out. Before my hand could get close, she grabbed her own collar and ripped it open. The buttons flew off, exposing a pale, ample chest to the open air. A few sharp gasps echoed through the bus, and some of the men instinctively looked away. “Fine! You wanted to look? Look!” Her voice shook, and huge tears rolled down her cheeks. “See for yourself! I am a girl! I am not a man! Stop making up excuses, you disgusting pig!” The sight of her seemingly humiliated and vulnerable pushed the crowd’s anger past the boiling point. “Worse than a beast!” “Sue him, sweetie! We’ll all stand up for you in court!” “Call the police now! Let him rot in jail!” The passengers were practically foaming at the mouth, looking at me as if I were a hardened criminal. I stared at the pale skin exposed by the ripped fabric. Up close, the edge of the silicone prosthetic was visible. “Still looking?” The older woman stepped between us, raising her hand and swinging it down hard. Slap! A stinging heat bloomed across my cheek. “You animal! Where are you looking?” Her hands shook with rage, her finger nearly poking my eye out. “People like you make me sick! You’re going straight to hell! Just wait, the police are almost here. Let’s see how tough you are then!” The sharp pain on my face cleared away any remaining patience I had left. I pushed her hand aside. “Get out of the way! You don’t know what you’re talking about!” “Help!” Seeing me push forward, the girl let out a terrifying scream. “He’s going to kill me! He’s trying to choke me!” In an instant, half a dozen hands grabbed me from every direction. Before I could even register who was touching me, I was slammed face-first onto the cold, grimy floor of the bus. “Hold him down! Don’t let him move!” “Unbelievable! He’s still trying to fight!” “Don’t worry, honey! We’ve got him!” My arms were pinned painfully behind my back, and a heavy knee pressed into my spine, making it hard to breathe. 4 I struggled desperately. “Let me go! Let me go, you idiots!” “Don’t listen to him! Keep him down!” The girl’s trembling voice rose above the din. “His eyes… they were so scary. He really wanted to kill me!” “Hear that? Shut up and stay down!” “Don’t even try to move!” More people pressed in, forming a human wall to protect the “victim.” “You’re safe now, sweetheart. He won’t touch a hair on your head.” “We’ve got you covered.” Lying face-down on the floor, I could only see the legs of the passengers surrounding her. The older woman and a few others were fussing over her, offering water and whispering comfort. The fury inside me burned hotter than ever. “Let me up!” I yelled, straining my neck, the muscles in my throat tight with exertion. “Still talking? Quiet!” The hand on the back of my neck shoved my face harder against the floor, sending a flash of pain through my jaw. Just then, the wail of a siren grew louder in the distance. “The police are here!” “The driver must have called them!” “Thank god! Put this trash where he belongs!” The bus finally pulled over and came to a halt. “What’s going on here? Who called?” a firm voice called out as the doors hissed open. “Officer! Over here! We called!” The older woman’s voice was tight with excitement. “You have to arrest this pervert! He assaulted this poor girl, and when we stopped him, he tried to fight us and choke her!” “Yes! We all saw it!” “The evidence is right here!” A flood of accusations washed over the officers as they stepped on board. The police pulled me up off the floor. I stumbled, barely finding my footing. Two younger officers flanked me immediately, their hands resting near their belts, their eyes full of suspicion. The lead officer, a seasoned man with a stern face, looked around the chaotic bus before his gaze settled on the weeping, disheveled victim. He gestured for the crowd to quiet down, then turned to the girl. “Miss, are you saying this person assaulted you?” “Yes,” she sobbed, her shoulders shaking. “He groped me the moment I got on the bus, and when I called him out, he tried to attack me.” She shrank back behind the older woman, revealing several red scratches on her collarbone. My eyes narrowed. Those marks weren’t there before. She must have scratched herself during the struggle. “Look, Officer! There’s the proof!” the older woman yelled. “He did that to her! If we hadn’t stepped in, who knows what he would have done!” The lead officer’s face darkened. He stepped closer to the girl, his tone softening. “Don’t worry. Tell me exactly what happened. Are those scratches from him?” Through her tears, she spun a vivid, terrifying tale of being followed, groped, and then assaulted when she tried to defend herself. The surrounding passengers chimed in, eager to confirm every detail as eye-witnesses. The officer listened, gesturing for his partner to take notes, before turning his attention to me. His eyes were cold, filled with deep distrust. “What do you have to say for yourself?” he asked. I licked my dry, split lip, forced a calm smile, and held out my hands. “Officer, I confess. I’m the one who groped this girl.”

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During my senior year of high school, I used fake photos of a gorgeous model to catfish an MIT-bound genius. I scammed him into giving me a year of free SAT tutoring. After graduation, we were supposed to meet in real life. But my cousin, who had just scored a 1540 on her SATs, tried to intercept him. “He’s the top student in MIT’s physics department. Do you really think a humanities nerd like you deserves him?” I didn’t go to MIT. I went to Harvard. After the semester started, there was a joint Harvard-MIT mixer. When the notoriously aloof upperclassman sitting across from me was asked about his dating history, he answered flatly: “I got played by a catfish.” “It didn’t feel great.” After he spoke, his eyes locked onto mine. “Wouldn’t you agree, freshman?” Chapter 1 The day the SAT scores were released happened to coincide with a massive family dinner. My cousin, Chloe, had scored a 1540. She instantly became the prized jewel of the entire family. “I knew our Chloe would crush it.” “Exactly! She’s the absolute pride of this family!” I sat in silence, my head bowed, staring at the phone hidden under the edge of the table. My online boyfriend, Liam, had just sent me two messages: “Did you check your scores yet?” “I’m at the airport. I’ll see you tonight.” My heart did a violent flip. I hadn’t figured out how to reply yet. Suddenly, my cousin called my name: “Emily.” I looked up. I was met with her malicious, overly sweet smile. “Did you check your scores yet? What did you get?” Before I could answer, my aunt laughed. “Chloe, why are you rubbing salt in Emily’s wounds?” “Someone who fails basic algebra on a regular basis isn’t going to miraculously sprout wings on the SATs.” Ever since my dad passed away from an illness, my family’s financial situation had been dire. Our relatives had always looked down on us. Especially my cousin, Chloe. She was the golden child. Growing up, her absolute favorite hobby was stepping on me to elevate herself. I forced a stiff smile and looked at her. “You really want to know?” “We’re all family here.” Chloe smiled innocently. “Emily, even if you have to go to community college, nobody here is going to laugh at you.” My mom put down her fork and squeezed my hand under the table. “I’m proud of Emily no matter what she scores.” My aunt muttered under her breath: “Tsk. Dirt poor and practically failing, yet she still acts so high and mighty.” For a moment, every single eye in the private dining room was pinned on me. I took a bite of melon, chewed slowly, and finally spoke: “It’s true. I choked under pressure. Didn’t do my best.” Chloe couldn’t hold back a triumphant smirk, though her tone was fake-sympathetic: “What do you mean, choked? Your scores have always been right around the—” I cut her off: “—I only scored 40 points higher than you.” Chapter 2 She froze. A few seconds later, she practically shrieked: “Are you insane?! If you’re going to lie, make it believable!” “You’re a humanities student! The absolute highest score in the state for the humanities track this year was a 1580!” “Correct.” My voice was completely flat. I casually picked up another piece of melon. “I am the top humanities scorer in the state.” The room plunged into dead silence. Chloe stood frozen, her face shifting violently between red, green, and white. Suddenly, she blurted out, “Did you cheat on the SATs?!” “Believe whatever you want.” I grabbed my mom’s hand and stood up. “We’re going home.” Leaving a room full of stunned relatives in the restaurant, I walked home. When I checked my phone, I saw two new messages from Liam. “It’s okay if you didn’t do well.” “In my eyes, you are always the brightest star.” “…” He was so sweet, I wanted to cry. I had used a fake profile to mercilessly exploit him for a year of free elite tutoring. For the first time, a sharp pang of guilt pierced my chest. Chapter 3 When I went back to my high school that afternoon, I was the absolute center of attention. After all, on all my previous practice tests, my scores had barely scraped a 1200. The students were whispering everywhere I went. “How did the class slacker suddenly get a near-perfect score?” “You haven’t heard? Emily cheated. The school board is reviewing the security footage right now.” Amidst the chaotic chatter, I suddenly caught a few girls gossiping in the hallway. “Liam is coming back to visit the school tonight.” “Oh my god, Liam? The guy who got early admission to MIT last year and broke the state record for the AP Physics exams?” I had barely registered his name when Chloe suddenly appeared. She was surrounded by a crowd of sycophants, all praising her for her “amazing” 1540. “Actually, I know Liam personally. We’ve talked privately quite a bit.” Hearing Liam’s name, Chloe raised her voice slightly. “Last year, when my practice scores dipped, he reached out to me specifically. He told me he wanted to see me at MIT.” “That’s why I worked so hard this year.” Someone gasped. “Meeting at the absolute top… that is so romantic!” Chloe put on a deeply shy expression. Yet her eyes darted toward me, completely triumphant and provocative. I let out a scoff. “I talk to Liam every single day. How come I never heard about him encouraging you?” “Emily, you are a pathological liar.” “Does Liam even know who you are?” Chloe looked at me with pure disdain. “He’s the top physics student at MIT. Do you really think a humanities nerd who cheated on her SATs deserves him?” Suddenly, a voice echoed down the hall: “Emily! The school board officials want to see you in the principal’s office.” Every single person in the hallway turned to stare at me. I heard someone mutter loudly: “Cheating on a standardized test… isn’t that a federal crime?” Chapter 4 I stood in the principal’s office, my back straight, facing the probing gazes of the school board officials. “You’ve reviewed the security footage. You should know I didn’t cheat.” “Of course we know that.” They asked, “Emily, we are simply curious. How did you manage to jump nearly 400 points on the actual exam compared to your practice tests?” I pursed my lips. “Because… I was intentionally tanking my scores.” Westfield High has a very specific, highly lucrative corporate scholarship. It was designed to incentivize underperforming, low-income students. If a student’s final SAT score improved by more than 300 points compared to their junior year baseline, they received a $20,000 “Most Improved” grant. “My family’s financial situation is terrible. I wanted to ease the burden on my mom.” The officials in the room exchanged complex, heavy looks. Someone let out a deep sigh. A moment later, my homeroom teacher walked over and patted my shoulder. “Don’t worry about the money anymore. You’re the top humanities scholar in the state. The academic scholarships alone will cover everything.” Chapter 5 By the time I walked out of the office, the sky was growing dark. The students outside were mostly gone. I unlocked my phone and checked the senior group chat, only to realize what was going on. The school was hosting a massive post-graduation banquet at a nearby hotel. Everyone was there. And Liam had shown up. Someone sent a candid photo of him to the group chat. A tall guy in a white tee and cargo pants stood under the warm hotel lights, a light jacket draped over his arm. He stood perfectly straight, like a stalk of bamboo. His eyelashes were lowered, his gaze cool and distant. Someone like him would be the most dazzling person in any room he walked into. And me… I looked up. My reflection stared back at me in the glass of the school’s bulletin board. I was painfully thin, my features incredibly plain. Because I had been pulling all-nighters working multiple part-time jobs, I even had two massive breakouts on my forehead. I looked absolutely nothing like the flawless AI-generated model photo I had sent him. The group chat was still buzzing. “Liam is so gorgeous, but he looks like he has a lot on his mind. He keeps drinking and zoning out.” “He’s probably thinking about Chloe! They’re supposed to meet at the top, remember?” Chloe popped into the chat to reply: “We met up! We met up!” Since I was completely in the wrong for catfishing him, I originally hadn’t planned on meeting Liam at all. But in that moment, maybe because the summer night breeze was intoxicating… A massive, impulsive urge to see him surged in my chest. However, right as I arrived at the hotel lobby. I pulled out my phone to check which floor the banquet was on. Two new text messages popped onto my screen. From Liam. “That photo wasn’t actually you, was it?” “You must be incredibly ugly in real life. How do you have the absolute nerve to use a fake photo to scam me? You disgust me.” My footsteps halted. My entire body turned to ice. A second later, a new post refreshed on my Instagram feed. It was from Chloe. She was wearing Liam’s light-colored jacket, leaning against his shoulder in a highly intimate, affectionate pose. The caption read: “I finally caught the moon.”

