Category: English

In my third year working the VIP lounges of the city’s high-end clubs, the name Beckett Clifford meant absolutely nothing to me. I was mid-shift, the air thick with expensive cologne and the clink of ice, when a stranger’s hand began to slide up the hem of my skirt. Before I could deploy my practiced “polite deflection,” the heavy oak door of the private suite was kicked open with a violence that silenced the music. A man stormed in. He didn’t say a word before his fist connected with the guest’s face, leaving him a bloody mess on the velvet upholstery. That was Beckett. He stood there, chest heaving, his eyes a turbulent storm of rage and a jagged, inexplicable pain. “This is what you left me for?” he hissed, his voice trembling. “To do this?” I didn’t recognize the emotion in his voice, let alone his face. I did what I always did: I masked my confusion with a practiced, predatory smile. I stepped toward him, letting my body graze his in the way that usually loosened a man’s wallet. “You look new, handsome,” I purred, my voice a low honeyed drawl. “Is this your first time playing? Around here, we don’t care where the money comes from, as long as there’s enough of it.” Beckett froze. Silence stretched between us, heavy and suffocating. I took the opportunity to slide my arms around his waist, leaning in close. “You seem like you have a lot of pent-up energy. Want me to help you blow off some steam? But let’s be clear—you’re going to have to outbid the guy you just sent to the ER.” He shoved me away then, his expression curdling into pure disgust. “You really can’t live without a man’s hand on you, can you? All that ‘pure and innocent’ bullshit from before… it must have been exhausting to maintain the act.” The smile stayed plastered on my face. Inside, I felt nothing. Three years ago, an “accident” had wiped my slate clean. I woke up in a hospital with no past. Who he was, what we had been—it was all gone. … The force of his shove sent me staggering. My hip hit the edge of the mahogany table, a sharp bloom of pain radiating through my side. As a professional, I didn’t let my expression flicker. I knew exactly what I was in this world. If a client was angry, it meant I hadn’t performed my role well enough. I straightened my skirt, smoothed my hair, and turned to the back bar. I grabbed a bottle of the most expensive Louis XIII cognac on the shelf. “Don’t be like that,” I said, walking back to him with a swaying gait, my eyes wide and pleading. “That gentleman was about to tip me a thousand dollars. You chased him off, and my rent is due. Help a girl out?” I pulled a roll of crumpled bills from my clutch and, keeping my eyes locked on his, tucked them slowly into the neckline of my dress. Beckett stared at me as if he wanted to peel my skin off just to see if there was anything real underneath. “Is this a game to you?” he laughed, a harsh, jagged sound. “Faking amnesia? Norah, you’ve hit a new low in your little performance.” I didn’t understand the name he called me, but I understood the contempt. I’d seen it a thousand times. “Whatever the boss says,” I whispered. I poured a glass to the brim and held it out with both hands, letting my body go soft as I leaned into his space. “For the right price, I can be whoever you want. Want the shy college girl? Or the heartless siren? I’m very versatile.” Crash! With a violent sweep of his arm, Beckett sent the entire display of premium spirits flying. Shattered crystal and amber liquid rained down, soaking my hair and my dress. I didn’t flinch. I just stood there, dripping, watching him. “You want money?” He pulled a black Amex from his wallet and flicked it at my face. The sharp plastic edge grazed my cheekbone, a stinging heat following in its wake. “There’s a fifty-thousand-dollar limit on that,” he said, pointing to the floor covered in jagged glass and spilled booze. “Get on your knees. Lick it up. Drink every drop off the floor and finish the rest of the bottles, and the card is yours.” Fifty thousand. My heart hammered against my ribs. Just that afternoon, the hospital had sent another final notice. My brother’s specialized care, the imported neuro-nutrients… they were going to pull the plug tomorrow if I didn’t pay. Fifty thousand would buy him months. I didn’t hesitate. I couldn’t afford to let him change his mind. I let my knees drop directly onto the broken glass. The shards sliced through my stockings and into my skin instantly. It was a white-hot, sickening pain, but I didn’t make a sound. I leaned down, bracing myself on the floor like an animal. The raw alcohol hit my throat like a razor blade. I forced myself to swallow, glass pricking my palms, my stomach churning. My diet had been coffee and cigarettes for weeks; my stomach was already a wreck. This was torture. But I kept going. I reached for the card at his feet. It was my brother’s life. “Cough… cough!” A sudden, metallic heat bubbled up in my chest. I doubled over, a violent coughing fit racking my body. When I pulled my hand away from my mouth, there were flecks of bright red mixed with the cognac. I wiped my mouth with the back of my hand and gripped the black card tight. “Thank you, sir,” I said, forced a wobbly, flirtatious smile as I struggled to stand. “Need me again tomorrow? I can work on my tolerance. I can wear whatever outfit you like… just name it.” Beckett looked paralyzed. He stared at the blood on the floor, shock flickering in his eyes before it was swallowed by a fresh wave of fury. “You’re pathetic!” He kicked the table over, the sound echoing like a gunshot in the small room. “You were always a damn good actress. Before it was the ‘innocent girl-next-door’ routine, and now it’s this amnesiac martyr act. I wonder how long you can keep it up, Norah!” He slammed the door so hard the walls vibrated. The second he was gone, the mask shattered. I curled into a ball on the glass-strewn floor, clutching the card to my chest. My heart felt like a hollowed-out cavern. I didn’t know him. I didn’t want to know the “past” he kept throwing in my face. Was it good? Was it bad? It didn’t matter. Nothing could be worse than the present. If my past was beautiful, remembering it would only make this hell unbearable. I’d rather be a brainless girl in a short dress, smiling for monsters. Because as long as Evan was in that hospital bed, my dignity was a luxury I couldn’t afford. I’d give my life for him. The next day, I was fired. “You pissed off Beckett Clifford,” the floor manager said, not even looking me in the eye. “No high-end club in this city will touch you now. Get out.” I didn’t even get my last paycheck. Evan’s medication couldn’t stop. Two thousand dollars a day. Just to keep him breathing. With nowhere left to go, I went to the Underground—a windowless basement casino on the South Side. It was a place for the desperate and the predatory. I put on the “Bunny” uniform. It was little more than scraps of satin, fishnets, and six-inch heels. The air was a thick sludge of cigar smoke, cheap perfume, and the sour sweat of men losing money they didn’t have. I carried trays of chips through the crowd. Rough hands pinched my thighs; someone slapped my rear as I passed. I never flinched. I just turned back with a wink, placing their hand firmly onto a drink glass. “A touch is a hundred-dollar chip, honey. A drink is a thousand. Which one are we doing?” Usually, my wit was enough to get me through the night with a pocket full of tips. Until Beckett showed up with a group of his friends. He sat in the center VIP booth, his legs crossed, a cigar smoldering between his fingers. He watched me through the haze. The men with him—the city’s golden boys—looked at me with a sickening mix of recognition and malice. “Well, look at that,” one of them sneered, fanning out a stack of hundreds. “If it isn’t the campus sweetheart herself.” They knew me. I didn’t know them. The man looked at Beckett, saw the coldness in his eyes, and took it as a green light. He whistled to a busboy, who brought over a slop bucket used for clearing tables—filled with cigarette butts, half-eaten appetizers, and the dregs of a dozen different drinks. It smelled like rot. He tossed the stack of hundreds into the bucket. “Need the cash, right? Fish them out with your teeth, and the pile is yours.” The table erupted in laughter. A crowd began to gather, circling me like I was a circus freak. The smell made my stomach roll. But I saw the money. It was thick—at least two thousand. One day of life for Evan. I swallowed my bile and sank slowly to my knees. I leaned over the bucket, held my breath, and lowered my face toward the gray, oily liquid. My lips touched something slimy. I bit down on the edge of a bill. “Enough!” A hand clamped onto my shoulder and yanked me back. I looked up to see Beckett standing over me, his face a mask of distorted rage and something that looked almost like grief. He was always so angry at me. “Is the amnesia act that fun for you? Who are you trying to get sympathy from?” He spat the words out. “You make me sick.” He walked out again. I spat the bill into my hand and wiped the grime off it with my sleeve. Moody prick, I thought, my mind already calculating the remaining balance. A few days later, Margot arrived. She walked into the casino like she owned the air we breathed. She was Beckett’s fiancée—the socialite princess of the city. She stopped in front of me, looking at my tattered satin ears with a look of pure venom. “My engagement ring is missing,” she announced, her voice cutting through the noise. She pointed a manicured finger at me. “She’s the only one who’s been near me. Search her.” I hadn’t been within ten feet of her. But the bouncers were already moving. Rippp— The cheap fabric of my uniform was torn open, buttons flying across the floor. My skin was exposed to the cold air and the leering eyes of a hundred gamblers. Men whistled. I didn’t fight. I covered my chest as best I could and dropped to the floor. “Ma’am, I didn’t take it!” I begged. “Please, don’t let them fire me. I need this job. I really need the money…” I couldn’t be blacklisted again. I couldn’t lose this. Beckett stepped through the entrance at that exact moment. He stopped dead. He saw me on the floor, half-naked and crying, and he looked away, his jaw tightening so hard I thought it might snap. “The ring is in the car, Margot,” he said, his voice strained. He grabbed her wrist. “Why are you wasting your time with trash like this? Let’s go.” They left without a backward glance. I crawled into a bathroom stall and locked the door. The “siren” mask evaporated, and I sobbed until I couldn’t breathe. I tried to pin my uniform back together, my fingers shaking too hard to work the safety pin. Evan, I’m so tired. I don’t know if I can do this anymore. But Margot wasn’t done. She had seen the way Beckett looked at me. It wasn’t just hate; there was a flicker of something he couldn’t control. A week later, I received a mysterious invitation for a private party. Appearance fee: Three hundred thousand dollars. I didn’t even hesitate. When I arrived at the sprawling lakeside estate, I realized it was Margot’s birthday party. The room was packed with the city’s elite. Margot sat in the center of the room and tossed a black leather dog collar at my feet. “Put it on.” She smiled, a cold, sharp expression. “Tonight, you’re our pet. Act like a good dog, and the check is yours.” I did the math in my head. Three hundred thousand. That was the surgery. That was the recovery. That was everything. I picked up the collar and buckled it around my neck. A pair of diamond-encrusted stilettos stepped onto my back. The sharp heel dug into my spine through my thin dress. “Such a good girl,” Margot laughed, pressing down. All night, I was their footstool. I was kicked, tripped, and humiliated. My ribs throbbed with every breath, a cold sweat breaking out on my forehead. But I kept my eyes on that check on the mantel. Hours later, the physical abuse seemed to bore her. She crouched down, grabbed my hair, and forced my head up. “Why the act, Norah?” she hissed. “Were you this ‘innocent’ when those naked photos of you were plastered all over the internet? Did you look this pathetic then?” My mind went blank. Naked photos? When? Even in the clubs, I had never crossed that line. “And your mother,” Margot continued, her voice like a viper’s. “Like mother, like daughter. A homewrecking whore in life, and a pathetic corpse in death. Your whole family is trash.” I stared at her, uncomprehending. Mother… is she dead? My only memory was Evan. My confusion only enraged her. “Still playing dumb!” She kicked me hard in the shoulder. I was kneeling at the edge of the grand staircase. The world tilted as I lost my balance. Thump. Thump. Thump. My head cracked against the marble. Warm blood began to trickle into my eye, blurring my vision. Through the haze, I saw a pair of polished leather shoes. Beckett was here. “Beckett!” Margot cried out from the top of the stairs, her voice suddenly trembling with fake tears. “I invited her to be nice, but she tried to blackmail me! She said if I didn’t give her money, she’d tell people I pushed her! I… I felt so bad I gave her a check…” “Yeah, we saw it, Beckett,” her friends chimed in. “She’s a total grifter.” Beckett’s eyes turned to ice. I knew he wouldn’t believe me. “You’d risk your life for a paycheck?” he sneered, looking down at me with pure loathing. “Extortion now? You really are addicted to the gutter, aren’t you?” “Get out. Don’t bleed on the rug.” He didn’t ask for my side. Not a single word. I just folded the check, tucked it into my pocket, and limped out into the night. The mountain air was freezing. As I walked down the dark, winding road, a flash of a memory hit me. A tall silhouette holding me, a voice deep and tender: “Don’t worry, Norah. As long as I’m here, no one will ever hurt you.” I clutched my head, dropping to the curb in pain. Who was that? Why did it hurt so much to remember? I squeezed the check in my pocket. Don’t think. Just save Evan. “Insufficient funds.” I stared at the bank teller. Margot had given me a fake check. My ears began to ring. I ran back to the hospital, clutching the useless piece of paper. The head nurse met me at the door of the ICU, her face a mask of professional detachment. “Ms. Vance, we aren’t a charity. Your brother’s life support and the imported meds cost a fortune. You’re fifty thousand in the hole.” “If the balance isn’t cleared by 8:00 AM tomorrow, we have to move him to a general ward and discontinue the specialized treatment.” Moving him meant a death sentence. I looked through the glass at the man covered in tubes. “Evan…” I whispered, hot tears finally breaking through. “Just wait. I’ll get the money. Don’t leave me.” My phone buzzed. A text from an unknown number. [Private Yacht Mystery Game. Female participants needed. $2 million for one night. Rule: Absolute obedience. Risk: Personal safety not guaranteed.] Two million. I didn’t think twice. I dialed the number. To save my brother, my life was a small price to pay. That night, the sea air was biting. I was escorted onto a massive, three-story luxury yacht. When I stepped onto the main deck, my heart stopped. Beckett. Again. He was sitting with Margot, their bodies pressed together in an intimate, heated display of affection. “Oh, look, our star has arrived!” Margot giggled. She pointed to a transparent glass walkway suspended over the side of the yacht, dangling over the churning black waves of the Atlantic. “The game is simple,” Margot said, tossing a box of lingerie at me. “Put that on. Walk the length of the glass bridge. No holding the rails.” “The guests will be throwing ice cubes at you to keep things interesting. If you make it to the end without falling in, the two million is yours.” The yacht lurched in the swells. One slip, and the current would pull you under the hull. It was suicide. “What? Scared?” Margot mocked. “Then get lost.” I looked at the briefcase of cash on the table. I thought of the nurse’s cold words. I thought of Evan’s pale face. “I’ll change,” I said. I picked up the box. It didn’t matter. I’d lost my dignity years ago. Slam! The dressing room door was kicked open. Beckett shoved his way in and locked it behind him. The small space was immediately filled with the scent of his cigar and a suffocating, heavy tension. He grabbed my wrists and pinned them against the steel wall. “Are you really this obsessed with money?!” he roared. “You’d wear that for those men? How much lower can you go?” I looked at his face. I saw the rage, but for the first time, I saw the raw, bleeding agony underneath. It was almost funny. I didn’t smile. I didn’t flirt. I just pried his fingers off my wrists, one by one. “Mr. Clifford,” I said, my voice dead. “Keep your morality to yourself.” It was the first time I’d ever spoken to him without the mask. “My brother is in a hospital bed. If I don’t have fifty thousand by tomorrow morning, they pull the plug. He dies. Period.” My eyes burned, but I refused to cry. “A man like you—born with a silver spoon—will never understand what ‘no choice’ feels like. To save him, I’d let them throw stones at me, not just ice. I’d cut my own heart out and sell it if there was a buyer.” “You think I’m trash? Fine. You think I’m disgusting? Great.” I pushed past him and began to pull on the scraps of lace. “This is my life. Get used to it.” I walked out of the room, leaving him standing there like a statue. The deck was filled with catcalls. I stepped onto the freezing, wet glass of the walkway, barefoot. Below me, the ocean was a roaring black abyss. I was shivering so hard the glass vibrated. “Pelts!” Margot screamed, laughing. Handfuls of ice began to rain down, stinging my back, my legs, my face. I gritted my teeth, staring at the end of the bridge. Ten steps. Five steps… Evan is going to live. A large block of ice struck the back of my knee. My foot slipped on the wet glass. “Ahhh!” “NORAH!”

