I am a pureblood human, adopted by a family of vampire nobles. I thought I was destined to become their walking, breathing blood bank. Who knew the Duke and Duchess were obsessively doting parents, and my newly minted adopted brother would be head over heels for me? Overnight, I reached the absolute peak of my life. 1. Humans and vampires had been at war for over two hundred years before finally signing a truce. To show their sincerity, the human leaders decided to send someone over to be adopted by the Vampire Duke’s family. And the unlucky bastard chosen for the job was me. During the two centuries of war against vampires, humanity had genetically modified and evolved themselves to survive. I, however, was one of the very few remaining “pureblood” humans. As a pureblood, I couldn’t fight my way out of a paper bag. My combat power was a flat zero. In the old days, I would have been considered utterly useless. Nowadays? With a twist of fate, I was treated like a rare, endangered mascot. I had no right to refuse. I was packed up overnight and shipped off to the castle of Duke Dracula. Before I left, a kindly-looking old government official patted my shoulder with a smile. “Kid, you’ve seen spy movies, right? We don’t need you to do anything crazy. Just observe them and see if they actually intend to keep the truce.” I focused my mind and instantly heard his inner thoughts. [The girl is definitely pretty, but she doesn’t look too bright. I really hope she doesn’t mess this up.] I sneered internally. Surprise, old man. I might be a weak, delicate pureblood human, but I had my own cheat code—telepathy. Otherwise, going into vampire territory completely alone would be no different from throwing a sheep into a wolf’s den. 2. I finally met the Duke’s family. It was nothing like the creepy human folk songs from two hundred years ago. The Dracula Castle wasn’t dark or desolate at all; it was lavish, opulent, and brilliantly lit. The butler wasn’t a talking pig, there were no fat witches riding broomsticks, and no creepy black cats smiling from the shadows. I have to admit, the vampire race was blessed with absurdly good genes. They were breathtaking. The Duke was noble and handsome, and the Duchess was stunningly beautiful. Their only son, Wyatt, was exceptionally striking. He had deep, dark eyes, pale marble skin, and blood-red lips. Despite having such vivid, intense features, his overall aura was incredibly cold and untouchable. They threw a massive welcome banquet in my honor. At the party, the Duke proudly announced my adoption, officially declaring me the very first Human Princess of the vampire race. The entire banquet was livestreamed, instantly blowing up the internet and trending worldwide. Before coming here, I was terrified I’d just be a walking blood bank for the Dracula family. So, when they invited me to sit down for dinner, I was trembling like a leaf. The Duchess’s eyes sparkled as she smiled warmly. “Don’t be afraid, sweetheart. The noble House of Dracula gave up drinking human blood a long time ago. Besides, you are my daughter now.” [She’s so cute! A cute little human like this… I could kiss ten of her to death!] Me: ??? The Duke patiently comforted me. “Rest assured, darling, we will never hurt you.” His dark green eyes shimmered as he gazed at me with overwhelming tenderness. [She seems to lack a sense of security. Should I go kidnap a few more humans to keep her company? Wyatt won’t do; he walks around with a deadpan face all day, he’s too boring.] [Come to think of it, I haven’t raised a child in centuries. What do kids even like these days? Whatever my baby wants, I’ll buy it for her.] I was completely blown away by the wind. So, the legendary, ruthless, and bloodthirsty Duke and Duchess… were actually obsessive, doting parents?! When it was time to take our seats, I chose to sit next to Wyatt. At least my new brother seemed a bit more like a “normal” person. He remained entirely expressionless and indifferent to me sitting so close. His brows were slightly furrowed, and he didn’t say a single word. He looked the definition of aloof. I hesitated for a second, then gently tugged at his sleeve and gave him a friendly smile. “Brother.” To my shock, Wyatt reacted violently. He stood up abruptly, shaking off my hand. “Let go!” I was so startled I almost cried. A flash of regret crossed Wyatt’s eyes. [Is my sister going to cry? Damn it, I didn’t mean to do that.] [Her eyes are so pretty. Red and misty, like a fragile little bunny.] [She smells so incredibly good.] [No, I have to restrain myself. I can’t scare her.] As his inner thoughts popped into my head one after another, the corners of his eyes flushed pink, and a faint blush spread across his cold, pale cheeks. Meanwhile, my own face grew paler and paler. Help me! What kind of bizarre family had I just walked into?! 3. The dinner ended with Wyatt leaving the table early, and the Duke and Duchess showering me with endless comfort. That night, I lay in the gorgeous princess room the Duchess had prepared for me, tossing and turning. Unable to sleep, I eventually got up, planning to sneak down to the kitchen for a midnight snack. The moment I stepped out into the hallway, a hand shot out and violently yanked me into the adjacent room. My dear brother pinned me against the wall. His hair was damp with sweat, his face heavily flushed, and his dark eyes were misty, staring down at me with an intense, heated gaze. He looked… like a delicious, molten chocolate lava cake. I gulped uselessly. “Brother, what’s wrong? Are you sick?” He buried his face in the crook of my neck. His heavy breathing brushed against my skin, sending a tingling numbness down my spine. When he spoke, his tone was still fierce and cold: “Shut up.” [What do I do? I love my sister too much.] Well, then… After the mental bombardment at dinner, I was already immune to this. Was my brother’s inner monologue just permanently set to “embarrassingly affectionate”? The contrast between his outward behavior and his inner thoughts was way too extreme. Classic case of a guy whose mouth says no, but whose body says yes. Certain that he had no intention of hurting me, my anxiety dropped by half. I obediently acted as a human body pillow, staying perfectly still and letting him hold me. As a result, my brain was flooded with his thoughts, scrolling like a live chat feed. [Am I holding her for too long? Is this a bit weird?] [But it’s just so hard to push her away…] [House Dracula gave up human blood ages ago. Why am I feeling like this…] Suddenly, I felt something sharp pressing against the side of my neck. It felt like two conflicting emotions—restraint and aggression—were fighting a war inside him. I suddenly realized what it was. Those were the sharp fangs of a vampire. Instantly, my blood ran cold. [She is… so intoxicating.] [She seems to be shivering. Is it because she’s scared?] [Enough, Wyatt. Stop it right now!] Wyatt finally let go of me. I breathed a massive sigh of relief. The very next second, with a wave of his hand, I was swept right out the door. Bang! The door slammed shut behind me. I felt like I had literally taken flight, landing dizzily back in the hallway. My head was spinning. Once I calmed down, I analyzed the situation. Even though his confusing actions were rude and impatient, I was completely unharmed. He probably… wouldn’t hurt me, right? 4. The next morning, I went downstairs. The Duke and Duchess weren’t around, and neither was Wyatt. The butler approached me with a polite, professional smile. “Princess, the Duke and Duchess are still resting. They instructed me to have you eat breakfast first, and then Prince Wyatt will take you to school.” I looked at the butler’s warm smile, nodded gently, and pretended I couldn’t hear his inner monologue. [What on earth is the Duke thinking? Prince Wyatt can hardly be described as friendly toward the Princess.] The maids brought out over a dozen different American-style breakfast dishes. Pancakes, crispy bacon, scrambled eggs, golden hash browns, avocado toast, and blueberry muffins… they had everything. I was amazed. These were the kinds of real, traditional foods I had only read about in the human historical archives. Ever since humans underwent genetic evolution and became obsessed with strength, nobody cared about actual food anymore. Most humans survived on nutrient paste just to maintain bodily functions. Only aristocrats cooked real meals daily as a symbol of their wealth and status. Back home, I obviously wasn’t qualified to eat stuff like this. But I was a pureblood human. That disgusting nutrient paste tasted like literal poison to me. Sitting at the table, I finally felt a genuine sense of gratitude that my fate had changed. Just as I was aggressively stuffing my face with a blueberry muffin, Wyatt slowly walked down the stairs wearing his school uniform. I took one look at him and almost burst out laughing. The uniform was tailored to perfection, crisp and sharp, giving him the ultimate aura of a noble aristocratic heir… Assuming, of course, you ignored the weird mask strapped to his face. I bit my lip to hold back my laughter and stole another two glances at him. His eyes and brows were still beautiful, but the thing covering his mouth… was that seriously not a dog’s anti-bite muzzle? Right then, I heard Wyatt’s inner voice. [Does this anti-bite mask look weird?] [But this is already the coolest-looking one they had!] [Why does my sister keep staring at me?] [She looks like… she really wants to laugh?] I couldn’t hold it in anymore. I let out a loud snort of laughter. Good lord, it actually was an anti-bite muzzle. 5. Because of my untimely laughter, Wyatt was as cold as a block of ice for the entire car ride to school, refusing to give me a single pleasant look. But I wasn’t afraid of him at all anymore. He was so scared of losing control and hurting me that he voluntarily strapped an ugly, bizarre muzzle to his own face. Wyatt was exactly like a hedgehog. His back was covered in sharp spikes, but if you flipped him over, his belly was soft, white, and completely harmless. I could feel the gentle warmth hiding beneath his icy exterior. The butler, perhaps afraid we might actually fight, rode in the car with us. Throughout the ride, I relied entirely on the butler to educate me on everything I needed to know. “St. Jude’s Academy is the most elite aristocratic school in the vampire community. The students are all sons and daughters of high-ranking officials and nobles. However, Your Highness, you outrank them all.” The highest leader of the vampire race was the Duke; they had no king or queen. That was why the butler said I was the most prestigious student there. “There are magical wards placed over the campus. All vampire abilities are neutralized on school grounds, so you don’t need to worry about them using powers to hurt you.” Thanks to the butler’s enthusiastic and detailed introduction, I learned everything I needed to know. St. Jude’s was a comprehensive academy combining middle school, high school, and university. It had produced countless top-tier geniuses across every industry in vampire society. Before I was sent here, I was a freshman at a human art college. I just had to continue my major here. I had heard that St. Jude’s had produced historically famous artists. Getting to study here was definitely me marrying up in life. Wyatt was in the medical school. He was their top genius student and was close to graduating. Thinking about this, I glanced over at him. My eyes naturally fell to the hands resting lightly on his lap. Pale, slender, with distinct knuckles. Hands that pretty were definitely suited for holding a scalpel. Sensing my gaze, Wyatt’s expression grew even colder, and he turned his head to stare out the window. But his fingers unconsciously curled into fists. [Damn it, why did Merlin have to bring me up?] [Will my sister think I told him to brag about me on purpose?] Help me. I wanted to laugh again. 6. Once we arrived at the school, Wyatt gave me a haughty, icy warning: “Behave yourself. Don’t cause trouble!” [I already warned all the old geezers on the board. She shouldn’t run into any trouble, right?] I flashed him a brilliant, sweet smile. “Okay, brother.” Wyatt frantically averted his eyes. His pale, jade-like earlobes flushed crimson. He turned around with a blank face and practically fled the scene. [My sister is… s-so cute.] The butler smiled and handed me my backpack. “You can head in now, Your Highness. I can only escort you this far.” I tilted my head, my eyes curving into happy crescents. “Thank you, Uncle Merlin.” The butler’s eyes lit up. “Just Merlin is perfectly fine, Your Highness.” [No wonder the Duke and Duchess adore Her Highness so much. What a good kid.] I grabbed my bag and walked onto campus. Every step I took resulted in a 100% head-turning rate. I could hear their inner thoughts constantly. [Oh my god, is that a human?] [Is that Princess Chloe? I watched the livestream, she really looks like that!] [Does someone like her really deserve to be Prince Wyatt’s sister?] … For a moment, it felt like tens of thousands of flies were buzzing in my ears. I couldn’t take it anymore, so I mentally blocked out their voices. My telepathy was controllable, like a switch. If I didn’t want to hear someone’s thoughts, I could just turn it off. Otherwise, I would have been driven insane a long time ago. The principal personally welcomed me, escorted me to my classroom, gave me a few words of advice, and left. With a polite smile, I introduced myself to the class. “My name is Chloe, I’m 19, and I live at the Dracula Castle.” A sneer echoed from the crowd. A blonde, blue-eyed girl stood up, looking at me with pure disdain. “Are all human women as ugly as you?” 7. The classroom went dead silent for a second. Then, the entire room erupted in mocking laughter. Everyone stared at me with varying degrees of ridicule, coldness, or contempt. Vampires, male or female, were naturally pale, gorgeous, with long legs. It was their racial trait. But I wasn’t exactly bad-looking either. I had classic almond eyes, big and round. Even if I couldn’t compare to their supernatural, physics-defying beauty, I hardly deserved to be called ugly, right? I gritted my teeth. I endured it. This was vampire territory. Why would they ever submit to a fake human princess? I had anticipated this kind of reception before I even arrived and mentally prepared myself for it. Sticking to my “don’t cause trouble” principle, I just smiled and didn’t say a word. But the blonde girl wasn’t going to let me off the hook. She walked right up to me and yanked my hair. “Hey, ugly freak. Roll back to your human territory, or sooner or later, I’ll suck your blood dry!” Screw this. I can’t take it anymore. I threw down with her. We brawled until the teacher rushed in and pulled us apart. Just like in human schools, fighting meant they had to call your parents. And my “parent”… was Wyatt. The teacher didn’t dare disturb the Duke and Duchess, so they called Wyatt over. I stood in front of him, hair a messy bird’s nest, hanging my head in shame. He had just warned me not to cause trouble, and five minutes later, I was fist-fighting a classmate. Why couldn’t I just hold it in?! Wyatt furrowed his brows deeply, his dark eyes scanning me up and down. He turned to the teacher, his voice chilling to the bone: “What exactly happened here?” I really couldn’t grasp his actual mood. So, I sneakily turned on my cheat code to hear his thoughts. [Is the Sinclair family tired of living?! Turning my cute, pretty sister into a scruffy little mud pie!] I had been feeling pretty wronged and upset a second ago.