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1 My daughter clung to my leg. She was sobbing, begging for a ten-dollar plastic toy. Nolan didn’t even look up from his phone. His voice was ice. “Stop spoiling her. It’s a waste of money.” I swallowed the ache in my chest and finally managed to coax Sophie into calming down. Just as she wiped her eyes, a notification popped up on my screen. It was an Instagram update from his college sweetheart. In the photo, she was beaming. Cradled in her arms was the latest designer handbag. A sick curiosity took over. I opened a boutique website and found the exact bag. The three-thousand-dollar price tag felt like a slap to the face. Her caption read: “Thank you! Absolutely in love with my birthday gift this year!” Underneath the post, there was only one like. It belonged to my husband. I looked down at the chipped, faded doll Sophie was clutching. Slowly, I took a screenshot of the post and sent it to him with a single text. “The bag you bought her could buy our daughter three hundred toys. Is that right?” “Did you buy Jennifer’s bag?” “Three grand? Where would I get that kind of money?” Nolan didn’t stop scrolling. He didn’t even blink. “It’s a cheap knockoff. I got it from a street vendor downtown for fifty bucks.” “Jennifer just lost her job. She’s been depressed. I figured a fake bag would cheer her up. We go way back, you know.” He said it so casually, as if he were talking about the weather. It felt like a physical hand was squeezing my heart. “Cheer up an old friend?” I asked. “Nolan, last week Sophie wanted a ten-dollar doll. You said it was a rip-off. You said it was too expensive.” “And now you’re spending money to cheer up another woman?” Nolan threw his phone onto the sofa with an exasperated sigh. He glared at me. “Are you done? Sophie has a mountain of toys in her room. That’s just throwing money away. Jennifer is different. She’s a single mom struggling to get by. What’s wrong with a guy helping out a friend?” “Can you stop being so petty and paranoid all the time?” Petty. Paranoid. A bitter laugh escaped my lips. I turned and walked into our bedroom. Nolan probably thought I bought his excuse. He picked his phone back up, muttering “crazy woman” under his breath. I sat on the edge of the bed. My hands and feet were freezing. That bag wasn’t a fake. The authenticity tag, the texture of the leather, the stitching. I knew it all too well. It was the exact bag I had stared at for months leading up to our anniversary, the one I ultimately couldn’t bring myself to buy because we needed the money for the house. I took a deep, shaky breath and opened the nightstand drawer. I pulled out Nolan’s old tablet. He mostly used it for gaming now, but he had forgotten something crucial. His app accounts were all synced. I tapped on his ride-share and travel apps. My heart hammered against my ribs. The most recent booking was a short domestic flight to Seattle. The date was last Saturday. That was the exact day Nolan told me he had to pull an all-nighter at the office to finish a massive project. I kept scrolling. My breathing turned shallow. On that same day, there was a transaction on his credit card. An upscale family restaurant in Seattle. The bill was over three hundred dollars. That money could have bought Sophie thirty toys. It could have covered our groceries for weeks. Tears pricked my eyes. I tilted my head back, forcing them down. I wouldn’t cry. Not yet. I found the restaurant’s number and dialed. A cheerful hostess answered almost immediately. “Hello, how can I help you today?” I forced my voice to sound light and polite. “Hi there. My husband dined at your restaurant last Saturday. He thinks he lost his lucky silver lighter. Could you check your lost and found?” “I don’t remember the exact table, but his name is Nolan. Last four digits of his phone number are xxxx.” I heard the clacking of a keyboard. A few seconds later, the hostess replied. “Hi ma’am. Yes, I see Mr. Nolan’s reservation. Unfortunately, our cleaning staff didn’t turn in a lighter from that table.” My grip on the phone tightened until my knuckles turned white. My nails dug into my palm. “I see. I must be mistaken then. Oh, by the way, was he alone? I was worried he might have drank too much with his clients.” The hostess must have sensed the ‘wifely concern’ in my voice. She sounded even warmer. “Oh, don’t worry! Your husband didn’t order any alcohol.” “He was with a lovely lady and a little boy. The little guy kept calling him Daddy. They looked absolutely adorable together. Just a picture-perfect family.” A picture-perfect family. Those words twisted like a serrated knife in my gut. I don’t even remember hanging up. My brain was echoing with the phrase. Nolan didn’t just give her money. He gave her the most valuable thing he had. His time. He poured all his patience, gentleness, and cash into that woman and her kid. And for me and Sophie? All he had left were cold shoulders, excuses, and lies. This was the man I fought my own family to marry. This was the husband I gave up my dreams for, scraping by so he could build his career. It made me want to throw up. I walked into the bathroom and turned the faucet on cold. I splashed the freezing water over my face. The shock snapped me back to reality. What good were tears? Would crying bring my money back? Would it make Nolan a decent father? No. Well then, Nolan. If you love playing Daddy to someone else’s kid so much, I’ll make sure you get your wish. 2 Sunday morning arrived. Nolan woke up early, whistling as he shaved. He even sprayed on a little cologne. “That account still has some loose ends. I need to head into the office for a few hours.” “You stay home with Sophie. Don’t wait up for dinner.” He lied with such flawless ease. He didn’t even bother coming up with a new excuse. I was braiding Sophie’s hair. I didn’t look up. “Okay.” “Actually, I was thinking of taking Sophie out today too. I heard there’s a great new indoor theme park a few towns over.” Nolan’s hand froze on his tie. A flicker of panic crossed his eyes. “Why go all the way out there? That’s a ridiculous drive. Just take her to the park down the street. Don’t waste gas money.” I smiled, clipping a pink bow into Sophie’s hair. “She’s been begging to go for weeks. Besides, I found a Groupon. It’s dirt cheap.” Nolan grabbed his briefcase and practically sprinted out the door. The moment it clicked shut, my smile vanished. I had made a reservation at that exact restaurant. Directly across from their favorite table. At eleven a.m., I walked into the upscale bistro holding Sophie’s hand. It was beautiful. Soft lighting, pastel decor, and the sound of children laughing. I spotted Nolan immediately. He was sitting by the floor-to-ceiling windows. He leaned forward, utterly engrossed. Sitting across from him was Jennifer. Next to him was a little boy, maybe five or six years old. The kid was clumsily trying to snap a complex Lego set together. Nolan had his hands over the boy’s, guiding him patiently. “Look, buddy. This piece goes here. See? Nice and sturdy.” “You are so smart. Way better at this than my clumsy little girl.” His voice was dripping with a tenderness I hadn’t heard in years. His eyes were full of pure adoration. Sophie tugged at my sleeve. Her voice was a tiny whisper. “Mommy, is that Daddy?” “Didn’t Daddy go to work? Who is that boy?” Looking down at my daughter’s confused, innocent face broke something inside me. I crouched down and smoothed her hair. “Be a good girl, sweetie. Go play in the ball pit over there for a minute. Mommy needs to talk to Daddy.” She didn’t want to leave my side, but she was always a good kid. She nodded obediently and trotted off toward the play area. I took a deep breath and marched straight toward their table. Before I even reached them, Nolan seemed to sense something. He looked up. The moment his eyes locked onto mine, the Lego piece slipped from his fingers and hit the table with a sharp clack. All the color drained from his face. “What… what are you doing here?” Jennifer jumped. She scrambled to her feet, looking like a deer in headlights. “Stella…” I ignored her completely. My eyes were fixed on my husband. “Is this the office?” “Are these the loose ends on your account?” “So your idea of overtime is building Legos with another woman’s son?” People at the neighboring tables were starting to stare. Nolan’s face went from pale to a deep, embarrassed red. He shot out of his chair, grabbed my wrist, and yanked me toward a quiet corner near the restrooms. “Are you insane? We’re in public! Stop causing a scene!” “Can you just give me an ounce of respect?” Once we were out of earshot, he dropped my wrist like it burned him. He hissed through his teeth. “Are you tracking me?” I gave him a dead-eyed smile. “If you don’t want people to know, don’t do it.” “You’re worried about respect now?” “You barely speak two words to your own daughter at home, but here you are overflowing with fatherly love?” Nolan shifted his weight. His eyes darted around as he spun his web. “Jennifer just moved back. Toby transferred to a new school and doesn’t have any friends. He’s been really withdrawn.” “I’m just helping a friend out. Being a positive male role model for the kid.” “Sophie is a social butterfly. She doesn’t need me hovering over her.” “Are you seriously jealous of a little kid? You’re being totally irrational!” His logic was a masterclass in gaslighting. Right on cue, Jennifer rushed over. Her eyes were red. She looked like a fragile, heartbroken victim. She reached out, trying to touch my arm. “Stella, please don’t be mad at Nolan. This is all my fault.” “I’m just so useless. I’ve been struggling to raise Toby alone, and I leaned on Nolan too much.” “Yell at me if you want, but please don’t let this ruin your marriage.” “I’ll leave right now. I promise I’ll never bother him again.” Fat tears rolled down her cheeks perfectly on cue. The performance was Oscar-worthy. Seeing her cry triggered Nolan’s hero complex. He immediately pulled Jennifer behind him, shielding her from me. He glared at me. “Look at what you’re doing! You’re terrifying her.” “Jennifer is so understanding. But you? You’re acting like a crazy bitch!” “Why can’t you learn to be a little more gentle? A little more forgiving?” I stared at the two of them. It was a perfectly choreographed routine. Understanding? Forgiving? A pathetic homewrecker and a cheating narcissist. What a match. I didn’t scream. I didn’t cry. I just stood there in silence. My gaze slowly drifted down to Jennifer’s neck. Resting against her collarbone was a silver necklace. The pendant was uniquely shaped, like a butterfly caught mid-flight, its wings dusted with crushed sapphires. My pupils dilated. That was my necklace. It was the most precious thing I owned. 