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The day Liam Sterling’s underground romance blew up and trended at number one on Twitter, our shipping fandom was an absolute wasteland of tears. Because the girlfriend exposed in the photos… wasn’t me. 1 When the paparazzi video of Liam’s secret relationship hit the internet, my manager Dave was practically glowing with joy. For no other reason than this being the perfect opportunity to “convert” the fandom. The ship name for Liam and me was “Starbrook,” and right now, that tag was a chaotic mess of grief. Some people were cursing Liam for being a jerk, others were crying about how they had wasted their emotional investment, vowing never to ship actors again. And then there were the people who pitied me. They declared they were unstanning Liam and would only support me from now on. A few big fan accounts were still desperately trying to hold the line, arguing that since Liam hadn’t released an official statement, things could still turn around. Some fans were even analyzing the grainy, leaked video frame by frame, desperately trying to match the mystery girl’s outfit and silhouette to me. But unfortunately, it wasn’t me. I clicked on the video and watched it. It was short, only about a dozen seconds. A girl heavily bundled up in a jacket and wearing a face mask wrapped her arms around Liam’s waist as they got into a car parked by the curb. Then, they drove straight back to the Sterling family’s private estate. I watched it over and over again, until Dave explicitly warned me: “I’ve already heard from industry insiders. Liam’s team is planning to confirm the relationship, but to protect the girl, they aren’t going to reveal her identity.” Dave couldn’t control the smirk on his face. “We’re just going to sit back and reap the benefits. You don’t have to do a single thing, and an army of fans will shower you with sympathy. Later, I’ll leak a few PR articles about how heartbroken and haggard you look. Say nothing. We’ll weaponize the angst to turn those shippers into your hardcore solo fans, plus grab a wave of general public sympathy. It’s a massive win.” He looked at me with burning ambition, fully intending to mold me into the perfect victim. I didn’t say a word. 2 Eight hours after the paparazzi video went viral, I refreshed my feed and saw Liam’s official statement. He apologized to his fans with genuine sincerity. He admitted that he was indeed in a relationship, but because his partner wasn’t in the entertainment industry, he wanted to protect her privacy and keep her identity hidden. He asked for the fans’ understanding. The top comment under his post was from a fan asking: So you never loved Riley Brooks? All that protection and sweetness, all the care and affection you showed her… was it all fake? He replied directly to that comment with a single sentence: It was just editing. Please don’t take it seriously. Liam and I had been the number-one trending ship for ages. Our fans dedicated their lives to analyzing every variety show, behind-the-scenes clip, and drama episode for “crumbs,” editing together diabetes-inducing videos to prove our love was real. They always said, “If there is only one real couple in Hollywood, it has to be Starbrook.” I completely understood why the shippers were having a meltdown. They had invested real feelings into this for so long, only to suddenly realize that the leading man in this fairytale never intended to give the rose to the leading lady. I sat under the massive chandelier of the makeup room, staring at the words It was just editing. Please don’t take it seriously, and felt a wave of dizziness wash over me. Because I had to admit the truth—the fans weren’t the only ones who got too deep into the role. I did, too. But he had a girlfriend all along. All the protection, the care, the affection he showed on set and during press tours… it was all written off as “editing.” The fans weren’t the only ones suffering from unrequited delusions. I was, too. 3 I met Liam on the set of a massive epic fantasy series. Liam had been famous since he was a teenager. He came from an incredibly powerful, wealthy family and only acted because he genuinely loved the craft. He was low-key and humble. After starring in a high school coming-of-age movie at sixteen, he skyrocketed to fame, and the media spent a decade trying—and failing—to dig up dirt on his background. He had almost zero scandals and was famous for his professionalism. I had idolized him since I was sixteen, looking up to him the way a fan looks up to a superstar. That was until I was 23, fresh out of NYU Tisch, and walked onto the same set as him. It was a big-budget fantasy show. He was the male lead, and I was, at best, the fourth female lead. I had very little screen time. I played his young apprentice mage, quietly harboring a secret crush on him, following him everywhere. My shining moment in the script was sacrificing myself to take a fatal blow meant for him. The day I finally met Liam was my first day on set. He was tall, lean, and somehow even more handsome in person than on screen. He practically glowed in the crowd. Everyone had that jittery excitement of meeting an idol. The extras and crew were whispering on the sidelines, but no one dared to approach him. The first time I spoke to him was at the cast and crew kickoff dinner. Dave dragged me over to toast the director and producers. Liam was sitting next to the director, holding a cup of tea, looking down and listening quietly to the director speak. It’s hard to describe the feeling of that moment. We were in a loud, glamorous room full of networking and chatter, yet he was as calm as the tea in his hands, wrapped in his own invisible barrier that kept the noise at bay. I was so nervous during the toast that I stuttered through my introduction. The director laughed and pointed me out to Liam. “This is your little apprentice. The one who dies for you later. You two have scenes together next week.” He looked up, gave me a soft smile, and politely nodded. “Nice to meet you.” My palms were sweating the entire time. 4 Our first time talking alone was right before our first scene together. It was a simple scene, but this was Liam Sterling—the man I had looked up to since I was sixteen. I hid in a corner with my script, pacing and muttering my few lines over and over again until I heard a laugh behind me. It was a warm, forgiving laugh. I turned around and saw Liam standing there, watching me. He was very tall, and I was sitting on an apple box, so he was looking down at me, but it didn’t feel intimidating at all. Maybe it was the effortless, deep-rooted good manners he possessed that made people feel comfortable. His tone was incredibly gentle. “Don’t be nervous. It’s a very simple scene. Just relax.” My heart pounded like a drum. It was the overwhelming thrill of seeing your longtime idol standing right in front of you. I looked at him nervously and asked, “When we’re done shooting this, could I… get your autograph?” We gradually got to know each other. He was someone who naturally kept his distance, but everything about him screamed “good upbringing.” When interacting with the cast and crew, he was politely detached but incredibly considerate, never once making life hard for the staff. Yet, no matter how aloof his natural aura was, the moment the director yelled “Action,” he instantly slipped into character—becoming the bold, charismatic mentor. No matter how viral our “Starbrook” ship became later on, the truth was, during the six months I spent on that set until I wrapped, there was no secret romance. No hidden sparks. Our ship only blew up because of an accident. 5 It happened while the fantasy series was airing, a full year after we finished shooting. The female lead of the show, Vanessa Thorne, got caught having an affair with a married studio executive. The executive’s wife found out, and suddenly, hit pieces and leaked dirt on Vanessa were everywhere. Among the widely circulated leaks was a behind-the-scenes video of Vanessa and me. It was a scene where she was supposed to push me into a freezing river. She seemed to be in a terrible mood that day, and I was shoved into the icy water over and over again. Filming a summer scene in the dead of winter is pure agony, especially when you have to repeatedly plunge into a freezing river. She curled her lips into a smile. She had the face of an innocent heroine, but her smile made my skin crawl. Without a shred of apology, she looked down at me and said, “Sorry, I’m just not feeling it yet. Let’s do another take, okay?” We belonged to the same talent agency, but she was the reigning queen of the company. I couldn’t afford to cross her. I stayed silent, shivering uncontrollably as I dragged myself out of the freezing water. Just as we were setting up for the next take, Liam happened to walk by. He had incredible self-control. He was the kind of person who could get angry without ever raising his voice. He looked at my face, which was bruised and blue from the cold, and then turned to Vanessa with a polite, icy detachment. “How about you get in the water yourself to ‘find the feeling’? It might actually help improve your acting.” Vanessa’s face flushed crimson from humiliation, but she didn’t dare offend Liam. She had to swallow her pride. The video ended with Liam reaching a hand out to me, saying, “Get up. Go change your clothes. I’ll talk to the director. We’re cutting this scene for today.” I looked up at him from the muddy ground, looking exactly like a stray dog staring at its rescuer. At first, the comments under that leaked video were normal. People were mocking Vanessa’s fake nice-girl persona crumbling. But gradually, someone left a comment that started it all: Does anyone else think these two have insane chemistry? Maybe it was because the massive status gap between Liam and me perfectly fit the Prince and Cinderella trope. He was too perfect, and I checked every box of the underdog. Everyone loves a story about being saved. At first, it was just harmless jokes. None of us intentionally tried to push a fake romance. Liam didn’t need to, and my team didn’t dare try to leech off his fame—especially since I was a total nobody in Hollywood. People were mostly just having fun playing matchmaker. That was until someone made a deadly serious fan-edit of our characters: the timid apprentice who quietly loved her mentor, following him faithfully until she died in his arms. The video was gut-wrenchingly sad, paired with a hauntingly tragic song, and it completely broke the internet. And so, the internet started digging through our interviews and press tours. The moment that pulled thousands of fans down the rabbit hole was during a press junket for a streaming platform. The host handed out cute plushies to the main cast. I was the lowest on the call sheet, so I was seated at the very edge of the stage. But at the end of the interview, before the cameras cut, Liam held up his plushie, leaned past the female lead, the second lead, and the third lead, and handed it directly to me. “You younger girls usually like these things, right?” he asked. Then there was the reality show. Because I wasn’t famous, I barely got any screen time. But eagle-eyed fans noticed something in the background of another guest’s shot: Liam, ignoring the burning heat, using his bare hands to peel a roasted sweet potato for me, before dropping the softest, sweetest part of the core right into my bowl. The aloof, untouchable A-lister, and the D-list actress he spoiled rotten. That was how the fandom was born. But it turned out… it was all just a giant misunderstanding. 6 The next time I saw Liam was a week after his relationship was exposed. It was a pre-scheduled cast interview. Normally, only the big stars attend these promo events. The only reason I was invited was, undeniably, because our ship was so incredibly popular. But with his secret relationship now out in the open, my presence was deeply awkward. I saw him backstage before we went on. He had a private dressing room. I only caught a glimpse of him through the cracked door as I walked by. He was in profile, talking to his publicist, looking calm and at peace. He didn’t seem affected by the media circus at all. He had been in this industry long enough. Fan culture and internet traffic didn’t dictate his life anymore. His talent was his armor. I looked away. I played the role of a beautiful, decorative vase on stage. The producers had scrapped all the ship-baiting questions, and I tried my best to stay silent and invisible. But Liam, acting as if nothing had changed, continued to look out for me. He tossed conversational cues my way and made sure the camera caught me. The hosts exchanged knowing looks, and finally, chasing the inevitable clickbait, they asked about his love life. His expression shifted almost instantly. The sharp, cool lines of his face softened into something incredibly tender. Just thinking about her seemed to pull a smile to his lips. “I never intended to hide it,” he said. “She just didn’t want the public exposure.” “We’re childhood sweethearts. We’ve been together for ten years.” “When I was sixteen and defied my family to become an actor, she was the one who supported me. Through every low point and every highlight of my life, she’s been there. She is my light.” The camera panned to my face. I held my smile perfectly, cheering and clapping along with everyone else, showing absolutely no cracks in my armor. That is, until the very end of the interview, when the show decided to give Liam a “surprise” for the sake of ratings. It was a pre-recorded segment. A video tour of my college dorm room at NYU. The walls were plastered with Liam Sterling. Posters of his first movie, tickets to his fan events, cutouts from magazines. And then came an interview with my old college roommate—someone I barely spoke to—acting like my best friend. “Oh, Riley? She’s been obsessed with Liam since she was sixteen! She used to say Liam was her light. The only reason she became an actress was to follow that light.” Liam looked over at me in surprise. The host smiled politely, but her words were laced with venom. She asked Liam, “Did you know your little apprentice was your biggest fan?” Liam shook his head. “I had no idea.” He paused, then added, “She never mentioned it.” The host laughed, digging the trap deeper. “We all assumed you took such good care of her on set because you knew she was a super-fan! You’re usually known for being pretty distant, so we’re all very curious… why were you so protective of her?” The entire studio seemed to hold its breath. He smiled—open, handsome, and completely devoid of any romantic undertones. He answered simply, “She has a certain spark to her. It reminded me of myself when I was younger.” He paused, smiled again, and added, “Plus, she’s the exact same age as my little sister. We just clicked.” He was so painfully honest that the room went dead silent. Eventually, everyone forced a laugh, and the interview wrapped up awkwardly. I sat in the corner like a prop, trembling uncontrollably. I knew exactly what was going to happen. Those two quotes of his were going to be spliced together in a thousand different videos. Liam’s fans were going to use them to repeatedly slap the “Starbrook” shippers in the face. I knew the massive gap between us. I never dared to demand anything. I just wanted to quietly guard my tiny, insignificant, embarrassingly out-of-reach fantasy. Before he started treating me differently, I never had any delusions. He was the one who handed me that pathetic sliver of hope. But the light I had chased since I was sixteen had a light of his own. And my closely guarded, decade-long secret had just been ripped open, gutted, and put on display under the blazing studio lights for everyone to see. This pathetic, one-sided crush of mine was going to be dragged through the internet, dissected like a dead fish, making me look like an absolute clown for everyone to judge. But in front of the cameras, I had to keep smiling. A polite, flawless, impenetrable smile, no matter how many times I was scrutinized or asked about Liam Sterling. 7 The first time I saw Liam on a screen when I was 16, it wasn’t a movie or a TV show. It was an interview. At the time, my mother had just jumped off a building and killed herself after finding out my dad was having an affair. I was suffering from severe clinical depression. I slit my wrists and submerged myself in the bathtub. The small TV across from the bathroom was playing Liam’s interview. He was 20 years old. He had experienced the rollercoaster of Hollywood—skyrocketing to fame with his first movie, followed by a brutal dry spell, before finally winning Best Actor with a gritty indie drama. It was a very raw, deep interview. He looked striking, his eyes intense and mature. He carried an aura of quiet stability, the kind of calm that only comes after surviving massive highs and lows. I don’t remember what the host asked, but I will never forget what he said next. He smiled and said, “I get lost sometimes, too. I’ve wanted to quit a million times. But then I realized, no matter how hard things get, if you just grit your teeth and survive it, you’ll look back one day and realize it was just a bump in the road.” “There is nothing in this world to be afraid of. We only get to do this once. As long as you stay alive, you have infinite possibilities.” I don’t know where the courage came from, but suddenly, I wanted to stay alive long enough to see karma destroy my father and his mistress. So, soaking wet and bleeding, I dragged myself out of the tub, found some gauze, wrapped my wrist, and dialed 911. For a very long time after that, Liam Sterling was the light that saved me. He was my psychological anchor. Until the day I finally stood in front of him. How could my heart not race? How could I not have delusions? When you cross mountains and oceans to finally stand in front of the person who saved your life… When you discover that the real him is somehow even better than the version in your head… When he looks at you differently on set, on reality shows, in crowds, and specifically takes care of you… Even if the moon doesn’t belong to you, for a brief second, it feels like the moonlight is shining down just for you. With so many people editing romance videos of us, writing fanfiction, praying for us to get together, you slip into the illusion. It feels like if you just reach out your hand, you could touch the moon. It felt that close. But it was time to wake up from this one-woman play. After the show wrapped, Liam actually connected me with a few casting directors. He even gave me his private phone number, telling me to reach out if I ever needed anything. The director happened to be there when he gave it to me, and he looked shocked. “Liam, you really do adore your little apprentice.” The director turned to me with a grin. “Not many people get Liam’s private number. He seems friendly, but his standards are sky-high. Kid, you better hold on tight to your mentor.” See? All those mixed signals gave me false hope. But to him, he truly just saw me as a little sister, an established veteran looking out for a rookie he respected. He said I reminded him of his sixteen-year-old self—obsessed with acting, pure in his dedication. So he wanted to help me. But he didn’t know that the thing I was obsessed with, the thing I was dedicating myself to… was never acting. It was him. I stared blankly at our text thread. Honestly, I could have pretended nothing was wrong. I could have kept playing the innocent apprentice, utilizing his admiration to stay close to him. Maybe one day, I could have used his complete lack of defenses to climb my way to the top. But a long, long time later, I finally replied to his last text. I was direct and entirely honest. “Liam, you don’t need to look out for me anymore. I feel guilty.” I once read a book where a character is told to just have a clear conscience, to ignore what people say, and let the rumors bounce off her. And she replies, “But what if my conscience isn’t clear?” You are just a generous senior actor helping a rookie. But Liam, what if my conscience isn’t clear? What if I want more? I think Liam understood. He never texted back. And after that, he never looked out for me again. The moon is supposed to hang high in the sky, meant only to be looked at from afar.

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The system’s chime echoed in my mind just as a fresh wave of agony bloomed behind my ribs. I slumped against the cold, sterile tiles of the hospital corridor, clutching my chest. Every word of the conversation between my fiancée and my sister was a jagged shard of ice, driven straight into my marrow. They had lied. The four failed heart matches, the months of agonizing “bad luck”—it was all a fabrication, a cruel game played to appease the “real” son who had suddenly appeared in our lives. Now that he had been diagnosed with heart failure, the donor organ I had spent years waiting for—the one that was supposed to be my second chance at life—was being diverted to him. My sister hadn’t flown back from London to support me. She was here with a waiver, her voice a practiced melody of manipulation as she told me to “just wait a little longer.” She claimed the long-lost biological brother couldn’t wait. But who was counting the times I had teetered on the edge of the abyss? Yesterday, I had been the one throwing her out of my room in a fit of righteous fury. Today, my life-saving surgery had been reassigned behind my back. The family bonds I cherished and the love I had built were nothing more than cheap, disposable commodities in their eyes. Before my tears could even dry, I pressed the activation key for the Return Program. … [Return Program initiated. Countdown: Seventy-two hours.] Just three more days. Then I could leave this miserable existence behind forever. I leaned against the wall, forcing oxygen into my failing lungs as I shuffled back to my room. When I pushed the door open, the sight was a physical blow. Orderlies were already sweeping my personal belongings into cardboard boxes. Two men were unhooking my ventricular assist device—the machine keeping my heart beating. My sister, Isabelle, was directing them with cold efficiency. My fiancée, Helena, stood by her side, her silence a heavy, suffocating shroud. I leaned against the doorframe, gasping for air. “What… what are you doing?” Helena’s eyes flickered toward my ghostly face. Her fingers twitched, a momentary lapse in her composure, before she looked away and turned toward Isabelle. Isabelle’s expression shifted, a flash of guilt quickly replaced by a hardened resolve. “Adrian, Lucas just came out of a crisis. He’s in the critical observation window. He needs this private suite and this specific equipment. It’s an emergency.” I tightened my grip on the doorframe, trying to breathe through a spasm. my voice was a raspy whisper. “Isabelle, I’ve failed four matches. My heart is a ruin. If you take this away, I’ll die.” Isabelle turned bone-white. She gritted her teeth. “You’ve survived every crisis before. You’ll make it through this one. Lucas is different—he’s fragile. Please, Adrian. For me. Just give your brother this one thing.” I looked at these two women—the people I had loved with every fiber of my being. One was the sister I had adored for twenty years; the other was my childhood sweetheart. And here they were, ruthlessly asking me to hand over my only chance at survival. Suddenly, the weight of it all—the years of trying to earn their love—just vanished. I felt an incredible, numbing exhaustion. What did it matter? In a few dozen hours, I would be gone anyway. I let out a jagged, self-deprecating laugh and nodded. “Fine. Take it.” Isabelle’s rehearsed arguments died in her throat. She stared at me, bewildered by my sudden compliance. Right then, a searing pain clawed at my heart. I stumbled, my knees buckling. “Adrian!” Helena lunged forward, catching my arm. When she realized I wasn’t dead yet, she let out a long breath, her voice softening into that manipulative tenderness I used to mistake for love. “Adrian, you’ve always been so strong. You can handle a few days without the monitors. Once Lucas is out of the woods, I promise I’ll get you the best care available.” She brushed a hair from my forehead. “When you’re better, I’ll take you to that chalet in St. Moritz. Just the two of us.” Three months ago, those words would have been my lifeline. Back then, if I so much as nicked a finger, Helena would cancel her board meetings to bandage it herself, her eyes red with worry. But now? She knew exactly how excruciating a thoracic surgery was, yet she had tricked me into the operating theater four times, letting them cut me open for nothing, just to spite me on behalf of Lucas. “Stop it, Helena. Stop the act.” Her hand froze. The irritation of being seen through flickered across her face, and she withdrew her touch. “If you’re going to be ungrateful, then we’ll do this the hard way.” She signaled the orderlies to move my remaining things to a general ward. My assistant, Arlo, burst into the room, his eyes bloodshot with rage. He shoved an orderly who was tossing my things. “You can’t throw this out!” Arlo’s voice cracked. “This is Adrian’s pain journal! Every night he couldn’t sleep from the agony, he wrote in this just to stay sane. How can you treat it like trash?” Isabelle and Helena’s expressions shifted. Helena stepped forward and snatched the notebook, flipping it open. A stack of yellowed receipts fluttered to the floor. She paused, reading a page. Isabelle was in that horrific crash. The hospital was out of her blood type. I’m the only match. The doctors say over-donating will damage my heart long-term, but as long as she lives, I don’t care. She flipped to another page, filled with frantic calculations. Helena’s firm was set up. The penalties are astronomical. I liquidated the trust my grandmother left me to cover her margins. I took out private loans to bridge the gap. The interest is mounting, but she can’t know. She has enough pressure. I’m a man; I’ll carry this debt for her. The two women stared at the papers, a momentary silence falling over the room. But the ego is a powerful thing. They didn’t want to be the villains of this story. “Adrian,” Isabelle said, her voice dripping with disbelief. “Did you really plant these ‘props’ just to compete for our affection with Lucas? That’s low, even for you.” Recalling all the genuine love I had wasted, I didn’t even