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The night before the SATs, my mom slipped sleeping pills into my brother’s milk, just so he could get a good night’s rest. I tried to stop her in time, but she scolded me for having ulterior motives. “If you hadn’t ruined Tyler’s sleep, would he have bombed the test?” Later, I was forced to drop out of school to work, and then forced into an engagement with a wealthy idiot just so she could use the money to buy my brother a house. The day before the wedding, I tried to escape through a window, but accidentally fell six stories to my death. Given a second chance at life, I returned to the night before my brother’s SATs. I stood there and watched as the sleeping pill dissolved into his milk, releasing a rapid stream of tiny bubbles. 1 Mom frowned at the bubbles in the baby bottle, added a spoonful of honey, and finally nodded in satisfaction. Yes, my brother was nineteen years old, but he still drank his milk from a baby bottle. My mom spoiled him rotten, claiming that drinking straight from a glass might make him choke, and a bottle was much safer. “Mom, are you prepping milk for Tyler?” My mom shot me a nasty glare. “Keep your voice down! Don’t wake your brother.” I looked at the blister pack of sleeping pills next to the bottle, two pills visibly popped out. I asked in a hushed whisper, “Did you put sleeping pills in his milk?” Our house was right next to a busy highway. Even at night, you could hear the piercing sound of car horns. My mom wanted my brother to sleep soundly, so she took it upon herself to come up with this brilliant idea. Sleeping pills might knock a person out fast, but they also slow down neural reaction times, causing the side effect of sluggish thinking. In my past life, I forcefully poured the spiked milk down the drain and ran out in the middle of the night to buy noise-canceling earplugs for him. Unfortunately, even if good sleep could magically add points to your SAT score, my brother still wouldn’t have qualified for anything better than an unaccredited strip-mall college. The day the scores came out, Tyler hung his head in anger. Mom hugged him, heartbroken, and then aggressively slapped the apple right out of my hand. “Eat, eat, eat, all you know how to do is eat! Your brother is devastated, and you still have an appetite?” Of course I had an appetite. He usually scored an 800, and this time he scored an 850. It wasn’t exactly a miracle, but you could at least call it a stroke of luck. “Your brother has a habit of drinking milk every night. If you hadn’t poured it out, he wouldn’t have performed so poorly!” From childhood to adulthood, I had heard things like this countless times. “Your brother only likes the tips of the strawberries. You can eat the rest.” “Your brother likes the room that gets the morning sun. You can sleep in the study.” “Your brother likes it quiet. Stop talking so much.” I was so angry I actually laughed. “If you love your precious son so much, why did you even give birth to me?” “If it wasn’t so Tyler would have someone to support him later in life, I would have thrown you out ages ago. You wretched little girl.” I’ve seen plenty of families that favored sons over daughters, but treating the son like a literal god and the daughter like a slave? My mom was truly one of a kind. 2 I always had better grades than my brother, but my mom never praised me once. Instead, she constantly hyped him up, claiming that boys were late bloomers and he would eventually surpass me. Maybe. Maybe when he was buried in the dirt, the grass on his grave would grow a little taller than me. “You still want to go to college? What use is reading so many books for a girl? While you’re young, you should be waiting tables. By the time you’re thirty, even the back of the kitchen won’t want you.” My mom went to my high school and officially withdrew me, completely ruining my bright future. Then she spent a fortune registering me as a VIP on an elite matchmaking site. Did you think she was trying to find me a good husband? Of course not. she wanted to find some rich idiot to extort a massive financial settlement from, all so she could buy her precious son a house. Thinking of everything from my past life, I couldn’t help but hate myself for playing the villain for nothing. “Tyler loves his milk with honey. After drinking this, maybe he’ll get a perfect score and get into an Ivy League,” I said smoothly. In this life, I turned a blind eye to the sleeping pills next to the bottle. My mom could dig her own grave for all I cared. The wrinkles on Mom’s face smoothed out as she beamed. “Your brother has always been smart. If he over-performs tomorrow, I’d be perfectly happy with a top-tier state school.” I smiled along, suppressing the sharp retort that almost slipped out. Hot tip: Scoring an 850 on the SATs does not get you into a top-tier school. 3 Tyler always used to say that Mom had a hard life, and told me I shouldn’t argue with her so much. Heh. He was the sole beneficiary of the system, so naturally, it was easy for him to sound so high and mighty. If Mom stopped favoring him, if her sacrifices suddenly cost him his own privileges, would he still be so magnanimous? After drinking the spiked milk, my brother, predictably, couldn’t wake up. In the morning, Mom paced nervously outside his bedroom door. It was 8:20 AM, and she still couldn’t bear to wake her baby boy. At 8:40 AM, Tyler was finally woken up by his own bladder. Sporting a severe case of bedhead, he stumbled out of his room. “Mom, what time is it?” he mumbled groggily. Mom dipped a mini dumpling in soy sauce and literally carried it all the way to the bathroom for him. “It’s 8:30, honey. Quickly, take a few bites, and then your sister will bike you to the testing center.” To ensure he ate peacefully, Mom deliberately lied, shaving ten minutes off the actual time. I followed right behind her holding a glass of juice. “Yes, exactly! You need a full stomach to have the energy to ace the test. Mom woke up at 5 AM to make these for you. She even hid a lucky silver coin inside one of them so you’d pass with flying colors!” Gag. My brother dry-heaved, his eyes rolling back. “What the hell, are you trying to choke me to death?!” He spat the silver coin aggressively onto the floor, knocking the plate of dumplings out of Mom’s hands. “Look what time it is! Why didn’t you wake me up earlier?!” Mom’s expression instantly morphed into that of a scolded child. “Mom just wanted you to get some good rest…” “Can you use your brain for once instead of just doing whatever pops into your head?!” The more he thought about it, the angrier he got, his words absolutely merciless. He was the only one allowed to speak to her like that. If it had been me, I would have been slapped across the face. “Tyler, Mom was just doing what’s best for you. How can you talk to her like that?” Wow, so this is what it feels like to be a saint. Being generous at someone else’s expense was truly exhilarating. Tyler shot Mom a hateful glare. “Hmph. ‘For my own good.’ If I don’t get into college, are you going to take responsibility for it?!” SLAM. Tyler stormed out of the house. Mom stood there, tears pattering down onto the bathroom floor. 4 The day the scores came out, Tyler held his 850 score report and sighed heavily. You have to hand it to him. He might have been dumb, but he was remarkably consistent. Even with a fresh start in a new life, it was the exact same familiar 850. This time, I was smart. I didn’t sit there eating an apple. Instead, I wore my neat school uniform and sat primly on the couch, my face twisted into an expression of deep, thoughtful sorrow. Snore… snort… In the dead-silent house, Dad’s booming snores from the bedroom felt incredibly jarring. Mom’s explosive anger finally found a landing spot. Taking three steps at a time, she kicked open the master bedroom door and slapped Dad right across the face. “Sleep, sleep, sleep! Is that all you know how to do?! Tyler’s future is ruined, and you can still sleep?!” My dad, Robert, was a safety engineer at a local plant. He had worked the night shift and only gotten home at 6 AM. He hadn’t been asleep long before Mom woke him with a slap. He groggily sat up, a mix of sheer exhaustion and rage twisting his face. “Are you crazy?! What the hell are you screaming about now?!” “You’re the crazy one!” Mom threw the printed score report directly at Dad’s face. “Take a good look! These are Tyler’s SAT scores. An 850! He can’t even get into a community college.” Mom cried as she spoke, grabbing Dad’s collar and pounding her fists against his chest. “Are you done yet?! You lunatic!” Dad forcefully shoved her away. He didn’t use much strength, but Mom used the momentum to throw herself onto the floor, slapping the wood planks as she wailed. “You hit me! I gave you a son, and this is how you treat me?! Oh my god, I was blind to marry you…” In our house, Mom had the highest combat power. I had already tasted the benefits of picking the right side, so if I didn’t jump in now, when would I? “Dad, even though you earn the money, Mom works incredibly hard running this house. You can’t just ignore her sacrifices.” I helped Mom sit up and confronted Dad with absolute, righteous indignation. “Running this house?! Good, fine! Let’s ask your mother exactly how she runs this house.” “In March, she spent $800 on ‘genius focus gummies’ for your brother.” “In April, she spent $2,000 enrolling him in an elite SAT boot camp.” “In May, she spent another $1,500 paying a psychic for a manifesting crystal to guarantee he’d get into a top school.” Dad seemed desperate to vomit out all his built-up bitterness. He couldn’t stop. “Every single cent of my hard-earned blood money was wasted by your mother! I haven’t even started crying yet, but here she is throwing a tantrum!” Hearing this, Mom refused to back down. “Isn’t Tyler your son too?! You’re so stingy about spending a few bucks on your own child, it makes me sick!” They went back and forth, throwing spectacular insults at each other. Meanwhile, I stood to the side, my mind floating in outer space. In my past life, my heart broke for Dad’s exhaustion, Mom’s labor, and my brother’s confusion. But none of that empathy brought me any good; it just made me the family’s eternal scapegoat. In this life, I chose to stay out of it. By refusing to intervene in their karma, the resentment buried deep in their hearts finally found a different outlet. “ENOUGH! Stop arguing! From today on, I’m never spending another dime of your money! I’ll go get a job myself!” Tyler jumped up from the couch in irritation, dropped his dramatic ultimatum, and slammed the front door on his way out. 5 The atmosphere in the house was terrifyingly suffocating. Taking advantage of the fact that my parents were too busy fighting to care about me, I slipped out the door. I had a part-time job as a barista at a coffee shop near my school. It paid a few hundred bucks a month—not much, but it was a safety net. With my brother failing his exams, whether he repeated his senior year or went to a shady private college, it would cost a fortune. Sooner or later, I was highly likely to be forced down the same path of dropping out. In this life, I couldn’t just sit and wait to die. I had to save up enough for my own tuition and living expenses so I could keep studying. “Why is a pretty girl like you working so hard? If you need cash, I can give it to you.” As I was wiping down a table, a clammy hand covered mine. I looked up. It was a guy around twenty years old. He had a bleached-blonde bowl cut, spoke with a raspy fuckboy voice, and was aggressively winking at me. I was naturally very pretty. Back at school, creepy guys always tried to harass me. In my past life, I asked my mom for help. She told me that flies don’t bite seamless eggs. “Why are they targeting you and not anyone else? Seducing men at your age, have you no shame?!” Now, having lived a second life, I decided to protect myself. I kept my right hand completely still while my left hand picked up a half-full cup of iced coffee, ready to splash it right into his flat face. “Little girl, are you thinking about throwing that coffee on me? Friendly warning: this T-shirt cost $300.” The blonde guy looked me up and down. Seeing my cheap thrift-store clothes, he assumed I was an easy target. He smirked confidently, his acne-scarred face leaning in closer. “That’s a good girl…” “Oh… SPLASH.” Before he could finish his sentence, his face was met with two cups of murky brown coffee. One was from me. “Three hundred dollars is a bit steep. Go ahead and call the cops. If they say it’s my fault, I’ll pay you back full price.” The other cup came from a guy sitting at the next table. He had just ordered an espresso and poured the entire thing onto the blonde punk’s head without taking a single sip. My eyes trailed down his rolling Adam’s apple, past his grayish stubble, all the way up to his hair, which was tied into a high ponytail. “Are you blind?! I’m sitting right here looking this gorgeous, and your eyes are glued to this scrawny girl?! You have zero taste!” Terrified, the blonde guy fell backward onto the floor, screamed “Freak!” and scrambled out of the coffee shop as fast as he could. I never expected to meet such a uniquely helpful civilian in our isolated little town. I bowed to the guy. “Thanks a lot, man.” “No problem.” He stared at me, slightly dazed. “I had a younger sister. If she were still here, she’d be about your age.” He explained that his sister was a year younger than him, but she went missing as a toddler. The trauma completely shattered his mother’s mental health, so she frequently coped by dressing him up like a little girl. Kidnappers deserve to rot in hell. For their own selfish greed, they destroy entire families. “Don’t worry,” I comforted him. “Since they stole your sister, they obviously wanted a girl very badly. She’s probably living a great life right now.” The guy nodded, the tight crease between his brows relaxing slightly. “If bad people try to bully you again, try acting completely unhinged.” “There’s no point reasoning with people like that. It’s better to just give them a taste of their own medicine.”

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My college roommate from four years ago, Anna, is getting married and asked us to be her bridesmaids. We had to pay for our own travel, accommodation, and bridesmaid dresses. And there was no traditional red envelope given to thank us for our help. The day before the wedding, we arrived at her rural hometown at 6 AM to help set up the bridal suite. The next evening, right after the wedding wrapped up, we had to find our own way out of the countryside. Thinking about our supposed “sisterhood,” the three of us still showed up like absolute suckers, even bringing generous cash gifts. We endured the humiliation of the vulgar, rural wedding hazing customs. And what did we get in return? She publicly referred to us as “my three maids.” The groom was my ex-boyfriend from college. During the reception, we had to sit through the retelling of their “eight-year-long romantic journey.” Throughout the story, Anna used all of our most embarrassing photos and awkward college moments to make herself look elegant and superior by comparison. Finally, we couldn’t take it anymore and smashed the giant LED screen. That night, I woke up in my college dorm room. Anna was standing there, bragging about an expensive bottle of perfume a suitor had given her. There were four people in this dorm. Three of us had just been reborn. 