3 My eyes were glued to the silver chain. The blood roared in my ears. It was “First Light.” The piece that won me the National Young Designer’s Award back in college. It was the peak of my design career. And the end of it. That year, I was supposed to use that award to secure a full-ride scholarship to Parsons. I was going to study in New York. But Nolan’s startup crashed. He owed a massive amount of money to the wrong people. They were banging on our door every night. To save him, I gave up the scholarship. I took my entire thirty-thousand-dollar prize money and paid off his debts. I spent the next three years working double shifts at diners and selling crafts at flea markets just to keep us afloat. That necklace was a one-of-a-kind original. It was the only monument I had left for a dream that had died. For years, I kept it locked in the deepest corner of my safe. I didn’t even dare to wear it. And now, it was resting on Jennifer’s skin. It was the ultimate insult. I took a slow step toward her. “Stop making a fool of yourself,” Nolan snapped. “Take Sophie and go home!” I ignored him. I raised my hand and pointed straight at Jennifer’s throat. “Where did you get that?” Nolan flinched. He avoided my eyes and instinctively blocked Jennifer again. “What do you mean? I bought it!” “It’s from a flea market. Cost me twenty bucks. What’s the big deal?” Another flea market. Another cheap excuse. I let out a cold, sharp laugh. I lunged forward and grabbed the necklace. Jennifer shrieked. She slapped her hands over her neck and stumbled backward. “What are you doing! You’re hurting me!” “Stella, I know you hate me, but this was a gift from Nolan…” “A gift?” I turned to Nolan. My voice shook with pure rage. “You said this was a twenty-dollar piece of junk?” “Do you even know what is engraved on the back of it?” Nolan went pale. A thin layer of sweat broke out on his forehead. Of course he knew. Years ago, when I showed it to him as a symbol of our future, I held his hand, traced the tiny etching on the back, and said: “It’s an S. For Stella.” “If your memory is failing you, Nolan, let me help you remember.” I yanked hard. The silver chain snapped. I flipped the pendant over and shoved it inches from Nolan’s face. The tiny, elegant “S” was unmistakable. “Do you see it?” “This is First Light! It’s the only trophy I have left from my past!” “How dare you?” “How dare you take my blood, sweat, and tears and use it to play sugar daddy to another woman?” A crowd was forming. People were whispering and pointing. Nolan’s pride couldn’t handle the public humiliation. His eyes turned wild. He yelled back at me. “Yeah! I took it! So what?” “What’s yours is mine! It belongs to the house!” “Jennifer said it looked pretty. She said she needed a lucky charm.” “She’s been having a hard time, so I let her borrow it! Is that a crime?” “It’s just a piece of metal! Why are you being so hysterical?” “It was just gathering dust in a drawer anyway. At least now it’s actually getting some use!” I stopped breathing. In his eyes, my dreams, my youth, the ultimate sacrifice I made for him… It was all just “metal gathering dust.” Jennifer had recovered from her shock. She rubbed her neck, letting the tears fall freely. “Stella, I had no idea it was so important to you…” “Nolan told me it was just a cheap trinket.” “If you’re that desperate for it, you could have just asked. You didn’t have to attack me like an animal.” “It’s not like I can’t afford my own jewelry…” As she sobbed, her eyes flicked to the crowd, gauging their sympathy. And it worked. Some onlookers muttered under their breath. “That wife is psycho. Just ripping it off her neck?” “It’s just a necklace. Total overreaction.” My hand trembled around the silver pendant. My chest felt hollowed out. In that moment, everything became crystal clear. Nolan didn’t just disrespect a piece of jewelry. He had completely shattered my dignity. He wiped away every piece of myself I had sacrificed to build our family. To him, I was utterly worthless. I gripped the necklace tight in my fist and turned around. “We are done, Nolan.” Panic finally pierced through his anger. He lunged forward, grabbing my arm, and actually dropped to his knees right there on the restaurant floor. “Stella! Wait! I’m sorry!” “I messed up!” “I shouldn’t have taken your stuff. I wasn’t thinking!” “You have the necklace back now! Can we just go home and act like a normal family?” He clung to my jeans, sobbing, putting on a show for the crowd. I kicked him off. I just felt sick. 4 When I got home, I locked the necklace back inside the safe. Then I locked myself in the bathroom and cried until my throat was raw. That night, Sophie woke up crying. She was burning up. The thermometer read 103 degrees. She was lethargic, her tiny body trembling, murmuring that her head hurt. I panicked. I threw a coat over her pajamas and rushed her to the emergency room. Registration. Blood tests. Waiting rooms. I ran up and down the hospital corridors alone, carrying my forty-pound daughter in my arms. In those agonizing hours, my hatred for Nolan crystallized into something cold and permanent. The doctor finally wrote up a prescription and told me to pay at the billing counter. I pulled out the blue debit card. It was our emergency fund. It was also meant to be Sophie’s college fund. I had deposited every spare dollar into it for five years. There was exactly forty thousand dollars in that account. I never expected Nolan to save a dime, so I managed it. But Nolan knew the PIN. Beep. The billing clerk frowned and slid the card back across the glass. “Insufficient funds, ma’am.” I froze. “That’s impossible. There’s forty thousand dollars in that account. Try it again.” “Is your machine down?” The clerk looked sympathetic but exhausted. “The machine is fine. The card is empty. You’ve got about forty-five bucks left. Do you have another card? There’s a line.” Forty-five bucks? The world spun. Forty. Thousand. Dollars. That was money I scraped together by denying myself everything. Skipping lunches, buying second-hand clothes, working freelance gigs late into the night. My hands shook violently as I pulled out my phone and opened the banking app. There it was. A transaction from three days ago. Transfer amount: $39,950. Recipient: Jennifer. I paid for Sophie’s meds with a high-interest credit card. Once she was hooked up to her IV and sleeping in the pediatric ward, I marched out to the hallway and called Nolan. It rang a dozen times before he picked up. His voice was hushed and guilty. “Hey babe, you’re up late. I’m still at the office…” “Where is the money?” My jaw was clenched so hard my teeth ached. “Sophie’s emergency fund. Forty thousand dollars. Where is it?” Dead silence on the line. Then, the stammering began. “Look… babe, let me explain.” “Jennifer’s mom… she got really sick. She needed emergency surgery.” “You know how American hospitals are. No insurance, no cash, no surgery.” “It was a matter of life and death. I couldn’t just let the woman die, could I?” “I just loaned it to her. She’s putting her mom’s house on the market. Once it sells, she’ll pay me back every cent…” “Loaned?” My entire body was shaking. The tears I promised not to shed streamed down my face. “Nolan, that is Sophie’s money!” “Your daughter is lying in a hospital bed right now with a 103-degree fever, and I couldn’t even pay her medical bill!” “You took your daughter’s safety net to play savior to your ex’s mother?” “Are you even human?” “Do you have a soul at all?” My voice cracked, echoing down the empty hospital hallway. A passing nurse gave me a sharp look, motioning for me to quiet down. I slapped a hand over my mouth, choking on my own sobs. The pain in my chest was unbearable. Nolan was still defending himself. “How was I supposed to know Sophie was going to get sick?” “Besides, we’re talking about a life-saving surgery versus a fever. Can you not tell the difference?” “Do you have zero empathy?” Empathy? I looked through the glass window of the ward. I looked at my daughter’s flushed face, a needle taped to her tiny hand. She was so small. So vulnerable. And her father had abandoned her for another woman. I wiped my face. I stared blankly at the wall and lowered my voice into a dead, flat calm. “You wanted to be a savior, Nolan?” “Good. That’s great.” “Since you’re so generous, I hope you’re ready to pay the price.” “I am going to make you spit out that forty grand. Every single cent.” I hung up the phone and blocked his number. If you want to play dirty, Nolan, welcome to the mud.

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1 To marry Connor, I severed all ties with my family. My father struck my name off the family records right in front of my eyes. My mother slapped me across the face, declaring that from that day on, she no longer had a daughter. I didn’t regret it. Our engagement dinner was set for the grand ballroom of the Plaza Hotel. Two hundred invitations had been sent out. Dressed in a rented gown that pinched my waist, I waited for three hours. He never showed up. My calls went straight to voicemail, and my messages were left unread. I forced a smile and told the remaining guests that he had been called away for an urgent business trip. When the venue emptied, I was left to clean up the wreckage alone. My phone buzzed with a social media notification, a trending local post. Connor, heir to the Holden family empire, marries his childhood sweetheart. The attached photo showed him in a tailored suit, holding Fiona’s hand outside the courthouse, a red marriage certificate proudly in hand. The registration date was three days ago. I carefully folded the rented gown, packed it back into its garment bag, and dialed a number I hadn’t called in three years. “Mom, can I come home?” … “You still have the nerve to call this home?” My mother’s voice cracked through the receiver, so raspy and hollow that I barely recognized it. I opened my mouth, but the words withered in my throat. “Your father had heart bypass surgery last month. He spent twenty days in the ICU.” A loud ringing filled my ears. “Why didn’t anyone tell me?” “Tell you? You were the one who said you were marrying that Connor fellow, no matter what. You told us you were done with this family.” “Mom, I—” “Don’t call me Mom. You haven’t used that word in three years, don’t start now.” The line went dead. I redialed immediately, but the phone was already switched off. Huddled on the curb outside the ballroom, I stared at the trending post. The comments section was already in the tens of thousands. Someone had screenshotted the status I had posted three hours ago, captioned: “Finally, the wait is over.” The top comment below it read: “Too bad he wasn’t the one waiting for you.” The banquet manager walked out, a clipboard in his hand. “Miss Shen, the remaining balance is thirty-six hundred dollars. If we don’t settle this tonight, there will be a late fee.” “Can I do a wire transfer?” “Yes, that works.” I opened my mobile banking app. My balance was exactly thirty-six hundred and two dollars. It was the sum of three years of quiet, painstaking savings. Once the transfer cleared, my balance was exactly two dollars. The manager gave me a fleeting look, perhaps searching for some words of comfort, but ultimately nodded and walked away. At the bridal boutique, the assistant quietly took the garment bag from my hands. “Did it get stained, Jane?” “No, it’s clean.” “Here is your deposit refund.” “Thank you.” I took a cab back to our apartment. When I pressed my thumb against the smart lock, the screen flashed with two words: “Access Denied.” I tried three times, but the result was the same. I messaged Connor: “I can’t get in.” It marked as read. Eight minutes later, he replied with a six-digit passcode. No greeting, no explanation. I punched in the numbers and pushed the door open. The first thing I saw in the foyer was a pair of plush pink slippers. They were not my size. On the entryway table sat a massive bouquet of baby’s breath with a card: “Fiona, welcome to your new home. Love, Connor.” I had lived here for three years, and he had never once bought a single flower for me, not even on the day we moved in. On the coffee table was a pink mug painted with the words “Mrs. Holden.” A lavender cardigan was draped over the sofa. It wasn’t mine. The bedsheets in the master bedroom had been replaced with purple silk. The cotton sheets I had bought were stuffed into the absolute bottom of the linen closet. My clothes had been shoved into a tight corner of the wardrobe to make room for a row of new dresses. The price tags were still attached, the cheapest one costing four hundred dollars. In three years, I had never spent more than thirty dollars on a single piece of clothing. On the back of the bedroom door, there was a sticky note in Connor’s handwriting. Jane, sleep in the guest room for a few days. Fiona just moved in and is still adjusting. Just a temporary arrangement. I stared at those words, then slowly peeled the note off the wood. My phone rang. I called Connor back, and this time, he answered. The background was loud, filled with clinking glasses and chatter, like a busy restaurant. “Jane, this isn’t a good time.” “Did you marry Fiona?” A heavy silence lasted for two seconds. “I’ll explain later.” “Then why was my fingerprint deleted from the door?” “Fiona wanted to reset the security settings. I’ll add yours back tomorrow.” His voice was flat, as if he were discussing the weather. “Two hundred people watched me wait for three hours today, and you couldn’t even manage a single phone call?” “Don’t get hysterical, Jane. It’s not what you think—” Suddenly, a soft, whiny voice drifted through the line. “Connor, the soup