bother to argue. I leaned down to pick up my journal. As I bent over, the world tilted. A violent throb erupted in my chest. I collapsed, cold sweat instantly soaking my shirt. Isabelle merely sighed, annoyed. “This again? The moment the monitors are gone, you stage a heart attack? Grow up.” Helena waved a hand at the security guards. “Get him out of here. Adrian, when are you going to start acting like a man? This is pathetic.” I was numb as the guards dragged me down the hall to a cramped, freezing bed in the general ward. [Countdown: Sixty-eight hours.] Just a little longer. I curled into the thin sheets. Without the assist device, every breath was a conscious struggle. Arlo sat by my bed, tears streaming down his face as he cursed them under his breath. He told me he’d go find a way to buy the medication I needed, even if he had to beg for it, and then he ran out. A few hours later, Lucas walked in. He looked slightly pale, but his eyes were bright with triumph. He walked to my bedside, leaning in close, his chest puffed out. “Adrian,” he whispered, a cruel smirk playing on his lips. “Can you hear it? Listen to how strong this heart beats.” He chuckled. “You really think those four matches failed because of ‘luck’? I just told Isabelle and Helena that I felt you were looking down on me. To make it up to me, they made sure you went under the knife for nothing. They even swapped your post-op anti-rejection meds for vitamins.” He leaned closer, his voice a venomous hiss. “You’re pathetic. Betrayed by your woman and your sister, and you were still pining for them in that stupid diary. It’s hilarious.” My entire body shuddered. I stared at him, the horror of his words sinking in. Four times I had gone into that theater with hope, only to wake up to failure. I had spent nights coughing up blood, watching my hair fall out in clumps from the ‘meds’ they gave me. I thought it was just my fate. It wasn’t fate. It was a game. A primal surge of rage gave me a burst of phantom strength. I lunged at him, swinging my fist with everything I had left. “Go to hell!” Lucas didn’t expect the attack. My fist caught his jaw, sending him stumbling back. “Help! Isabelle! Helena! Adrian’s gone crazy! He’s trying to kill me!” The door was kicked open. Isabelle and Helena rushed in, panic written all over their faces. “Adrian! What are you doing?” Helena screamed, shoving me back with enough force to send me crashing against the wall. Isabelle threw her arms around Lucas, frantically checking his chest. Lucas sobbed into her shoulder. “My heart… it hurts. He wanted to kill me. He wanted to take it back!” Helena turned on me, her eyes flashing with hatred as I lay twitching on the floor. “Have you lost your mind? Lucas just got off the table! Do you have to be a murderer too?” I lay there, the light fading from my vision as the pain reached a crescendo. I watched the women I would have died for shield a monster like he was a wounded lamb. I forced a bloody smile. [Countdown: Forty-eight hours.] Please, system. Make it fast. That night, Lucas claimed his chest felt “tight,” and the entire cardiology wing went into an uproar. I lay in the dark, listening to the chaos outside, my mind drifting to the past. A year ago, the truth about our “switched at birth” status came out. Lucas was the biological Parker; I was the mistake. To make up for his years in foster care, Isabelle gave him everything—my room, my car, my position. “Adrian, he suffered for twenty years. We owe him. Just be patient,” she’d say. And Helena, under pressure from her family to align with the “real” heir, tried to keep us both on a leash. She thought if she gave Lucas whatever he wanted, he’d eventually let us be together. Lucas took advantage of that. He broke my childhood mementos. He pushed me into a freezing lake in the middle of winter, which triggered my heart failure. They always told me to wait. To be the bigger person. But they forgot one thing: once a man’s dignity is ground into the dirt, once his heart is truly broken, there is nothing left but ash. Isabelle burst into my room, her eyes bloodshot. She didn’t say a word as she began ransacking my bedside locker. “What… what are you doing?” I asked weakly. She ignored me until she found a small amber pill bottle. She grabbed me by the collar and slammed the bottle into my face. “Adrian! Do you have any humanity left?” she screamed. “They found toxins in Lucas’s porridge. It was this, wasn’t it? If you couldn’t beat him to death, you’d poison him!” The bottle hit my eye, making stars dance in my vision. I looked at the bottle on the floor. It was the specialty medication Arlo had bought with his own savings. Without the machines, these were the only things keeping my heart from stopping. “That’s my… medicine,” I gasped. “Liar!” Isabelle slapped me, hard. The force spun my head around, the metallic taste of blood filling my mouth. “Lucas’s nurse saw you lurking near his room! How can you still lie?” I couldn’t even stand up, let alone “lurk” anywhere. The label on the bottle clearly stated the drug’s name and its use for heart failure. But she chose not to see it. They only believe the lies that make them feel righteous. Rapid footsteps sounded in the hall. Helena entered, her face a mask of cold fury. She looked at my battered state, a flicker of something—regret?—crossed her eyes, but she suppressed it. “He just survived, Adrian. Do you really want him dead that badly?” I looked up at my sister. For a second, I saw the girl from ten years ago who had stood between me and a group of bullies, her own head bleeding as she told me, Don’t be scared, Addy. I’ll protect you forever. Now, that same person threw a legal document at my face. “Adrian, Lucas is the blood that the Parkers have missed for twenty years. If you can’t coexist with him, there’s no room for you in this family. This is a severance agreement. Sign it, and you’re dead to us. Your life is no longer our concern.” She spoke with such finality, but she didn’t offer me a pen. She was certain I would beg for forgiveness, as I always did. I looked at the paper. “Okay.” I didn’t have a pen. I bit my finger hard until it bled, and using the blood as ink, I scrawled my name at the bottom and pressed my thumbprint down. Isabelle’s pupils dilated. She looked at me, stunned. “I only… I just meant…” But I couldn’t hear her anymore. A roar of pain erupted in my chest, and the world began to spin. I fell backward. [Countdown: Twenty-four hours.] My consciousness flickered in the dark. I heard Arlo screaming outside. “Let me go! He’s dying! His heart is failing!” A guard’s voice, bored: “Orders from Ms. West. No one goes in without her permission.” “You’re killing him! I’ll call the police! I’ll destroy you all!” Then came the dull thud of fists hitting flesh. I tried to move, but my eyelids felt like they were made of lead. When I finally woke, Helena and Isabelle were sitting by my bed. “Where… where is Arlo?” Helena’s face was stone. “The servant who wouldn’t stop barking? I had him detained.” I struggled to sit up. Isabelle pushed me down and handed me a script. “The poisoning story has gone viral. People are digging into the ‘fake heir’ scandal. Our stock prices are cratering because of your drama. You are going to do a livestream. You will admit you’re the one who poisoned him, you will apologize to Lucas, and you will publicly break off the engagement.” I stared at the script and laughed. Helena grabbed my hand, her voice dropping to a persuasive hum. “Adrian, think about the companies. If you do this, I’ll release Arlo unharmed. I swear, once the stocks stabilize, I’ll divorce Lucas. I’ll find you a new heart. We’ll get married for real. This is the last time I’ll ask you to sacrifice. Be a man, okay?” I didn’t want to. But for Arlo’s life… I looked at the countdown. I closed my eyes. “Fine.” Half an hour later, the camera was on. I read the words, branding myself a jealous poisoner and a fraud. I renounced my name and my inheritance. The comments section exploded. The fake son is a monster! Why isn’t he dead? Rot in hell, you piece of trash! Helena watched the stock ticker climb back up. She immediately announced her upcoming marriage to the “rightful” heir, Lucas Parker. Then, she shut off the feed. “I did it,” I whispered. “Let Arlo go.” The door opened, and Lucas walked in, grinning. “Don’t bother looking for him, ‘Brother.’ Half an hour ago, I told him about your little confession. He thought he was the reason you were being blackmailed. He said as long as he was alive, they’d have a leash on you. So he grabbed a guard’s knife and shoved it into his own throat. Died instantly. Such a loyal dog.” My brain went white. My vision blurred into a bloody haze. Since Lucas returned, everyone had turned their backs. Only Arlo, the boy who had followed me since we were ten, had stayed. He had literally taken bullets and blows for me. I had tried to give him money to leave this sinking ship, but he’d just yell, My life is yours, Adrian! If they want you, they have to go through me! He kept his word. My sanity snapped. I swung my hand to slap the smirk off Lucas’s face. Smack. Isabelle caught my wrist and delivered a brutal blow to my cheek. The taste of copper flooded my mouth. She shielded Lucas, glaring at me. “You dare touch him in front of me? I regret ever taking in a viper like you!” Helena stepped in too, pushing me back. “Adrian! Are you insane? It was just a servant! Arlo chose to do that. It’s not Lucas’s fault!” I stared at them. My tears had run dry. My heart didn’t even feel pain anymore—just a cold, empty void. Before they could react, I scrambled onto the windowsill. Helena’s face finally changed. “Adrian! What are you doing?” Isabelle panicked, lunging toward me. “Addy, stop! Don’t be stupid!” Lucas stood back, sneering. “Are you still falling for this? He’s just trying to guilt-trip you because he knows you care. He doesn’t have the guts to jump.” I looked at the three of them—their fear, their arrogance, their lies. I smiled. [3… 2… 1…] I opened my arms and let myself fall backward into the sky. The wind roared in my ears, punctuated by a single, soul-shattering scream from above. “NO!!!”

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For five years, I’ve lived in the shadow of a title that tasted like ash: The Cursed Heir. It started because my best friend, Derek, died on my birthday—exactly one year to the day after my fiancée, Cora, was killed in a tragic accident. They used to call me “The Golden Boy” with a wink and a smile, but after they were gone, that nickname became a leaden weight around my neck. A curse. I spent every waking moment wondering if they’d still be here if I hadn’t insisted on celebrating another year of my life. I was at a private academy helping my nephew with his transfer paperwork when I saw her. A profile I would recognize in a crowded stadium. I froze, the air leaving my lungs in a sharp whistle. The woman looked exactly like Cora. I couldn’t help myself; I followed her out to the parking lot. She was crouched down, her face set in a stern line as she lectured a small boy. “Zoey, you got into another fight today? If this keeps up, you can forget about dessert for a month.” The boy pouted, crossing his arms. “Cora, you’re such a mean mom! She started it! You always take their side!” Mom? Cora? The world tilted on its axis. My heart didn’t just break; it shattered. They weren’t dead. They were alive, and they had a life together. They had a child. “Uncle Adrian? What are you looking at?” My nephew’s voice pulled me back to the brutal reality. Cora turned at the sound of my name. For a heartbeat, our eyes locked, and the expression on her face froze into a mask of pure, icy shock. … I stood there, paralyzed. My mind was a chaotic storm of emotions I couldn’t categorize. Should I be happy? Happy that I wasn’t the “jinx” who had killed them? Or should I be devastated that they had staged the most gruesome betrayal imaginable just to get away from me? Why? Cora and I had grown up together. On her twentieth birthday, she had legally changed her middle name to match a poem I loved. She told me, “Our hearts are two threads woven into a single tapestry, Adrian. We’ll understand each other’s souls forever.” The day before my birthday five years ago, she had whispered a promise: “Adrian, we’re going to celebrate every year together. I’ll be the umbrella that keeps the rain off you.” But she was the one who brought the storm. I searched for the exact moment she stopped loving me, but the memories were too painful to sift through. The school bell rang, and the children scrambled back toward the building. Cora walked toward me. There was no shame in her stride, no stutter in her step. She looked at me with a terrifyingly familiar warmth. “Golden Boy,” she said softly. “You found us sooner than I expected.” A sharp, stabbing pain flared in my chest. To her, this was just a game of hide-and-seek. I took a ragged breath and looked her in the eye. “When did it start?” She tilted her head, looking genuinely thoughtful, as if we were discussing the weather. “Maybe it was that day you got into a fight for him. I realized then that a man who wasn’t so… dominant… had his own kind of charm. Or maybe it was graduation, seeing him in that frayed, cheap shirt. It moved me.” She sighed, a mature, casual shrug of the shoulders. “Adrian, you can’t predict what you’ll love from one second to the next. Just like I used to hate the billionaire-heir type, but I still fell for you once.” Cora was always an expert at being both cruel and direct. “Why didn’t you just tell me?” I choked out. “Why fake your deaths? Why the secret marriage?” “Because I knew you too well,” she said, her voice devoid of regret. “Back then, you hadn’t learned how to weigh love against interest. You were too impulsive. A public breakup would have ruined both our families and destroyed Derek’s reputation.” She looked at my expensive suit, then back at my face. “But you’ve learned now. Otherwise, you’d be calling the tabloids instead of standing here quietly.” She had calculated everything. Even my silence. I wouldn’t make a scene—not because I had learned “restraint,” but because I was dying. I had six months left, and I didn’t want to spend them screaming at ghosts. I spent the rest of the afternoon in a quiet coffee shop, staring at the steam rising from a cup I didn’t drink, wondering how to tell my parents about the diagnosis. When I reached the front door of the family estate at dusk, I heard a child’s laughter echoing from the drawing room. Confused, I paused by the door. “Derek, take the child and leave through the side gate in five minutes,” I heard my mother say. “Adrian said he’d be home soon.” A heavy silence followed, then my father’s weary sigh. “What you did five years ago was too much. Adrian hasn’t been happy for a single day since. Even if he isn’t my biological son, it breaks my heart to see him like this.” “We’ll make it up to him later,” my father added, though he sounded unconvinced. Derek’s voice—soft, gentle, the voice of the brother I thought I’d lost—replied, “I know, Dad. It’s my fault. I’ll tell him everything soon.” The world went cold. Pieces of a puzzle I never wanted to solve clicked into place. Why my mother was always insisting I bring Derek home for dinner. Why she looked like she was about to cry every time she saw him. Why she was always slipping him money under the table. The Barbie dolls I’d occasionally find in the guest wing. He was the biological son. I was the one who had been switched at birth. And they had known about the “dead” lovers and the secret grandchild all along. They had watched me rot in guilt for five years while they played house with the “real” son behind my back. A chilling numbness settled over me. At least I didn’t have to worry about them being sad when I died. They didn’t need me. They never did. I pulled out my phone and sent a text to my oncologist: I’m opting out of the chemo. Please cancel my next appointment. Suddenly, the door handle turned. I couldn’t face them. I turned and ran into the darkness, not stopping until I reached a deserted park. I sat on a bench and finally, mercifully, let the tears come. There was no one left in this world who loved me. Eventually, my legs went numb. I dragged myself back to the house that was no longer mine. My parents looked at me with varying degrees of guilt until my father finally cracked. “Adrian… Derek… he didn’t actually die.” They watched me, gauging my reaction. “He and Cora are married. They have a daughter.” When I didn’t scream, my mother’s voice sharpened, turning defensive. “Don’t you dare blame him. You were the ones switched. He suffered through a life of poverty that should have been yours. Even if he ‘stole’ Cora, you’re still the one with the trust fund and the title. You should be grateful.” Grateful. The word felt like a slap. I had no right to be angry. Anger is a luxury for those who are loved. I simply nodded. They seemed taken aback by my composure. “The school is a bit far from their place,” my father said, though it wasn’t a suggestion. “They’re going to stay here with us for a while.” That night, Cora and Derek moved in. The house was suddenly loud, filled with their belongings and their laughter. My mother was in the kitchen, a tender smile on her face I had never seen before. “Slow down, Derek,” she cooed. “Let me finish the dishes. You’ve worked hard your whole life. It’s time you were taken care of.” Cora sat on the velvet sofa, her eyes tracking me as I stood in the foyer. “Don’t just stand there, Adrian. Come sit.” I didn’t move. In the house I had lived in for twenty-six years, I felt like a trespasser. Dinner was a spread of everything Derek loved. My mother kept piling food onto his plate, then ruffled Zoey’s hair. “Eat up, sweetie. Your daddy didn’t get to eat like this when he was your age.” Every word was a barb aimed at me. Zoey looked up from his plate, staring at me with wide eyes. “Uncle, why aren’t you eating? Do you hate us?” The table went silent. Derek put down his fork and offered a soft, rehearsed smile. “Don’t be silly, Zoey. Uncle Adrian just has a small appetite.” I opened my mouth to speak, but my mother beat me to it. “Adrian, I thought you were being mature about this. If you’re just going to sit there with that long face and try to make us feel guilty, then leave. I’m begging you, stop being so dramatic for once.” My grip on my fork tightened until my knuckles turned white. A dull, throbbing pain bloomed in my chest. I shook my head, but a sudden, violent cough seized me. My father sighed, a look of disappointment on his face. “Adrian, if the food isn’t to your taste, your mother can make you something else.” I forced a smile and swallowed a mouthful of sandwich. It tasted like cardboard. “It’s fine. Everything is fine.” Cora watched me, a flicker of something—maybe pity—crossing her eyes. I retreated to my room as soon as I could. I locked the door and sank to the floor, the mask of “Golden Boy” finally crumbling. My phone buzzed. Dr. Aris: Are you sure about this, Adrian? Without treatment, your timeline is very short. Chemo could give you at least another six months. I stared at the screen for a long time before typing back: Thank you, Doctor. But I’m ready to leave. A knock at the door. I wiped my eyes and opened it. It was Cora. She was holding a plate of dumplings. “You didn’t eat much. These are the wild mushroom ones you used to love.” “I don’t love them anymore,” I said flatly. As I moved to close the door, she reached out, knocking the phone from my hand. The screen was still glowing. She saw the message. Her eyes darkened. “You’re leaving?” I scrambled to pick up the phone. She had only seen the last part. She looked at me, her voice dropping. “Because of me?” I stepped back. “No. I just want to see other cities.” She wanted to say more, but I shut the door in her face. The next day, I began clearing out my life. I found an old box filled with photos of Cora and me, and the necklace she gave me when she “confessed” her love. The pendant was a tiny gold heart. Back then, her world revolved around me. Back then, my parents loved me. I put it all in a trash bag. In the hallway, I ran into Zoey. He was playing with blocks on the floor. “Uncle, what are you throwing away?” I knelt down and ruffled his hair. His warmth felt alien against my cold skin. “Just some old things that don’t work anymore.” He blinked at me. “Do you hate me and Mommy?” I looked at his face—he had Cora’s eyes. My heart softened. “No, Zoey. You’re a good kid.” “Then why are you always sad?” He took my hand. “Daddy said you were a prince, and princes are always happy. Grandma said you were the luckiest person in the world because you had everything.” Prince. The word was a joke now. Everyone believed Adrian Ellington was the happiest man alive. No one wanted to see the truth. My eyes blurred. I turned away so he wouldn’t see. Cora and Derek walked up. Seeing me with Zoey, Derek rushed over, his face tight with a panic I didn’t understand. He scooped the boy up. “Zoey, don’t bother your uncle. He’s… not well. He needs his rest.” He emphasized “not well” as if he were telling Cora I was faking it for attention. Zoey looked at Cora. “Mommy, Uncle is crying. His hands are so cold.” Cora’s gaze landed on my face. She saw the redness in my eyes and froze. She lunged for the trash bag in my hand, and the necklace spilled out. “You’re throwing this away?” her voice was raspy. “Yes,” I said. “It serves no purpose.” She gripped the bag, her knuckles white. She looked angry—or maybe she was grieving. “Adrian, how can you just let go?” I let out a hollow laugh. “Cora, the past is dead. I’m moving on. Why wouldn’t I?” “Moving on?” She scoffed. “You call this moving on? Looking like a ghost? Do you have any idea how much you’re worrying everyone?” I’m the one who ruined everything? I didn’t answer. I just watched the light in her eyes flicker and die. Derek pulled on her arm. “Cora, leave him. Adrian has been spoiled his whole life. It’s natural he can’t handle sharing the spotlight. I’m fine with it. As long as I have you and a home, I can handle his moods.” I didn’t bother explaining. I walked out of the house. Cora chased me into the driveway, grabbing my wrist and pinning me against the brick wall. Her eyes were swimming with guilt. “Adrian, why are you acting like you’re already dead?” I pushed her away. I was so weak it barely moved her. “It doesn’t matter, Cora.” As the words left my lips, blood began to pour from my nose. It wouldn’t stop. Cora panicked, her hands fluttering toward my face. “Are you sick? Adrian, what is this?” I shook my head, wiping the blood with my sleeve. “I’ve just been taking too many supplements. My blood is thin.” Before she could press further, Derek yelled from the porch. “Cora! Zoey is having a reaction! He’s asking for you!” Cora looked at me, torn, then turned and ran back inside. Once she was gone, I leaned against the wall and coughed into my hand. It came up crimson. I went to the hospital and picked up a fresh bottle of painkillers. The doctor tried to argue for the hospital bed again. I just smiled. “Chemo gives me six months of agony. This way, I get to leave quietly. These last few years have been hard enough. I’d like the end to be easy.” I stayed in a hotel that night. When I returned home the next morning, the entire family was waiting in the living room. “Adrian, how could you?” my mother screamed, her eyes red. For a second, I thought they knew. I thought they cared. “What… what happened?” Cora looked at me with pure loathing. “Zoey nearly died yesterday. A severe peanut allergy.” “You knew Derek was allergic, too,” my father added, his voice cold. “But you put peanut butter in the kids’ snacks.” I looked at Derek. He wouldn’t meet my eyes. I realized then that he was willing to risk his own daughter’s life just to ensure I was exiled forever. “I didn’t do it,” I said. My voice was hollow. My mother stood up and delivered a blow that sent me reeling. The slap echoed through the room. I hit the floor, my head spinning, fighting the urge to vomit blood right there on the rug. My father moved to help me, but my mother stopped him. “No! He’s been spoiled into a monster. He tried to kill a child and he won’t even admit it.” Tears dripped onto the hardwood. My mother spoke one last time. “I wish I had never raised you. I wish the hospital had never made that mistake.” She slammed the door as she left. My father followed. After a long silence, Derek knelt beside me. His voice was dripping with fake sympathy. “Adrian, Zoey is going to be okay. It’s fine. I know you didn’t mean it.” Cora put a hand on his shoulder. “Go get some sleep, Derek. You were up all night at the ER.” When they left, I struggled to my feet and swallowed three painkillers. “What are you taking?” Cora was standing in the doorway. I didn’t answer. She grabbed my arm, her eyes widening as she felt how thin I’d become. “Adrian, you’re skin and bones.” But her concern was quickly replaced by anger. “Zoey is an innocent child. If you hate me, take it out on me.” I am innocent, too, I thought. Why can’t anyone see me? “I don’t hate you,” I said. “And I didn’t hurt him.” I went upstairs and packed a small bag. When I opened the front door to leave, my mother was standing there. She saw the suitcase and hesitated. “Where are you going?” Then, as if remembering she was supposed to be angry, she snapped, “Fine! Go! Don’t come back until you’re ready to apologize!” I checked into the hospital under a different name. I had enough money left for one month. Day by day, my hair began to fall out. I spent my afternoons walking through the city parks until I was too weak to stand. Finally, Cora called. “Adrian, are you okay? Mom and Dad are worried. Just come home. Tomorrow is your birthday. Let’s just move past this.” I looked at my reflection in the hospital glass—a skeleton draped in pale skin. “Tell them to take care of themselves. I’m not coming back.” That night, as the clock ticked toward midnight, the pain became a living thing, clawing at my bones. I reached for the pills on the nightstand, but my fingers were useless. The bottle shattered on the floor, white pills scattering like snow. Sweet, metallic heat surged up my throat. I covered my mouth, but the blood soaked through my fingers and stained the white sheets. At least I don’t have to have another birthday, I thought. The world blurred. The light faded. And finally, the silence was absolute.