01 “I told him I didn’t need any perfume, but he insisted! Giving me this on Christmas Eve… do you guys think he’s into me?” Anna held up the expensive bottle of perfume, posing for a selfie, her humblebrag anything but subtle. She didn’t notice that the way I was looking at her had completely changed. When nobody responded, she just kept talking to herself: “This senior said his girlfriend isn’t as pretty as me, and doesn’t have my figure. Is he hinting at something? He even asked me out tonight, but I don’t think of him that way at all.” At that exact moment, my phone buzzed. My boyfriend sent me a selfie from his dorm room, followed by a $5.20 Venmo transfer. The message read: So sorry, baby. I’m stuck finishing a paper tonight and can’t be with you for Christmas Eve. Once I save up some money from my part-time job, I’ll buy you a real present! In the corner of his selfie, I spotted the torn wrapping paper from the exact same expensive perfume Anna was holding. The cheap audacity made me want to throw up. No wonder they had an “eight-year-long romantic journey” at their wedding. They were hooking up right now! Anna was wearing my Gucci coat and carrying my Chanel bag. She spritzed herself with my Jo Malone perfume and said, “Chloe, is your boyfriend not taking you out? I’m so jealous of you. I had plans booked for Christmas Eve a month ago. It’s like these guys have never seen a pretty, rich girl before…” “I’m going to the library tonight. Take off my coat and leave my bag here. I need to use them.” Anna froze. “Oh, and I forgot to mention,” I continued casually, “my family has a habit of putting rubbing alcohol into expired cosmetics so nobody accidentally uses them. Which foundation and perfume did you just put on? Does your face burn?” Anna’s face dropped. She frantically grabbed makeup wipes, furiously scrubbing her face, and yelled, “Why didn’t you tell me earlier?! Are you trying to ruin my skin on purpose?!” I hopped down from my loft bed and stared at her coldly. “Did you ask me before you stole my stuff? Just because I didn’t say anything before doesn’t mean I didn’t know.” “Why… why are you being so mean all of a sudden? It’s just a little bit of makeup.” Anna rolled her eyes, put on a face mask, and headed for the door. “Well, you aren’t wearing this dress, right? I’m running late, I have to go to my date.” The dress she was wearing was also mine—a designer summer slip dress. Anna grabbed a winter coat but purposefully draped it over her arm instead of wearing it. She strutted through the freezing December campus, her bare shoulders exposed, her curves on full display. She tossed her long, curled hair, ensuring every guy she walked past stared. Her intentions couldn’t have been more obvious. I smiled and used my phone app to remotely lock my Porsche. Sure enough, not even half an hour later, Anna kicked the dorm door open. She was completely wrapped in her winter coat, shivering violently, her lips practically purple. “What a broke loser! He actually expected me to take the bus! Taking the bus downtown for dinner?! Is he insane?!” At the exact same time, my boyfriend aggressively texted me five times in a row, asking why the Porsche wouldn’t start. Before I could even reply, he FaceTimed me. The loud ringtone startled Anna. She looked over at me and was about to speak when I answered the call right in front of her. “Chloe, what the hell is your problem? Why did you lock the Porsche?” 02 Hearing my boyfriend’s voice, Anna quickly looked away. But she didn’t look guilty or panicked at all. Wow. So they were intentionally making a fool out of me together. “I’ve been driving that car for weeks, how could you just—” “Who do you think owns the car, buddy? I was in a bad mood, can’t I lock my own car? I thought you were in your dorm doing homework. Why do you need to drive?” My tone was even more aggressive than his, completely catching him off guard. He stammered, “…I, I was just asking! Why are you so mad?” I saw Anna furiously pulling off my dress on the bottom bunk. I laughed and said to the screen, “Let me guess, were you planning to drive my car to take some girl out and pretend you’re rich?” “Well, let me tell you a funny story. I heard about a girl going on a date tonight. She wore her roommate’s clothes, carried her roommate’s bag, and even used her roommate’s expensive three-ply toilet paper. Am I at college to study, or am I running a charity for the homeless?” My boyfriend’s face flushed bright red. He immediately hung up the call. Anna immediately snapped, “Who are you being passive-aggressive towards, Chloe? I washed the clothes before I wore them! Are you really going to hold a few pieces of toilet paper over my head? I don’t owe you anything!” “Just because your boyfriend is broke and pathetic doesn’t mean you get to take your anger out on your roommate! I didn’t do anything to you!” Just then, Mia pushed the door open, returning from the library. As soon as she set down her thermos, Anna rushed over to her, playing the victim. “Mia, please talk some sense into her! Chloe is holding a grudge over a few sheets of toilet paper. Aren’t we supposed to be sisters?” Mia remained completely expressionless and said coldly, “That’s highly debatable.” Mia was also reborn. After attending that disastrous wedding, her hatred for Anna ran deep. Because during the wedding slideshow, Anna had publicly displayed a photo of Mia walking around the dorm in nothing but her bra and underwear. “What… what is wrong with you guys today? You’re acting so weird.” Anna awkwardly sat down in her chair, trying to change the subject. “We’re usually such good friends. It’s like you guys took crazy pills today. Whatever, I’ll let it slide. Mia, pour me a cup of hot water, I almost froze to death out there.” Mia didn’t even look at her. She slammed the lid onto her thermos. “If you want hot water, get it yourself. We aren’t your maids.” Anna froze. Her eyes instantly filled with tears. She curled up on her bed, crying, “I didn’t do anything to you guys…” Girl, are you ever going to drop the princess act? You played us for fools in our past life. Do you really think we’re going to put up with you this time around? Mia glanced at me, asking if I wanted to go shower, treating Anna like she didn’t even exist. When we came back from the showers, Anna was sitting on her bed, happily video-chatting with someone. “…Yes, Sean, I miss you too.” “Of course I’m in my dorm! It’s just three of us right now, one of the girls went home for the weekend.” “What’s so interesting about a girls’ dorm? It’s just a few beds and desks. Here, I’ll show you.” Saying that, Anna leaned out of her bed, switched to her rear camera, and brazenly started filming the entire room. I immediately clutched my towel tightly around myself and warned her, “People are changing in here! Stop filming!” Anna kept her AirPods in, acting like she couldn’t hear me, giggling and introducing the room to the guy on the phone. Mia lost it. She charged forward, hung up Anna’s FaceTime call, grabbed her by the collar, and slapped her hard across the face. “Are you deaf?! People are changing, and there’s underwear hanging up! Who the hell are you filming that for?!” Anna shrieked like a stepped-on cat. “Sean is my cousin! So what if I show him?!” “You’re acting like anyone actually wants to see you! Even if a fat cow like you stripped naked, nobody would want to look!” 03 Mia instantly went silent. She was from the Midwest. She was 5’7″ and weighed maybe 130 pounds. How on earth did that make her fat??? Her eyes, blazing with hatred, locked onto Anna. The fury practically radiated from her head. “You are utterly disgusting!” Mia was strong. She shoved Anna down onto the bed, forcefully ripped her phone from her hands, grabbed Anna’s thumb, and forced it onto the scanner to unlock the phone. “What are you doing?! Why are you taking my phone?!” Mia signaled to me with her eyes. I grimly opened Anna’s photo gallery. It didn’t take long to find the problematic photos. There were pictures of my drying underwear, photos of our other roommate Sarah changing her clothes, and… The photo of Mia completely naked while changing. When we got to that photo, I handed the phone to Mia. Her eyes instantly went red. “That… that was an accident! I must have hit the camera button by mistake, I didn’t even know I took that!” Anna stammered for a moment, then turned her head, acting tough. “What does my photo gallery have to do with you?! Stop invading my privacy! Do you know that’s illegal?!” The next second, she let out a bloodcurdling scream. Mia grabbed the front of Anna’s shirt and ripped it clean in half. “Are you crazy?! You fat pig, you—” Mia shoved the torn fabric into Anna’s mouth to shut her up. She violently stripped Anna completely naked and threw her onto the bed. The dorm door was wide open, the hallway lights blazing. Anna turned pale as a ghost, huddling on her mattress, trembling and whimpering. “Listen to me very carefully. I have permanently deleted everything on your phone. If you ever dare to secretly film us again, I will strip you naked and throw you out the front doors of the lecture hall. Do you understand me?” Anna, crying and snotting all over herself, nodded frantically. Only then did Mia let her go, turning around to grab her laundry basket. Anna stayed curled up on the bed for a minute, recovering. Then she rapidly threw on fresh clothes, grabbed her phone, and bolted out the door. “Is she going to the RA?” I asked. “Maybe. But Mia has a stubborn streak. I’m guessing she’ll escalate this all the way to the top. I wonder what will happen if this blows up?” Anna suddenly stopped in the doorway. Her fists were clenched so tight her knuckles were white, and tears were still streaming from her bloodshot eyes. I walked over with a cold smile, hooked my arm through hers, and offered some fake advice. “Come on, blowing this out of proportion is bad for everyone. Besides, we’re all roommates. We’re sisters, right?” Anna shot me a tearful look, a flash of calculating shrewdness hiding in her eyes. She quickly put on her best victim act. “Of course we’re sisters. I just wanted to record our memories together so we’d have something to look back on after graduation. How could Mia treat me like this?” What a masterclass in gaslighting. The manipulation was so thick, it was no wonder we had all been fooled by her in our past life. “She’s probably just stressed from working three jobs and is in a bad mood. Since we’re all sisters, why don’t you just let it go?” Anna wiped her tears and grabbed my hands, faking sincerity. “You’re right. Sisters shouldn’t hold grudges over small things. Mia is from the country, so she has a bad temper. I’m a well-educated city girl; I should just be the bigger person and tolerate it!” That very night, Anna sent massive paragraphs of text to our fourth roommate, Sarah, who had gone home for the weekend. The gist was: I’m being bullied and isolated in the dorm. Mia physically assaulted me. If you help me speak up, we can go to the RA together and get Mia expelled. I won’t let her get away with this. Do you really think Chloe cares about you? She’s so rich, she looks down on you. Do you really think Mia cares about you? She’s jealous that you’re a local city girl, and she curses you behind your back. You’re my only true friend left. We need to stick together. Sarah read it, instantly forwarded the screenshots to me, and added three words: Is she insane? Sarah was also reborn. She was lucky enough not to have her underwear photographed, but at the wedding, Anna had shamelessly mocked her during the toasts: “So what if she grew up in the city? Both her parents are dead anyway. She’s not nearly as happy as a country girl like me.” 04 Sarah’s parents had died in a car crash shortly after our college graduation. Because of that single, vicious comment, Sarah was the first one to throw a glass at the wedding’s LED screen. Late that night, the three of us reflected deeply in our group chat about why we had let Anna manipulate us so thoroughly in our past life. We were all first-time dorm residents. We figured that living together required tolerance and compromise. Living together for four years was like gaining three new family members. If one family member had “princess syndrome,” liked to take advantage of small things, and lacked a filter… well, she had flaws, but we definitely had flaws too. We decided to just tolerate it and let it go. Even after graduation, when Anna called us crying, saying she couldn’t find any bridesmaids, we stepped up and played the fools. We never expected her to completely trample over all of our bottom lines at her wedding. It finally showed us exactly how garbage her character truly was. So, getting a second chance, none of us planned on letting her off the hook. The next day was Monday. During class, Anna stuck to Sarah like glue, sitting in the very back row, leaning in close, and trying to act buddy-buddy. Her intentions couldn’t have been more obvious. During the lecture, my boyfriend texted me, asking why he couldn’t log into my PSN account. My PSN account had every single game and expansion unlocked, so I always let him use it. After being reborn, the first thing I did was change all my passwords. I instinctively glanced over at Anna. Sure enough, she was holding her phone sideways, sitting in a pre-game lobby, waiting for someone. I pulled out my phone and logged onto my gaming account. Within a second, I received a game invite from a user named [BeNiceToAnna]. In the team chat, Anna typed: I just need one more win to rank up! Carry me, big brother! It’s so nice getting to use your skins. She was even using a matching couple’s avatar with my account. Absolutely disgusting. In my past life, they had flaunted this right in front of my face, and I had been completely blind to it! I joined the game, picked a character, and spent the entire match stealing her loot, stealing her kills, and intentionally getting her killed. She got so mad she almost threw her phone multiple times. But, I still carried her to a win. Anna got so excited she ran to the bathroom to send a voice memo. In her most sickeningly sweet, baby voice, she cooed, “Thank you so much for carrying me to the next rank, big brother—” Before she could finish, I kicked open her stall door and shoved my victory screen right in her face. “Does it feel good to flirt with someone else’s boyfriend in a public toilet?” “Is that loser really as good as me? Can he carry you with a 12-0 streak, or can he drive a Porsche downtown to buy you dinner?” “Since you love digging through my trash so much, how about I put a dumpster on your bed so you can play in it day and night? You two are dating using my money. Am I your sugar daddy? Should I pay for your wedding and his honeymoon too?!” Anna’s face turned beet red. She stood awkwardly in the stall, shifting her weight from foot to foot, and mumbled defensively, “I don’t know what you’re talking about… I’m just playing a game with your boyfriend, are you jealous or something…” Mia just happened to walk into the bathroom. She rushed over, her eyes wide, and asked me loudly, “What? I heard she’s a homewrecker sleeping with taken guys now?” Mia rolled up her sleeves, looking ready to throw down. Anna shrieked, ducked under Mia’s arm, and sprinted out of the bathroom. Sarah walked past us carrying Anna’s abandoned backpack, giving us a reassuring nod. “Anna, what’s wrong? Why are you running?!” Sarah chased after her, pretending to be a concerned friend. As they walked away, I smiled. Insulting someone’s deceased parents is the ultimate line to cross. I knew that by trying to buddy up to Sarah, Anna was signing her own death warrant. Right then, my boyfriend called me again. Seeing I wasn’t picking up, Mia bluntly asked, “Do you want me to cuss out the cheating bastard for you?” How could I let him die so easily? I had to keep him around to properly torture him. Mia stood by the sink, rubbing lotion onto her hands, advising me, “Just don’t let him fool you again. I remember you two broke up senior year last time. This time, dump him early.” She was working a part-time job washing dishes in a cafeteria kitchen. Her hands were red and cracked from the cold water; sometimes she could barely hold a pen. Her family lived in a deeply impoverished rural county. In this second life, she wanted to ride the wave of social media to make money. During those years, platforms like YouTube and TikTok were just beginning to explode, offering massive creator incentives. Mia was working three jobs just to save up enough money to buy a high-end camera to start vlogging. I asked her if she needed any financial help, but she confidently declined. She believed that with her future knowledge, she could definitely make money. This time around, she didn’t even want to apply for the university’s low-income financial aid. She wanted to leave it for students who actually needed it. We never expected that on the day the financial aid applications were announced, someone casually mentioned Mia’s name in the dorm group chat. Instantly, Anna spammed the chat with four or five selfies. The caption read: I finally met a rich girl! This is the newest DJI camera, it’s so cool! My roommate bought a new drone! Turns out she’s been living frugally just to fund her expensive hobbies! She’s so amazing! Sneaking a touch of Mia’s (my roommate) new drone! [Heart] [Heart] Even though she quickly unsent the messages, a lot of people in the dorm group still saw them. She followed it up with a sticking-out-tongue emoji, acting totally innocent, saying she sent it to the wrong chat. And then she immediately posted the exact same thing on her Instagram story. I figured Mia was probably at work and hadn’t checked her phone. Otherwise, she would have climbed through the screen and strangled her. The next second, a direct message from [Class President Sarah] popped up on my screen: Anna actually applied for the low-income financial aid grant. She’s preparing her paperwork right now. What do you think, should we ‘arrange’ a little surprise for her?