is getting cold. Come back to the table.” He lowered his voice. “I have to go. We’ll talk later.” Later. For three years, every promise he made was pushed to some vague “later.” I clutched my phone, sitting on the edge of the guest bed. Five minutes later, an unknown number popped up. “Jane? It’s Fiona.” Her voice was sickeningly sweet. “Connor wanted me to let you know he won’t be coming home tonight. He said you shouldn’t wait up and should get some rest.” I said nothing. She paused for a beat, then added: “Jane, Connor always says you’re the most understanding person he knows. He knew you wouldn’t get upset over something so minor. He said you never mind.” “Jane? Could you open the door? I’m here to grab some things.” Fiona was standing outside the door at noon the next day. She wore a cream-colored knit dress, her long hair draped over her shoulders, holding two cups of iced boba tea. I unlocked the door, and she slipped on those pink slippers, walking in as if she owned the place. Her movements were entirely natural; she didn’t even have to look for the light switch. The switch was hidden behind a decorative wooden panel in the corner, a detail that had taken me a week to find when we first moved in. She curled onto the sofa, placing the cups on the table. “I got you one. Low sugar. Connor said you don’t like sweet things.” I didn’t touch it. “What are you here for?” “Just a few changes of clothes. It’s a bit inconvenient for Connor and me to keep staying at the hotel.” She smiled, walking into the master bedroom to open the closet. As she passed the nightstand, she casually picked up the photo frame. It was the only picture I had with Connor. I had begged him for hours before he finally agreed to take it, his face entirely expressionless the entire time. Fiona stared at it for a moment, then flipped it face-down on the table. “We probably don’t need this anymore, right?” I walked over and flipped the frame back up. She tilted her head, her tone carrying a mock gentleness. “Jane, do you really not know?” “Know what?” “Connor said your engagement was just for show. His grandmother’s health is failing, and she was pressuring him to settle down, so he just went along with it to keep her happy.” Just to keep her happy. Three years ago, when I cut ties with my family to be with him, he had held me and said: “Jane, you have me now.” He had convinced me to turn down a prestigious corporate management track position in Seattle so I could move to New York and help him launch his startup. An offer with a six-figure salary, crumpled and thrown into the trash. He told me we were building our future together, that everything we made would be ours. And I had said yes. He told me things were tight and asked me to cover the company’s operating costs with my savings. And I had said yes. All those sacrifices, reduced to “just for show.” Fiona pulled a stack of clothes from the wardrobe, spotting my faded floral dress tucked at the very bottom. “This dress looks so old, Jane. You still keep it?” “I bought it in college.” “Ah, that explains it.” She packed her things and headed for the door, stopping near the guest room. “By the way, Jane, you might want to start packing your things. Connor said we’re officially moving back in next week.” I looked at her. She quickly waved her hands. “Oh, I don’t mean to kick you out! I just don’t want our things getting mixed up. Connor said you’re incredibly reasonable, so I knew you wouldn’t take it the wrong way.” As she bent down to change her shoes, I noticed a silver bracelet on her wrist. It was the bracelet that belonged in my jewelry box, the one my mother had given me for my eighteenth birthday. “Where did you get that bracelet?” She looked down, her tone dripping with innocence. “Connor gave it to me. He said he found it at a local vintage market. Pretty, isn’t it?” He had taken my mother’s gift and handed it to another woman, calling it a market find. I stood frozen. Fiona opened the door and smiled back. “Oh, one last thing. Connor is going to cancel the supplementary credit card you have. An account can only have one secondary card, and he needs to set up a new one for me.” I was the one paying off the monthly balance on that card. “Really? Well, thank you so much, Jane.” She took a few steps, then turned around again. “Connor told me to tell you that he appreciates everything you’ve done during this transition, and he’ll make it up to you later. But you’ll have to wait a little bit. We haven’t paid the deposit for our honeymoon hotel yet.” “Jane, don’t go online today.” Sarah’s message had been sent at two in the morning. I didn’t see it until seven. “What happened?” “Someone leaked photos of you from yesterday.” I opened social media. The top trending local post read: The Engagement Dinner Farce: Bride-to-Be Left Waiting in an Empty Ballroom for Three Hours. The attached photos had been taken covertly by one of the guests. The rented dress, the empty head table, and me sitting there alone, forcing a smile as I raised a glass to toast the remaining crowd. The comments were merciless. Renting a gown for an engagement? How pathetic. Why try so hard to climb into a family like that? This is hilarious. Stood up in front of two hundred people, and she still tried to cover for him by saying he was on a business trip. Winner of the most pathetic partner of the year. I turned off my phone. Two minutes later, it rang again. It wasn’t Connor; it was his mother. “Jane, dear, I wanted to discuss something with you.” Her tone was far more polite than usual, the kind of forced politeness that makes your skin crawl. “Don’t worry about those online posts. I’m trying to get them taken down.” “They won’t go away, Mrs. Holden.” “Well, then we’ll handle this another way.” She paused. “To be honest, Jane, when Fiona returned from abroad last year, she was hesitating about committing to Connor. So Connor had to find a way to nudge her.” “What way?” “By setting up an engagement with someone else, just to give her that final push.” My ears rang. “So the engagement was a lie?” “Not a lie, exactly… just a gesture. A temporary arrangement.” I looked down at the simple silver band on my finger. It had cost thirty dollars at a small artisan alley. I had picked it out, buying a matching pair. He had worn his for two days before taking it off. I had worn mine for three years. “Mrs. Holden, I was the one who printed those two hundred invitations. I was the one who paid the deposit for the ballroom.” “Connor will pay you back.” “When?” “Once things settle down for him financially. By the way, Jane, about the twenty thousand dollars you lent his company—” “What about it?” “Things are really tight with the business right now. Do you think you could…” I hung up before she could finish the sentence. I checked our joint savings account on my banking app. Balance: zero. The last transaction was three days ago, the day he registered his marriage with Fiona. He had withdrawn twelve thousand dollars. The transaction note read: Honeymoon Fund. That money was what I had earned from working freelance over the last six months. He had told me a joint account would make things easier once we married, that it would be our shared asset. And I had believed him. My phone buzzed. It was Sarah. “Jane, I can’t keep this from you anymore.” She sent a screenshot of a group chat named Connor’s Campaign Crew. Connor had sent a message the night before the engagement dinner: Once tomorrow’s performance is over, we’re done. Keep your mouths shut around Jane. The replies were lined up. Copy that. Brilliant, man. Can’t believe she actually fell for it. The last message was from Connor: a laughing emoji. Sarah added: I’m so sorry. I only found out yesterday that you were actually left waiting there. He told everyone you were just helping him run the event as a favor. If you have nowhere to stay, come to my place. I stared at that screenshot for a long time. The laughing emoji. At nine that night, Connor finally called. “Jane, don’t take what my mother said to heart. She doesn’t know how to phrase things properly.” “What about the group chat screenshot?” A three-second silence. “Who showed you that? It was just my friends fooling around.” “The laughing emoji was also just fooling around?” He let out a heavy sigh, his tone sharp with irritation. “Jane, can you please stop obsessing over such minor things? I told you I’d explain everything when I get back.” “You always say that.” “Then what do you want me to do?” I held the phone, silent. He waited, his tone softening slightly. “Just calm down, alright? It’s not what you think. Let’s talk in person.” Connor didn’t show up until three days later. Fiona was right behind him as he pushed the door open. She slipped into her slippers and curled up on the sofa as if she had never left. I stood by the guest room door, watching them. He glanced at the packed suitcase in the room. “Looks like you’ve made up your mind. I found a small studio apartment for you, fully furnished. I’ll cover the deposit and the first three months of rent.” “I put eight thousand dollars toward the down payment of this place.” “I’ll pay you back later.” “What about the twelve thousand from our joint account?” “Fiona needed to book the flights and hotels. Consider it a loan.” “And the twenty thousand I lent your company?” “The business is strapped right now. You’ll have to wait.” I looked at him, realizing his eyes didn’t even flinch as he said those words. He believed he was being perfectly reasonable. My gaze drifted to Fiona’s neck. She was wearing a delicate silver necklace with a tiny star pendant. I had saved up for two months to buy him that necklace for his birthday. He had told me the style was too feminine and refused to wear it. Now it was around her neck. “I bought that necklace.” Fiona touched the pendant, looking at Connor. “Connor, didn’t you say you bought this for me?” He frowned. “It’s just a necklace, Jane. Let’s focus on the important things.” I didn’t sit down. He sighed. “I know you’ve sacrificed a lot for me and the company over the last three years, and I appreciate it. But we can’t force feelings. Once Fiona came back, I realized I couldn’t let her go.” “So you married her three days before our engagement dinner.” “She finally agreed to settle down, and the timing was tight. I couldn’t delay it.” “But you could let me wait for three hours without a single phone call?” He looked away, his voice quiet. “That was my mistake.” Fiona gently tugged at his sleeve. “Connor…” He patted her hand comfortingly. I knew that gesture too well. He used to pat my hand the exact same way, telling me everything would be fine. I let out a quiet laugh. “Fine. I’ll take my things. You can keep the rest.” He seemed startled. “You… aren’t going to demand an explanation?” “You just gave me one.” I turned, walked into the guest room, and shut the door. Through the wood, I could hear their muffled voices. Fiona chuckled softly. “See, Connor? I told you she wouldn’t make things difficult for us.” He replied quietly: “That’s just how she is. She won’t make a scene. Don’t worry.” That’s just how she is. She won’t make a scene. I turned off my phone, knelt down, and pulled my suitcase from under the bed. It had been with me for three years, its corners scuffed and the zipper temperamental. I packed my clothes, placing the faded floral dress on top. I didn’t have much to carry anyway. Within thirty minutes, everything was packed. I took off my house keys and set them on the entryway table. I unclasped the silver band from my finger and left it beside them. Fiona was wearing my mother’s silver bracelet. I didn’t ask for it back. Perhaps that was the last trace of my existence in this apartment. I didn’t look back as the door closed. I walked down and hailed a cab. Before turning my phone off, I sent one final message: The keys are on the table. Don’t contact me again. Then I went to the carrier store, canceled the number, and got a new SIM card. When Connor returned to the apartment that evening, he saw the keys and the ring. He pushed open the guest room door, finding nothing but an empty bed. He frowned and dialed my number. “The number you have dialed is no longer in service. Please check the number and try again.”