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In the dead of night, when sleep feels like a luxury I can no longer afford, I usually find myself scrolling through my feed. That’s how I saw it—a post from my best friend, Beth. She had shared one of those mindless personality quiz results. The bold text over her photo read “Seductress,” and she’d captioned it with a line that made my skin crawl: “A little kitten looking for her master… any takers?~” I was about to leave a teasing comment, something about her being a bit too thirsty for a Tuesday night, when my eyes caught a reply that made my heart lurch into my throat. The comment came from a burner account I’d been quietly following for years—an account belonging to my husband, Cole. The words felt like a physical blow: “The 24-karat gold cage is ready. Don’t run too fast, little kitten.” I stared at the screen, unable to breathe. Cole was the kind of man who still got a shy flush on his face when things got too heated in the bedroom. To see him post something so raw, so… carnal… it felt like looking at a stranger. A thousand questions swarmed my mind, but I forced them down. I couldn’t just confront him. Not yet. Everyone in our social circle knew that Beth was Cole’s “third rail.” You didn’t touch the subject. You didn’t bring her up. Even at our wedding, I had purposefully seated Beth at a distant table, far from the head of the room, just to avoid any potential friction between them. The next day, the man who prided himself on never missing a family dinner suddenly called to say he had to work late. The timing was too perfect, the excuse too hollow. My feet took me to Beth’s apartment before my brain could tell them no. Standing outside her window, I saw him. Cole—the man who claimed he couldn’t boil an egg to save his life—was standing in Beth’s kitchen, wearing an apron, meticulously plating a meal. I didn’t have the courage to walk through that door. Instead, I went home, pulled out the divorce papers I’d tucked away in a drawer months ago as a “just in case” that I never thought I’d need, and signed my name with a hand that wouldn’t stop shaking. … I opened the app again, wanting to screenshot the evidence, but then I saw it. The timestamp. He had posted that comment on my birthday. At exactly midnight. During the thirty seconds I spent blowing out my candles and wishing for a lifetime with him, he was busy flirting with my best friend. A sharp, stinging ache hit the bridge of my nose. My phone buzzed. A text from Cole, his tone as warm and deceptive as ever: [Donna, honey, this project is running late. Don’t wait up. Get some sleep.] I stared at the screen, the irony tasting like ash in my mouth. I didn’t reply instantly like I usually did. In our three years of marriage, Cole had been the perfect husband in the eyes of the Manhattan elite. His only flaw was his vocal distaste for Beth. Whenever her name came up, his jaw would set, and his eyes would turn to ice. Everyone knew the story. Five years ago, he had chased Beth relentlessly. She had rejected him at every turn. The final blow came at a high-society gala where she told him in front of a dozen people, “You’re boring, Cole. You don’t have a romantic bone in your body. I’d rather be single than spend a night with a man who treats life like a spreadsheet.” After that, he never looked at her again. He even pulled his firm’s investments from any company that dared to hire her. Later, when our families started pushing us together, we slid into marriage like it was the most natural thing in the world. He treated me with such tenderness that people began to say the “cold Cole” was a myth. I actually believed we had found love after the vows. But it was all a performance. When did it start? After her divorce? Or was it always there, simmering beneath the surface? I walked into our empty apartment. In the master bath, the shower was still set to the exact temperature I liked. Cole always made sure of it; he’d even warm my towels in the dryer before I got in. He was a man with a reputation for being a devoted lover. Now, I realized it was just a script he was following. A few minutes later, a text from my cousin, Toby, popped up. He had been looking into things for me. He sounded livid. [Donna, I found the paper trail. Cole has transferred over two million dollars to Beth’s personal accounts.] [They meet every week. Every time you think he’s at the office, he’s with her.] [Should I tell your mother? She’ll ruin him.] I typed back, my fingers cold: [Don’t do anything rash. I’ll handle this.] When Cole finally came home late that night, I had scrubbed every trace of emotion from my face. He smelled like the cold night air—and something else. Something floral. He frowned when he saw me still up, reaching out to pull me into his arms. “Why aren’t you in bed? Have you been waiting for me?” Beth’s name was a lump in my throat. I swallowed it. “Yeah. Just a little insomnia.” He tucked my head under his chin, his voice thick with performative guilt. “I’ve been so busy lately, I’ve ignored you. I’ll make it up to you this weekend. I’ll get you something special.” Still the perfect husband. The next morning, as he was rushing to get dressed, I spoke up. “It’s Saturday, Cole. Where are you going?” “Emergency meeting at the office. I have to be there.” He cinched his tie with practiced ease, grabbing his keys. I said softly, “Do you know what today is?” He paused, glancing at the calendar on the wall, and feigned a look of sudden realization. “God, I’m an idiot. Our third anniversary.” He stepped closer, kissing my forehead. “The meeting is unmovable, but I’ll make it up to you tonight, okay?” I felt a cold laugh bubbling in my chest. Make it up to me? By coming home with another woman’s scent on his skin? “Go ahead,” I said. “I have plans with a friend anyway.” He looked relieved and practically ran out the door. I waited five minutes, got into my car, and drove straight to Beth’s office building. At noon, the lunch crowd was swarming the nearby bistro. I followed them in and took a seat at a booth directly behind them. I watched as Cole meticulously peeled shrimp and placed them in Beth’s bowl. A chill swept through me. He had told me for years that he hated the smell of seafood, that he couldn’t stand the texture. We never had it in the house. And yet, here he was, playing servant to her cravings. I watched him reach across the table to wipe a stray drop of sauce from the corner of her lip. It was an action so intimate, so natural, it felt like a knife to the ribs. Beth giggled, swatting his hand away. “Stop it. People are looking.” “Let them look,” Cole’s voice was low, but it carried perfectly to my ears. “I’m taking care of my kitten. Why should I care what they think?” Kitten. There it was again. I didn’t confront them. I followed them. I watched as he took her to every place he had ever taken me—the same parks, the same galleries. They even sat in our usual spots. It was a systematic erasure of our life together. Every romantic gesture he had ever shown me had just been a rehearsal for her. I was the practice round. I was the mannequin he used to learn how to be the man she wanted. I waited until evening to corner Beth as she was heading home. She was wearing a new designer dress, her makeup flawless. When she saw me, a flicker of panic crossed her eyes, but it was gone in a heartbeat, replaced by a practiced smile. “Donna! What are you doing here? Waiting for me?” I didn’t play along. “Beth, you know he’s my husband.” Twelve years of friendship, discarded for a sordid little thrill. Her smile faltered. She tried to look confused. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. Cole and I can barely stand each other. You know that.” I pulled up the videos, the screenshots, and the bank transfers on my phone and shoved them in her face. “Barely stand each other? Is that why he’s buying your bags? Giving you millions? Is that why he calls you his kitten and talks about gold cages?” Beth’s face went ghost-white. She hadn’t expected me to have receipts. “We’re in love,” she whispered, her eyes welling up with easy, practiced tears. “I didn’t want to hurt your marriage, Donna. He came to me. He told me there was nothing left between you two.” “In love?” I asked, my voice terrifyingly calm. “That bag on your shoulder was bought with our joint account. You’re spending my money, sleeping with my husband, and you want to talk to me about love?” She stood there, frozen. My eyes moved to the necklace around her neck—a delicate silver chain with a small cat pendant. “That’s a beautiful necklace,” I said. Her hand instinctively went to the pendant. “It was my mother’s birthday gift to me,” I continued. “Cole told me he lost it when we moved. I see he ‘found’ it and gave it to you.” Four years ago, before my mother passed, she gave me that necklace and told me to keep it safe. Cole had held me while I cried, promising to protect everything I cherished. I reached out, my fingers steady, and unhooked the clasp from her neck. I tucked the silver into my pocket. “You…” Beth hissed, but she didn’t dare stop me. As I turned to walk away, she called out, her voice sharp and desperate. “Donna, I’m pregnant. It’s Cole’s.” I froze. “Don’t hate me,” she said, her voice dropping to a theatrical sob. “He loved me first. It took me getting divorced to realize how good he was. I won’t take him from you, Donna. You stay here in the city, and I’ll move upstate. I just want my baby to have a father sometimes.” She had it all planned out. The perfect mistress arrangement. I didn’t turn back. I let the tears fall only when I was out of her sight. Twelve years of friendship. Done. When I got home, I laid all the evidence out on the dining room table. Cole walked in twenty minutes later. When he saw the files, his face transformed from confusion to a terrifying, dark rage. “You spied on me? Donna, since when did you become so manipulative?” I didn’t flinch. I looked him dead in the eye. “Manipulative? Compared to a man who’s been gaslighting his wife while sleeping with her best friend? You call her your kitten. You’re building her a cage. Does it bother you that your little whore has to be kept in the dark?” Cole’s eyes snapped. Before I could move, his hand swung. The slap echoed through the quiet apartment. My head jerked to the side, my cheek stinging with a heat I’d never felt before. The silence that followed was deafening. “You hit me?” I whispered, the words trembling. He looked at his hand, then at me, horror dawning on his face. He reached out to touch my face. “Donna, I didn’t mean… you pushed me. You shouldn’t have said those things about her.” I started to laugh, a jagged, broken sound. “You love her that much? Then why did you marry me? What was I, Cole? Your cover? Your practice run? A joke you told yourself?” “Enough!” he barked. “Beth and I are… it’s complicated. You’re making a scene out of nothing.” “Nothing?” I mocked. He finally broke, his shoulders sagging with a frustrated sigh. “Fine. I admit it. I married you to spite her. I wanted to prove I could be the romantic man she said I wasn’t. But I didn’t lie about our time together—I do care for you. Isn’t that enough?” “She’s vulnerable right now, Donna. She’s just been through a divorce. She needs me. But there’s nothing more to it.” A sharp pang of grief hit me. Nothing more to it? Then where did the baby come from? I took a deep breath. “Why me, Cole? Why did you pick me to destroy?” He took a step forward and grabbed my hands. His voice was suddenly, terrifyingly gentle. “Because I knew you loved me. I knew you’d never leave.” It was the cruelest answer he could have given. I wanted to scream, but the pain was so deep I couldn’t even breathe. He had known about my secret crush for years and used it as a leash. I had been a fool, thinking we were “learning to love” each other. The two most important people in my life had conspired to break me. Cole pulled me into a hug, whispering into my hair. “Donna, I’ll move her away. Somewhere far. She won’t interfere with our life. I promise.” I pushed him back. “So you’re going to keep her? Like a pet?” He didn’t answer. The silence was his confirmation. The front door opened then. Beth walked in, her eyes red from crying. She looked at Cole, then at me. “Donna, please don’t fight because of me. I came to apologize.” She walked over and gave a small, theatrical bow. “I’m so sorry. Six months ago, after my divorce, I was in a dark place. We had a few drinks and things happened. It was a mistake. Please, don’t let this ruin your marriage. It was all my fault.” Cole immediately stepped in front of her, shielding her. “It’s not your fault, Beth. Don’t blame yourself.” Watching them, I felt a wave of nausea so strong I thought I would retch. A mistake? For six months? They weren’t “mistaken.” They were addicted to each other. Cole roughly shoved me aside to guide Beth toward the door. “This isn’t the time. I’ll take you home.” He didn’t look back at me once. He didn’t see the signed divorce papers on the table. An hour later, Toby called. He sounded like he was about to explode. “Donna, I had a contact at the hospital check the records. Beth’s prenatal visits, her travel history—everything. That baby isn’t Cole’s.” I gripped the phone. “What?” “She was seeing a guy before her divorce was even finalized. She probably doesn’t even know who the father is herself. She actually had a private DNA test done—amniocentesis—and it’s a 0% match for Cole. I’m sending you the PDF right now. We can end this.” I closed my eyes. “Don’t tell anyone. Just send it to me.” Two hours later, I had the report in my inbox. I printed it out and tucked it into the very back of the divorce settlement. A little parting gift for the happy couple. I was leaving, but I wasn’t going quietly. I booked a flight to Vancouver for the following week. After our fight, Cole stopped coming home. He was likely waiting for me to cave, to play the “good wife” and beg for his return. I thought I could spend my final days in the city in peace. But two days before my flight, the world ended. I was leaving a department store with a few travel essentials when two men in masks grabbed me. Before I could scream, I was shoved into the back of a black van. As the darkness of a sedative started to take hold, I heard another voice screaming in the van. It was Beth. When I woke up, we were both tied to support beams in a crumbling warehouse. My wrists were raw from the hemp rope. The kidnappers were pacing, eyes darting between us. They called Cole. Twenty minutes later, the warehouse doors crashed open. Cole charged in, looking like a man possessed. “Let them go,” he rasped. “I’ll give you whatever you want.” The kidnapper laughed, playing with a switchblade. “We want money, obviously. But I know you’ve got plenty of that. I want to see how much they’re worth to you. Ten million into this account just to keep them breathing. And then… we play a game. You can only take one with you.” One. My fingers curled into my palms. Even now, after everything, I had to be measured against her. Cole’s eyes darted between us. When he looked at me, there was a flicker of shame, but it was instantly swallowed by the terror he felt for Beth. Beth started wailing, her voice shrill and broken. “Cole, please! I’m so scared… the baby… think about the baby!” That was it. That was the killing blow. Without a second of hesitation, Cole pointed at her. “I choose her. Let her go.” He looked at me then, his voice shaking as he spoke to the kidnapper. “Don’t hurt Donna. Give me an hour, I’ll get you another fifty million.” The kidnapper’s eyes lit up. “One hundred million. If it’s not in the account in three hours, your wife dies.” “Done. Just wait for me. Donna, don’t be afraid. I’m coming back for you. I promise.” He scooped Beth up and ran out the door, leaving me in the dark with the wolves. In his heart, I had never even been a contender. The heavy doors groaned shut. Time began to stretch into an agonizing crawl. The kidnappers grew impatient. One checked his phone and spat on the floor. “The bastard lied to us. The account is frozen.” Enraged, they began to take it out on me. A boot to the ribs. A fist to the jaw. “I can give you the money,” I whispered, my voice cracked. “Just let me go.” They didn’t believe me. They thought I was a stalling tactic. The beating continued until the world started to blur into a haze of grey. “He’s not coming back,” one of them muttered. “She’s useless now. Get rid of her like we planned.” They tied heavy iron weights to my ankles. I was dragged across the concrete, the sound of the ocean growing louder with every step. The water was ice. It shocked my system, making my lungs burn for air I couldn’t reach. I struggled, but it was futile. The weights pulled me down, down into the black. I hate you, Cole, I thought as the pressure crushed my chest. Two more days… I was two days away from being free. The light above the surface faded. My consciousness fractured.