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My younger brother got a new girlfriend. The very next day, she deleted every single female contact on his phone. His girlfriend: “If you need something from him, tell me and I’ll pass it on.” Me: “Oh, then pass this on: our family doesn’t accept you!” 1 On Saturday, I was stuck at the office working overtime like a good corporate drone when I suddenly received a relentless bombardment of texts from my mom: Mom: Stella, your brother deleted me from his contacts. Mom: Can you get ahold of him? I laughed out loud. Wow, is this kid’s delayed rebellious phase finally kicking in? I switched over to my chat with Leo: Stella (18-Year-Old Beauty): Did you seriously delete Mom’s contact? The message spun for a long time. Just as I was about to curse my cousin Owen for being a cheapskate and refusing to upgrade our company’s terrible Wi-Fi, the message finally processed. A bright red exclamation mark popped up, mocking me: Message Not Delivered. You have been blocked. I stared at the screen for a solid minute, a vein throbbing in my temple. I switched back to my chat with Mom: Stella (18-Year-Old Beauty): Mrs. Thorne, please forgive your daughter’s incompetence. Stella (18-Year-Old Beauty): Your precious son blocked me too!!! Mom’s status showed: Typing… For ten whole minutes, nothing came through. Finally, a barrage of texts arrived: Mom: Forget about that ungrateful brat!!! Mom: Let’s see who he begs for his allowance this month! Mom: Blocking his own mother and sister? He’s out of his damn mind! Watching those three messages pop up like machine-gun fire, I could only sigh in admiration. Mrs. Thorne, beautifully done. Though I wholeheartedly agreed with Mom’s proposal to leave Leo out in the cold, I still switched over to the chat with my childhood best friend, Ethan Brooks. Stella (18-Year-Old Beauty): My brother blocked me and my mom. Can you reach him? Stella (18-Year-Old Beauty): If you can, ask him if he’s still breathing. It didn’t take long for a reply. It was a screenshot of a text conversation: Ethan: Leo, did you block your mom and sister? Leo: I’m Leo’s girlfriend. I deleted them. Is there a problem? Ethan: His mom and sister are worried about him. Can you have him text them back? Leo: If they need something from him, tell me and I’ll pass it on. Just skimming that screenshot made my blood boil. Stella (18-Year-Old Beauty): Ethan, text that girl back right now. Stella (18-Year-Old Beauty): Say: ‘Oh.’ Stella (18-Year-Old Beauty): ‘Then pass this on: our family doesn’t accept you!’ Stella (18-Year-Old Beauty): And tell Leo he can go collect cans to pay for his own tuition and living expenses because his mom cut him off! 2 Even though I was fuming over Leo’s new girlfriend, as his older sister, I still had an obligation to figure out what the hell this kid was doing. I grabbed my purse and marched out of the office, suddenly struck by a terrifying thought: Did Leo join a cult or a pyramid scheme?! Before my panic could fully set in, I spotted Ethan. Dressed in a black trench coat over a crisp dress shirt and slacks, he was leaning against his car. Seeing me walk out, he looked up from his phone. “Did you just get back from Southern University?” I asked. Ethan nodded. “I figured you’d be heading to Hudson University to track Leo down. I had to swing by to pick up some documents from my old professor anyway.” “Good guess,” I marveled. “Get in.” Ethan opened the passenger door, holding it steady for me. I pulled my seatbelt across my chest. “Didn’t you finish covering those substitute lectures at Hudson? Why do you still have documents left with your professor?” Ethan cleared his throat softly. “I forgot them. My professor asked me to come grab them.” “What’s the situation with Leo?” “Oh, that idiot is either in a cult or severely brain-damaged by love.” Thinking of that bright red exclamation mark, I rolled my eyes. “He really pissed my mom off this time.” The car drove through the gates of Hudson University. As we passed a small grove of trees, I caught a glimpse of my love-struck, brain-damaged brother. “Ethan, I see him. Can you park around here?” “Yeah, there’s a spot up ahead,” Ethan replied, turning the steering wheel. The moment my feet hit the pavement, I dragged Ethan toward Leo. Halfway there, the girl leaning affectionately against Leo’s chest started to look incredibly familiar. “Ethan.” I nudged him with my elbow. “Isn’t that the girl who aggressively chased you for three months while you were lecturing here?” Ethan glanced over. “Yeah. It’s her.” Wow! Good for her! She got rejected by Ethan and decided to settle for my brother instead?! I marched over in three strides and grabbed Leo by the ear. “Excuse me, little girl, borrowing your boyfriend for a second.” “Stella?!” Standing over six feet tall, Leo was forced to bend sideways as I yanked his ear. “What are you doing here?” “What am I doing here?!” I let out a dry, angry laugh. “Why don’t you ask your precious girlfriend what she did?!” I dragged him by the ear a few yards away. The moment Leo spotted Ethan, he broke free from my grip and hid behind him like a lifeline. “When did you get a girlfriend?” I demanded. Leo peeked his head out from behind Ethan’s shoulder. “Yesterday.” “You started dating yesterday, and today she deleted your own mother and sister from your phone?!” I reached out, trying to smack him. “Did you know about this?!” “Y-Yeah,” Leo stammered, looking slightly guilty. “Vanessa… she has trust issues! She lacks a sense of security!” “Lacks a sense of security? So she finds security by deleting every female contact in your phone?!” I was furious. “This precious girlfriend of yours chased Ethan for three months, got rejected, and immediately hooked up with you. What? Do you think you’re hotter than Ethan?” “With that empty head of yours, if you fed your brain to a zombie, it would spit it out and yell, ‘Gross! Simp brain!’” Leo glanced at Ethan, then puffed out his chest defensively. “Vanessa and I were love at first sight! It’s destiny! You wouldn’t understand because you’ve been forever alone since birth!” “You little—!” My head was buzzing with rage. I rolled up my sleeves, fully prepared to beat him to a pulp. Daring to call his sister ‘forever alone’? I clearly needed to remind him of his place in the food chain. “Stella, calm down,” Ethan intervened, gently holding me back. “Let Leo call your mom to tell her he’s safe first.” Taking a deep breath, I pointed at Leo. “Call Mrs. Thorne right now and tell her you’re breathing.” With that, I grabbed Ethan’s arm and dragged him away from that infuriating scene. Ugh. Naive little boys in love are a lethal hazard. 3 Back at the office. I sat at my desk, stressing out so much my hair was practically falling out. Because of Vanessa’s little stunt, Mrs. Thorne had gone nuclear. Not only did she cut off Leo’s allowance, but she decisively kicked him out of the house. Mrs. Thorne’s exact words: That ungrateful brat can come back when he’s single! Even so, seeing how utterly brainwashed Leo was, if I didn’t intervene, I was genuinely going to become an only child. I opened my text thread with Ethan: Stella: My mom invited you over for dinner tonight. Bring Leo with you. Ethan: Sounds good. I’ll pick you up after work. Stella: Perfect. Just as I hit send, I saw General Manager Price walk into my department with someone trailing behind him. I took a closer look. Well, well, well. If it isn’t the innocent little green tea girlfriend herself! Mr. Price set Vanessa up at an empty desk and pulled me aside. “Stella, my daughter wants to intern here to gain some experience. Vanessa says she really looks up to you. I’d appreciate it if you could show her the ropes.” “An internship? Isn’t she only a sophomore?” Mr. Price scratched his head. “She asked for it herself. I figured some real-world experience wouldn’t hurt.” I looked at Mr. Price, then at Vanessa. “Alright. But let me be clear, Mr. Price—I treat everyone equally. I’m not going to give her special treatment just because she’s your daughter.” Mr. Price nodded happily. “Of course, of course.” After seeing him out, I sat back at my desk. Vanessa walked over, holding a cup of coffee. She placed the coffee on my desk, her large doe eyes blinking sweetly. “Sister.” “Stop right there. I’m not your sister. While you’re at this company, I highly recommend you call me Director Thorne.” Vanessa looked pitifully wronged. “But Leo calls you that, so I thought…” I gave her a half-smile. “Leo who? That ungrateful brat was officially disowned by our family. Don’t try to play the family card with me.” “But I feel so close to you, Director Thorne. You feel like my own older sister. I thought you felt the same way.” Close? You didn’t feel ‘close’ when you used my brother’s phone to block me. I continued, “Since you’re here to learn, you’ll start like every other intern. Go organize the company’s entire design pitch portfolio for the past year. I want it by Friday.” Vanessa bit her lip. “Understood, Director Thorne.” “Wait,” I called out as she turned. “Thank you for the gesture, but I don’t drink coffee. Please take it with you.” Vanessa froze. Her small face instantly flushed crimson. Grabbing the coffee, she practically fled. I ignored the little manipulator and focused on my work. Around 4:30 PM, the office suddenly erupted into a commotion. Someone who only showed his face once every eight hundred years had actually appeared—our company’s CEO, my older cousin Owen. Despite his usual goofy demeanor, he was surprisingly dressed in a sharp suit. He clapped his hands as he walked into the department. “Design team! I just landed a massive account! We’re partnering with Southern University’s research lab to design the branding for their new tech product. Their representative is arriving shortly. Stella, make sure you greet them properly.” Before leaving, Cousin Owen threw me a ridiculously exaggerated, sleazy wink. I took a deep breath, suppressing the urge to punch him. “Understood.” After Owen left, Vanessa suddenly appeared behind me. She asked in a sickly-sweet voice, “Director Thorne, can I come with you?” Between the mention of Southern University and Cousin Owen’s sleazy wink, I knew exactly who the representative was. I eyed Vanessa critically. Did she hear about this partnership from her dad, and specifically begged to intern here just to stalk Ethan?! If that was the case, this girl had some serious nerve! Eating from my brother’s bowl while staring at the steak on Ethan’s plate! “Vanessa, did you finish summarizing the pitch portfolio?” She nervously twisted the hem of her shirt. “N-No.” I patted her shoulder. “Then stay here and keep working on it. Maya, come with me.” Ignoring Vanessa’s reaction, I called over another intern who had been with us for a while and walked out. 4 Unsurprisingly, the representative was Ethan. “You told me a while ago you were looking for a design partner for the lab’s new product. I didn’t expect you to actually bring it to us,” I said. Ethan gently patted my head. “What, is our great Design Director unhappy about it?” I feigned surrender. “Stop talking nonsense. I’m deeply honored.” By the time we finished discussing the partnership, it was almost time to clock out. Ethan checked his watch. “Are you working overtime tonight, Stella?” “Of course not.” I handed my final notes to Maya. “Cousin Owen is a massive cheapskate. He refuses to pay overtime, so why would I stay late?” Ethan’s eyes crinkled with amusement. He offered me his arm. “Do I have the honor of escorting Miss Stella out?” I hooked my purse over his outstretched arm. “Permission granted!” At my house. I unlocked the front door, fully prepared to yell: Mrs. Thorne, your precious daughter is home! But the words died in my throat. I grabbed Ethan’s arm. “Don’t you feel like the vibe in here is a little… off?” “Yeah. It’s much quieter than usual.” “Exactly! Usually, Mom would be yelling at me to wash my hands by now. Why is it dead silent?” Oh no! Did a burglar break in and kidnap Mrs. Thorne?! I pulled out my phone, ready to dial 911, when Mom walked out of her bedroom looking absolutely exasperated. I immediately dropped my phone and ran over to hug her. “Who had the audacity to upset our beautiful Mrs. Thorne?” “Who else? Your brother!” “What did Leo do?” “What did he do? He brought his girlfriend over! They’re currently giving her a grand tour of his bedroom!” Mom marched angrily toward the kitchen. “Infuriating! Absolutely infuriating!” Leo brought the green tea girlfriend here? Was he trying to give Mom a stroke?! Ethan leaned down and whispered in my ear, “I take it Leo hasn’t unblocked you and your mom yet?” “He wishes he could,” I scoffed. “Mrs. Thorne blacklisted his number days ago.” When dinner was ready, Leo emerged with his precious girlfriend. Vanessa looked at me timidly. “Hello, Director Thorne.” Me: What is with that look? If anyone else saw this, they’d think I was the Wicked Witch of the West about to eat her! Then, Vanessa turned her shimmering gaze toward Ethan. “Hello, Ethan.” Before Ethan could say a word, Leo chimed in. “Vanessa, you don’t need to be so formal calling her Director Thorne. Just call her ‘Sister’ like I do.” I looked horrified. “Please don’t. I absolutely cannot bear the weight of her calling me that.” “Stella, you—” “It’s not Director Thorne’s fault. I’m the one who wanted to call her that,” Vanessa interrupted gently. Leo: “But Vanessa…” Vanessa knitted her thin brows together, her doe eyes brimming with grievance. “Leo, it’s okay. Director Thorne just doesn’t like me.” As she spoke, tears welled up in her eyes, hanging precariously on her lashes. Seeing this, Leo immediately pulled her into a protective embrace, looking heartbroken. What a master-class performance. I let out a harsh scoff, too exhausted to watch her put on a soap opera. I kicked Leo hard in the shin. “Move! You’re in my way!” If I knew Leo was bringing this girl, I wouldn’t have arranged this dinner. I would’ve let him starve on the streets! “Ethan, let’s go help Mom.” I grabbed Ethan and dragged him away from the toxic fumes.

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It had been twenty days since Julian and I started our cold war. Today, he posted a picture on Instagram. Fingers intertwined with the school’s most popular girl. Quietly, I logged into the college application portal and changed my top choice to Lancewood University, a thousand miles away. At a party, one of his buddies teased him, “Chloe, if you don’t sweet-talk him soon, Julian’s actually going to end up with someone else.” I softly whispered an apology. Julian’s lips twitched into a smirk. “Forget it. Go home and pack your bags. We’re heading out tomorrow for the start of the semester.” I offered a vague hum of agreement. Julian didn’t know I had already bought a bus ticket to Lancewood for tonight. 1 I am the daughter of the housekeeper for Julian’s family. When I was seven, we moved into a small room on the first floor of their house. My duty was to take care of his everyday needs. For ten whole years, attending to him became a task etched into my bones. I was docile and well-behaved. Julian’s mother often praised me. But Julian hated me. The first time we met, he was standing on the staircase wearing a crisp white button-down and tailored shorts, looking as perfectly put together as a porcelain doll. I was wearing a faded, torn sundress, staring blankly at everything around me. The disgust in his eyes was impossible to hide. His mother introduced me. She told him I was Mary’s daughter, Chloe. My father had run off, and with nowhere else to go, we had come to stay with Mary. He didn’t say a word, just turned and walked upstairs. His mother told me that from then on, I was responsible for taking care of Julian. My mother also warned me. She said the family situation was complicated, and it was a miracle we were allowed to stay. She told me to talk less, do more, and absolutely never make Julian angry. I knew Julian didn’t like me. To make sure we could stay, I tried to make myself as invisible as possible. Every day, I quietly organized his clothes and cleaned his room. For the first three months, Julian didn’t speak a single word to me. That year, he got sick. His mother had been in a bad mood and was traveling overseas. The family doctor came and prescribed medicine, but by nighttime, his coughing still hadn’t stopped. I remembered a home remedy my grandmother used to make: poached pears with peppercorns. When I made it and brought it to him, Julian looked at it with absolute revulsion. “Chloe, are you trying to poison me? What kind of hillbilly concoction is this?” I replied timidly, “It’s not poison. The pear is good for you. It stops the coughing.” Julian looked annoyed. “If it doesn’t work, will you get the hell out of my house?” I froze, standing to the side, not daring to breathe. Julian let out a scoff and drank it down. The next morning, his coughing was much better. 2 Before elementary school started, my mom found a boarding school for me. It was a bit remote, meaning I could only come back on weekends. I felt a wave of relief. Being away from my mom meant I wouldn’t make things difficult for her in the house, and I wouldn’t have to walk on eggshells around Julian anymore. While I was packing and waiting for the bus, my mom ran over, completely out of breath, to tell me the news. Julian’s mother wanted me to attend the same elementary school as him. She wanted me to take care of him at school. I whispered, asking if I could just not go. My mom grabbed me by the shoulders. “Chloe, are you stupid? Julian’s school is the best in the city. Do you know how many people would kill to get in?” I lowered my eyes and didn’t say another word. 3 From that day on, I became Julian’s shadow. I followed him from elementary school straight through middle school. I got his lunch, carried his backpack, and did his homework. Everyone knew I was a tail he couldn’t shake off. By middle school, he had made a whole group of friends. And I was just the tail trailing far behind them. Always monitoring his mood, always anticipating his needs. His friends joked that I was his most loyal admirer. If Julian told me to go North, I wouldn’t dare take a step South. The only thing that never changed was his disdain for me. In eighth grade, Julian went out with his friends and got his favorite jacket dirty. He dragged me out of bed in the middle of the night and ordered me to hand-wash it. I was wearing a thin spaghetti-strap nightgown, my face burning red with embarrassment. Julian looked away awkwardly and sneered, “With a body that flat, who’d even want to look?” The quiet insecurity of a teenage girl began to take root. During our sophomore year, the academic pressure was crushing. I stayed up day and night doing practice tests. On a whim, Julian decided he wanted to eat my cooking. He demanded I make his lunch every night and bring it to school for him the next day. By the time I finished my practice tests and cooked his meals, it was past midnight. Then I still had to wake up early to make sure he got to school on time. At lunch, I heated up the food and brought it to his desk. His friend threw an arm around him and teased, “Look at Julian, getting home-cooked meals from his little wife.” Julian’s face instantly turned to ice. With a look of pure disgust, he shoved the food I had just heated up over to his desk-mate to eat. I didn’t say anything. I just waited quietly for them to finish, washed the container, and went back to my practice tests. That year, I finally started to develop, much later than the other girls. I absolutely hated running during P.E. class. But I couldn’t get out of it. I wasn’t Julian. During P.E., he usually just played basketball on the other court, and the teachers never bothered him. Whenever it was my turn to run, some guys would always whistle at me. I unconsciously slowed my pace. Oliver, a guy from the class next door, happened to walk by and handed me his uniform jacket. It caused a huge commotion. I had seen him at the opening assembly. Rumor had it his family’s company was massive. He was polite and gentle, and both his looks and his grades were at the very top of the school. “Put this on. You still have half a mile to run.” After a moment of hesitation, I took it. Later, someone spread a vicious rumor in class, saying I was shameless, deliberately trying to seduce Oliver, and even wearing his jacket to show off. Sitting in the back row, Julian violently kicked a desk over. It hit the floor with a deafening crash. Everyone instantly shut up. That evening, Julian didn’t wait for me to walk home. He said since I was so capable, I should just have Oliver take me home. I sighed, dug out some change, and went to wait for the public bus. To my surprise, Oliver was there too. He was quietly listening to an audiobook, and he waved when he saw me. I sat next to him, and he took out an earbud. I knew the jacket incident had caused him trouble too, so I softly apologized. Oliver just smiled, unbothered. “Chloe, don’t listen to the rumors. Just focus on your studying. You have two and a half years until college. Have you thought about where you want to go?” Oliver had the kind of gentle, elegant good looks that were the complete opposite of Julian’s sharp, aggressive handsome face. I was stunned for a moment. Where did I want to go to college? I had never even thought about it. My only thought was how to get my grades higher, and then higher still. I couldn’t afford tutoring, so my mom had managed to borrow Julian’s old notes for me. I had to admit, Julian was smarter than me. He often understood a concept the first time he looked at it. I had to review and practice relentlessly just to grasp the basics. Having his notes was genuinely a huge help. My mom had told me to just apply to whatever colleges Julian chose. His family was wealthy and had connections; his choices would definitely be the right ones. I didn’t know which college he was going to apply to. Oliver smiled gently. “Think about it carefully. Where do you really want to go?” When I got home, my mom told me Julian wasn’t coming back for dinner. She asked where he was. I shook my head and said I didn’t know. By the time Julian finally came home, it was past midnight. He looked exhausted, and there was blood on his hands. He walked in, gave me a cold glance, and went straight upstairs. I quietly asked if he needed me to help bandage his hands. He ignored me and kept walking. I went online and started researching different universities. It was the very first time. The first time I clearly realized I could leave Julian. I could go to a place I actually wanted to be. A while later, feeling uneasy, I asked my mom if she had ever thought about leaving the family. After all, we couldn’t live here forever. My mom looked a bit lost. She said that ever since she divorced my dad, she had worked for them. Even though Julian had a terrible temper sometimes, his mother was relatively easy to get along with. In all these years, I had never once seen Julian’s father at the house. I only knew bits and pieces from overheard conversations. His father’s company was massive, and he was always busy. His parents had a terrible relationship; it was an arranged marriage. After Julian was born, his father practically moved in with his mistress. His mother raised him, but aside from working, she traveled constantly, leaving my mom to take care of the house. My mom said her original plan was to work here until I graduated college, then take her savings and start a small business. I softly asked if she had considered leaving as soon as I finished high school. My mom stayed silent, stroked my hair, and didn’t say a word. 4 Ever since the jacket incident, Julian found new ways to torture me every single night. If it wasn’t fetching him water, it was organizing his desk. Or changing his bedsheets, or washing his new clothes by hand. I was just thankful I wasn’t sharing a bed with my mom anymore, so she didn’t have to see it and worry. If Julian didn’t sleep, I wasn’t allowed to sleep either. I had to stay visible, constantly doing something. A few times, the exhaustion hit me so hard I just passed out. When I woke up, I was always on the sofa in his room. And Julian would already be gone. I started taking the public bus by myself. It took longer, but my heart felt lighter. I figured if I pissed him off enough, maybe he’d just ignore me forever. Of course, that was impossible right now. All I could do was use my studying as an excuse to stop spending all my time trying to please him. A week later, Julian had a basketball game. Normally, I’d buy his sports drinks and have his change of clothes ready. This time, I didn’t go. I stayed in the classroom, memorizing vocabulary words. My mom called, saying Julian had been in a terrible mood lately. His mother had asked her to tell me to take better care of him. She had ordered bubble tea to the court and told me to go pick it up. I took the drinks and sat on the sidelines. A few girls were giggling and gossiping nearby. “Told you. She couldn’t stay away. Julian ignores her for a few days, and she panics.” “A lapdog needs to know its place. She tried to play hard to get, but she caved.” I didn’t say a word. On the court, Julian jumped and sank a perfect shot, drawing cheers from the crowd. He stared right at me and gestured for me to hand out the drinks. I handed them to the other players first. I brought the last cup over to him. He had his hands resting behind his back, looking at me with a malicious glint in his eye. I stood there in the sun, holding out the cup, absorbing the mocking stares of everyone around us. I said quietly, “Julian, your drink.” He didn’t look at me. His voice was lazy. “Hold it up to me. I sprained my wrist. It hurts.” I unwrapped the straw, put it in the cup, and held it up to his mouth. Julian leaned down and took a few sips. His friends whistled and hollered at him. He just smirked, unbothered. I genuinely didn’t understand what he was trying to prove. Until I turned around and saw Oliver sitting on the bleachers across from us. Was he trying to show off in front of Oliver? They both came from wealthy, influential families. Both were incredibly good-looking and at the top of the class. It was inevitable that people compared them. I just hadn’t expected Julian, who usually ignored everyone, to start caring about Oliver. I didn’t overthink it. I just did as I was told, holding the straw to his lips. At least if Julian was in a good mood, he wouldn’t make my life miserable, and I’d be able to get some sleep tonight.