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Carter pursued me for two years and spoiled me rotten for five. Five years ago, he was killed in the line of duty. No body was ever found. Today, five years later, Captain Miller called me personally. He said Carter had been found. He was alive and well, but… He was getting married. On the way to that coastal town, Captain Miller and the other officers kept trying to gently talk me out of my delusions, but I refused to give up. I rubbed the plain silver band on my finger. He had proposed to me. He was my fiancé. How could he marry another woman? A flight and a bus ride later—five hours on the bus having me throwing up violently—we finally arrived at the small seaside town after a ten-hour journey. “It’s over there.” Captain Miller pointed to a place called Sunny Haven Inn. It was an obscure little bed and breakfast that had suddenly gone viral because of a set of photos a tourist posted online. In those photos, the owner had accidentally stepped into the frame. Even though it was just his side profile, it was enough to send the internet into a frenzy. Captain Miller gave me a heavy look. “He doesn’t remember anything. You have to…” I stared fixedly at that door, my senses completely shutting down. When Captain Miller pushed the door open, a wind chime made of seashells let out a crisp, clear melody. Before us lay a massive courtyard with a cobblestone path leading to the main house. There was a giant wooden swing, a golden retriever, and several stray cats lounging about. I looked at the animals in shock. Suddenly, a figure emerged from behind a curtain of strung seashells. The man was tall, with long legs and tight, lean muscles visible beneath his black t-shirt. His jawline was sharp and clean. The moment I laid eyes on him, my body froze uncontrollably. A numb tingling shot down my spine, and my head buzzed. All my bodily functions seemed to fail at once, leaving me with only enough strength to stare desperately at the man in front of me. I had seen people who looked eighty percent like Carter—some even had the exact same teardrop mole under their eye—but I always knew with one glance that they weren’t him. But the man standing before me was far removed from the boy I knew. His facial features were more mature than the teenage Carter, sharper, and noticeably colder. I couldn’t stop myself from stepping closer, and closer, until I clearly saw the teardrop mole by his eye, and the braided red cord around his neck… “Car… Carter…” I choked out, fighting back a sob, whispering his name softly as if afraid I’d scare him away. He looked up at me. His gaze was entirely, devastatingly foreign. “Excuse me?” “Carter…” I could barely articulate his name. The man looked at me with cold indifference. “Sorry, miss. You have the wrong person.” I could be wrong about anything in this life, but I could never be wrong about Carter Davis. He was half my soul. Captain Miller hurriedly pulled me back. “Sorry about that. Do you have any vacant rooms?” Carter crossed his arms, scrutinizing us carefully. “Yes. How many?” “Two.” “Come on in.” He turned and walked straight into the house without sparing me another glance. I had naively believed that as long as he saw me, he would remember. If he just looked at me, everything would go back to normal… But the way he looked at me was unfamiliar and sharp, tinged with a hint of annoyance at my abruptness. I didn’t cry when I heard he was alive. I didn’t cry when I heard he was getting married. But remembering the look in his eyes just now, my heart felt like it was being crushed in someone’s fist. It hurt so much it felt like it would explode, and my tears fell uncontrollably. 2 “IDs.” Captain Miller handed over our driver’s licenses. When the man reached out to take them, I saw it clearly: the top half of his left pinky finger was missing. As he walked behind the counter, he moved with a slight, almost imperceptible limp in his right leg. I clamped a hand over my mouth. Captain Miller grabbed the room keys and quickly had someone escort me outside. I sat in my room for a long time before I found my voice. “How did he end up like this?” On the way here, I swore to myself that the moment I saw him, I would slap him as hard as I could. That heartless bastard, how could he forget me and marry someone else! But the moment I saw him, I suddenly couldn’t bear to do it. All I wanted to do was hold him. I stayed in my room for hours, so long that Sarah, a colleague, got worried and dragged me out. Everyone was in the backyard having a barbecue. I instantly spotted Carter manning the grill. Captain Miller stood next to him, and the two seemed to be getting along great. “Chloe, feeling better?” I nodded. “Carter, let me introduce you. This is Chloe.” I slowly extended my hand, fighting with everything I had to keep it from trembling. “Chloe Adams. Nice to meet you.” A broad, warm palm briefly grasped mine. “Carter. Nice to meet you.” A greeting between strangers. In that split second, my nose stung. I remembered right after he proposed, he had held me, incredibly gentle, and whispered affectionately, “Nice to meet you, Mrs. Davis.” We had missed our chance. Looking at the man in front of me, I had a million questions, but all that came out was, “It’s beautiful here. Have you been living well?” He expertly flipped the skewers on the grill and answered casually, “Pretty well.” That’s good. As we spoke, a piece of chicken wing fell from the grill. He looked toward the door. “Potato, come here.” Potato was the name of an orange tabby we had adopted together. Carter named him. He had said, “He’s fat and round, what else would we call him but Potato?” Watching the big golden retriever trot over, wagging its tail, my throat tightened. “His name is Potato?” “Yeah. He’s fat and round. What else would I call him?” I turned around to secretly wipe my tears. Only Carter would come up with such a cheesy name twice. When the food was ready, we all sat around the table. Seeing the beer, I grabbed a can and downed it. The bitter taste spread across my tongue. I looked at the man across from me. The teardrop mole I used to tease him about was still there. The braided red cord still hung around his neck, though I didn’t know if it was the one I gave him. None of this felt real. Sarah handed out the skewers, placing a mushroom one on his plate. Before he could react, I snatched it away. “No, he can’t eat mushrooms.” Everyone at the table suddenly stared at me. Just as I froze, not knowing what to do, a figure ran over and jumped right onto Carter’s back, wrapping her arms around his neck and nuzzling him affectionately. “Carter, I missed you so much!” Carter hurriedly leaned forward, supporting the person on his back with one hand. “Get down.” It was a reprimand, but all I could hear in his tone was pure indulgence. He pulled the girl off his back and into his arms, smiling as he introduced her. “This is my wife, Lily.” 3 Still holding the mushroom skewer, I stared blankly at the girl whose smile was as bright as the sun. My chest convulsed. It felt like I had been smashed with a sledgehammer. It hurt so much I couldn’t breathe. “Hi everyone! I’m Lily, Carter’s wife. Welcome to Oceanside!” Captain Miller and the others greeted her one by one. Lily was very outgoing. She complimented everyone. When she got to me, she said, “Chloe, you’re so pretty! And so slim, I’m so jealous! Your hair is so nice too, unlike mine. I’m practically going bald.” Remembering something, she turned to the man behind her. “It’s definitely because you don’t know how to blow-dry hair properly. Be careful, or next week you’ll have a bald bride at the altar!” Carter ruffled her hair, letting out a helpless laugh. “Okay.” Looking into her clear eyes—eyes that had never seen a speck of dust, eyes filled entirely with excitement for her wedding—I saw exactly what I used to look like. “Wedding?” Sarah asked. “Yes! Next Wednesday is our wedding. We’d love it if you all came!” I opened another can of beer. Lily reached for one too, but before she could grab it, the man snatched it away. “No drinking.” Lily pouted. “Just a sip.” Ignoring the fact that we were there, she sneaked a kiss on his cheek. “Please, Carter? Just one sip!” “Drink this.” Inside a white mug were floating rose petals. As the lid was lifted, the scent of roses wafted out. Lily frowned. “Roses? Carter! I’ve told you eight hundred times, I don’t like floral tea. How do you always forget!” “I don’t know… I just make it out of habit.” Hearing his words, I turned my head and downed the last drop of my beer. I used to hate drinking water. In high school, my throat would get so dry from reciting textbooks that sometimes I lost my voice. To make me drink water, Carter would make me all kinds of floral teas, fruit teas, and oolong teas, rotating them constantly. In the winter, he’d boil apple cider and pear soup for me. Every time I took an extra sip, the arrogant, untouchable Carter Davis acted like he wanted to build a shrine for my pink thermos. Seeing me drink the beer, Lily tried to negotiate. “Look, Chloe just drank a whole can. Maybe her hair is so nice because she drinks beer.” “Quiet, you.” I stared at the empty can by my hand, smiling bitterly. “My ex-boyfriend didn’t let me drink either, because I’m a lightweight. He was super strict with me.” Lily looked at me. “Then won’t he be mad if you drink like this now?” I glanced behind her and shook my head. “He stopped caring about me a long time ago.” Realizing she had touched a nerve, Lily looked apologetic and stopped arguing, obediently drinking the tea from Carter’s mug until it was empty. I only ate that single mushroom skewer, but I drank quite a lot. My head spun, so I excused myself early. As I walked down the steps, I heard Lily’s hearty laugh. I looked back. Lily was clinging to Carter’s back like a sloth, waving her arms, talking non-stop. Carter stumbled occasionally from her weight, but he just kept his head down, patiently cleaning the table with a good temper, as if he were entirely used to it. Carter was not a good-tempered man. I thought he only reserved his patience for me. I thought he would only ever love me in this life… Looking at Lily, whose face was overflowing with happiness, I clutched my violently aching heart. It hurt so much I wanted to die. That should be me! The one being spoiled rotten by Carter Davis should be me! Suppressing the urge to tear them apart, I forced myself back to my room. I dumped everything out of my bag onto the floor until I found my pills. I swallowed them, and only then did the tidal wave of my emotions slowly begin to recede. When Sarah came in, I had returned to normal. “I thought you were going to cause a scene.” I looked out the window. “I planned to. But suddenly, I couldn’t bear to do it.” “I saw how much you brought with you. Were you planning to help him get his memory back?” That suitcase held our ten years. It had the first note he ever passed me, his first confession letter, the gifts he gave me from age 18 to 28, our first photo together, and our first wedding portrait. I shook my head. “I never thought about it.” Sarah looked at me in shock. “W-Why?” Remembering the brutal murder of Carter’s parents, I closed my eyes and steadied my breathing. “The pain of losing your family… I don’t want him to endure that twice.” 4 I woke up very late the next day. By the time I got dressed and walked out with my sketchbook, it was already past lunch. Captain Miller waved at me. “Chloe, we saved some food for you.” Everyone was chatting at the wooden table in the courtyard. When Lily saw me, she practically sprinted inside and came back out holding an orange envelope, handing it to me like a precious treasure. “Chloe, we don’t have a lot of family, so this is a formal invitation to our wedding.” A formal invitation. I took the envelope, lacking the courage to pull out the card inside. Lily kept urging me, “Chloe, you’re an art major! Tell us what you think of the design!” It was a thin piece of paper, but it felt like it weighed a ton. “Here, let me see. Wow, the colors are gorgeous,” Sarah quickly chimed in. “Right?! Carter picked the orange, and I picked purple, but the orange looked way better. Chloe, what’s your favorite color?” I set down my sketchbook and pointed to my orange sweater. Before high school, I didn’t have a favorite color. But one day I wore an orange jacket, and Carter told me I looked really pretty in it. From then on, orange became my favorite color. “Chloe, your taste is so similar to my Carter’s!” My Carter. Hearing those words felt like glass shards in my ears. There was a time when Carter loved nothing more than introducing me to people as, “My Chloe.” Seeing my expression falter, Sarah immediately took the invitation from me. “The cartoon inside looks just like you, Lily. Very cute. But wait… is this a sunset? The wedding is at sunset?” Lily rubbed her cheeks. “Carter insisted on it! Because he said…” “Because someone can’t wake up.” Lily stared at me, dumbfounded. “Chloe! How did you know?! That’s exactly what Carter said! But more importantly, Carter really loves sunsets.” Carter once told me that his favorite time of day was dusk, because at dusk, Sleeping Beauty finally woke up and became his girlfriend. I was a notoriously heavy sleeper. Waking up at 5:30 AM for high school was pure torture. For those three years, every single morning, I would sit on the back of Carter’s bicycle, wrapping my arms around his waist and going back to sleep with my eyes closed. I could cram three full dreams into a ten-minute recess, and every time I woke up, his varsity jacket would be draped over me. I remember one time, half-asleep, hearing someone sigh beside my ear. “Man, you sleep so much. What am I going to do with you on our wedding day?” Fast forward to my twenty-fourth birthday. I was woken up in the morning by the scratch of his stubble. I pushed him away to keep sleeping. He pulled me into his arms, gently patting my back, his voice thick with sleep. “Chloe, let’s have our wedding at sunset.” I mumbled in agreement. He kissed my forehead, letting out a satisfied sigh. “I have to make sure my little sleepyhead gets enough rest. If you get cranky and refuse to marry me, who am I going to complain to?” But now, it wasn’t that I refused to marry him. It was that he wasn’t marrying me. I truly had no one to complain to. I stood up and grabbed my sketchbook. At that exact moment, Lily noticed the ring on my left ring finger. Seeing her gaze, I wiggled my fingers. “Because he used to say the same thing.” “Are you married, Chloe?” “Yeah. I’ve been married for five years.” Lily looked surprised. “Where’s your husband? Did he not come with you?” I looked at the man walking toward us from a distance, and slowly shook my head.