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Twice in my life, I have been thrown out of my own home before the age of thirty. The second time was Kellan. He was my childhood best friend, the boy who spent ten years chasing me with a devotion that felt like a religion. After we married, he was the picture of the perfect husband—patient, attentive, and seemingly unbothered by the fact that my ex, Gideon, sent “tokens of regret” every anniversary. Even when three years passed without a positive pregnancy test, Kellan never whispered a word of blame. I remember the way he would press his lips against my ear in our most intimate moments, his voice a warm, honeyed lullaby: “If you don’t want kids, we won’t have them. As long as I have you, it’s enough.” But on the night of our third anniversary, the lullaby ended. He walked through the front door with a woman I didn’t recognize, and I watched from the hallway as the housekeeper dragged my suitcases out of the master suite like they were bags of trash. My fingers were white-knuckled around the pregnancy test I hadn’t yet found the courage to show him. My voice shook, brittle as glass. “Kellan, what is this?” He lit a cigarette, his eyes flashing with a mockery so sharp it felt like a physical blow. He looked at me as if I were the punchline to a joke only he understood. “Nina, stop. The ‘innocent wife’ act is getting old.” He exhaled a plume of smoke. “When Gideon Vane threw you out on the street, did you really learn nothing at all?” The first time I was evicted, it was from a penthouse overlooking Central Park. It was a marriage of convenience to Gideon, a titan of industry. I had gone to the clinic for a checkup, only to return early and find him in our bed with a college student. He didn’t offer an apology. Instead, he blamed my “lack of spirit” and had his security detail escort me to the curb. When I told my father, he didn’t offer a shoulder to cry on. He just sighed and said, “Men with that kind of money don’t settle for one flavor, Nina. Grow up.” Maybe it was spite. Maybe it was a desperate need to feel wanted. That was why I finally said yes to Kellan. I thought I was marrying safety. … 1 The pregnancy test in my palm felt like a live coal, burning through my skin. I looked at him, but I didn’t beg for an explanation. I didn’t have to. The woman’s smug expression and the slight, unmistakable swell of her stomach told the entire story. I reached for my purse, ready to vanish. Kellan crushed his cigarette into a crystal tray and stepped into my path, his face twisted with a dark, vengeful satisfaction. “You’ve been pining for Gideon for years, and I never said a word. You refused to give me a child because of him, and I took the hit,” he said, his voice rising with a terrifying sort of righteousness. “Now that I’ve found someone who can give me a family, you’re going to play the victim?” His lips curled into a smirk. “Look, we’ve known each other forever. You know how this world works. Keep your title, keep your status. You can be the Mrs. Mercer people see at the galas, and she’ll be the one who keeps my bed warm. It doesn’t have to change your position.” A familiar, dull ache throbbed in my chest. He wasn’t wrong about one thing—I’d been here before. I had experience. I didn’t waste words. I simply leaned forward and slapped him. Hard. “You disgust me, Kellan.” The room went silent, the staff frozen in the periphery. Kellan’s smile vanished, his features hardening into something unrecognizable. He grabbed my wrist, his grip bruising. “You think I’m disgusting? You’re a twice-married woman, Nina. What made you think I was going to stay celibate for a woman who gave her best years to another man?” My grip tightened on the plastic stick until it snapped. The jagged edge sliced into my palm. I didn’t feel the pain, but the tears escaped anyway. Kellan’s eyes flickered, a momentary lapse of resolve crossing his face. He softened his voice, a conditioned reflex. “Fine. I’ll make you a deal. Once the baby is born, I’ll send her away. Just… don’t walk out.” I looked at the face I had known since I was five years old. He was a stranger. He noticed the blood on my hand and frowned, reaching for my palm. “What is that?” I wrenched my hand away and tossed the broken pieces of the test into the trash can by the door. “It’s nothing,” I whispered, my voice sounding like it was coming from a great distance. “Just a piece of garbage that wasn’t wanted.” I was talking about the baby. And I was talking about myself. Kellan opened his mouth to speak, but a sharp cry from the woman behind him drew him away. She was clutching her stomach, slowly pulling off her silk face mask. My heart stopped. I knew that face. She was the girl from the penthouse. The “scholarship student” I had personally sponsored for years out of a sense of misplaced charity. Three years had passed, but Talia was still as fresh and radiant as a dewy morning. Gideon had once described her skin as “shaming the silk sheets.” He told me he couldn’t stop thinking about her, even when he was lying next to me. My grand gesture of walking away from Gideon to “set them free” had led her straight to my second husband. And she had managed to get pregnant first. Judging by her bump, this hadn’t started yesterday. I bit my lip until I tasted copper, stepping toward her. “Nina,” Talia said, her voice a sickly-sweet chirp. She grabbed my hand before I could react, her eyes wide with mock surprise. “I had no idea you’d come back to Chicago after the New York disaster. What a small world. We really do have the exact same taste in men, don’t we?” I didn’t answer with words. I swung my hand again. Crack. But the blow didn’t land on Talia. Kellan had stepped in front of her, taking the hit across his cheek. His expression went cold, a dangerous edge bleeding into his voice. “That’s enough, Nina! Two hits are all you get.” He shielded her with his body. “She’s fragile, and she’s carrying my heir. Don’t take your bitterness out on her. You remember how you ended up three years ago? Don’t make me do that to you.” A violent shudder went through me. Suddenly, I was back in that freezing New York alleyway. After I’d caught Gideon, he stopped pretending to be the gentleman. He had looked at me with pure indifference and asked, “A woman’s expiration date is three months in my world. You got a year. Why are you complaining?” To force me into submission, he had used every corporate weapon in his arsenal. He froze my accounts, seized my car, and had me dumped on the street like a stray dog in the middle of a blizzard. I remember the cold, the way the snow turned grey in the slush, and the terrifying weight of the men who had pinned me down in that alley. Then, Kellan had appeared like a miracle. He had fought them off, gathered me into his arms, and wept into my hair. “I’ve got you, Nina… I’ll protect you with my life.” How pathetic. Back then, Talia had knelt at my feet, promising to spend her life repaying my kindness. She chose to repay me in my husband’s bed. And Kellan, the man who promised to be my shield, was now the one holding the sword. The snow outside was light, but I felt colder than I ever had in New York. I wiped my eyes, grabbed my phone, and didn’t look back. I headed for the guest wing, just needing a bed to collapse into for one night before I disappeared. “Wait,” Talia called out. I turned to see her winding her arms around Kellan’s neck. “Didn’t you promise me we’d stay in the south-facing suite? You said the view from the window makes everything… more exciting.” She looked at me, a predatory glint in her eyes. Kellan gave a soft, dark chuckle. Holding my gaze, he scooped her up and carried her into our bedroom. My bedroom. The room with the skylight he’d installed because he wanted us to “sleep under the stars.” The room he’d later planned to convert into a nursery so our baby could be “woken by the sun.” Now, before my baby could even take its first breath, that sanctuary was becoming their nest. I closed my eyes, but I could already hear the echoes of what was to come—the same sounds I’d heard through Gideon’s door. The heavy breathing, the gasps, the betrayal. The sound of the bedroom door slamming shut was the final twist of the knife. I leaned against the hallway wall, my legs giving way. The silence of the house was deafening, broken only by the vibration of my phone. An unknown number. A text message: Nina, don’t you want to know the real reason Kellan ended up with Talia? Meet me at The Magnolia Lounge. 9:00 AM. I didn’t need to check the contact. It was Gideon Vane. The Magnolia Lounge was where we first met. It was where he’d approached me after I lost the bidding on my mother’s last estate painting, my eyes red from crying. The next day, he’d shown up at my father’s house with the painting in hand. For the next six months, the gifts never stopped. My father, seeing a golden goose, practically gift-wrapped me for him. I grew up in a world of artifice; I expected nothing from a tactical marriage. But Gideon had used letters—clumsy, handwritten notes—to crack my shell. When I fell overboard during a yacht gala, he had dived into the dark water without a second thought. I came out unscathed; his legs had been shredded by the reef. I thought I had found my soulmate. I was so certain of it that I brought Talia, my charity case, into our home to give her a better life. And they turned me into a pariah. Thinking about it didn’t hurt anymore. Even seeing Gideon again didn’t stir the old grief. He looked the same—sharp, handsome, perhaps a bit thinner. “There’s something you need to see,” he said as I sat down. He pushed his phone across the marble table. “What?” He hesitated, then swiped the screen. My blood turned to ice. The video was grainy, but unmistakable. It was Kellan, three years ago. He was leaning against his car in a New York alley, lighting a cigarette and handing a thick envelope of cash to a group of vagrants. My breath hitched. Gideon adjusted his glasses, his voice low and grim. “I’m a bastard, Nina. I know that. But Kellan? He’s a different kind of monster. I threw you out, yes. But the men who attacked you that night? The ones who ‘traumatized’ you so he could play the hero? He hired them.” The world tilted. “He wanted you broken,” Gideon continued. “He knew you’d never choose him while you were whole. So he destroyed you to make sure he was the only one left to pick up the pieces.” Flashes of that night surged back. The twisted faces. The laughter. The tearing pain in my abdomen—the loss of the pregnancy I hadn’t even known about yet. “Stop it!” I gasped, clutching the table. The air in the lounge felt too thin. I stared at Gideon, my teeth chattering. “And you? Why tell me this now? Just to prove you’re the ‘lesser’ of two evils? To show me that the man I ran to was worse than the man I ran from?” Tears blurred my vision. “You want to prove that I’ll never be happy without you. But you’re just like him. You all use me like a pawn.” Gideon was silent for a long moment. “I’m a prick, Nina. I cheated. I failed you. But I never planned to replace you. Not legally.” He leaned in, his eyes piercing. “Kellan has been taking Talia to the Mercer family estate. He’s introducing her as his future. And Nina…” He paused. “He filed for a quiet annulment weeks ago. He didn’t just throw you out of the house; he’s erased you from the marriage entirely. Come back to New York with me. Let me fix this.” The shock was so total I felt nothing. It was the white-out of peak agony. I opened my mouth to tell him to go to hell, but a hand suddenly clamped onto my shoulder, yanking me backward. “Gideon! You’ve got a hell of a nerve!” Kellan’s voice exploded in my ear. He was shaking with rage, his grip on my neck nearly choking me. “Is this how it is, Nina? You get your feelings hurt and run straight back to your old flame?” I didn’t fight him. I just stared at him with empty eyes. Gideon stood up, his face darkening. “Let her go, Kellan.” In an instant, a circle of security guards surrounded the table. Kellan laughed, a jagged, ugly sound. “You have no standing here, Vane. She’s my wife. You spent years sending her gifts, playing the pining ex. If you loved her so much, maybe you shouldn’t have been so busy screwing the help.” Gideon flinched, his fists curling. “Don’t get cocky. You’re making the same mistakes I did.” He turned to me. “Nina, when you’re ready, call me.” He walked away, his guards clearing a path. The air between me and Kellan was thick with unspoken venom. I walked to the car without a word, and he trailed behind me, his voice a low, frantic growl. “You aren’t going with him. You aren’t calling him. You’re done with him!” When I didn’t respond, he snapped. He grabbed my shoulders and began to shake me. “Answer me! Do you hear me?” “You’ve been through one divorce. You really want to be a two-time loser? Your father won’t take you back. No one wants a used-up socialite. I’m the only one who loves you, Nina. Just stay in your lane. Be my wife.” Love me? Is that what this was? Betrayal, manipulation, and hired violence? I started to laugh. A low, ragged sound that bubbled up from my chest. Kellan forced my head up, his eyes wide with frantic desperation. “What’s so funny?” I didn’t look at him. I just whispered, “Besides Talia… is there anything else you’re hiding?” Kellan went rigid. He turned his face toward the window, unable to meet my eyes. He didn’t confess, but his silence was a signed confession. My laughter grew louder, more hysterical. It tore through the cramped space of the car like a serrated blade. “Enough! Shut up!” Kellan lunged, trying to cover my mouth. The rage in my chest finally broke. I grabbed his hand and bit down, hard, until the metallic taste of blood filled my mouth. “You’re a goddamn animal, Kellan!” I spat. “You want to know who I love? I love Gideon. I regret every second I spent with you. At least he was an honest bastard. At least he didn’t kill my soul just to own it!” Kellan’s breath came in ragged hitches. His eyes turned a violent, bruised red. He pinned me against the seat, his hand tightening around my throat. “You think I don’t regret it?” he hissed. “I could have had any woman in this city, and I chose a broken, discarded toy. Gideon had the right idea—Talia is ten times the woman you are. She’s actually fun. She actually knows how to please a man.” The words felt like a physical weight on my lungs. I tried to speak, but he squeezed harder. “What? You like biting? Let’s see how much you like this.” The world began to dim. The last thing I saw was Kellan’s distorted, angry face before everything went black. … When I opened my eyes, I was back in the house. But I wasn’t in the guest room. I was in bed, and my wrist was shackled to the headboard by a heavy iron chain. Talia was sitting in a chair by the bed, smiling as she stirred a steaming cup of liquid. “Kellan said you’re a bit… hysterical. He wants you to take your medicine.” With Kellan gone, she dropped the act. She grabbed a handful of my hair and forced my head back. “I was good to you,” I rasped, my voice a broken thread. “Why would you do this?” Talia laughed, a sharp, jarring sound. “Why? Because you’re pathetic! You’re so desperate to be ‘good’ that you practically handed me your life on a silver platter. I hate people like you. Always looking down from your mountain of gold, offering ‘charity’ like we’re stray dogs. I didn’t want your help, Nina. I wanted your chair. And now I have it.” She forced the liquid into my mouth. It was bitter, stinging my throat. A few minutes later, a sharp, cramping pain bloomed in my lower abdomen. I curled into a ball, my fingers digging into the mattress. “What… what did you give me?” She smiled, a sweet, angelic expression. “Medicine.” “It’s an abortifacient. In ten minutes, your second chance at a family will be nothing but a mess on the sheets. You really aren’t meant to be a mother, are you?” Her laughter filled the room. I reached out, my eyes landing on a paring knife on the fruit plate nearby. With a burst of adrenaline, I lunged, the chain clattering as I pressed the blade against her throat. “Stop it!” Kellan burst into the room, his face pale. He didn’t look worried; he looked furious that I was still fighting. “You’re going to kill someone over Gideon? Is he really worth it?” “Kellan, help me! She’s crazy! She’s trying to kill the baby!” Talia wailed, clutching her stomach. “Don’t worry, honey. I’ve got you,” Kellan said, his voice dripping with a tenderness he’d never shown me. I wanted to scream. Their baby would be fine. But mine? I looked down. The white duvet was already blooming with a dark, horrific red. The knife felt heavy in my hand. Everything became a blur. Kellan disarmed me, throwing the knife aside. He looked at me, a flicker of confusion crossing his face. “Nina, where are you hurt?” “It’s just… her period,” Talia lied quickly. He hesitated, a flash of disappointment in his eyes. I watched him. I watched the man who had been my “protector” since I was thirteen years old. When I was thirteen, I fell off a swing. He had dove under me to break my fall, breaking three of his own ribs. I had cried, asking why he didn’t just move. He’d smiled through the pain and said, “If I moved, you would have gotten hurt. I never want you to feel a second of pain, Nina.” The boy who couldn’t bear to see me stub a toe was now the man watching me bleed out from his own betrayal. I dragged myself toward the edge of the bed, reaching for him one last time. Talia let out a staged scream. Kellan reacted instinctively. He grabbed the knife from the floor and turned. Pain is supposed to make you weak, but in that moment, it made me clear. I didn’t move. I let the blade sink into my shoulder. The world turned crimson. I saw Kellan’s pupils dilate, his face turning a ghostly white as he realized what he’d done. I reached up with my good hand, touching his cheek. My voice was a whisper. “Why the New York alley, Kellan?” “Why… why did you kill both of them?” Then, the darkness claimed me again.