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My son won an award for his college capstone project, which came with a $2,000 cash prize. He used $1,000 to buy himself a pair of limited-edition sneakers, $500 to buy his dad a tailored suit, and the remaining $500 to book a weekend getaway for his grandparents. I thought he was saving an even bigger surprise for me, waiting with a heart full of anticipation. When he noticed me waiting, he frowned and muttered, “You’re just a stay-at-home mom. You’ve never sacrificed anything for me. What right do you have to a cut of my money?” Overhearing this, my husband looked at me with pure disgust. “Stay-at-home moms have it so easy. I’ve given you a wonderful life, and you have the nerve to be greedy for your son’s money! You’re insatiable.” Later, the whole family signed up for premium health insurance policies, leaving me as the only one uninsured. They claimed that since stay-at-home moms didn’t do any “real” work, I wouldn’t get sick. As it turned out, out of the entire family, I was the only one who developed a critical illness from years of chronic overwork. Seeing the astronomical cost of the surgery, they immediately opted to pull the plug on my medical care. In the end, I died entirely alone in a cold hospital room. When I opened my eyes again, I had been reborn. And my son was currently screaming in my face, calling me a control freak. 1 “All you do is hover over me and control every little thing! You won’t let me eat this, you won’t let me drink that—you’re so damn annoying! “Why don’t you just go fucking die?!” My son’s spit flew onto my face, snapping me out of a daze. Looking around, I was utterly shocked by the painfully familiar scene unfolding before me. I had been reborn. I was back in the year my son was in eighth grade! Because it was the final year before the crucial high school placement exams, I had drafted a rigorous study schedule for him. Today was the fifth day of that plan, and the moment he walked through the door, he exploded. He came in cursing and throwing a tantrum. I had barely asked him one question before he hurled that vicious insult at my face. He grabbed the expensive study tablet I had bought him, slammed it onto the floor, and stomped it into pieces. “To hell with English! If you care so much, go learn it yourself! Stop forcing your own pathetic dreams onto me and making me accomplish them for you, you selfish freak!” This was the third time he had thrown a violent tantrum this week. I looked at him and asked calmly, “Didn’t you say you wouldn’t settle for anything less than an elite prep school?” He let out a disdainful scoff. “I’ve been at the top of my class since middle school started. It’s just a prep school; do you seriously think I can’t get in?” My mother-in-law, Brenda, chimed in from the couch. “Exactly, Nora. You’re way too strict with Tyler. Our Tyler is brilliant; he doesn’t need to study all this extra junk. Your schedule is suffocating him. You need to reflect on your own behavior.” My father-in-law, Arthur, spat a sunflower seed shell onto the coffee table and nodded in agreement. I asked them, “One hour of self-study every night, three hours of tutoring on Saturday, and taking all of Sunday off. For a student preparing for high school placement exams, is that really considered strict?” Tyler hurled his heavy backpack onto the floor. “You’re a fucking control freak! You enjoy the power trip, so of course you don’t think it’s strict! I’m a human being, I need to breathe! Give me back my weeknights and weekends!” My husband, Mark, pushed the front door open, his brow deeply furrowed. “What’s all the screaming about? I could hear you guys all the way down the hallway.” He turned his gaze to me. “Nora, are you nagging Tyler again?” The entire family unanimously decided it was my fault. I remembered what happened at this exact moment in my previous life. I had desperately tried to provide evidence that if Tyler didn’t put in the effort, his grades would slip. I was rewarded with nothing but eye rolls and bitter resentment from the whole family. Looking back, I realized how pathetic and ridiculous I had been. This time, I didn’t get angry, and I didn’t panic. I just looked at my son and asked, “So, what do you want to do?” Tyler looked at me in shock, as if he hadn’t expected me to ask that. He stood frozen for a long moment before finally speaking up: “First of all, I get to eat whatever I want, and I go to sleep whenever I want. You are not allowed to manage me!” I nodded. “Okay.” 2 Tyler’s eyes nearly popped out of his head. In pure disbelief, he demanded, “Don’t patronize me! I’m being completely serious!” Mark masked his own surprise and interjected, “Nora, this isn’t the first time I’ve told you this. A growing boy needs more than just studying; he needs rest. You force him to bury his nose in books all day, you’re going to depress him. Do you really not see that you’re the problem here?” Brenda added fuel to the fire. “I’ve said from the start that Nora’s parenting methods were toxic! Our Tyler used to be such a sweet boy, and her parenting has made his temper worse and worse. People outside the family keep asking me if there’s something psychologically wrong with him and telling me to take him to a therapist!” Arthur let out a heavy grunt, angrily tossing a handful of sunflower seed shells onto the floor. He glared at me coldly. “As a mother, you cannot push a child to the brink like this! If we were living in the old days, a mother who drove her son to this point would be thrown in an asylum!” I couldn’t help but laugh. I threw my hands up. “Why is everyone getting so worked up? What did I even say?” Brenda bared her teeth and spat at me, “I don’t need you to say it to know you disagree with letting Tyler rest! It’s not like I just met you yesterday!” I ignored her and looked back at my son. “Do you have any other demands?” Tyler glanced at his dad and grandparents, then tentatively added, “On top of those two, I want you to cancel my forty-five-minute daily screen time limit. I want to be on my phone as long as I want. If I want to game, I game. If I want to watch streams until three in the morning, you are not allowed to interfere!” I nodded again. “Done.” His eyes widened even further. He immediately grabbed a pen and paper, ducked his head, and frantically scribbled down over a dozen demands. I skimmed the list. The gist of it was simple: he wanted me to completely step away from every aspect of his life. He shoved the paper toward me. “Sign it! I’ll only believe you if you sign it!” I swept my gaze over my husband and my in-laws’ reactions. They were all looking at me with smug expressions, fully expecting me to say “no,” ready to jump in and ruthlessly criticize me the moment I did. I had lived that life for nearly ten years. Tyler was not naturally gifted at academics. A concept that another student could grasp in one minute took him half an hour to fully understand. Yet, from a young age, he was obsessed with being number one and wanted everyone to call him a genius. Since he lacked natural talent but desperately wanted the glory of getting into an elite prep school, he had to work twice as hard. In my previous life, when I realized this, I weighed my career against his future and chose him. I quit my job as a teacher, dedicating myself entirely to being a stay-at-home mom. I single-handedly dragged him from the absolute bottom of his grade to the top ten. Every single day, apart from doing chores and waiting on my in-laws hand and foot, my routine consisted of buying him study materials, making schedules, tutoring him one-on-one, solidifying his knowledge, and making sure he didn’t burn out. For almost ten years, year in and year out, I did this. Though the days were monotonous and exhausting, seeing him improve made me feel it was all worth it. I swallowed his constant, unreasonable tantrums, bore the brunt of his family’s baseless accusations, and successfully molded him into an Ivy League design student who even won a prestigious award for his senior thesis. And what was the result? When he stood on that stage to give his acceptance speech, he thanked everyone under the sun. He thanked himself, his dad, his grandparents, his professors, his classmates—he even thanked the stray cats on campus. But he didn’t mention me once. When it came to the prize money, I was entirely excluded. After college, riding on the coattails of the stellar resume I had essentially built for him, he landed an incredible offer at a top firm. The very first month he got paid, he rented an apartment and moved out. For an entire year, he didn’t even come back to visit me on holidays. Later, when the years of repressed stress and exhaustion manifested into a terminal illness, I lay in a hospital bed and begged to see him. He dragged his feet, taking half a month to finally show up. The moment he walked into my room, his face was buried in his phone, and he even chuckled at whatever he was watching. When I tried to speak to him, he cut me off impatiently. “I’m an independent adult now! Are you seriously still trying to micromanage me just for playing on my phone?” After that, the only other time he came to the hospital was when I was on the brink of death. He rushed in and immediately told the doctors to withdraw all life-saving care… Now, staring at the piece of paper in front of me, I smiled. I picked up a pen and signed my name with a fluid stroke. “From today onward, you’re free, Tyler.” 3 My son literally jumped for joy. He kicked his shoes off, threw his jacket on the floor, grabbed a massive bottle of Coke, and bolted into his room to boot up his gaming PC. After playing for a bit, he yelled out into the living room. “Grandma! Order me some KFC! I want fried chicken! Two whole buckets!” Brenda eagerly obliged, as always. “Okay! Whatever my precious grandson wants to eat, Grandma will order it. Unlike some people, who micromanage every bite of food that goes into their own son’s mouth.” As she spoke, she pulled out her phone to order the food, her eyes shooting daggers in my direction, clearly waiting for me to step in and stop her. Tyler hated exercise but loved deep-fried food. At 5’11”, he was already pushing 200 pounds. He was heavily overweight, and his blood panels were all bordering on dangerous levels. I used to try desperately to help him lose weight, cooking him healthy, low-fat meals. But I couldn’t stop his dad from secretly giving him allowance money to buy junk food at school. Because of that, I strictly forbade him from eating any junk food once he got home. Over this one issue alone, the family and I had fought no less than five times. Seeing that I wasn’t saying anything, Brenda deliberately raised her voice to Arthur. “Old man, look! I ordered two whole buckets of fried chicken for Tyler!” Her voice was booming, as if she were terrified I wouldn’t hear her. I picked up my phone and walked outside to take a call, completely ignoring her. I had sent a text earlier to an old colleague asking about job opportunities, and she was calling me back. We used to teach at the same school. Later, I quit to become a housewife, and she quit to open her own private tutoring center. A year ago, when we ran into each other and she found out I had been personally tutoring my son the whole time and hadn’t really left the education sphere, she was thrilled. She practically begged me to join her company as a partner. In my previous life, I had been incredibly tempted, but the thought of Tyler needing my one-on-one attention made me refuse without hesitation. This time, I was going to reboot my life. Hearing that I was ready to join, she excitedly invited me out for dinner. I immediately grabbed my purse and got ready to leave. Seeing this, Brenda asked nervously, “It’s almost six o’clock! Where are you going? Aren’t you making dinner?” “I have plans.” “You have plans?! You can’t just leave! The whole family is waiting to eat!” Brenda scowled, her mouth gaping open like a bottomless pit. “If you have hands, cook it yourself. If you don’t, then starve.” Dropping that sentence, I walked right out the front door. I grabbed dinner with my old colleague, went shopping, and got my nails done. My mind and body experienced a level of relaxation I hadn’t felt in years. In the past, my only thoughts were helping my son be number one and taking care of the family so my husband could focus on work. My mind was always tightly wound. The smile had long vanished from my face, replaced only by deepening wrinkles with each passing day. Tonight, doing something so simple with a friend made me feel like I had traveled back ten years in time. By the time I got home, it was almost 10:00 PM. The living room lights were blazing. Mark was sitting on the couch, his face dark as thunder, waiting for me. 4 “So you finally decided to come back?” I looked at him calmly. “I’m not lost, obviously I know how to come home.” His face darkened further. He pointed at the disaster zone on the floor and yelled, “Do you see this?! Your precious son threw all this! There’s sunflower seed shells trailing all the way to his bedroom door! And chip crumbs, and dirty tissues! You turned a perfectly good house into a garbage dump! “And look at the time! He ate two buckets of fried chicken before dinner, then ate an entire takeout box during dinner, and now he had his grandmother make him a huge bowl of noodles! If he keeps eating like this, he’ll be over 200 pounds by tomorrow! “I’m not done! I just checked his backpack. He hasn’t written a single word of his homework today! He’s been playing that game since six o’clock! Is this a joke to you?” He grew more agitated the more he spoke. He turned and slapped the calendar on the wall, emphasizing, “He has midterms in ten days! And right after midterms is the parent-teacher conference! I already bragged to my coworkers that my son is a genius who always ranks in the top ten, and they’re waiting for me to send them pictures from the conference! How the hell is he supposed to get top ten with this kind of studying attitude?!” I listened quietly to his rant, then let out a small laugh. “Wow, so you actually knew all of this? I assumed you were completely clueless, considering how you always accused me of being a tyrant who was driving her child insane every time I tried to discipline him.” His face changed. He choked on his words for a long moment before squeezing out, “Don’t play games with me! You’re his mother! You know better than anyone what’s good for him! Letting him do whatever he wants is absolutely not loving him!” He waved his hand dismissively, barking an order at me. “Look, I know you’re just putting on a show to teach him a lesson, but time is precious. Drop the act and go rein him in!” I raised an eyebrow. “I’m not acting. Since I signed that agreement, I absolutely will not go back on my word. If you want to manage him, go right ahead. It’s not like he’s only my son.” He puffed his chest out righteously. “I have to work and make money to provide for you!” I pulled out the employment contract I had just signed and tossed it on the table. “What a coincidence. I have a job now too. $4,000 base salary plus commission. I start tomorrow.” He picked it up, skimmed it, and all the fire drained out of him. He started stammering, “Y-you’re serious?” I shrugged. He hurriedly walked over, pushed me down onto the couch, and started lecturing me with faux earnestness. “Why are you doing this? You have a roof over your head and food on the table. Why do you need to go out and show your face to the world? Is the $3,000 allowance I give you every month not enough?” I sneered. “Try living on it yourself, and you’ll see if it’s enough.” He fell silent for a moment, then pulled out his phone to show me a video of a female livestreamer. “Do you really think making $4,000 at a tutoring center is easy? What kind of ‘good job’ can a middle-aged married woman realistically get? They’re lying to you. In the end, they just want you to do this kind of trashy, borderline-explicit livestreaming. Look at this woman—how disgusting and cheap is she? Is that what you want to become?” His words were dripping with such vile misogyny it made me sick. I glared at him coldly. “Is your brain full of actual garbage? You’re filthy, so everything you look at seems filthy to you!” He scoffed, licked his lips, and tried another angle. “No, seriously, your son is at the most critical stage of his life right now. If he bombs his high school placement exams, he’ll have to go to some mediocre public high school. Can a mediocre high school get him into an Ivy League? Definitely not! If he doesn’t, what kind of future will he have?” I turned my head toward my son’s bedroom and shouted, “Tyler! Can you get into a top prep school without my help?!” Tyler, who just happened to be walking out to use the bathroom, heard me and let out a contemptuous laugh. “You make it sound like the only reason I got top ten before was because of you. I got those grades because I’m smart! It has nothing to do with you!” Heh. Those were the exact lines his grandparents constantly fed him to stroke his ego, and he actually believed them. His IQ really was a tragedy. 5 Seeing this, Mark’s face turned incredibly ugly. He had always played the role of the loving, indulgent father. He was nowhere to be found during the grueling daily grind of actual parenting, but the second Tyler got good grades, he’d rush to the parent-teacher conferences to soak up all the glory. After holding it in for a long time, he finally spat out, “Tyler, your mom is really mad.” My son’s face instantly darkened, and he glared at me with murderous intent. “What the fuck, are you trying to back out of the deal?!” Brenda interrupted, trying to steal my lines. “That’s right! Your mom wants to back out! You’ve eaten enough tonight, stop eating, or she’ll just nag you to death again.” Look at that. The whole family knew I was right; they just didn’t want to be the ones the kid hated. Tyler’s rebellious streak flared up. He picked up his massive bowl of noodles and started shoveling them into his mouth right in front of my face. His cheeks puffed in and out, genuinely looking like a pig at a trough. Mark and Brenda stared at me, waiting for me to blow up. Instead, I gave a bright smile and gave my son a thumbs up. “Your dad is right. You’re a growing teenager. Eat as much as you want.” In that moment, I saw a flash of unprecedented panic in Mark’s and Brenda’s eyes. Ten days passed just like that. The midterm results were posted. Ranked 200th in his grade. A catastrophic, sheer-drop decline! The entire family was convinced I wouldn’t be able to keep up the act anymore and would finally tear up the agreement.