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I spent ten years building Vincent’s career. From his debut to his sudden rise to fame, all the way to his award-winning moments, I was the one standing behind him, blocking every hit. Then, his first love drove drunk and killed someone. Vincent told me to take the fall. He said, “Sienna’s career is just taking off. You’ve already retired from the industry.” I went to prison for seven years. The day I was released, they publicly announced their marriage. When a reporter asked him about me, he simply replied, “There’s no need to bring up people from the past.” The day I jumped off a building, they were live-streaming their wedding. When I opened my eyes again, it was the night of the accident. Vincent was shoving his car keys into my hand. “Just tell them you were the one driving.” I tapped the screen on my phone and went live. “Did everyone hear that?” 01 The fluorescent lights in the underground parking garage flickered unsteadily. A white Bentley was smashed against a concrete pillar, its front end crumpled entirely inward. There was blood on the ground. A lot of it. It was pooling out from underneath the car, crawling across the gray concrete until it reached the tip of my shoe. Sienna was hiding behind Vincent. Her hair was a mess. The hem of her white dress was stained with dirt, and a glaring red friction burn covered her right wrist. It was a burn from the airbag deploying. In my previous life, I only found that out much later. By then, it was too late. The police file read: Driver Diana, driving under the influence, struck and killed designated driver Frank Chen. I pled guilty. Vincent hired the absolute best defense attorney for me. The best attorney told me that a cooperative attitude and a massive payout would reduce my sentence. Sitting in the detention center, I had asked him, “What about the victim’s family?” The attorney didn’t even look up from his files. “Mr. Cross will handle it.” Mr. Cross handled it beautifully. The victim’s mother took the money. The victim’s teenage sister was shipped off to study abroad. I sat in a cell for seven years. The day I walked out, no one came to pick me up. The massive LED screen at the airport was broadcasting Vincent and Sienna’s official couple interview. Sienna was leaning against his shoulder, smiling so sweetly. A reporter asked, “Vincent, someone online recently mentioned Diana. They said she sacrificed a lot for you back in the day.” Vincent squeezed Sienna’s hand. “There’s no need to bring up people from the past.” He said it so flatly. As if my seven years in hell were nothing more than an outdated movie poster. The garage light flickered again. Vincent shoved his car keys into my palm. The metal was freezing. His voice was lowered to a frantic whisper. “Diana, listen to me.” “The accident already happened. The most important thing right now is damage control. We have to minimize the fallout.” I stared at him. He was wearing a black tailored suit. A drop of blood stained his cuff. It wasn’t his blood. It was Sienna’s. Or maybe the dead man’s. He didn’t look at the body on the ground. He only looked at me. “Just tell them you were the one driving.” I asked, “Why?” Vincent froze. As if the question itself was completely absurd. In my previous life, I hadn’t asked. Whatever he said, I just blindly accepted. He had said, Diana, do me this one favor. So I did. He had said, You’ve been out of the spotlight for years. The public won’t even remember you. So I nodded. He had said, Sienna can’t take this hit. She’s just starting out. So I lowered my head and signed a false confession. But this time, I asked. Vincent’s brow pulled into a deep knot. “Sienna cannot be ruined.” Sienna sobbed, grabbing his sleeve tightly. “Vincent, I swear I didn’t mean to.” “I thought it was completely empty over there.” “I was just so scared.” Vincent turned to her, his voice immediately softening. “It’s going to be okay.” Then he turned back to me. “Diana, you’ve been retired for years. The internet doesn’t even remember your name.” “Take the blame. I’ll get you the best legal team.” “I’ll pay all the civil damages.” “I won’t let you suffer too much.” I looked down at the keys in my hand. My phone’s live-stream interface was already running. The phone was hidden in my palm, the camera lens just barely peeking out from the cuff of my sleeve. The viewer count was still low. Thirty-seven. Forty-two. Sixty-eight. Vincent kept talking. “Sienna’s career is just taking off.” “She just signed on for a massive new movie, and she has streaming deals and endorsements lined up.” “You’re different.” “You’re already retired.” The viewer count spiked to three hundred. Comments started rolling in. [Diana? Wait, is this THE Diana?] [Why is she going live? What is this?] [Where is she? A parking garage?] I raised the phone slightly. The lens pointed straight at Vincent. “Say that again.” Vincent’s face changed slightly. “What?” I said, “What exactly do you want me to tell them?” His eyes darted down to my phone. His pupils violently contracted. “Diana!” The live chat exploded. [Holy shit, is that Vincent Cross?] [What did he just say?! He’s asking Diana to take the fall for a crash?!] [Is Sienna there too?!] [Is that blood on the ground?!] Vincent lunged forward to grab my phone. I stepped back, the heel of my shoe dragging through the blood on the floor. “Don’t move.” I pivoted the camera toward the wrecked Bentley. The driver’s side door was wide open. The deployed airbag had distinct streaks of blood on it. The passenger seat was completely clean. I tilted the camera down, panning over the shattered glass of liquor bottles on the ground. Then I panned to Vincent’s assistant, who was clutching a black hard drive. The assistant went pale, instinctively trying to hide the drive behind his back. I asked, “What’s that in your hand?” He didn’t answer. The viewer count hit twenty thousand. Vincent lunged at me again. “Turn that off!” I dodged his hand. “Vincent, there is a man dying on the floor.” His face was terrifyingly grim. “I already called an ambulance.” “Did you call the police?” He stayed silent. I looked at Sienna. “Did you call the police?” Sienna shook her head, sobbing hysterically. “Diana, I didn’t mean to!” “I really didn’t mean to do it!” I said, “I asked if you called the cops.” She cowered behind Vincent. “I was too scared.” The chat was moving too fast to read. [They didn’t call the cops?!] [You hit someone and your first move is PR damage control?!] [Is that the security footage hard drive in the assistant’s hand?!] [Someone call 911! Call the cops right now!] I pulled out my second phone, dialed 911, and put it on speaker. “There’s been a drunk driving accident with a casualty in the underground garage of the Star Bay Villas.” Vincent’s face turned ash gray. “Diana, think very carefully about what you’re doing.” The dispatcher’s voice came through. “Are there any injuries at the scene?” I said, “Yes. A man is lying in front of the car. He’s bleeding heavily.” Sienna let out a piercing scream. “Don’t say drunk driving!” I turned the camera directly onto her face. “You drank, didn’t you?” She slapped her hands over her mouth. Vincent grabbed my wrist, his grip like a vice. “Diana, that is enough.” I stared right back at him. “It’s not.” His voice dropped to a lethal whisper. “Don’t push me.” I raised the phone higher. “Did everyone hear that?” 02 The live stream cut off the exact second Vincent ripped the phone from my hand. Right before the screen went black, the final frame caught the assistant bolting toward the fire exit stairs, clutching the security hard drive to his chest. My phone slammed onto the concrete, the screen spiderwebbing with cracks. Vincent shoved me hard against the side of a parked car. His fingers dug into my wrist so hard I thought the bone would snap. “Are you insane?” I looked at him calmly. “I called the cops.” His chest was heaving. “Do you have any idea what you just broadcasted to the entire internet?” “Yes.” “You’re going to destroy Sienna!” I said, “The man on the ground is already destroyed.” He froze. Sienna’s sobs grew louder, more frantic. “Vincent, I swear I didn’t mean to!” “You said you were going to fix this!” “You promised me you wouldn’t let anything happen to me!” Vincent closed his eyes tightly. He let go of my wrist, turning to his manager. “Call the PR department. Draft a statement right now.” The manager looked sick. “It’s already the number one trending topic.” “Screen recordings of the live stream are everywhere.” “Diana’s old fan accounts and every major gossip blogger have already reposted it.” Vincent turned back to me. “Are you happy now?” I rubbed my bruised wrist. “Not yet.” The wail of sirens echoed from the distance. Sienna’s legs gave out, and she nearly collapsed. Vincent caught her by the waist. “Don’t panic.” I watched him. “Are you holding her up, or are you trying to hold up the crime scene?” He ground his teeth. “Diana.” I said, “You’d better remember every single word you said tonight.” He stared at me, his eyes dark. “What exactly do you want?” “I want to see both of you sitting in an interrogation room.” The police cruisers and the ambulance arrived almost simultaneously. Paramedics rushed toward the man on the ground. Police officers immediately set up crime scene tape. A young officer walked over. “Who made the 911 call?” I raised my hand. “I did.” He asked, “Who was driving the vehicle?” Sienna trembled violently, crying uncontrollably. Vincent spoke up smoothly. “Officer, we haven’t determined that yet.” I shot him a sideways glance. “You seemed pretty certain five minutes ago.” The officer frowned. “What do you mean?” I said, “He was trying to force me to take the blame.” Vincent’s voice was sharp. “Diana, watch your words.” I handed my cracked phone to the officer. “The screen recordings are all over the internet. The raw file is saved on this phone.” “He literally shoved his car keys into my hand a few minutes ago.” The officer took the phone. Vincent’s manager immediately stepped in, his hands raised defensively. “Officer, there seems to be a huge misunderstanding here. Our legal team is on the way.” The officer looked at him coldly. “There’s a man dying on the floor. You’re all coming to the station for questioning.” Sienna suddenly wailed. “I didn’t mean to!” Everyone turned to look at her. Vincent’s face drained of color. “Sienna.” She sobbed, her words spilling out in a panicked rush. “I only had a little bit to drink!” “I really thought I was fine to drive!” “He just came out of nowhere!” The officer immediately asked, “Are you admitting you were the driver?” Sienna’s crying choked off instantly. Vincent interjected, his voice low and firm. “She is in a state of extreme emotional shock. Nothing she says right now can be taken as a reliable statement.” I said, “The live stream caught everything.” Vincent snapped his head toward me. I pulled out my backup phone. “I switched devices.” His eyes darkened instantly. “You came very prepared tonight, Diana.” I stared at him with absolute zero emotion. “I died once. I learned my lesson.” He frowned. “What are you talking about?” I didn’t answer. The police escorted all of us out. Right before I got into the cruiser, Vincent stood next to me. The cold night air hit us. His voice was barely a whisper. “Diana, it’s not too late to turn this around.” I looked at him. “Turn what around?” “You can say the live stream was just an emotional breakdown.” “I’ll have my PR team coordinate a joint statement with you.” “We’ll just say you’ve been dealing with severe mental health issues.” I let out a soft laugh. His face turned instantly cold. “What’s so funny?” “It sounds familiar.” In my previous life, this was exactly what he did. First, he convinced me to plead guilty. Then, he released a statement claiming I had suffered a mental breakdown. He had held my hands and said, Diana, just wait for the storm to pass. I’ll get you out. Then I sat in a cell for seven years. He never came. Before stepping into the police car, I looked back at him. “Vincent.” He looked at me. I said, “There’s no need to bring up people from the past.” His face completely fell. 03 By that night, the internet was completely broken. #DianaLiveStreamsCrash# #VincentCrossForcesDianaToTakeTheFall# #SiennaDUI# #StarBayVillasGarage# #SecurityHardDrive# I sat in the precinct giving my statement. The detective asked, “Why did you turn on your live stream before walking up to them?” I said, “I managed Vincent’s PR crises for years.” “I knew exactly what their first move would be.” The detective looked up from his notepad. “Their first move?” I said, “His crisis management playbook.” “Hide the liquor bottles, wipe the security footage, call the spin doctors, and find a scapegoat.” The stenographer’s fingers paused for a fraction of a second over the keyboard. “How do you know the exact protocol in such detail?” I stared at the metal table. “Because I used to be the one executing it.” Outside the interrogation room, Frank arrived. He was wearing a black trench coat, carrying a thick laptop bag. He looked at me through the glass window. I gave him a single nod. Frank used to be my agent. The year I quit acting, we had a massive, explosive argument. Diana, you are an actress, not Vincent’s glorified babysitter! he had yelled. I had replied, His career is just taking off. He needs me right now. Frank had slammed the door and walked out of my life. In my previous life, after I went to prison, he tried to appeal my case. But I had already confessed, and the evidence had been scrubbed clean. When he finally came to visit me, sitting behind the thick plexiglass, his eyes were bloodshot. Who the hell are you taking the fall for, Diana? Back then, I just lowered my head. Don’t ask. This time, he got here fast. When the questioning ended, a police officer escorted me out into the hallway. Frank immediately tossed his jacket over my shoulders. “Where’s your phone?” “The police confiscated the primary device.” “What about the live stream backend?” “The account is still active.” “Give me your backup phone.” I handed it over. He opened his laptop, typing rapidly. “I screen-recorded the raw stream.” “The gossip accounts ripped it too.” “I cut three separate clips of the assistant running off with the hard drive.” I asked, “What about the victim?” Frank’s expression darkened. “He didn’t make it.” I closed my eyes tightly. From the other end of the hallway, Sienna’s sobbing echoed off the walls. “I swear I didn’t do it on purpose!” “I had no idea he was standing there!” “Vincent, you have to help me!” Vincent’s voice hissed, harsh and low. “Shut up.” Sienna cried even louder. “Are you yelling at me?!” “Didn’t you promise you were going to fix this?!” “You said Diana was going to help you!” Frank looked at me. “Did you hear that?” I said, “I heard it.” He pulled a digital voice recorder out of his pocket. “And so did this.” Vincent was quickly escorted out of an interrogation room by a slick-looking lawyer. When he saw me standing next to Frank, his face turned rigid. “Frank, you really do just smell blood in the water, don’t you?” Frank didn’t miss a beat. “Well, you reek of garbage.” Vincent ignored him and focused entirely on me. “Diana, we need to talk.” I said, “Talk here.” He glanced nervously at the police officers walking down the hall. “In private.” Frank stepped in front of me, completely blocking Vincent’s view. “She is not speaking privately with a criminal suspect.” Vincent scoffed, a dark sneer on his face. “And who the hell are you supposed to be?” I said, “He’s my legal representative.” Frank froze for a second, then turned his head to look at me in surprise. I stared dead at Vincent. “From now on, anything you have to say goes through him.” Vincent’s eyes turned instantly glacial. “You’re not even going to answer my calls?” “No.” “Ten years together, and you’re just going to burn it all down?” I let out a bitter laugh. “What exactly did those ten years give me?” He opened his mouth. I cut him off. “Don’t mention the awards.” “I was the one who earned them for you.” Vincent’s expression twisted into something ugly. He leaned in, dropping his voice. “If you blow this up into a media circus, no one wins.” I said, “The victim’s family wins.” His Adam’s apple bobbed. “I’ll pay the civil damages.” “Are you going to do the jail time?” “Diana.” “Are you going to sit in a cell for Sienna?” He glared at me. “I wasn’t the one driving.” I nodded. “Neither was I.”