🌟 Continue the story here 👉🏻 📲 Download the “MotoNovel” app 🔍 search for “446529”, and watch the full series ✨! #MotoNovel

The third year of Elena’s “graduate studies” in London had stretched the Atlantic into a vast, digital void. I had slowly grown accustomed to a relationship that lived entirely within the confines of a five-inch screen—a routine of pixelated kisses and time-zone math. That Tuesday, I was killing time at a high-end organic market in downtown Chicago, drifting through the aisles. On a whim, I snapped a photo of a gourmet display and sent it to her: “At the grocery store. Thinking of you. Everything reminds me of you today.” My phone buzzed almost instantly. “What a coincidence! I’m at a market too, wishing you were here. I miss you so much it hurts.” She followed it with a cute, pouting cat emoji. I felt that familiar, dull ache in my chest, a mixture of longing and affection that made me smile despite the distance. I started to move toward the snack aisle when a scene near the imported chocolates caught my eye. It was a picture-perfect family. The man was tall, strikingly handsome in a bespoke charcoal suit, leaning down to catch the hand of the woman beside him. She was radiant, holding the hand of a toddler who was waving a bag of organic fruit snacks and chirping “Daddy!” in a sweet, high-pitched voice. A pang of envy hit me. I looked away, offering a small, polite smile as I prepared to walk past them, unwilling to intrude on their private bubble of happiness. Then, the woman turned her head. The profile was unmistakable. The slope of her nose, the way her hair tucked behind her ear—it was Elena. My Elena. … My brain went white. The blood rushed to my head with such force I could hear the pulse thundering in my ears. Instinct took over before logic could even find its footing. By the time I realized what I was doing, I had already lunged forward. My fist connected squarely with the handsome man’s jaw. He wasn’t prepared for the impact. He stumbled back, a look of pure shock turning into immediate, searing rage. “What the hell is wrong with you?” he roared, wiping a smear of red from his lip. Without waiting for an answer, he threw himself at me. We became a blur of limbs and anger, crashing into a display of expensive olive oils. Elena’s scream pierced the air—a sharp, jagged sound. She threw herself between us, her hands clawing at my jacket, before her palm connected with my cheek in a stinging slap. “You psychopath!” she yelled, her voice trembling. “Who do you think you are? Why are you attacking my husband?” Then, she actually looked at me. The words died in her throat. The color drained from her face, leaving her ghost-pale under the fluorescent lights. “Elena,” I said, the name tasting like ash. I wiped a trickle of blood from the corner of my mouth and let out a short, hollow laugh. “Care to explain what you’re doing in Chicago?” My gaze dropped, landing on the subtle but unmistakable curve of her belly beneath her designer coat. “And whose child you’re carrying while you’re supposed to be across the ocean?” Panic flared in her eyes for a split second. The man, sensing the shift, pulled her protectively into his side. He looked down at her, his brow furrowed. “Babe? Who is this guy?” Elena’s expression shifted. The panic was stifled, replaced by a chilling, practiced composure. She looked me straight in the eye, her voice cold and steady. “I don’t know him. I… I might have seen him around, maybe? He’s clearly unstable.” She turned to her husband, her voice softening into a plea. “He’s just a crazy person, Greyson. Let’s just go.” I don’t know him? Less than sixty seconds ago, she was telling me she loved me via text. Now, she was standing five feet away, effectively erasing seven years of my life with a single sentence. The rage in my chest felt like it was going to burst my ribs. When did she get married? That child looked at least two years old. If he was her husband, what was I? A secret? A long-distance placeholder she kept for the ego boost while she lived a double life right under my nose? She hadn’t been in London. She had been here, in this city, building a home, raising a son, and getting pregnant again with another man’s child. The humiliation was a physical weight. I wanted to scream, to shake her, to demand the truth. My fists clenched until my knuckles turned white, but I forced myself to breathe. My father had raised me with a strict, perhaps outdated, code: you never lay a hand on a woman. I stepped closer, my voice a low, dangerous vibration. “Elena. Say it again. Look me in the eye and say you don’t know me.” She knit her brows, her face a mask of annoyed pity. “Sir,” she said, projecting her voice for the benefit of the gathering crowd. “Are you trying to harass me? I have no idea who you are or how you know my name. I am a married woman. My son is right here, and I am pregnant. Please stop this delusional behavior before my husband calls security.” I started to laugh. It was a dark, jagged sound. “Fine. Have it your way.” I turned and walked out of the store without looking back. Five minutes later, my phone buzzed in my pocket. “I’ll explain everything later. Please, Des, just trust me. Don’t do anything rash.” I didn’t reply. I blocked her number, deleted our entire message history, and wiped her from my digital life in three taps. I was about to power down the phone when a local “People of Chicago” video popped up on my feed. Normally, I’d swipe past, but a face caught my eye. The man from the grocery store. The ID was his name: Greyson Pierce. I clicked on the profile, and my heart sank into my stomach. It was a “lifestyle vlog” account. It went back three years. The most recent video was from this morning. A “Get Ready With Us” for preschool drop-off. It showed Elena holding the little boy’s hand, skipping toward a private school gate. Greyson’s voice came from behind the camera, warm and filled with pride. “Slow down, you two! Mommy’s got a passenger on board, remember?” The caption read: “Finally sending the monster to school. Time for some 1-on-1 time with my beautiful wife!” The comments were nauseating. “Greyson is such a girl-dad in the making.” “Elena is so lucky.” My eyes burned. I felt like an idiot. I had seen this account before—it was popular in the city’s socialite circles. How had I never realized the “mysterious, private wife” was the woman I was sending “goodnight” texts to every evening? I scrolled down. Three months ago. A video of Elena’s slender hand feeding a grape to Greyson. The caption: “She heard me say I missed the grapes from that specific vineyard in Bordeaux. She literally walked out of a high-level board meeting and flew to France just to bring me some. She lost a million-dollar deal, but she said my smile was worth more.” I looked at the date: June 25th, 2024. The memory hit me like a physical blow. That was the day I had been rushed to the ER with acute gastritis. My fever had hit 103. In my delirium, I had called Elena, begging her to come home, telling her I just needed her to hold my hand. She had sounded so stressed on the phone. “Des, I’m so sorry. I’m in the middle of a seminar in London. I can’t just leave. It’s impossible.” She had Venmo’d me a hundred dollars. “Get a friend to take you to the hospital, okay? Order some soup. Rest for me.” I had been so touched by her “concern,” so guilty for “distracting” her from her studies. Now, looking at the video, I realized she hadn’t lied about being in France. She just wasn’t there for school. She was there to hand-deliver grapes to her husband while I was vomiting blood in a Chicago hospital room thirty minutes from her house. I scrolled more. A video of her in a silk apron, cooking dinner. Greyson’s caption: “She hates takeout. No matter how late she works, she always makes sure there’s a home-cooked meal waiting for us. I love you, baby.” I laughed, a dry, sobbing sound. It wasn’t that she cared about “health.” It was just that my health hadn’t been worth the effort of a home-cooked meal. Then, a photo of Greyson in the mirror, wearing a sharp navy tie. Caption: “My wife insists on tying my tie every morning. She says it’s her favorite ritual.” My breath hitched. I remembered my college graduation. I was struggling with my first real silk tie in front of a cracked mirror. Elena had leaned over my shoulder, her chin resting on my collarbone. “Desmond,” she had whispered. “Once I learn how to do this perfectly, I’m going to do it for you every single day.” I had kissed her forehead. “I’ll never let anyone else touch my ties but you.” She had learned. She had become an expert. She just gave that “special ritual” to someone else. Finally, I reached the very first video. It was a shot of two hands, intertwined, showcasing matching platinum wedding bands. The caption: “Mrs. Pierce, you look stunning today.” The date was the exact day Elena supposedly flew to London to start her program. During those hours she was “in flight” and unable to text, I had sent her two messages: “Stay safe over there, El. I’m already counting the days.” “When you get back, let’s finally get married.” While I was planning our wedding, she was walking down the aisle with Greyson Pierce. I clicked the phone off. I sat in the dark of my apartment for a long time, just breathing. Three years. The last three years had been a curated, high-definition joke at my expense. I went to my bedroom and fell into a heavy, dreamless sleep. Sometime later—hours, maybe—a frantic pounding on my door startled me awake. I stumbled to the entrance, bleary-eyed. When I opened it, Elena was standing there. My face went cold. I tried to slam the door, but she shoved her arm into the gap. I didn’t care; I kept pushing. “Ow! Des, stop! You’re hurting me!” she cried, her eyes welling with tears. “Get your arm out of the way, Elena, or I’ll break it,” I said, my voice devoid of emotion. “Please,” she begged, refusing to move. “Just let me explain. Please.” “Explain what?” I sneered. “Explain the logistics of how you managed to sleep with two men in the same city for three years? Explain how you’re carrying his ‘wild seed’ while I was waiting like a dog for you to come home from a London that didn’t exist? Or should we talk about how you’re a Mrs. Pierce now? Congratulations, by the way. Sorry I missed the wedding.” She looked frantic. “No! It’s not like that! Des, we never broke up! I never wanted to leave you!” She grabbed my forearm, her tears spilling over. “I didn’t have a choice! The Pierce family… they’re powerful. My father’s company was failing. It was an arranged marriage, a business merger. I was the only daughter. I had to do it!” I nodded slowly. “And that’s your excuse? My family isn’t exactly poor, Elena. Why didn’t you tell me? Why didn’t you think for one second that my family could have helped yours? That we could have been the ones to merge?” I found myself shouting. Even now, in the middle of this betrayal, I was angry that she hadn’t chosen me to save her. It was a pathetic realization. “Elena,” I said, my voice dripping with loathing. “If you made your choice—to marry him, to have his children—why keep me on a leash? What was the end game? Were you going to wait until I found out? Or were you planning to keep me as your little side-piece forever?” “No!” she cried. “I never wanted you to be in the shadows! Des…” she closed her eyes, a look of twisted pragmatism crossing her face. “Don’t be naive. Real mergers happen between the top one percent. We are old money, Des. You’re… different. My parents told me to endure it for three years. Give the Pierces an heir, solidify the assets, and then I could get a divorce. Once I had the settlement, I could come back to you. It would have been so much easier then!” I stared at her, wondering if I had ever actually known this person. I started to laugh. “What did you just say?” “You think I’d want you as a second-hand wife? After you spent three years in another man’s bed?” I didn’t wait for an answer. I shoved her back and slammed the door. She stayed in the hallway for a long time. Finally, I heard her muffled voice through the wood. “I know you still love me, Des. You’re just hurt. You’ll wait for me. I’ll make this right.” She didn’t make it right. The next person to show up wasn’t Elena. It was Greyson Pierce. It happened during our Q4 strategy meeting. I was at the front of the conference room, presenting a proposal for a new tech acquisition, when the double doors were kicked open. They hit the walls with a boom that silenced the room. Greyson walked in, his hands in his pockets, looking like a man who owned the world. He was followed by four large men in suits—security, or perhaps something more private. He walked straight up to the podium, stopping inches from my face. With a slight nod from him, his guards moved. Before I could even react, they had me pinned, forcing me to my knees on the carpet. The room erupted in gasps. Greyson smirked and tossed a phone onto the table in front of me. “Desmond Whittaker, right?” he said, his voice a calm, dangerous purr. “You’ve got a lot of things to say, apparently. Why don’t you tell everyone here about your relationship with my wife?” I gritted my teeth, looking at the screen. The messages were gone—she had wiped them. The only thing left was the Venmo record from the day I had gastritis. A hundred dollars. “Are you a high-priced escort, or just a pathetic charity case she keeps on the side?” Greyson asked, his eyes burning with a mix of triumph and fury. “My wife is young. She gets bored. She made a mistake with a nobody like you, and I can overlook that. But you? You’re a snack she had while she was waiting for dinner. You don’t get to exist in my world.” I looked up at him and smiled. “Are you done?” Greyson blinked, clearly taken aback by my lack of fear. He let out a sharp, angry laugh. “You’ve got a thick skin. I’ll give you that.” One of my senior VPs stood up. “What is the meaning of this? Let Mr. Whittaker go immediately!” Greyson didn’t even turn his head. “Maybe you should Google who I am before you open your mouth. I’m handling a private matter with a parasite. Sit down.” Then, he punched me. Hard. Right in the gut. I groaned, the metallic taste of blood filling my mouth. But the pain cleared the fog. I had had enough. With a surge of adrenaline, I wrenched my arms free from the guards—I’ve spent five mornings a week in a boxing gym for years; they weren’t expecting me to actually know how to fight. I lunged upward, catching Greyson with a hook that sent him reeling back into the mahogany table. “You actually hit me?” Greyson roared, clutching his jaw. “I’m just getting started,” I said, my voice cold. I looked at him with genuine pity. “Elena? She’s a piece of trash I’m done with. You want her? Keep her. She’s all yours.” “But don’t you dare come in here acting like the victim,” I continued, stepping toward him. “You’re the one who should be embarrassed, Pierce. Because you’re the interloper. You’re the one who walked into a seven-year relationship and thought you bought something new.” Greyson’s face darkened. “What are you talking about?” I wiped the blood from my lip. “It seems Elena hasn’t been honest with you about the timeline. Here, why don’t you see for yourself how long we’ve been—” Before I could pull out my backup phone, a hand snatched it from my grasp. Smash. The phone was hurled against the floor, shattering into a thousand pieces of glass and silicon. I looked up, stunned. Elena was standing there. She looked horrified, her eyes darting between us. She spoke quickly, her voice sharp and frantic. “What are you doing hitting my husband? Desmond, who do you think you are?” I looked at her, and the last shred of affection I had for her finally died. She was still playing the game. She was protecting her meal ticket, and she was arrogant enough to think I’d just play along and take the fall. Greyson looked at her, his expression wounded. “Elena… who is he? You told me you didn’t know him. Why is there a money transfer? Why did he say you were together?” “It’s nothing,” Elena said, her voice turning sweet as she stroked his arm. Her smile was perfectly composed. “I just remembered. He was a student I used to sponsor. A charity case from years ago.” She turned to me, her eyes like ice. “Desmond, I tried to help you when you had nothing. Is this how you repay me? I gave you money because I felt sorry for your family’s situation. I didn’t realize you’d grow some deluded obsession with me. You’re a social climber, nothing more. Did you really think a girl like me—a Sterling-Rossi heiress—would ever actually look at someone like you? You’re a cockroach.” One of my executives stood up, looking baffled. “What? Sponsored? What the hell are you talking about?” “Exactly,” another joined in. “Who do you people think you are, coming in here like a mob and talking this nonsense?” Elena frowned. She didn’t understand why they weren’t instantly believing her. She expected them to see a “nobody” being crushed by a socialite. She didn’t realize that in this room, she was the one out of her depth. Before she could say another word, a deep, booming voice echoed from the doorway. “Well, this is fascinating. I’d very much like to meet the woman who claims to be ‘sponsoring’ the son of Charles Whittaker, the sole heir to the Whittaker Global empire.”

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The familiar voice drifted through the speakers of my quiet floral studio, cutting through the late-night relationship podcast I had playing in the background. It was Corinne. The woman I had loved for eight years. The woman who hadn’t spoken to me in ten days. “My boyfriend and I have been together since high school,” her voice crackled over the airwaves, heavy with an exhaustion that felt performative. “Back then, he saved me from a terrible situation. His right hand was shattered by a baseball bat. He could never paint again.” My breath caught in my throat. “I swore I would take care of him for the rest of my life,” she continued, her voice trembling just enough to sound sympathetic. “But I’m drowning. I can’t hold on anymore.” “He’s become so volatile, so sensitive,” she paused, letting the silence stretch. “Then, a new intern started at my firm. He’s an artist, too. And looking at his hands—his perfectly whole, unblemished hands—it was like taking my first real breath in years.” She let out a ragged sigh. “I don’t want to look at that ruined hand anymore. I can’t stomach the guilt.” The podcast host offered a gentle, practiced murmur of sympathy. “Guilt is not romance, sweetie. Letting go is the kindest thing you can do for both of you.” “If his presence has become a tax on your happiness, buy out the debt. Settle the score of what he did for you financially, and walk away.” The host had barely finished her sentence when my phone lit up on the counter. An email notification from my bank. A wire transfer from Corinne. Five hundred thousand dollars. The attached memo read: Wesley, this is enough to cover your medical bills and a fresh start somewhere else. Let’s stop torturing each other. Let me go. 1 I accepted the money. I typed out a single word in response: Done. Tossing the phone aside, I looked down at my right hand. A thick, angry scar snaked from the base of my wrist up to my knuckles, a jagged fault line that ached with a needle-like intensity whenever the Seattle air turned damp and cold. This hand had been useless for eight years. And for eight years, it had been Corinne’s prison. Now, she had purchased her parole for half a million dollars. The next morning, I took the train downtown to her firm to return the keys to her penthouse. When I pushed open the heavy glass door to her corner office, she wasn’t there. Tristan was. The intern. The one who made her feel alive. He was sitting in Corinne’s leather executive chair, casually flipping through a stack of contracts. At the sound of the door, he glanced up, a slow, easy smile spreading across his face. “Hey, Wesley. Looking for Corinne? She’s in a board meeting.” I didn’t look at him. I walked straight to the mahogany desk and dropped the keyring squarely in the center. I turned on my heel to leave, but Tristan’s voice stopped me. “Wesley, wait. Corinne was in a terrible mood last night. Her stress ulcers are acting up again. Could you maybe—” “I’m not her father,” I cut him off, my voice flat. Tristan’s smile slipped for a fraction of a second before he recovered, his expression smoothing into a mask of polite concern. He picked up a ceramic mug from the desk. “My apologies. It’s not my place. Hey, don’t leave mad. Have some coffee. I just ground the beans myself.” He took a step toward me. Then, suddenly, the toe of his expensive loafer caught on the edge of the plush rug. He pitched forward. The entire mug of scalding, freshly brewed coffee splashed directly onto my ruined right hand. The pain was instantaneous and absolute. I sucked in a sharp, hissing breath, instinctively jerking my arm back as the heat seared into my nerve-damaged skin. But before I could make a sound, Tristan screamed. He screamed as if he were the one who had just been doused in boiling water. A few stray drops had landed on his wrist, leaving a faint pink bloom on his pristine skin. The office door flew open. Corinne rushed in, her heels clicking frantically against the hardwood. She didn’t even glance in my direction. She made a beeline straight for Tristan, her manicured hands hovering anxiously over his arm. “Where did it hit you? Let me see. Is it bad?” Tristan’s eyes welled with perfectly timed tears. He shook his head bravely. “I’m fine, Corinne. Really. It was my fault. I tripped and spilled it all over Wesley.” Only then did Corinne turn to look at me. Her eyes dropped to my right hand, which was already turning a furious, blistering red. But her brow furrowed not with worry, but with a deep, weary irritation. “Wesley, what has gotten into you?” she demanded, her tone dropping in temperature. “Tristan is just an intern. Whatever anger you have toward me, take it out on me. Why do you have to bully a kid?” The words hit me harder than the boiling water. I stood there, watching her physically shield Tristan with her body. Behind her shoulder, I caught Tristan staring at me, a microscopic smirk playing on his lips. I couldn’t speak. The air had been sucked out of the room. I reached past them, picked up the keys I had just dropped, and shoved them into my coat pocket. Corinne’s eyes narrowed. “What are you doing now? Are you seriously trying to threaten me with the keys?” “No,” I finally rasped, my throat feeling like it was lined with sandpaper. “I just realized there’s no point in leaving them here.” “You’ve obviously already changed the locks.” I turned and walked out. From down the hall, I heard her voice, tight with repressed fury: “Wesley! Are you ever going to stop making a scene?!” I didn’t look back. I just kept walking, putting one foot in front of the other until I was out of that suffocating glass tower. Outside, the midday sun was blinding. My hand was on fire, a throbbing, blistering reminder of what a colossal fool I was. Eight years ago, when this hand took the brunt of a metal bat meant for her skull, she had held my bleeding fingers to her chest and sobbed, swearing she would spend the rest of her life protecting me. Eight years later, my hand was scalded in front of her, and she demanded to know why I was so narrow-minded. I made it back to my floral studio. The heavy scent of eucalyptus, damp earth, and crushed petals wrapped around me. This was how I survived. This was my sanctuary. I pulled an ice pack from the floral cooler and pressed it against my blistering skin. The physical sting dulled slightly, but the burning in my chest only grew more suffocating. My phone vibrated against the counter. It was Corinne’s younger sister. “Hey, Wesley. Did my sister do something stupid again? You know she’s emotionally stunted. Don’t take it to heart.” 