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1 The day annual bonuses landed, mine came in a box of condoms. “Sales is just the company’s red-light district. All those numbers? From boozing and sleeping around.” I looked up at the secretary, her face stretched into a lewd grin. “Having a blast and making bank? I wouldn’t mind that gig.” A few crude chuckles echoed through the conference room. I snapped my laptop shut, pushing back from the table. Leaning by the window, I opened my messenger. A message from the VP of our rival company, three days old, still sat there. “Ms. Graham, thought about it? Bring your clients over, and the VP spot is yours.” … More lewd laughter drifted from the conference room behind me. Then came Mr. Henderson’s reedy, squawking voice: “Walk out that door, and don’t you dare regret it!” I didn’t look back, striding purposefully towards the open-plan office. Linda, her ten-centimeter heels clicking, chased after me. She deliberately raised her voice in the hallway: “Oh, come on, Ms. Graham, stop pretending you’re so high and mighty.” “Without this company, you’re nothing. And don’t forget to pick up that box of condoms from accounting. Mr. Henderson’s little severance gift.” Colleagues glanced over, whispering. I stopped, sweeping a cold gaze over her. Linda hugged her arms, a triumphant, sneering smile plastered across her face. Instead of getting mad, I smirked, turning towards my workstation. Last month’s sales reports still sat piled on my desk. That was the result of three consecutive all-nighters, my team and I burning the midnight oil. Just ten minutes ago, Mr. Henderson had, with a casual flick of his wrist, erased it all. I looked at the familiar faces beyond my cubicle. Josh kept his head down, pretending to type, his shoulders trembling slightly. Ms. Lee, eyes red-rimmed, shot me a look of suppressed fury. In that moment, my last shred of hesitation vanished. My phone buzzed in my pocket. I pulled it out. The screen showed a message from Mr. Chen, the VP of Genesis Tech, our competitor. “Ms. Graham, what’s your decision?” My fingers flew across the screen. “I’m bringing the project. I want the Sales Director position.” He replied almost instantly. “Deal. Contract’s ready, car’s downstairs.” I shoved my phone back into my pocket and started packing. I didn’t bother with the box full of random junk. I just unplugged my encrypted USB drive. Then, I opened my laptop, my fingers dancing across the keyboard. After copying the core client data, I deleted the files directly. Leaving behind only a heap of worthless surface-level data in the company system. Once that was done, I shut down the computer, feeling utterly refreshed. Mr. Henderson burst out of his office, I hadn’t even noticed him. He stared at my empty desk, the jowls on his face quivering. “Iris Graham, if you walk out that door, I’ll make sure no one in this industry ever hires you!” He pointed a finger at my nose, roaring, “Everyone knows your dirty little secrets! Don’t think changing places will magically clean up your act!” Here we go again with the sleazy rumors. It was his usual tactic, trying to corner me with that kind of low-down garbage. I cut him off impatiently: “Mr. Henderson, save it.” I casually unclipped my ID badge from my neck. In front of everyone, I tore the badge cleanly in half. With a flick of my wrist, the pieces landed precisely in the nearby trash bin. “Keep your threats and your condoms for yourself. Be careful not to screw yourself over.” The entire floor fell silent. Mr. Henderson’s face turned scarlet with rage, his mouth agape, unable to utter a word. I picked up my bag and walked out without a backward glance. Stepping out of the company building, the late autumn chill wind hit my face, yet it felt exhilarating. A black Maybach was parked by the curb. Mr. Chen, the VP himself, got out and opened the car door for me. “Ms. Graham, welcome to Genesis.” No talk of probation periods, just the core employment contract. I signed my name, watching the passing scenery outside the window. I pulled out my phone and posted on social media. The accompanying photo was my brand-new Genesis Tech ID badge. The caption was just a simple line. “New beginnings. Making money with my brains, not my looks.” A few minutes later, my phone vibrated furiously. 2 The day after I left, my old company was in an uproar. According to Josh’s whispered messages, the sales department was in complete chaos. Mr. Henderson slammed the printed client list onto Linda’s face. “That Iris broad always hogged the resources, now they’re yours!” He pointed at the long list, roaring, “Go close those deals! Prove that sales is all about looks!” Linda, holding the folder with only contact information, was brimming with confidence. She changed into a low-cut, tight red dress, her perfume so strong you could smell it two blocks away. Her first target was the multi-million-dollar client, Mr. Thompson from Apex Group. Linda, with two fresh-out-of-college girls in tow, marched straight to Apex Group’s building. She thought it would be the same old song and dance she used to pull with Mr. Henderson. But I knew Mr. Thompson too well. He was a true go-getter, utterly disgusted by suggestive “public relations” tactics. Sure enough, less than half an hour later, Linda emerged, looking utterly deflated. Not only did Mr. Thompson refuse to see her, he called a complaint directly to the company’s front desk. “Tell your Mr. Henderson that if he sends any more inappropriate people to harass us, he can expect a legal letter!” Mr. Henderson, in his office, furiously smashed a cup. Unwilling to scold Linda, he turned his wrath on the rest of the sales department. “It’s all your fault for not backing up Director Linda properly!” “A bunch of useless hacks! Can’t even handle one client!” My former colleague, Ms. Lee, was crying uncontrollably on the phone. “Iris, we can’t take it anymore.” “Mr. Henderson is forcing us to give clients gifts, entertain them at dinners, and even hinting that the female employees should follow Linda’s lead…” I clenched my phone, my voice turning colder. “Hang in there for two more days. The real show’s coming.” Hanging up, I looked at the dense data analysis on my computer screen. At Genesis Tech, I hadn’t wasted a second, working through the night to churn out a proposal. Completely discarding my old company’s “drinking culture.” Mr. Thompson agreed to my invitation. The meeting was set for a quiet business tea room. I didn’t order alcohol, opting instead for a pot of premium Pu-erh tea. I placed the thick analysis report on the table, sliding it towards Mr. Thompson. “Mr. Thompson, this is the proposal tailored for Apex Group.” Mr. Thompson flipped through a few pages, his brows slowly relaxing. “Ms. Graham, you truly understand me.” He closed the document, sighing, “The new people at that previous company are an insult to my intelligence.” I smiled faintly, refilling his teacup. “Professionals handle professional matters, Mr. Thompson. We only discuss business.” The meeting was very productive. Not only did I secure Mr. Thompson’s verbal commitment, but I also gained a crucial piece of information. My former company’s supply chain had a major vulnerability. Since I used to manage supply chain coordination, I knew exactly where their weak points were. At an industry gala that weekend, fate ensured a run-in. Mr. Henderson and Linda arrived, dressed to the nines. Linda was clinging to Mr. Henderson’s arm, her dress slit almost to her thigh. Upon seeing me, she deliberately raised her voice. “Well, well, isn’t it Iris Graham, the one who got kicked out?” All eyes in the vicinity instantly converged on us. Linda sauntered over, swaying her hips, scrutinizing my business attire. “Think you can close deals just by jumping to the competition? Or are you back to sleeping your way to the top?” Mr. Henderson let out a grating, cold laugh beside her. “Iris Graham, even a dump like Genesis can take you in?” “Heard it was Mr. Chen himself who picked you up? Guess you only have talent in that one area.” Their vulgar words echoed through the gala hall. Many people started pointing and whispering about me. I held my glass of juice, watching the two clowns. In that moment, I felt no anger, only a detached amusement, like watching a poorly acted play. 3 Facing Linda’s malicious slander, I didn’t descend into a shouting match like a fishwife. Instead, I merely turned slightly, smiling at the industry titans around me. “Mr. Henderson’s company culture is certainly… unique.” I said, unhurriedly, “After all, when annual bonuses are condoms, I just can’t appreciate that kind of generosity.” My voice wasn’t loud, but it was just clear enough for everyone nearby to hear. A stir went through the crowd, many revealing looks of disdain. Mr. Henderson’s face instantly turned ashen, as if he’d been slapped hard. Infuriated, he pointed at me: “Iris Graham, you just wait!” After the gala, Mr. Henderson didn’t let up. He aggressively spread rumors in several industry group chats, each with hundreds of members. He claimed I’d stolen trade secrets from my former company, even Photoshopped some explicit images. All in an attempt to completely ruin my reputation before the Apex Group tender. Whispers started circulating within Genesis Tech as well. People gossiped in the break room, questioning whether I would bring negative publicity to the company. “That Ms. Graham, her reputation isn’t great, is it?” “Why did Mr. Chen hire someone like her?” Mr. Chen, the VP, walked straight in, slamming a file onto the table. “I value Ms. Graham’s capability.” He scanned the room, his voice icy: “These underhanded tactics just prove our competitor is desperate. Anyone caught gossiping will be out the door.” Standing outside the door, a warmth spread through me. With the company trusting me so much, I couldn’t afford to lose. I didn’t rush to defend myself in the group chats; that would be a waste of time. Instead, I contacted a lawyer directly, getting all of Mr. Henderson’s defamatory screenshots and recordings notarized. At the same time, I reached out to a few former clients who had been burned by Mr. Henderson. We were going to team up and prepare a big surprise for him. The Apex Group bidding conference arrived as scheduled. Mr. Henderson and Linda, with their team, arrived in full force. They carried a beautifully bound proposal. Just a glance at the cover told me it was a plagiarism of an old, discarded draft of mine. Even the formatting hadn’t changed. Linda cornered me by the lounge door. She leaned in, smugly, “Don’t bother, Ms. Graham.” “Mr. Thompson privately agreed that as long as tonight…” She gave an ambiguous wink: “The contract’s ours. Your boring data won’t do anything.” I looked at her as if she were a hopelessly foolish child. “You don’t even know what Mr. Thompson detests most, and you think you’ll win the bid?” Mr. Thompson had a daughter who had been harassed early in her career. That’s why he loathed workplace quid pro quo above all else. Linda was dancing in a minefield, thinking she was waltzing. I couldn’t be bothered to enlighten her, merely sneering, “Is that so? Well, I hope you have a pleasant evening.” Both parties entered the conference room. Mr. Henderson sat opposite me, glaring menacingly. He raised a hand to his neck, miming a throat-slitting gesture. His lips clearly formed: “You’re toast.” I calmly opened my laptop. Mr. Thompson entered, his expression stern. His gaze flickered with distaste as it swept over Linda’s overly revealing dress. When he looked at me, he gave a slight nod. 4 Linda was the first to present. She swayed her hips to the projector screen, as confident as if she were on a red carpet. “At Cornerstone, we boast industry-leading service philosophies…” The entire presentation was a display of provocative posing, with the PPT content utterly vacuous. It was filled with suggestive phrases like “dedicated service” and “premium experience.” When she reached the crucial technical aspects, she stumbled. “Uh… well…” She had to turn to the technician beside her for help, and the atmosphere grew incredibly awkward. Mr. Thompson cut her off coldly: “Mr. Henderson, is this your idea of commitment?” Mr. Henderson immediately broke into a cold sweat, stammering, “Well… Mr. Thompson, we can discuss the terms further…” Mr. Thompson waved his hand impatiently: “Next.” I adjusted my blazer, picked up the clicker, and walked to the stage. My presence commanded the room. No wasted words, just solid data and logical arguments. I pointed to the line graph on the screen: “From what I understand, Cornerstone’s current inventory turnover rate isn’t sufficient to meet Mr. Thompson’s demands.” That sentence struck Mr. Henderson’s Achilles’ heel directly. He slammed his hand on the table and shot to his feet: “Iris Graham! You’re leaking former company secrets!” He pointed at me, roaring, “Mr. Thompson, this is corporate espionage! She stole all this data!” He tried to disrupt the meeting, to muddy the waters. I looked at him calmly, a mocking curve to my lips. “Mr. Henderson, these figures are derived from your publicly available financial reports.” “Is it so hard to admit to poor management?” My gaze was sharp: “Also, this is my professional integrity. Unlike some people who only focus their energy on how to hand out condoms to employees.” The room erupted in laughter. Mr. Thompson couldn’t help but smile, his admiration unconcealed. Mr. Henderson’s face turned beet red, but he couldn’t utter a single word in rebuttal. Mr. Thompson announced on the spot: “No further discussion needed.” He closed his folder: “I’m very satisfied with Genesis Tech’s proposal. Ms. Graham, let’s sign.” He completely ignored the Cornerstone group. Linda wasn’t giving up, trying to rush over to flirt and win him back: “Mr. Thompson, please reconsider…” Mr. Thompson frowned and called security. “Please escort this lady out. This is a conference room, not a nightclub.” Linda was dragged out by security, her arm in their grip, having lost one of her high heels. Mr. Henderson’s face was ashen, watching the multi-million-dollar contract fall into my hands. All his arrogance was extinguished in that moment. Walking out of the conference room, Mr. Henderson slumped, utterly defeated, onto a bench in the hallway. Like a mangy dog with its back broken. I walked up to him, looking down at him. “Mr. Henderson, I told you.” “Multi-million dollar contracts aren’t signed by taking off your clothes.” “This project? I’m taking it.” The glass door of the conference room was violently shoved open with a loud thud. Mr. Henderson, face red and tie askew, stormed out. He slammed a thick stack of files onto Ms. Lee’s desk, sending papers flying everywhere. “Useless! What good are you all, you good-for-nothings!”