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1 After my death, Rachel, the serial killer who had terrorized the entire country, was finally captured. But she was cunning beyond belief. Every year, she would confess to a new, unsolved murder just to delay her execution. Because each confession turned out to be chillingly true, her case was constantly re-examined, driving the public’s fury to an absolute boiling point. Until the eighth year. Just when everyone believed Rachel had finally run out of secrets, she dropped another bombshell. “For years, you have all been begging me to reveal where Lucas is. Well, I can tell you now: he is dead. I killed him.” “Absurd!” My sister, the lead prosecutor on the case, immediately fired back. “Lucas was jealous of his adopted brother. He hired you to kill him, and when the hit failed and you were caught, he fled the country with millions in family assets. He is still a fugitive. How could he possibly be dead?” Rachel looked up, her single good eye glinting as she let out a mocking laugh. “Someone did hire me back then, but it wasn’t him. And the target? It was him.” “Don’t believe me? The criminal profiler who helped catch me, wasn’t she his fiancée? Bring her here. Let’s see if she can drag the truth out of me so you can finally close this file.” … A collective gasp echoed through the courtroom, every eye locking onto my sister, Abigail. I was hovering just behind the prosecution bench, barely half a foot away from her. I could feel the sudden, suffocating catch in her throat. When my breath left me eight years ago, my consciousness did not fade. Instead, a strange, invisible force anchored me to the people I had once loved most. I had watched Evelyn write countless psychological analyses of me on her whiteboard after I vanished, ultimately concluding that I had a strong motive and the capability to commit the crime. I had watched Abigail build the prosecution’s case, declaring that my jealousy of Thomas had driven me to pay an assassin to put an end to him. Our parents could not survive the devastating blow. They collapsed, hospitalized with strokes, and never woke up again. After their joint funeral, Abigail wiped my name from the family records, erasing my existence like a stain. From that day on, Thomas became the only son, the only brother left in the family. Two years later, carrying the legacy and wealth that should have been mine, he married Evelyn in a lavish wedding. Every single milestone of their lives tore through my spectral soul. In the courtroom, Abigail’s hand trembled, her pen pausing over the legal pad. She stared at Rachel for a long, quiet moment. “The evidence in this case is ironclad, and over seven appeals, the courts have consistently ruled that Lucas fled the country after orchestrating a murder-for-hire plot.” “Your fabrications are nothing but a desperate attempt to delay your execution. The prosecution requests a recess.” The judge slammed the gavel. Abigail packed her files and walked out without looking back. I followed her out of the courthouse, drifting all the way to the cemetery. Standing before our parents’ headstone were Evelyn and Thomas, their fingers tightly intertwined. Hearing footsteps, Evelyn turned around, her voice raspy. “Did she talk? Did she say where Lucas is hiding?” Abigail shook her head, her face grim. “She claims… Lucas died eight years ago. She says she killed him.” “That’s impossible! It’s ridiculous!” Thomas interrupted, his voice cracking with defensive anger. “If Lucas is dead, who hired her to kill me? Who emptied our family’s bank accounts?” “If he hadn’t committed those atrocities, Mom and Dad wouldn’t have suffered those fatal strokes. They died within a month because of him!” “They loved him so much, yet he didn’t even show up to their funerals. He took the money and hid like a coward. Eight years, and not a single word!” He grew increasingly hysterical, clutching his chest as if the grief were too much to bear. Evelyn wrapped her arms around him, soothing him with gentle whispers. “Don’t cry, Thomas. Abigail and I would never believe her lies. Lucas committed those crimes. Even if he and Rachel collaborated on this story, the truth cannot be rewritten.” I floated right in front of her, watching the utter hatred burning in the eyes of the woman who had once promised to love me forever. My soul felt drenched in ice. During our happiest years, Evelyn had held my hand, swearing she would always stand by me. Yet she was the one who drew up the criminal profile that branded me a monster. I wanted to scream that I was innocent, but no sound came. Abigail looked down at the gravestone, her expression conflicted. “I also believe Rachel is lying. She uses these confessions to buy time. But this time, she specifically asked to see the profiler who drafted Lucas’s profile. She wants you to judge if she’s telling the truth.” Evelyn’s eyes flickered, but she remained silent. Thomas reached out, gently supporting her slightly protruding pregnant belly. “Evelyn, don’t go. Your third trimester has been so difficult, and you haven’t been sleeping. Let me look after you. Don’t waste your energy on a lunatic.” Evelyn looked at him, torn, but ultimately shook her head. “No, I have to see her. For eight years, we’ve lived in this shadow. Whether Lucas is alive or dead, I need to know where he is.” That evening, in the high-security visitation room. The moment she saw Evelyn, Rachel’s lips curled into a sickening grin. “Well, if it isn’t the brilliant profiler. I’ve heard so much about you.” Evelyn sat down, her gaze icy. “Lies won’t save you. Tell me where Lucas is.” Rachel leaned back, chuckling. “What’s the rush? We have plenty of time. That profile you wrote for Lucas… it was a masterpiece. Even I believed he was the killer when I read it.” She paused, her tone turning mocking. “But it’s a pity. A top-tier profiler like you couldn’t even see through the man you claimed to love. The monster you described cried like a baby before he died. He lost all his dignity, kneeling in the dirt, begging me to spare his life.” Rachel seemed to lose herself in the memory, mimicking my terror with dramatic gestures. “Please don’t kill me! I have a family who loves me, and a fiancée I’m supposed to marry! She’s three months pregnant with our baby! Please, I’ll give you everything, just let me live!” Hearing her mimic my dying pleas in that high-pitched, mocking voice, my spectral form convulsed with agonizing pain. The memories of that dark basement and the smell of my own blood rushed back. I screamed in silence, hiding my face. Evelyn flinched, suddenly looking toward the empty space where my spirit hovered, as if she had felt a sudden chill. The next second, she slammed her hand onto the table. “Enough! Shut up!” “Why should I?” Rachel laughed harder. “Don’t you want to know how he died? I stabbed him forty-three times, carefully avoiding his vital organs. I wanted him to bleed out slowly, to feel his life draining away.” “The boy who loved you so much crawled on the floor, clutching his stomach, begging for a savior who never came. In the end, he just stared at the ceiling, weeping until his eyes ran dry of blood, and then he stopped breathing…” “I told you to shut up!” Evelyn roared, her voice cracking. “You can’t manipulate me with these sick fantasies! Lucas is alive. And as for my pregnancy back then, it was a false alarm. You can’t shake my resolve!” Rachel’s eyes turned mocking. “Are you trying to convince me, or are you just trying to quiet the guilt in your own heart?” She dragged a piece of paper and a pen toward herself, scribbling rapidly. Then, she slid the paper across the table and closed her eyes. “I’ve said my piece. Let’s see if the brilliant profiler can crack this puzzle.” Evelyn looked at the paper. It was covered in strange, twisted lines that resembled neither letters nor symbols. Before she could demand an explanation, the guards entered and led Rachel away. Evelyn sat frozen, staring at the paper until Abigail and Thomas walked into the room. “Evelyn, are you okay? What did she say?” Thomas hurried to her side, looking at the paper. “What is this? It’s just scribbles. We shouldn’t let a lunatic waste our time and ruin the department’s credibility!” Before anyone could stop him, he snatched the paper and tore it into shreds. The officers in the room gasped. “Thomas! That was potential evidence! We could have analyzed or reconstructed it!” Thomas ignored them, turning to Abigail with tears in his eyes. “Abigail, please don’t dig into this. Rachel is a psychopath. If she keeps spouting these lies, it’s only going to hurt us, the real victims!” “Eight years ago, to save me, you took three stab wounds from Rachel. You were in the hospital for three months, and the doctors said you almost didn’t make it. I don’t want you to suffer anymore. Lucas already destroyed our family once. Are we going to let him do it again through her?” Looking at his tearful, protective face, Abigail’s resolve crumbled. “Thomas is right.” “Rachel is just playing games to stall her execution. Maintain the original verdict. No further investigations will be opened. Anyone who pries into this privately will face disciplinary action.” The officers nodded and filed out. My heart sank into an abyss of cold despair. My own sister had just closed the door on the truth. But then, Evelyn spoke up. “I have some paperwork to finish at the office. Abigail, please take Thomas home first.” As she spoke, she adjusted her glasses, a tiny habit she only did when she was hiding something. Only I noticed. I followed her back to her private office. She locked the door, rushed to the bottom drawer of her filing cabinet, and pulled out the old dusty file on my case. She grabbed a fresh sheet of paper, closed her eyes, and with a few precise strokes, recreated Rachel’s sketch perfectly from memory. Her spatial memory was flawless. She compared the sketch with the old street maps of the city. Just as she was on the verge of making a breakthrough, her phone rang. It was Abigail. “Evelyn, Thomas is in terrible shape. The stress of today’s events has triggered his panic attacks, and it’s putting your pregnancy at risk. He is hyperventilating and losing consciousness. I’m driving him to the hospital right now. Get here quickly!” Evelyn rushed out, leaving the files scattered on her desk. I followed her to the hospital. In the private room, Thomas looked pale and fragile. The moment he saw Evelyn, he threw his arms around her. “Evelyn, you’re finally here!” “I dreamed of Rachel… she was chasing me with a knife! I ran, but there was nowhere to hide. I’m so scared. For eight years, I haven’t had a single peaceful night. As long as she’s alive, the nightmare will never end! I feel like I’m losing my mind!” Evelyn held him, whispering comforts, but he kept sobbing. Abigail stood by the window, her expression grim. “The doctor says your pregnancy is highly unstable due to the sheer stress Thomas’s episodes are causing you. If this keeps up, you and the baby will both be in danger.” She gritted her teeth. “Lucas, you are truly heartless. Even after eight years, you won’t let Thomas go. You’re using Rachel to destroy him!” She stormed out of the room. “Where are you going?” Evelyn called out. “To the courthouse. I will demand the immediate authorization of Rachel’s death penalty. She won’t have another day to terrorize this family!” Thomas gradually calmed down. But then, Evelyn’s phone rang. It was her colleague. “Evelyn, your office just caught fire! We put it out quickly, but many files were destroyed. You should come check.” The files of my case were ancient and unique; there were no digital backups. Before Evelyn could leave, Thomas clutched her sleeve, begging her to stay. And once again, she prioritized him. I watched her sit by his bed until he fell asleep. My ghostly heart, which I thought could no longer feel, broke all over again. By the time she left the hospital, it was dawn. Abigail called her. “Under my pressure, Rachel’s execution has been fast-tracked. It will take place at ten this morning.” Evelyn was stunned. “So soon?” “For Thomas’s sake, she cannot live another day.” Evelyn was silent, then hung up. But right before she did, Abigail added: “Evelyn, I dreamed of Lucas last night. He was just a small, timid boy, the way he was when we first brought him home from the orphanage. He would save a piece of candy in his pocket for weeks, but for my birthday, he spent all his savings to buy me those high-heeled shoes I had only mentioned once. I keep wondering… how did such a sweet boy become a monster?” She hung up. Evelyn stood frozen at the green light until the cars behind her honked. When she reached her office, the desk where my files had been was reduced to ashes. She collapsed to her knees. “Am I too late?” Then, she remembered the pattern. She dipped her finger in the soot and drew it on the floor. She pulled out her phone and opened the old geographical maps of the city from eight years ago, overlaying the twisted lines onto the old grid. The intersection matched a massive, abandoned construction site that had been derelict for a decade. She drove there immediately. The concrete structure was decaying, steel rods rusting in the open air. Evelyn searched the dark basement with a flashlight, room by room, until she found a hidden chamber. Inside was a dusty crate. She opened it to find rows of videotapes, each labeled with a date. She recognized the dates; they were the active dates of Rachel’s victims. Her hands shook as she found the tape with my disappearance date. She started the old generator, popped the tape into the dusty player, and the screen flickered to life. Before the image even cleared, a desperate, sobbing voice echoed through the concrete room. “Please, please don’t kill me. I have people I love… I haven’t even said goodbye to her… I don’t want to die here…” It was my voice. Evelyn’s face turned white as a sheet.