2 Bridget’s voice was, as always, a burst of bright, chaotic energy. Throughout this entire agonizing decline of our relationship, she was the only one who had remained fiercely in my corner. “It’s nothing,” I lied softly. “Don’t give me that. She just called me, demanding I talk you off the ledge. She said… she said that guy Tristan burned his wrist and his skin is peeling, and that you were way out of line.” My stomach plummeted. Peeling? I looked down at the massive, fluid-filled blisters rising on my own scarred knuckles, and a bitter laugh clawed its way up my throat. “Wesley, who exactly is this Tristan guy?” Bridget asked, her tone shifting to suspicion. “She’s been bringing him up constantly.” “Just an intern at her firm.” “Just an intern? Bullshit. You know my sister. She is practically allergic to people, especially men. Since when does she care this much about anyone who isn’t you?” Since when, indeed. In high school, Corinne had been the brilliant, socially awkward girl the entire school treated like a pariah. I was the golden-boy artist, the only one who didn’t care what people thought. I pulled her out of the dark, vicious currents of high school bullying and anchored her. She had relied on me with a desperation that bordered on the pathological. When did it change? Probably right around the time she built her empire, while I remained the crippled guy tending to wilting flowers in a dusty shop. “Bridget,” I said quietly, the words tasting like ash. “Corinne and I are done.” Dead silence on the other end of the line. When Bridget finally spoke, her voice cracked. “Wesley, don’t say that. Don’t scare me. It’s been eight years. You guys don’t just end.” “She ended it.” “No! That’s impossible! She loves you. She would never throw you away!” Bridget was crying now, the sound high and panicked. I didn’t have the strength to comfort her. “I’m exhausted, Bridge. I need to go.” I hung up. I slid down the wall until I was sitting on the floor in the back corner of the shop, utterly still. Beyond the glass windows, the city moved in a blur of headlights and rushing pedestrians. It was a massive city, but there was no room in it for me anymore. Back then, I had turned down a full ride to RISD to follow her here. My art teacher had wept, furious, telling me I was throwing away a generational talent for a teenage romance. I hadn’t regretted it. Because Corinne had gotten into Columbia, her dream school, and she had looked at me with those wide, desperate eyes and promised we would build a life together. I believed her. I used the hand that could no longer hold a paintbrush to learn how to arrange stems, prune thorns, and keep things alive. I built this shop. I thought we were going to walk quietly side-by-side into old age. I thought. That was my fatal mistake. Around dusk, the brass bell above the door chimed. Assuming it was a late customer, I didn’t look up from the counter. “Wesley.” Corinne’s voice. Every muscle in my back locked, but I didn’t turn around. She walked around the counter and crouched down, forcing her way into my line of sight. “Does your hand still hurt?” she asked, a trace of exhaustion threading through her words. I said nothing. She reached out, intending to touch my injured hand. I flinched, jerking it back so violently I knocked over a spool of ribbon. Her hand hovered in the empty air between us, painfully awkward. “I had security pull the footage this afternoon,” she murmured, looking down. “I was wrong. Tristan tripped on his own.” “The camera outside your office has been broken for three years,” I said, my voice eerily calm. Corinne froze. She had insisted on disabling that camera years ago for her own privacy. She hadn’t checked any footage. She was fishing. If I had played along—if I had vented my grievances and complained about how unfair it was—she would have offered a hollow apology. And just like the hundreds of fights before, the incident would have been swept under the rug of our shared history. But this time, I didn’t play the game. Corinne’s expression hardened. “Do you have to be like this, Wesley?” “Like what?” “So uncompromising. So obsessed with being right!” A hollow, broken laugh escaped my lips. “Corinne, who exactly is being uncompromising here?” I stared dead into her eyes. “After eight years, is this really how little you think of me?” 3 She went entirely silent. It was a suffocating, heavy silence—one that cut deeper than any insult she could have hurled at me. Slowly, she stood up. She reached into her designer trench coat, pulled out a small silver tube, and placed it on the counter next to me. “It’s a prescription burn cream from Switzerland. Make sure you apply it twice a day.” Just like that, the mask was back on. The untouchable, pragmatic CEO. She was the benevolent benefactor bestowing grace upon the pathetic, needy dependent. “Also,” she paused, not meeting my eyes. “That money is yours. You earned it. Go… build a good life for yourself.” She turned and walked toward the door. No hesitation. No backward glance. I stared at her retreating silhouette. That back had once been the only thing I needed to feel safe in the world. Now, she was just the knife twisting in my ribs. I grabbed the tube of expensive ointment and threw it at her with every ounce of strength I had left. It hit her squarely between the shoulder blades and clattered loudly onto the hardwood floor. She stopped walking. But she didn’t turn around. The door opened, the bell chimed, and she was gone. I was left completely alone in a room full of dying flowers. For the next few days, Corinne didn’t reappear. The rhythm of my life resumed its hollow ticking. I opened the shop, arranged bouquets for strangers, and locked up. But the throbbing burns on my right hand were a constant, pulsing reminder that the ground beneath me had vanished. Then, the envelope arrived. Heavy, matte black cardstock. Inside was an invitation to a gallery opening. Tristan Matthew. Solo Exhibition. The venue was the most prestigious contemporary arts center in the city. The sponsor listed at the bottom? Corinne CorWes Media. It felt as though a giant, invisible hand had reached into my chest and squeezed my heart until it bruised. Tristan was an artist. Corinne had said that seeing his perfectly intact hands made her feel alive. What was she doing? Was this a victory lap? Was she rubbing my nose in the fact that she had found a flawless replacement? A man who could be everything I was supposed to be, but without the baggage and the trauma? I crumpled the thick cardstock and pitched it into the trash. But on the night of the exhibition, like a man walking to his own execution, I went anyway. Without an RSVP, the security guards barred me at the door. I stood outside in the freezing rain, peering through the massive floor-to-ceiling glass walls. Inside, Tristan was bathed in warm, golden light, wearing a custom-tailored suit, laughing as the city’s elite fawned over him. And standing right by his side, draped in a stunning silk gown, was Corinne. She looked at him with a gentle, glowing pride I hadn’t seen directed at me in half a decade. Standing there in my damp coat, I felt like an absolute clown. A voyeur pressing his nose against the glass of someone else’s perfect life. I turned up my collar and prepared to walk away. That was when I saw it. Hung in the dead center of the main gallery space was the exhibition’s centerpiece. The placard read: Shattered. It was a painting of a young boy curled into a tight, defensive ball in a dark corner, surrounded by a galaxy of jagged, broken stars raining down on him. The composition. The linework. The raw, bleeding emotion of it. I stopped breathing. The world tilted violently on its axis. That was my painting. It was the final piece I had ever drawn. Eight years ago, right after the doctors told me I would never regain fine motor control, I had locked myself in a room and drawn it in a fugue state of pure, unadulterated agony. Because my hand shook so violently, I had only managed to finish the sketch before my muscles gave out. That sketchbook was locked inside a safe in my old studio apartment. Only one person beside me knew the combination. Corinne. She had stolen my grief. She had taken the most agonizing, humiliating moment of my existence, gift-wrapped it, and handed it to her new lover to build his career on. Blood roared in my ears. I couldn’t see straight. I shoved past the velvet ropes, tearing my arm away from the security guard, and burst through the heavy glass doors. “Corinne!” My voice ripped through the elegant hum of the room. The string quartet stumbled to a halt. Dozens of faces turned toward me in shock. Corinne and Tristan spun around. The moment Corinne saw me, her face contorted into a mask of pure fury. She marched toward me, her heels striking the marble floor like gunfire. “Wesley, what the hell is wrong with you?” 4 She kept her voice in a vicious whisper, the disgust in her eyes entirely unfiltered. I pointed a shaking finger toward the center canvas. “That painting. Why is it here?” Corinne glanced over her shoulder at it, her expression entirely blank. “That is Tristan’s work.” “His work?” A hysterical, jagged laugh tore out of my throat. “Are you going to look me in the eye and tell me you’ve never seen that sketch?” Corinne’s pupils contracted sharply. “You’re a monster, Corinne!” I screamed, the sound raw and tearing. “Wesley, stop it!” She grabbed my arm, her nails digging into my jacket. “We are in public. Stop acting insane!” “I’m acting insane?!” I stared at her, hot tears finally spilling over my lashes. “You stole my work! You stole my grief and handed it to the man you’re sleeping with, and you have the audacity to call me insane?” The crowd had formed a tight, whispering circle around us. Tristan hurried over, wrapping a protective arm around Corinne’s waist. He looked at me with wide, Bambi-like innocence. “Wesley, man, I think you’re confused,” he said softly, playing to the audience. “This is a completely original piece. Corinne just… provided me with some conceptual inspiration.” “Inspiration?” I sneered. “You colored in my linework like a toddler with a coloring book and you call it inspiration?” “I don’t know anything about any linework,” Tristan whispered, shrinking slightly behind Corinne. “Corinne, he’s scaring me…” Corinne moved instinctively, shielding him behind her back, glaring at me as if I were a rabid dog that needed to be put down. “That is enough. If you don’t leave right now, Wesley, I will have you physically removed.” Security guards. Always security. In her world, I was just a mess that needed to be cleaned up and thrown out. “Okay,” I nodded slowly, wiping the tears from my face with the back of my ruined hand. “Okay. Remember this night, Corinne.” I looked at her—really looked at her—one last time. Then I turned and dragged myself toward the exit. The murmurs followed me out like a swarm of hornets. “Who was that guy? He looked deranged.” “I heard it’s her ex. He’s crippled, apparently. Has serious mental issues.” “God, no wonder she left him for Tristan. Who could deal with that kind of psycho?” Every word was a blade slipping neatly between my ribs. So that was the narrative. I was the unhinged, disabled burden. And Corinne was the tragic heroine who had finally escaped my toxicity. I made it back to the floral shop and locked myself in the storage closet. It was dark and smelled heavily of dust and dried lavender. I dug through a cardboard box at the very bottom of a stack, pulling out an old, weathered Moleskine sketchbook. Inside was the ghost of who I used to be. Charcoal portraits of Corinne studying. Pen-and-ink landscapes of places we promised we’d visit. And on the very last page, the original, trembling graphite sketch of Shattered. It was rough, the lines jagged from my shaking hand, but it pulsed with a desperate, screaming life. Now, it was just a stepping stone for someone else’s vanity. I pulled my knees to my chest, curling up on the dusty floor in the exact same posture as the boy in the drawing. Only this time, I knew no one was coming to pull me out of the dark. For the next few days, my body simply gave out. A brutal fever took hold, leaving me drifting in and out of a delirious haze. The fresh coffee burns on my hand became aggressively infected, aggravating the old nerve damage until the pain was a blinding, white-hot static in my brain. To manage the chronic nerve pain, I required a highly restricted synthetic opioid. Sweating and shaking, I crawled across the floor to my medical drawer. The amber bottle was empty. I distinctly remembered filling a new bottle just a few days ago. I tore the shop apart with my one good hand, knocking over vases and scattering dirt across the floor, but it was nowhere. A cold panic seized my chest. Without the medication, the withdrawal and the nerve pain combined would quite literally send my body into shock. It felt like someone was taking a sledgehammer to the bones in my arm, over and over again. Trembling so violently I could barely hold the phone, I dialed Corinne’s number. She was the only one who knew about my condition. She was the one who pulled strings with private doctors to get me the prescription in the first place. The phone rang endlessly. Finally, a sharp click. “What?” Corinne’s voice was clipped, intensely annoyed. “Corinne, I…” I gasped, my teeth chattering from the pain. “I’m out of my medication. Can you… please, can you bring me some?” “Out again?” she scoffed, the suspicion dripping from every syllable. “Wesley, are you seriously trying to play this game right now?” “I’m not… Corinne, please, I’m dying…” I curled into a tight ball on the floor, my clothes soaked in a cold sweat. The agony in my right arm was escalating, threatening to pull me entirely under. “The boy who cried wolf. Are you ever going to get tired of this act?” Her voice was devoid of an ounce of humanity. “I am incredibly busy. Tristan’s national tour is launching, and I do not have the time to entertain your pathetic tantrums.” Click. The line went dead. Listening to the dial tone, a strange, hollow peace washed over me. I let out a weak, rattling laugh. Maybe dying wasn’t so bad. Corinne. In the next life, I hope to God I never meet you.

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I’ve always had a knack for playing the fool. People tend to think my gears turn a little slower than the rest of the world, and I’ve learned to use that to my advantage. I remember when I was a kid, my grandmother used to call me a “bad investment,” a drain on the family coffers just because I wasn’t a boy. In a fit of petty genius, I took every cent of my college fund and blew it on the most expensive premium life insurance policy I could find. If I was going to be an investment, I was going to be a protected one. In high school, the “it” girls called me a “try-hard.” I took it as a compliment, thanked them with a wide, vacant smile, and proceeded to try even harder until their annoyance turned into genuine confusion. But the real test came after the wedding. My husband, Alex, had this “childhood best friend,” Penny. They were inseparable, the kind of bond that usually spells disaster for a new wife. On our wedding night, amidst the clinking of crystal and the scent of expensive lilies, she leaned in during a toast and smirked. “You’re a lucky woman, Maggie,” she whispered, loud enough for the surrounding tables to hear. “Alex is… well, he’s quite a force in the bedroom. I remember one weekend in Cabo where he kept me pinned to the mattress so long I couldn’t walk for three days.” The table went dead silent. Everyone was leaning in, waiting for me to shatter, to cry, or to cause a scene that would be the talk of the Hamptons for a decade. I didn’t blink. I just looked at her with wide, innocent eyes, tilted my head, and said, “Oh, Penny, you’re such a kidder. You must have been faking it. I mean… he’s practically a miniature.” … The air in the ballroom turned to ice. Someone at the next table let out a jagged, involuntary snort. “Alex, man,” a voice called out, laced with suppressed laughter. “That’s your wife talking. If she’s saying you’re coming up short, then we’ve all been lied to.” Men are fragile creatures, especially when it comes to their stature—in every sense of the word. Alex’s face didn’t just drop; it fossilized. He glared at me, his eyes dark with a mix of humiliation and burgeoning rage. Before he could snap, Penny beat him to it. She let out a high-pitched, fluttering laugh, pressing a hand to her chest as if scandalized. “Maggie! Oh my god, are you actually offended?” She winked at the guests, playing the role of the misunderstood truth-teller. “I was just trying to liven up the party with a little joke. I had no idea you were so… sensitive. I mean, saying something like that in front of everyone? Did you even think about Alex’s reputation?” Alex’s jaw tightened. His skin was turning a worrying shade of purple. Penny, the architect of this little disaster, looked at me with a triumphant, sharp-edged grin. I stared at her for a long beat, letting the silence stretch until it was uncomfortable. Oh, I thought. So that’s how we’re playing it? Jokes as daggers? Fine. I can play. I ignored Penny’s frantic twittering and reached out, grabbing Alex’s arm just as he was about to boil over. I looked up at him, my lower lip trembling slightly, channeling every ounce of “dim-witted victim” I possessed. “Alex, I’m so sorry. I’m just… I’m traditional, you know? We agreed to wait until tonight, so how could I possibly know your… dimensions?” I turned my gaze back to Penny, looking hurt and confused. “Penny told me all those things in private. I thought it was just ‘girl talk.’ She’s your oldest friend, Alex. She said you guys shared everything. I thought if she was comfortable joking about your body, then you were too.” I let a single, perfect tear well up in my eye. “I’m so sorry, honey. I didn’t mean to embarrass you. I just thought… if she knew, it wasn’t a secret.” Penny’s smirk vanished. Her mouth hung open, a fly-catching vacuum of disbelief. She started to stammer an explanation, but I didn’t give her the floor. I shrank back behind Alex, as if terrified of her reaction. “Penny, please don’t be mad! I didn’t mean anything by it. Like you said, it’s just a joke to keep things lively! You love Alex like a brother, right? Even after you told me about the time he got so drunk he ate the dog’s dinner, or how he fell into that septic tank at the country club and swallowed half the…” The ballroom fell into a silence so profound you could hear the ice melting in the bourbon glasses. Everyone was staring at Alex now, but the pity had been replaced by a grotesque curiosity. Alex had been a hyperactive, disaster-prone child, and as an adult, his ego was made of glass. He spent millions on PR to craft an image of “Old Money Sophistication.” Mentioning his childhood humiliations was the quickest way to end up on his permanent blacklist. I caught myself and slapped a hand over my mouth, looking horrified. “Oh no… did I say too much again? Alex, I’m so sorry! Everyone says I’m missing a filter. Penny, you won’t be mad at me, right? You’re the one who told me all this!” Penny’s carefully manicured face began to contort. She was vibrating with fury. “Maggie Langford, you lying bitch! I never said any of that!” she screamed, her voice cracking. The more she shrieked, the more I wanted to humiliate her. This was fun. Maybe I should get out more; personal growth really is invigorating. When it became clear I wasn’t going to engage in her shouting match, Penny turned to Alex, clutching his sleeve, her eyes brimming with calculated tears. “Alex, I didn’t! She’s making it all up! We grew up together, you know I’d never betray your privacy like that—” Alex didn’t even look at her. He ripped his arm away with such force she nearly fell over. “Shut up,” he hissed, his voice low and dangerous. “Who else would know those stories, Penny? My mother and you. That’s it.” He straightened his tuxedo jacket, his face a mask of cold fury. “If your mouth is this loose, I’m going to have to seriously reconsider the merger with your father’s firm.” Penny turned pale. “No! Alex, please! She’s manipulative, she’s trying to drive a wedge between us, I—” Alex didn’t wait for her to finish. He swung his hand, the crack of his palm against her cheek echoing through the hall. “Enough. Remember who she is. She’s my wife. If you ever disrespect her again, I will erase your family from this city’s social register.” The party was effectively over. Alex turned to storm out, but he didn’t make it three steps before he crumpled, hitting the marble floor like a sack of stones. Chaos erupted. Penny, ever the opportunist, threw herself onto his unconscious body, wailing like she was at a Victorian funeral. “Alex! Wake up! Please don’t leave me!” The guests backed away, terrified of being associated with a medical emergency or a scandal. I stood there, watching the theatricality of it all with a clinical sort of interest. Once I’d had my fill, I calmly pulled out my phone and dialed 911. By the time the paramedics arrived, Alex’s pulse was a ghost. … He was in surgery for fourteen hours. When the doctor finally emerged, he looked exhausted. “The patient has a severe, underlying cardiac arrhythmia,” the surgeon explained, pulling off his mask. “Strong emotional shocks are incredibly dangerous for him. Did something… provoke him?” He sighed. “If you’d brought him in five minutes later, he’d be dead.” Alex’s parents, Miriam and Arthur Langford, arrived just in time to hear that. Miriam collapsed into a waiting room chair, her face ashen. “How is this possible? He’s been fine for years. Why now? Why so sudden?” Penny, sensing an opening, stepped forward, her eyes gleaming with a fresh scheme. But before she could speak, I “accidentally” bumped into her with my hip, sending her stumbling back into a row of chairs. I burst into tears—big, ugly, cinematic sobs. “It’s my fault, Miriam! All my fault!” I wailed. “I shouldn’t have played along when Penny was joking about… about how Alex kept her in bed for three days. I thought we were just having fun, but I think the stress of the secret coming out was too much for his heart!” The atmosphere in the hallway shifted instantly. The Langfords were the epitome of “High Society.” They lived and died by their reputation. To have their son’s wedding day marred by tawdry jokes about infidelity and public humiliation? It was unthinkable. Miriam turned on Penny, her eyes narrowed to slits. “Penny Miller. You’ve been a nuisance for years, clinging to my son like a barnacle. But to pull a stunt like this on his wedding day? To humiliate him in front of his peers? Are you trying to destroy him?” Penny started to sob for real now. “Aunt Miriam, no! I didn’t mean it like that, it was a joke—” I tilted my head, looking confused through my tears. “A joke? So… it wasn’t true? You and Alex didn’t actually…” I gasped, covering my mouth with both hands. I had laid the trap, and Penny walked right into it. She opened her mouth to snap at me—”Maggie, you little—”—but Arthur Langford’s voice cut her off like a guillotine. “Shut up!” he barked. “Haven’t you shamed us enough? I don’t know what your father was thinking, raising such a classless brat. Apologize and get out of my sight before I call security.” Penny looked at me, her teeth grinding so hard I thought they might shatter. “I’m sorry, Maggie. I was… out of line.” I sniffled. “It’s okay. But my mother always told me, if you make a mistake with your mouth, you should probably learn some discipline. Don’t you think, Penny?” Miriam and Arthur were staring at her, waiting. With no other choice, Penny raised her hand and slapped herself across the face. Twice. “Is that… sufficient?” she hissed. I nodded solemnly. She turned and fled the hospital. She was barely gone before Alex woke up. I don’t know what his parents told him, but when I walked into his room, he reached out and grabbed my hand with desperate intensity. “Maggie, honey, forget everything Penny said. She’s just a girl who doesn’t know when to stop talking. None of it was true. I love you. I’d give my life for you. I would never, ever betray you.” I smiled at him, but inside, I was rolling my eyes. Give your life for me? Please. Don’t give me things nobody wants. It didn’t surprise me that the Langfords were being so precious with me. Alex’s heart condition wasn’t a secret to them, even if it was to the public. They’d spent a fortune on specialists, but nothing worked. My mother, however, happened to be the world’s leading authority on his specific type of arrhythmia. I knew exactly why this billionaire family had bypassed a dozen high-society matches to marry their son to a “nobody” like me. They wanted my mother’s brilliance on retainer. I’d figured Alex was handsome enough and the family was rich enough that I could tolerate the arrangement. But things had changed. A man who lacks loyalty is a man who lacks value. He was still fun to toy with, though. A week later, just as I was packing for a trip to visit my parents, Penny reappeared at our estate. She was acting strangely demure, offering to help me pack. “Maggie, please, let me help. I feel so terrible about the wedding. I need to do something to make it up to you.” I saw the glint in her eye—the classic “Trojan Horse” play. I was about to kick her out when Alex walked in. “Let her help, Maggie. She’s just being Penny. She explained everything to me—it was all a big misunderstanding. We’re family, we need to move past this.” I looked at him, amazed. A week ago he was ready to ruin her father; now they were back to being “family.” The bond of shared childhood secrets was thick, apparently. “Fine,” I shrugged. “Go ahead. Pack the guest room. Be careful with those boxes, though. They’re incredibly valuable. I wouldn’t trust anyone but you with them, Penny.” Penny’s eyes darted around. She nodded, her mind clearly spinning. A few minutes later, I heard the satisfying crash of porcelain hitting the floor. Alex rushed into the room. “What happened?” Penny was standing over a pile of shattered ceramics, her eyes brimming with fake tears. “Oh, Alex! The box was so heavy! Maggie, why didn’t you tell me? It’s almost like you wanted me to drop it so I’d look bad in front of everyone.” She sniffled, looking at Alex. “I shouldn’t say that. I’m sure Maggie isn’t that calculated. She’s too sweet to have a hidden agenda… she definitely didn’t marry you for the Langford trust fund.” I watched her little performance and felt a surge of professional respect. It was so familiar. It was exactly the kind of move I would make. I rushed over and grabbed her hands, my face a mask of touched emotion. “Penny! You really do see the best in me! How did you know I was so kind-hearted? That’s why I packed all that old junk so carefully. It’s sentimental garbage from my childhood.” I paused, looking confused. “Wait… you couldn’t tell the difference between priceless heirlooms and literal trash? Oh dear, maybe you really are as dim as everyone says.” I leaned in, whispering just loud enough for Alex to hear. “I’m not insulting you, honey! It’s just a joke. Don’t be sensitive!” Penny’s face turned scarlet. “You… you packed trash in designer boxes?” I tilted my head. “How else are you supposed to pack it? Here—” I grabbed a high-end garment bag and draped it over her head. “You look like you need one too. To keep the set complete.” Before she could explode, Alex barked, “Enough! Penny, if you’re just here to cause more trouble, get out!” She went quiet, seething. But she wasn’t done. That night at dinner, the housekeeper brought out the sea bass. Penny took one look at it, clamped a hand over her mouth, and let out a soft, delicate retch. When everyone’s eyes were on her, she looked down, blushing. “Alex, I don’t know what’s wrong with me. I’ve been so nauseous lately. And exhausted. And… well, I’m two weeks late.” She looked up at him, her eyes wide and wet. “Do you think… could it be? I checked the calendar, and it lines up perfectly with that night we stayed over at my place, right before the wedding…” The table went silent. Alex turned a color I didn’t think was biologically possible for a living human. Penny leaned closer to him, ignoring the rest of us. “I never wanted to come between you and Maggie, Alex. But a baby… a baby is innocent. You can’t just ignore your own blood.” In the suffocating silence, I let out a sharp, sudden laugh. I clapped my hands together and sighed. “Wow. So the wedding night story wasn’t a joke after all.” Alex spun toward me, panic written in every line of his face. “Maggie, no! She’s lying! Nothing happened, I swear—” Penny interrupted him, her voice sharpening. “Alex, I gave you my ‘first.’ Why would I lie about something like this? If I wasn’t afraid of our child being labeled a ‘bastard,’ I’d raise him alone. But you did this. How can you look at this… this woman, and tell me she’s better than me? Than us?” Alex was staring at me, desperate. “Maggie, believe me. I’ll make her go away. She’ll have an abortion. Only you are allowed to have my children.” That was the breaking point for Penny. She reached into her Chanel clutch and pulled out a stack of photos, slamming them onto the table. “Aunt Miriam, Uncle Arthur! Look at her! Look at who you brought into your family!” The photos scattered across the mahogany table. They were grainy, but clear enough: me, in various stages of undress, caught in passionate clinches with half a dozen different men. The air in the room grew heavy. Miriam and Arthur picked up the photos, their expressions hardening into something cold and lethal. “I tried to warn you with my jokes,” Penny said, her voice dripping with triumph. “I wanted her to just leave quietly. But she’s a leech. I had to hire a private investigator. She’s been playing you all for fools.” I looked at the photos. They were actually pretty good—the Photoshop work was top-tier. “Alex,” his father growled, “do you have anything to say about your wife’s… hobbies?” I looked at Alex. He was looking at the photos, then at me. The trust was gone. The “love” he’d sworn a week ago had evaporated. “Oh,” I said, leaning back and stretching. “Well, I guess we’re getting a divorce then.” Alex slammed his fist on the table. “You’re damn right we are! I’m done! I don’t care if I die from this heart condition, I won’t spend another second married to a slut like you!” He barked an order to his assistant, and within twenty minutes, a divorce agreement was on the table. He signed it with a flourish of ink and rage. I didn’t even blink. I signed my name right next to his. “Why are you still here?” Alex hissed. “Get out before I have security throw you and your trash into the street.” I stood up, smoothing my skirt. “I’m going. But I have a little parting gift for the family. I think you’ll find it… illuminating.” I pulled a remote from my pocket and tapped a button. The high-end projector in the dining room whirred to life. As the image flickered onto the wall, the entire room stopped breathing.