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When Jason’s mentee tripped and fell, he rushed to take her to the hospital. I stood in his office doorway, holding a file: “Here’s the budget for next quarter. Just sign it if everything looks good.” His mind was already miles away. Without even glancing at it, he scribbled his name. Watching his hasty retreat, I couldn’t tell if I felt disappointment or relief. But what he didn’t know was that what he’d just signed wasn’t a budget sheet at all. It was the divorce papers for him and me. 1 I pushed open his office door, immediately hit by a rich, unfamiliar scent. I turned, spotting an elegant aroma diffuser on the cabinet by the entrance, and a bouquet of white roses on his desk. This was definitely not Jason’s doing. He used to scoff at such things. Just then, his assistant, Tina, walked in. Seeing me eyeing the diffuser, her expression grew complicated. She stammered, “Ms. Graham, that’s Ms. Lee’s.” I looked up at her: “Ms. Lee? Jason’s mentee, Alice Lee?” “Yes.” She bit her lip, deliberating for a long moment before finally speaking: “Ms. Graham, you’ve been busy traveling for work lately and haven’t been in the office much, but Ms. Lee has been a frequent presence in Mr. Trachtenberg’s office.” “A few days ago, someone even saw them in the parking lot, being very… intimate. Now… now, everyone’s whispering about an inappropriate relationship.” I nodded, saying softly, “I understand.” After Tina left, I pulled open Jason’s desk drawer. A torn condom wrapper was carelessly tossed inside. Just then, my phone rang. Jason’s name pulsed on the screen. I answered. Silence on the other end. After two seconds, a suppressed moan suddenly broke through. A woman’s sultry voice purred: “She just got back today, and you’re already here with me. Aren’t you afraid she’ll be upset?” “Afraid of what? She stuck by me when I had nothing. Now that I’m so successful, how could she ever leave?” Alice Lee giggled. Her voice was laced with a hint of a pout: “Then don’t go home tonight. Stay and keep me company, okay?” “That depends on how well you behave tonight.” A crackle of static came through the receiver, and then the call abruptly ended. Three days prior, while I was on a business trip in Rhode Island, a photo suddenly appeared on my phone—Jason and Alice kissing in a car. In that moment, I felt as if I were frozen, my mind ceasing to function. Soon after, my brother called. He said only one sentence: “Iris, come home.” That night, I booked a flight home. It was my first time returning home in seven years. Seven years ago, Jason and I fell in love, but my father and brother vehemently opposed it. They said Jason was ambitious, overly proud, cold-hearted, and fickle. But I was head over heels, convinced they simply looked down on him. Every discussion about Jason ended in a bitter argument. Later, I helped him start his company. Several times, when we were at a dead end, I had no choice but to ask my family for help. My father agreed but made one condition. I had to conceal my identity from Jason for ten years. Jason was inherently sensitive, and to be with him peacefully, I had never mentioned my family’s background. By then, there was even less need to. So, to this day, he still believed I was a struggling individual with a difficult upbringing, just like him. 2 My father and brother handed me all the evidence of Jason’s infidelity. Looking at the dense array of videos and photos, my chest ached, making it hard to breathe. My brother sighed, patting my shoulder consolingly: “It’s not too late to find out now, Iris. Think about it carefully.” I looked down at the signed divorce papers in my hand and dialed my brother’s number. He picked up quickly. “Bro, give me three days. I’ll sort things out here, then I’ll join Reliance Capital.” His voice on the other end was noticeably brighter: “Good. I’m glad you’ve come to your senses. Call me if you need anything.” Hanging up, I stared blankly at our wedding photo on his desk. The picture was from our wedding. Back then, Jason’s eyes were full of me. He swore he’d always treat me well, never let me suffer, never let me be sad. Those words, he’d long forgotten, flung to the bottom of the ocean. I picked up the photo frame and tossed it into the trash can, then stood up and left the office. I returned home and started packing. Opening the closet, a black lace nightgown, clearly not mine, hung conspicuously inside. It seemed to be mocking me, reminding me how ridiculous my seven years of devotion had been. I opened the smart lock’s surveillance app. Sure enough, on the very night I left for my business trip, Jason had brought Alice Lee home, acting as if they owned the place. They were recorded clearly, kissing by the door, embracing by the elevator. On the last day of the surveillance footage, Alice Lee’s dress captured all my attention. It was the one Jason had bought for me. One year for my birthday, he wanted to take me shopping for a gift. It was early in his startup, he didn’t have much money, and I felt for him, only picking out a two-hundred-dollar dress. But a few days later, Jason bought that two-thousand-dollar dress instead. He smiled, telling me he knew I liked that dress when I walked past the store. That day, I was moved beyond words. I treasured that dress, wore it once, then washed it and hung it in the closet, never daring to wear it again. Jason knew how precious it was to me. Alice Lee twirled in that dress in front of Jason, asking him with a smile, “Does this dress look better on me, or on her?” Jason didn’t answer her. Instead, he leaned in and kissed her lips. In an instant, my stomach churned. I clapped a hand over my mouth, rushed to the bathroom, and knelt before the toilet, throwing up. It took a long time before I finally recovered. Looking up, I saw the face wash, makeup remover, and various skincare products haphazardly strewn across the vanity. I reached out and found a women’s underwear, one I’d never seen before, pressed beneath the face wash. My heart sank to the bottom, everything before me feeling absurd and sickening. I forced myself to remain calm, then tossed everything in the bathroom into the trash can. Back in the bedroom, looking at the closet and dressing table, I wanted none of it. I couldn’t accept anything that had been touched by someone else. Not objects, not men. I found all my identification documents, put them in my bag, and walked out the door. The moment I closed the door, it felt like I was sealing away my past seven years behind me. 3 Before leaving, I had one last thing to do. Visit Mrs. Walker, an old neighbor, in the hospital. She was the landlady of the rented house Jason and I used to have in the city outskirts. She had no children, and her husband had passed away years ago. Back then, Jason didn’t have much money, and she treated us like her own kids, looking after us a great deal. Later, our company grew better and better, and we earned more and more money. We moved out of the rental house and into our own place. But I never forgot Mrs. Walker’s kindness to us. Whenever work wasn’t too busy, I visited her almost twice a month. Six months ago, she suffered a sudden brain hemorrhage and was hospitalized. For her safety, she had been hospitalized for observation for the past half-year. I bought her favorite osmanthus cakes and flowers, then went to the hospital. She seemed much better than the last time I saw her, overjoyed to see me. She kept asking if Jason and I were doing well. I didn’t want to worry her, so I held back my discomfort and gently reassured her with a smile. “Don’t worry, he treats me very well.” Only after receiving a positive answer did she nod contentedly. “That’s good, that’s good. You went through so much with him to get to where you are now. He absolutely must treat you well.” We chatted for a long time, and I reluctantly left only when it was almost time to go to the airport. I stood in front of the hospital room, lost in thought for a moment, until a familiar voice behind me snapped me back to reality. Jason asked with some concern: “What did the doctor say?” I turned around and saw him with his arm around Alice Lee’s waist. Alice Lee blinked, then stood on her tiptoes to kiss his lips. Then she handed him a paper: “Jason, you’re going to be a daddy!” My mind went blank. A scene from four years ago suddenly flashed in my mind—my miscarriage. Back then, it was our busiest time. I was swamped, helping him find resources, pull in investments, pulling all-nighters to revise proposals, going on endless business trips and networking dinners. After one dinner engagement after another, a sharp pain shot through my abdomen, and I fainted. When I woke up, I learned I had been over two months pregnant. The stress from work during that period had caused me to lose the baby. The doctor said that, given my physical condition, natural conception would be difficult in the future. Jason saw my sadness and comforted me, saying it was okay if we didn’t have children, that he didn’t like kids anyway. But now, Jason’s joyful voice reached my ears. He held her in his arms, repeating over and over: “I’m going to be a dad! I’m going to be a dad!” Watching this scene, it just felt so laughable that I had actually believed his lies back then. As his words faded, our eyes suddenly met. Jason’s body stiffened, frozen in place for a moment. However, it wasn’t long before he regained his usual composure, a careless smile playing on his lips as he approached me. We went to a coffee shop near the hospital. Alice Lee sat opposite me, leaning delicately into Jason’s embrace. One hand caressing her stomach, her voice tinged with provocation: “Iris, I’m pregnant and not feeling well. I can only feel better leaning on Jason. You wouldn’t mind, would you?” Jason looked at her, his eyes filled with even more doting affection. He teased: “Do you think my wife is as petty as you are?” Hearing this, Alice Lee pouted, feigning a tantrum: “Well, that’s just because I care about you.” After she spoke, he glanced at me. His expression was playful: “Alice, you should learn from Iris. To love a man, you not only have to care about him, but you also have to be understanding.” I watched it all with cold eyes, taking a sip of coffee. 4 He handed her the car keys, commanding: “Go wait for me in the car.” Alice Lee didn’t want to, but she had no choice. She grudgingly walked out, looking back three times. After she left, Jason pushed the cake in front of me. “Cranberry, your favorite flavor.” I glanced at it, not touching it. I replied: “That was just a past preference. It doesn’t mean I still like it now. Nothing stays the same forever.” He paused for a moment. He chuckled: “Jealous?” I forced a smile, finding it oddly amusing. He spoke again: “Iris, as long as you behave, the position of Mrs. Trachtenberg will always be yours. There will be no one else.” I looked up at him: “Do you think I care?” He chuckled softly: “Don’t you? You spent seven years with me to get to this point, finally living a life of comfort and abundance. Would you really give it all away?” “Don’t blame me. With the company doing so well, I can’t not have a child, can I? Otherwise, who would inherit the company later?” “Iris, you understand, right?” I smiled. I looked up at him. I asked seriously: “Jason Trachtenberg, do you remember what you said when we got married?” He paused. I smiled: “You said you wouldn’t let me suffer even a little bit.” I took off my wedding ring and placed it on the table. His face changed. I spoke slowly: “I can’t walk this path with you anymore.” With that, I picked up my bag and turned to leave. He swiftly blocked my path, frowning as he questioned me: “Iris, what do you mean?” “Exactly what it sounds like. I can’t be generous enough to share my man with other women. These past seven years, consider it my punishment for being lovestruck.” “From now on, whether it’s Alice or anyone else, it has nothing to do with me.” His face went cold. “You’re divorcing me?” He then let out a cold laugh: “You wish. Divorce? You can forget about that for the rest of your life!”