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On Noelle Miller’s wedding day, my husband jumped from the 18th floor. Unlocking his studio, I found it filled with portraits of Noelle. The brushstrokes were frantic and chaotic, yet practically bleeding with his fierce, unyielding love for her. His best friend told me, “Ethan loved Noelle for ten years. She was the only light in his life.” When I opened my eyes again, I was back in high school. I watched Ethan being cornered by the school bad boy in an empty classroom, and silently shut the door on them. Later, he knocked on my window in the pouring rain, his voice hoarse and desperate. “Belle, do you not want me anymore…?” 1 Astrophysics professor Ethan Wright recently discovered a new asteroid, but during his press interview, it was his stunning, aloof looks that made him trend online. The public’s focus quickly shifted from the asteroid to his devastatingly handsome face. When people found out that the asteroid was named after the love of his life, the internet practically exploded. While praising this fairy-tale romance, netizens began furiously digging to find out who “E.l.l.e.” was. Holding my phone, I was grinning from ear to ear, unable to wipe the smile off my face. At the end of the video, the reporter asked with a smile, “Professor Wright, do you have anything you’d like to say to your true love, E.l.l.e.?” Ethan froze. His pitch-black eyes trembled slightly. “Happy wedding day.” His tone was calm, but threaded with an imperceptible, soul-crushing despair. I instantly stiffened. Happy wedding day? “Oooooh!” My best friend, Harper, nudged me playfully. “Belle, your Professor Wright looks so cold, but who knew he was such a romantic? Treating your anniversary like it’s your wedding day all over again!” Is that what it was? Looking at Ethan’s deeply affectionate eyes on the screen, my cheeks flushed hot. I had been by Ethan’s side for ten years. I stayed with him, transforming him from a suicidal, gloomy teenager into the refined, elegant professor he was today. Ten years ago, he transferred to our school and became my desk mate. He was a boy with pale skin and picturesque features, but the way he looked at me was always filled with impatience. And now, he had named an asteroid after me. When he spoke of his true love, his usually stern brow softened with devotion and tenderness. Today was our first wedding anniversary. I rested a hand on my flat stomach, curled up on the sofa. I was waiting for him to come home so I could be the first to tell him the news: I was pregnant. However… What I waited for instead was the news of Ethan’s death. He had jumped from the 18th floor. In his hand, he tightly clutched a crumpled note. Death is nothing but returning to the cosmos. Billions of years from now, we will reunite in the sea of stars. 2 Accompanied by Harper, I arranged Ethan’s funeral. He had left a will, stating that all his assets were to be donated to charity upon his death. For some reason, I was remarkably calm these past few days. Seeing Harper with swollen eyes, grinding her teeth at Ethan’s memorial portrait but forcing herself to comfort me, I actually felt the urge to laugh. After the funeral, I received a call from his lawyer. “Mrs. Wright, Mr. Wright owns a suburban villa that isn’t included in the donation clause… Whenever you have time, you can go sort through it.” The villa was on the south side of the city. I pushed open the front doors and was so stunned by what I saw that I couldn’t speak. The entire living room was filled with portraits. The brushstrokes were frantic and extreme, as rough as a beginner’s casual sketches. But the person in the paintings looked incredibly lifelike because of the intense, surging love poured into every line. It was Noelle Miller, the most popular girl from our high school. In ten years, I had never once heard her name leave Ethan’s lips. I had no idea he hid his feelings for her so deeply. I stumbled forward a few steps, leaning heavily against a desk to keep myself from collapsing. On the desk, several resin blocks were neatly arranged. Inside each block, an item was perfectly preserved: a Jolly Rancher, a dried flower, an acrylic nail with a rhinestone. The resin was smooth and polished, clearly having been held and caressed countless times. The trash Noelle had casually tossed away, he treated as priceless treasures. Meanwhile, the wedding ring I had personally picked out for him was lying neglected in a dried-up paint palette nearby. My heart spasmed with pain. Tears spilled from my eyes without my permission. After sitting down, I masochistically opened the notebook resting on the desk. It documented Ethan’s ten-year-long secret obsession. On his first day as a transfer student, he received a Jolly Rancher and a friendly smile from the beautiful girl sitting in front of him. It was as if a ray of sunlight had pierced through his pitch-black soul. For a gloomy teenager who suffered from domestic abuse and severe bullying, it was the first taste of pure, unadulterated kindness he had ever received. From that moment on, he was a goner. He wanted to lock her up. He wanted to possess her. He wanted her to smile only for him. But he couldn’t bear to drag someone so radiant into his darkness. E.l.l.e. isn’t for Isabelle. It’s for Noelle. It was his wedding gift to her. Flipping from the first page to the last, I was only mentioned in a handful of brief, dismissive entries. [My new desk mate is too nosy. So annoying.] […] [We got married. I regret it a little, but I have to take responsibility for her.] The breakfasts I brought him because I was worried about his low blood sugar, the bullies I chased away for him, the time I grabbed his hand and dragged him out of the fire his psychotic father started, the years of my companionship and comfort… He didn’t write a single word about any of it. The only thing he couldn’t forget was Noelle’s bright, dazzling smile from years ago. Every word he wrote felt like a knife carving into my heart. I clenched my fists, taking deep, shuddering breaths. The air still smelled faintly of his crisp pine cologne. It made me want to throw up. Some people are just pathetic. They don’t deserve salvation, and they don’t deserve to be loved. I pressed my palm against my stomach. He didn’t deserve to have me bear his child. Just as I was about to stand up, a noise came from the entryway. Two figures pushed the door open and walked in. 3 It was Caleb, Ethan’s childhood friend, and Noelle. Caleb’s eyes were bloodshot, his voice hoarse. “Ethan left this villa for you. You were the only light he ever had. When his depression got so bad he almost couldn’t hold on, looking at your pictures was the only thing that kept him going.” Noelle stood there looking lost, a layer of mist forming over her eyes. “After he got his early acceptance to MIT, he didn’t even need to go to class anymore. He only showed up every day just to get one more look at you…” It was then that Caleb noticed me standing behind the bookshelf. He froze. Then, he frowned in pure disgust. “What the hell are you doing here?” He strode over and shoved me hard. “Get out! Don’t pollute the only sanctuary Ethan had left! If you hadn’t clung to him like a leech, he wouldn’t have ended up like this!” I stumbled from the force of his shove, a dull ache throbbing in my abdomen. I steadied myself and slapped him hard across the face. “What does this have to do with me?! I never forced him to date me, and I never forced him to marry me! He missed out on Noelle because he was too much of a pathetic coward to do anything about it!” Noelle’s tearful, nasally voice suddenly cut in. “Did he… did he really never get my love letter?” Both Caleb and I froze. “What did you say?” “Before graduation, I left a love letter on his desk, but he never responded…” She let out a bitter laugh, and when she looked up, her eyes were tainted with resentment. “It was you, wasn’t it?” She glared daggers at me. “You were jealous of me, so you threw my letter away? You’re the reason we missed out on each other for a whole decade… and now he’s dead…” I had absolutely no idea what she was talking about. But Caleb believed her instantly. “You toxic bitch!” Grinding his teeth, he lunged at me. My stomach slammed violently against the sharp corner of the table. Agonizing pain ripped through me. Blood slowly seeped through my clothes. My vision went black, and I collapsed to the floor. 4 When I opened my eyes again, I was wearing my old high school uniform, clutching a textbook, standing right in front of the storage room. Inside, a teenage Ethan was leaning against the wall, his messy black hair falling over his forehead, looking at me with a hint of confusion. Asher Stone, the school rebel, sat lazily across from him, looking completely relaxed. Seeing me, Asher raised an eyebrow, a careless smirk playing on his lips. “Well, well. The valedictorian. Worried about him? I’m just having a… heart-to-heart with him.” The solid weight of the book in my hands told me this wasn’t a dream. My hands and feet turned instantly cold as a wave of intense hatred washed over me. The book hit the floor with a thud. Expressionless, I reached out, pulled the door shut on them, and turned to walk away. Behind me, the door was shoved violently open. Ethan sprinted past me like a gust of wind, leaving only a hurried silhouette. “Why’s he running? I just wanted to ask why he didn’t sign up for the track meet…” Asher muttered, picking up my dropped book and casually handing it to me. “You’re welcome, by the way.” I got a bad feeling about this and quickened my pace to follow Ethan. By the classroom door, Ethan stood frozen, staring at Noelle, who was joking around with her desk mate inside. The setting sun cast a soft, golden halo around his silhouette. His gaze was endlessly tender, yet filled with disbelief, as if he had fallen into a beautiful dream he refused to wake up from. My heart slowly sank. His demeanor and aura weren’t those of the gloomy teenager he used to be. He looked exactly like the refined professor from ten years in the future. Ethan… had been reborn too. “What’s his problem?” Asher patted his shoulder in confusion, squeezing past him into the classroom. “Class is starting, man. Stop blocking the door.”

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