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Everyone knew Caleb was the perfect boyfriend. But on our anniversary, he suddenly hard-launched his ex on Instagram. When I asked him why, he just laughed carelessly. “Because her waist… is thinner than yours, I guess.” 1 My boyfriend got a new girlfriend. Just one minute before he made it Instagram official, he sent me a breakup text. Before I could even process it, I saw his new post: “Three years. My feelings for you only grew.” The photo attached was of him and a girl. She was looking away from the camera, leaving only her side profile visible. He was looking at her, his lips pressed slightly together. That was his micro-expression when he was nervous. The top comment was pinned by him. It was incredibly cliché: “You’re always welcome to dock at my harbor.” Caleb’s post blew up with comments, but he didn’t reply to a single one. My chest felt tight. A wave of nausea hit me. I took a deep breath and called him. Honestly, I had always thought I didn’t care that much about this relationship. But… The moment the call went through, I realized my hands were shaking violently. The phone rang once before he quickly hung up. Soon after, Caleb’s text popped up. His tone was so cold it felt like a stranger: “Not a good time. Text me if you need something.” I typed out a massive paragraph, then deleted it word by word. Finally, I just sent one sentence: “We can break up, but you’re going to say it to my face.” Silence stretched on the other end. Then, as if bestowing a grand favor, he sent one word: “Fine.” After agreeing on a time and place, I felt a bit dazed. In this relationship, Caleb had always been the initiator. He chased me relentlessly, and his confession was so grand the entire campus knew about it. When I rejected him, he stood outside my dorm all night in the freezing winter, smoking a whole pack of cigarettes. Anyone’s heart would soften at that. Once, I casually mentioned missing a specific dish from my hometown. He drove through the night just to buy it for me. Even though the food was cold by the time it reached my hands. When someone was vaguely trashing me online, he scoured the internet, tracked the guy down, and put him in his place. Piece by piece, action by action, he chipped away at my walls until we finally got together. Whenever people on campus talked about us, they joked that Caleb was hopelessly whipped for me. But I never imagined our breakup would be so… effortless. 2 The coffee shop near the campus back gates. I sat by the window. I waited so long the coffee on the table went from hot to cold before Caleb finally showed up. He was dressed really strangely today. Usually, he loved a casual, preppy style. Always in light-colored crewnecks, always with classic black hair, always looking like the boy next door. But today… He was dressed entirely in black. A black hoodie, black cargo pants, and his hair was dyed. He even had a silver hoop earring in his left ear—this from a guy who was notoriously terrified of pain. I stared, stunned. We hadn’t seen each other for exactly two days, and he looked like a completely different person. Seeing my shock, he just smirked. “She likes it.” Three simple words, and I realized just how completely I had lost this past year. Caleb was a very egocentric person. While we dated, he treated me incredibly well, but he rarely listened to what I wanted. Once, I suggested he try a new haircut. He just smiled, ruffled my hair, and said, “Chloe, I don’t like it.” And that was the end of that. I sat frozen for a long time, then cut straight to the chase. “Give me a reason for the breakup.” My reflection was faintly visible in the window glass. The face looking back was calm and cold. But underneath, I was desperately trying to keep my emotions in check. I thought Caleb would make some excuses, or at least look a little guilty. He didn’t. He leaned back in his chair, a careless smile on his lips. “Because her waist… is thinner than yours, I guess.” I froze. Across the table, the corner of his mouth curled up. “Anything else? If not, I’m heading out. If I’m gone too long, she’ll get upset.” The moment those words left his mouth, I raised my hand and threw my coffee right in his face. In that split second, only one thought crossed my mind: What a shame. The coffee is completely cold. 3 Caleb left. After getting splashed with coffee, he only froze for two seconds. Then, he calmly wiped his face and dropped two words: “I’m out.” But after taking two steps, he looked back at me. “Chloe, I was really good to you this past year, wasn’t I? Let’s just part on good terms. We don’t even have to say hi if we bump into each other.” He didn’t give me time to react. He just walked out. I sat in silence for a few seconds. Then, I stood up, grabbed a steaming hot cup of coffee from the guy at the next table, muttered a quick “Sorry,” and chased after him. I dumped it right over Caleb’s head. It was hot, but not boiling enough to burn him. It did, however, make him look incredibly pathetic. But Caleb just stopped in his tracks. He kept his back perfectly straight and didn’t even turn around to look at me. I stared at his coffee-soaked clothes. “Caleb. Now we’re parted on good terms.” With that, I turned around, carrying the empty cup. I returned the cup to the couple inside and ordered them two fresh coffees to make up for it. The girl didn’t blame me at all. Instead, she gave me a thumbs-up. “Girl, that was badass.” I forced a smile, but didn’t say anything. Honestly, I’ve always been a really dull person. Introverted, sensitive, quiet, and boring. I happened to have a pretty face, so I had my fair share of guys pursuing me, but they were always the type casting a wide net. I’d reject a guy one second, and the next second he’d be whispering sweet nothings to someone else. Because of that, I never thought I’d be loved with such burning intensity. But then, a year ago, Caleb showed up. His loud, unapologetic affection, his dramatic pursuit, his meticulous care—it was so easy for me to fall into his gentle trap. In the year we were together, I never did a single thing to betray him. I was finally learning how to love someone, how to treat him right. But the second I finally figured it out, he turned around and became his ex’s safe harbor. I walked out of the coffee shop and headed toward campus. I told myself it was over, but I still felt like a zombie. So much so that the moment I reached the campus gates, I crashed right into someone. As I stumbled, a pair of hands grabbed my waist to steady me, then let go instantly like I was burning hot. I hit the ground. Hard. The person immediately crouched down to help me. “Chloe, are you… okay?” The voice sounded vaguely familiar. I let him help me up and looked at him. It was a senior. Ethan. He was in the same major as Caleb. “I’m fine.” I was going to thank him for helping me up, but considering how hard I just hit the pavement, I swallowed the words. He frowned. “Caleb’s Instagram post?” I laughed bitterly. “He made it official. With his ex from three years ago.” Since he brought it up, I couldn’t help but vent a little. “And the funny thing? As his current girlfriend, I only got the breakup text one minute before he posted it. Hilarious, right?” Ethan didn’t say a word. He just turned and walked away. I stood there, stunned, silently cursing myself for oversharing. Right. We were barely acquaintances. Why was I dumping my pathetic drama on him? He was probably just annoyed. I looked away and hurried back to my dorm. My silence only deepened on the walk back. Whenever I passed someone I knew, I’d deliberately look away and speed up. I was terrified they’d ask: “Chloe, when did you and Caleb break up? I just saw you guys grabbing lunch a few days ago. Why does he have a new girlfriend?” I wouldn’t know how to answer. Being publicly dumped for the whole world to see was humiliating. I practically sprinted back to my dorm, changed my clothes, crawled into bed, and wrapped myself in my blanket. I wanted to cry, but mostly, I just wanted to scream. I wanted to drag Caleb back here and beat the crap out of him. I kind of regretted not throwing a third cup of coffee. A little while later, my phone rang. It was my roommate, Becca. “Chlo, where are you?” I pulled down the blanket, my voice weak. “Dorm. Why?” “Caleb got beat up!” I sat bolt upright. The suffocating knot in my chest instantly loosened. It took me a second to find my voice. “Who did he piss off?” Becca sounded like she was right at the scene. It was noisy in the background, and it took a few seconds for her reply to come through. “It was Ethan.” “Omg, I’m dying. He looked SO hot doing it!” 4 Ethan? Why him… Becca’s voice was getting staticky, like she had bad reception, and the call dropped. I sat on my bed, staring blankly at the wall. I thought back to how Ethan had turned and walked away at the front gates. I thought he was just annoyed by my venting. I never imagined he was walking off to get justice for me. I debated whether I should go to the scene to see what was happening, but before I could decide, the dorm door swung open and Becca walked in. She was humming a little tune, clearly in a great mood. Before I could even ask, she dragged me out of bed and spilled the whole story. Ethan had tracked Caleb down and fought him. To be accurate, they beat the living hell out of each other. Both took some hits; neither had a clear advantage. Becca grabbed my hands, her eyes shining. “Chloe, you have no idea. Ethan demanded to know how he dared to two-time you, and the way he threw that first punch? Absolute cinematic perfection!” I felt my heart skip a beat. My fingers gripped the edge of my shirt, but I kept my face totally neutral. “What about… Caleb?” At the mention of Caleb, Becca went quiet. She looked up at me, hesitating. “He fought back. And…” “He told Ethan he knew Ethan had been eyeing you for a long time.” 5 I sat there in stunned silence for a long time before letting out a scoff. “That’s impossible. Ethan and I barely even talk.” Becca obviously didn’t buy it. “If you barely talk, why would he throw down with Caleb for you?” “He’s just a decent guy standing up for someone.” I gave a faint smile. “It wouldn’t be the first time he helped someone out.” Becca pursed her lips but didn’t argue. Ethan really was like the perfect golden boy straight out of a movie—smart, decent, kind. The school had even given him an award once for stepping in to stop a mugging. Honestly, I wanted to text Ethan and say thank you. We’d been connected on social media for over a year, but we rarely spoke. We just occasionally “liked” each other’s posts. I stared at his contact for a long time, totally unsure of what to say. Eventually, I gave up and locked my phone. … That afternoon. Out of habit, I headed to the dining hall alone for dinner, never expecting to run into— Caleb. And his ex-girlfriend. I have a quiet personality, and when I walk, I usually keep my eyes down or look straight ahead. I rarely look around. So, it wasn’t until I had gotten my food and sat down in my usual corner that I noticed Caleb and a girl sitting diagonally across from me. From my angle, I had a clear view of her side profile. It was the exact same girl from his Instagram photo. They were eating. I don’t know if he was trying to cater to her tastes, but Caleb had ordered a massive bowl of insanely spicy ramen—something he never ate. The broth was bright red. Even though he was sweating bullets, he kept looking up at her with a smile. The truth is, Caleb couldn’t handle spice. He had bad acid reflux. Eating spicy food always tore his stomach up. I stared blankly, my fingers subconsciously tapping the edge of my tray. And then… Caleb suddenly looked my way. Caught completely off guard, our eyes met. Honestly, I was a little nervous and instinctively wanted to look away out of guilt. But surprisingly, he beat me to it. Our eyes only locked for a fraction of a second before he casually turned his head away and placed a piece of meat into his girlfriend’s bowl. I sat frozen for a few seconds, then let out a quiet laugh. I guess it’s true what they say: the person who gets left behind has the hardest time moving on. He was the one who cheated. Why was I the one feeling guilty and nervous? I was just about to look away when the girl suddenly stood up, looking like she was going to buy a drink. And because of that, I finally saw her face clearly. In that instant, my mind went completely blank, leaving only one phrase echoing in my head: The understudy. Yes. Just like one of those cliché TV tropes. The guy can’t get over his ultimate “white moonlight”—his unattainable first love—so he finds a girl who looks just like her to keep by his side. And I… looked about eighty percent identical to his first love. 6 In that moment, everything finally made sense. That bullshit about her waist being thinner than mine? All a lie. The truth was, he never needed a reason to break up with me, because the only reason he ever dated me in the first place was that my face looked like his first love’s. How pathetic. I forced myself to look down and eat, mechanically shoving food into my mouth. But even my favorite pot roast tasted like ash. The food felt heavy in my throat today. I patted my chest, debating whether I should go buy a bottle of water, when a bottle suddenly appeared in my line of sight. Aquafina. I looked up and saw a smiling face. “Are you sitting alone? Mind if I join you?” It was Ethan. I smiled and waved my hand to say I didn’t mind, but the food was stuck in my throat, making me choke. Ethan was always observant. Without missing a beat, he unscrewed the cap and handed the water to me. I didn’t hesitate. I grabbed it and took two massive gulps. The food went down, but then I choked on the water. As I buried my head and coughed violently, Ethan gently patted my back. “Take it easy.” His voice was so gentle. I coughed for a solid minute before finally catching my breath. I took the napkin Ethan handed me, wiped my mouth, and looked up—only to accidentally make eye contact with Caleb. He was staring right at me. His eyes were dark and unreadable. 7 I’ll be honest—in that split second, my imagination ran wild. Like the most classic cliché: the scumbag ex sees his former girlfriend with a new, better guy, gets consumed by jealousy, and suddenly realizes the error of his ways. But reality proved that stuff only happens in fiction. After that accidental eye contact, Caleb quickly looked away. We weren’t sitting that far apart. I could almost see the cold indifference in his eyes. I looked away too, almost wanting to laugh at myself. What kind of teen romance movie did I think I was living in? Snapping back to reality, I looked at Ethan and smiled. “Thank you.” “No problem.” He set the water and the fresh pack of napkins in front of me, then sat down in the seat across the table. “Do you prefer eating alone?” After a moment of silence, he suddenly asked. I blinked. “Not really, just… maybe it’s my personality, but I’m used to it. My roommate hates the dining hall food, so she rarely comes here.” Ethan nodded. While we were talking, I noticed out of the corner of my eye that Caleb and his girlfriend had finished eating and stood up to leave. They were leaning in close to each other, looking incredibly intimate as they walked out. I didn’t look up. I just took another bite of my food. 8 They say time heals everything. In the blink of an eye, Caleb and I had been broken up for a month. One month. Thirty days. Over seven hundred hours. Over forty thousand minutes. Without Caleb around, my life didn’t really seem to change much. It really is true: the world keeps spinning no matter who leaves your life. For that whole month, I felt mostly numb. I didn’t experience any soul-crushing heartbreak, nor did I toss and turn in the middle of the night. But… My heart always felt a little hollow, like something was missing. The campus wasn’t that big, but Caleb and I rarely ran into each other anymore. The few times we did cross paths, I usually saw him holding hands with his girlfriend, taking a walk. They looked really in love. I heard through the grapevine that his new girlfriend was his first love from five years ago. She had just moved back from studying abroad, came from a wealthy family, had nothing but free time, and was constantly on campus looking for him. However, I did start running into Ethan a lot. Ethan was an incredibly gentle guy. Clean-cut features, a warm smile. Being around him felt like a soft spring breeze. We became good friends. Every night, we’d text back and forth for a bit. Becca seemed extremely approving of Ethan. In private, she was constantly trying to set us up. I politely shut her down every time. Ethan was great, but… I just wasn’t ready to start a new relationship yet. 9 Memorial Day weekend was coming up, and I wanted to take a short trip to clear my head. I mentioned it casually, and Becca got super excited. She insisted our whole dorm and Ethan should go together. Ethan agreed. I couldn’t really argue with it. I figured with a big group, it would be fine, so I said yes. Becca took charge of booking the bus tickets. But on the morning we were supposed to leave, I woke up to an empty dorm. I called Becca, and she cheerfully said, “We headed to the bus station early! You and Ethan can come together. Be good, bye!” Then she hung up. I knew she was trying to play matchmaker. I originally planned to just take an Uber to the station by myself, but leaving Ethan behind felt rude, so I gave him a call. However. When we both arrived at the station and went to the platform, we realized— We’d been played. Becca and the others never showed up. From the very beginning, she had only booked two tickets. Mine and Ethan’s. Standing in the waiting area, Ethan and I looked at each other, not knowing whether to laugh or cry. This aggressive matchmaking was going to be the death of me. With no other option, Ethan and I had to bite the bullet and embark on our three-day, two-person getaway. The main reason I wanted to take this trip was to see the ocean. I grew up landlocked and had never seen the sea. During my relationship, we never made it out there. Now that I was single, I had to see it at least once. On the ride over, Ethan booked a two-bedroom Airbnb. I tried to Venmo him my half, but he declined it. Seeing my confusion, he smiled. “We’re on vacation, no need to keep a strict ledger. Just buy me dinner when we get there.” I thought about it. The trip was three days long; I had plenty of time to even the score. After leaving the station, we took an Uber to the Airbnb. Because I hadn’t done enough research, we only realized upon arriving that while the place was beautiful, it was in the middle of nowhere. Thankfully, the scenery was stunning, the interior was modern, and it was spotless. It was just a hassle to get around. We dropped our bags in our respective rooms, rested for a bit, and headed out. We hit up two small tourist spots and eventually made our way to a famous local boardwalk night market. I have to say, the mini crab cakes there were out of this world.

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