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During the years when our love was at its most pure, Oliver spent an entire night kneeling in the freezing rain beside my mother’s grave. He was terrified I was going to break up with him. He prayed to her spirit, begging her to visit my dreams and convince me to stay. My heart softened. I took him back and uprooted my entire life to move to his city. Five years after that grand gesture, he cheated on me with a beautiful, much younger girl. For her, he was ready to quit his job, pack up his apartment, and move across the country. It was snowing heavily the day he officially asked for a break. I had walked block after block in the freezing wind just to buy a bag of hot roasted chestnuts from his favorite street vendor. My hands were numb as I asked him, “Can we just fix this? What am I supposed to do if you leave?” He stared at his phone, his face twisted with impatience. “Lily, are you seriously this obsessed? Can you really not survive without me?” I stopped begging. I wiped my tears, walked away, and erased every trace of him from my existence. Six months later, he crawled back. He was completely broke, looking like a ghost of the man I knew. He dropped to his knees, sobbing into his hands. “Can we just fix this? I can’t survive without you.” I looked down at him and spoke with perfect calm. “Then go die.” 1 Discovering Oliver’s infidelity happened on an utterly unremarkable Tuesday. I was in the kitchen prepping dinner. He had been out in his car taking a phone call for three hours. By the time he walked back through the front door, the food was ice cold. I was sitting quietly at the dining table, typing away on my laptop to finish an urgent marketing deck for my boss. I didn’t even look up. “Just microwave your plate,” I said, my voice tight with work anxiety. He gave a faint grunt of acknowledgment and headed straight for the bathroom. Maybe it was just a woman’s intuition. Something felt incredibly wrong. The old Oliver never hid in his car to take phone calls. Suddenly, the marketing deck didn’t matter. My mind was racing, searching for clues. It wasn’t until he stepped out of the steaming bathroom that I spotted it. Wrapped around his left wrist was a thin, red woven thread. It was cheap. Basic. Not a single bead or charm on it. Oliver worked in high-end fashion merchandising. He was borderline obsessive about his image and aesthetic. He coordinated his luxury watches and tailored cuffs with surgical precision. If he wore something out of place, his colleagues in Manhattan would eat him alive. There was absolutely no logical reason for him to be wearing a dollar-store friendship bracelet. He noticed me staring at his wrist. Smoothly, almost casually, he slid his hand behind his back. “I’m cutting carbs this week. Think I’ll skip dinner.” “Make sure you heat up your food when you’re done working,” he added. “Don’t eat it cold.” Then he vanished into the bedroom. I watched his back disappear as the door clicked shut. It felt like someone had just swung a baseball bat into my chest. I sat frozen at the dining table, staring at that closed white door. A horrific, prickling numbness washed over my skin. A voice echoed in the back of my skull, screaming a truth I didn’t want to hear. He is cheating on you. I don’t know how long I sat there. It was December in New York, and my entire body felt turning to ice. Fighting through the nausea, I forced myself to walk over to the bedroom. I took a deep breath and pushed the door open. Oliver jumped. He clearly hadn’t expected me to come in. His reflexes took over. He slammed his phone face-down onto the duvet. As I walked closer, he ripped out his AirPods and shoved the phone under his pillow. “You’re done already?” he asked. “That was fast.” “You should eat and hit the shower. Need me to warm up your plate?” If this were the old days, Oliver wouldn’t be asking. Whenever I had late-night projects, he would bring his iPad to the living room and sit beside me until I finished. He always knew exactly when I was about to get hungry. He would have the food hot and waiting, with a bowl of freshly washed berries on the side. I used to tease him about it. “You’re making a great housewife. You’re making me look bad.” He would pull me into his lap and say, “Then let me quit my job. You can be my sugar mama.” But whenever I agreed, he would shake his head. “Nah. I need to save up for a brownstone. I have to give you a real home.” When exactly did that boy disappear? I had no idea. Oliver’s eyes darted everywhere but my face. The guilt was suffocating the room. A wave of sheer desperation washed over me. Acting on pure impulse, I stripped off my clothes right there in front of him. I crawled onto the bed, straddled his lap, and started kissing him like my life depended on it. I needed his physical touch to prove he still loved me. I needed to know that, at the very least, we still belonged to each other in this way. But Oliver shoved me hard in the chest. He grabbed a random sweater off the floor and threw it over my naked shoulders. “Lily, what the hell are you doing?” That single question shattered whatever was left of my bleeding heart. “What am I doing? Is it that hard to figure out? I want my boyfriend.” His eyes were still dodging mine. He grabbed his phone from under the pillow, stood up, and backed away from the bed. “Let’s just not tonight. I’m exhausted.” “Go to sleep. I have to head to the office and pull an all-nighter.” It felt like an invisible hand had just slapped me across the face. Is there anything more humiliating than throwing yourself naked at the person you love, only to be looked at with disgust? Actually, yes. There is. 2 Oliver changed into fresh clothes and bolted from the apartment like it was on fire. I followed him into the hallway, wanting to scream, wanting to demand answers. But as I stood behind the heavy front door, I heard his voice echoing near the elevator bank. “Babe, why would I touch her?” “Stop overthinking. I’m going to sleep in the car.” “I know, I know. I’ll stay on the phone with you. I won’t hang up.” The elevator dinged. The doors slid shut, cutting off his voice. My hand hovered over the doorknob. I didn’t dare turn it until the hallway was dead silent. The space outside my door felt like a freezing, desolate wasteland. On his way out, he had even taken the trash I left by the door. So domestic. So cruel. The dam broke. I sank to the hardwood floor and sobbed until I was gasping for air. Why? Why was he doing this? My brain felt starved of oxygen. I stumbled over to the floor-to-ceiling windows in the living room and looked down at the street. His car was parked under a streetlight. He was sitting in the driver’s seat, phone pressed to his ear, laughing at something the girl on the other end said. He looked so relaxed. So happy. He spent the entire night in that car. I spent the entire night sitting on the cold floor by the window. At six-thirty in the morning, the car door finally opened. I scrambled back into the bedroom, threw myself under the covers, and pretended to be dead asleep. I had left the bedroom door cracked open. I heard him walk in, brush his teeth in the guest bathroom, and head back toward the front door. I heard every single footstep. Every second, I prayed he would walk into the bedroom. Just to hug me. Just to press his lips to my forehead like he had done a thousand times before. To whisper, “Going to work, baby. Love you.” If he did that, I could lie to myself. I could pretend last night was a nightmare. We could go back to the way we were. He never stepped foot in the bedroom. The front door slammed shut. I lay there for hours. I lay there until my swollen, burning eyes produced fresh tears, soaking my pillow completely through. I must have passed out from exhaustion. In my dreams, I was pulled back to the very beginning. Oliver and I were childhood friends. We grew up in the same small town in upstate New York. But it wasn’t some golden, sun-kissed coming-of-age movie. When he was eight, his parents had a messy divorce. His dad remarried a woman who didn’t want a stepson. His mom, eager to start a new life in Europe, dumped him at his grandmother’s house with ten grand in a checking account and never looked back. His grandmother lived in the apartment right above mine. I was eight years old, too. I didn’t have a dad. It was just me and my mom, scraping by. Oliver and I were like two stray dogs licking each other’s wounds. We kept each other standing. From elementary school through senior year, we didn’t spend a single day apart. He became the absolute center of my universe. When teenage hormones kicked in, the transition from best friends to first loves was seamless. We promised to go to the same college in the city. We swore we would never be separated. But when acceptance letters rolled in, I secretly changed my plans. I didn’t go to the prestigious university in Manhattan with him. I enrolled at the local state college back home. He didn’t find out until the final paperwork arrived in the mail. He stormed into my house, furious. “Why the hell would you change your major without telling me?” “Was everything we talked about just a lie?” I couldn’t bring myself to tell him the truth. My mother had just been diagnosed with a severe illness. I couldn’t leave her. Instead, I played the villain. “I just don’t have the same ambition you do. I want a quiet, boring life.” “Oliver, we just don’t make sense anymore.” We didn’t speak for the entire summer. The night before he left for the city, I found a stuffed envelope jammed under my front door. Inside was a wad of cash, maybe five hundred dollars, and a note written on lined paper. [This is the money I made flipping burgers all summer. It’s mine, not my dad’s. Use it. We’re going to figure out your mom’s medical bills together.] It broke me. I ran out into the damp evening air, crying, intending to run all the way to the bus station. But as soon as I opened the downstairs lobby door, I saw him. He was leaning against the brick wall, hands shoved in his pockets, grinning at me. I avoided his burning gaze, awkwardly wiping my face. “Why aren’t you on the bus?” He walked up and pressed a warm brown paper bag into my hands. The rich, sweet smell of roasted chestnuts filled the air. “I was worried a certain someone was too stubborn to realize she still needs me.” Whenever we fought as kids, a bag of hot roasted chestnuts was our silent truce. I took the bag and walked him to the station. Right before he boarded, he crushed me in a hug. “Lily, please don’t leave me behind. You’re all I have.” “Let’s make this official. Please?” 3 I said yes. Back then, I truly believed young love could conquer any tragedy. We dated long-distance for four years. Whenever he had a free weekend, he took the bus upstate. His Instagram and Snapchat were flooded with pictures of me. He constantly told me he wanted to make me feel secure, to prove I could always trust him. But I refused to let my baggage drag him down. Shortly after graduation, my mother passed away. I was completely alone. I handled the hospital bills, the morgue paperwork, the cremation, and the funeral plot all by myself. Oliver called me a few times. He said he had final-round interviews at top-tier firms on Wall Street. He couldn’t leave the city, but promised he’d rush back the second he secured an offer. I texted back a single word: [Okay.] The people who came to the funeral were mostly older neighbors. They all knew about me and Oliver. They stood near the buffet table, whispering about how successful he was becoming. Full academic scholarships. Bidding wars between corporate giants. He was going to put roots down in New York City and make a fortune. I listened to them, and I realized they were right. He had a massive, glittering future ahead of him. He shouldn’t be chained to a grieving orphan in a dead-end town. The day after my mother went into the ground, I sent him a text ending the relationship. Then I blocked his number, deleted my social media, and disappeared into a cheap motel where no one could find me. I spent a week existing in a numb blur. It wasn’t until his grandmother managed to get a hold of me that I found out he had come back. He had gone completely insane trying to find me. When he couldn’t, he drove to the cemetery and collapsed by my mother’s grave. He stayed on his knees in the freezing mud, begging her spirit to make me stay. Hearing that destroyed my resolve. I caved and went to the cemetery. I found him curled into a ball against her headstone. I couldn’t tell if his eyelashes were coated in morning dew or frozen tears. When he saw me, he scrambled to his feet and practically tackled me, burying his face in my neck, shaking violently. His eyes were bloodshot and wild. His voice was entirely gone. “Lily, please. Please don’t leave me.” “I’m begging you…” Looking at the boy who loved me that much, I had no defense left. We got back together. I packed up my life and moved to a tiny apartment in Queens with him. He worked insane corporate hours, so I took an easy admin job just so I could manage the apartment, cook his meals, and do his laundry. As he climbed the corporate ladder, setting his sights higher and higher, I started taking night classes, desperately trying to upgrade myself so I wouldn’t be left behind. I was still fighting for our future. How did he lose his way? My phone blaring aggressively on the kitchen counter jolted me awake. It was my boss, absolutely screaming into the receiver. She wanted to know where the marketing deck was and asked if I was trying to get fired. I squinted at the clock. It was 4:00 PM. My bones ached, and my brain felt like it was stuffed with cotton. I dragged myself out of bed and dug a thermometer out of the nightstand. I was running a massive fever. After apologizing to my boss, I threw a heavy cardigan over my pajamas and walked out to the dining table to finish the deck. Last night’s dinner was still sitting there, completely untouched. But there was a sticky note pressed to the wood. Oliver’s handwriting: [Flying out for a business trip for a few days. Throw the food out.] A hot tear splashed onto the yellow paper. Business trip. Right. He was with her. I knew it in my gut. Like a complete maniac, I started calling him. Back to back to back. He didn’t pick up once. Finally, my phone buzzed with a text. [Let’s just take some space and calm down.] Calm down? Space? What did that even mean? Total panic set in. I booted up the iPad and logged into the car’s GPS tracking app. The little blue dot was parked outside a boutique hotel downtown. Before I took an Uber there, I walked for twenty minutes through the biting wind until I found a street vendor selling hot roasted chestnuts. Clutching the warm paper bag to my chest, I found his luxury sedan in the hotel lot. I used the digital key on my phone to unlock the doors and climbed into the passenger seat. I assumed the app notification would alert him, and he would come down to see me. Instead, another text popped up. [Go home. I want to be alone right now.] I wanted to scream through the phone. Alone? Are you really alone, or is she in the bed next to you? But I was too terrified to ask. My chest felt like it was being crushed in a vice. My fingers trembled as I typed: [I have a high fever.] Ten minutes later, the elevator doors in the lobby slid open. Oliver walked out, pulled open the driver’s side door, and let out a long, heavy sigh. “Lily, if you’re sick, go to an urgent care. I’m not a doctor.” Tears blurred my vision. I reached out, desperately wanting to wrap my arms around his waist. He stiffened and leaned away from my touch. “Lily. I’m seeing someone else. You already figured that out, didn’t you?”

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My twin sister and I were getting married on the exact same day. But on the morning of the wedding, someone shredded her gown to pieces. When my husband found out, he took my wedding dress and gave it to her. The wedding coordinator was frantically calling for the bride and groom to line up. I was spinning in circles, tearing the bridal suite apart looking for my dress. That was when my husband finally looked at me, a flicker of guilt in his eyes. “It’s Hailey’s first time getting married. She deserves to have a flawless day. You two are exactly the same size, so I let her borrow your gown.” I stared at him, entirely unable to process his words. “What about me? This is my first wedding, too.” Carter furrowed his brow, completely exasperated. “Hailey is your twin sister. Can’t you just be the bigger person for once? Besides, we already signed the marriage license at the courthouse last month. Today is just for show. I already talked to Hailey. She’s going to walk down the aisle a second time pretending to be you. You guys are identical anyway. As long as you keep your mouth shut, no one will ever know.” 1 Half an hour ago, when Carter told me he gave my dress to Hailey, I thought I was having a stroke. I stood frozen in the hallway for a full thirty seconds. When my brain finally rebooted, I shoved past him and marched straight for the ballroom doors. Hailey and I had booked our receptions at the same luxury hotel. My reception was in the Sapphire Room. Hers was right next door in the Emerald Room. I stepped into the dim ballroom. Up on the altar, Hailey was exchanging rings with her groom. A brilliant spotlight shone down on her lace bodice and flowing train. Pure, radiant, and absolutely breathtaking. It was my dress. The tips of my fingers went completely numb. I planted my foot, ready to storm that stage. But Carter grabbed me from behind. His grip was brutal. His fingers dug into my bare upper arm like steel claws. He practically dragged me backward, shoving me all the way into the secluded bridal suite. “Jules, stop acting crazy! This is the most important moment of Hailey’s entire life!” He slammed the door shut and yanked at his bowtie, looking thoroughly annoyed. My eyes began to burn. A pathetic, choked sob clawed its way up my throat. “Is today not the most important moment of my life, too?” I stared at him without blinking. I wanted to look right through this man. We had known each other since childhood. We had been dating for two years. Carter avoided my eyes. A fleeting shadow of guilt passed over his face before it vanished. He reached out to hold my hands, speaking to me like a disappointed parent. “Jules, Hailey isn’t built like you. She’s highly sensitive, and you know she has a weak heart. If her wedding day was ruined, she would spiral into a depression she might never recover from.” “We all grew up together. You know Hailey has always needed extra protection. Whatever she wanted, if you didn’t have it, you helped her get it. If you did have it, you gave it to her.” “Why are you throwing a temper tantrum over something so trivial?” I slapped his hands away and let out a dry, hollow laugh. “You think I’m throwing a temper tantrum?” “What else would you call it?” Carter ran a hand through his perfectly styled hair, his voice rising with frustration. “It’s just a piece of fabric! I’ll buy you ten new designer dresses tomorrow if you want. Do you really have to be this relentless?” I looked at his self-righteous face. Every compromise I had ever made, every boundary I had ever let them cross, suddenly felt like jagged glass lodged in my throat. I couldn’t breathe. Since I was a little girl, I was conditioned to yield to Hailey. If she wanted my favorite doll, I handed it over. If she wanted the trophy I won at the science fair, I let her put her name on it. When she developed a crush on Carter and actively tried to steal him, I quietly stepped back. But then Carter came to me. He asked me out. He looked me in the eyes and said he finally realized I was the one he loved, not Hailey. That was the only reason we were standing here today. I had swallowed all the unfairness because my mother drilled it into my skull every single day. She always told me Hailey was fragile. Hailey was sickly. I had to yield. But did I really have to yield my wedding? My dress? My own husband? When I didn’t say anything, Carter assumed I had surrendered. His tone softened. He reached out to stroke my cheek. “Be a good girl. I promise I’ll make it up to you tonight, okay? Let’s go out there. We have to do our vows. You can just wear one of the bridesmaid dresses. It’s just family and friends out there anyway, nobody is going to judge you.” I leaned back, dodging his touch. I reached onto the vanity, picked up my diamond engagement ring, and dropped it onto the glass table. The sharp clink echoed in the quiet room. It sounded like a gunshot. Carter’s face went completely pale. “Jules, are you seriously doing this?” “Did you think I was joking?” I looked at him. My voice was so dead and calm it even scared me. “Carter, I’m done yielding. You can have the dress. You can have the wedding.” “I want a divorce.” “Absolutely not!” 2 The heavy wooden door flew open. My mother stormed into the suite, her face dark with fury. Hailey was right behind her, still wearing my wedding dress. “Do you think marriage is a game?” my mother hissed, glaring at me. “You’re refusing to walk down the aisle over a minor inconvenience? What are all those guests going to think of you? What are they going to think of this family?” I stared at her. “So you think it’s perfectly fine for me to walk down the aisle in a plain bridesmaid dress on my own wedding day?” “A dress is a dress! It’s just a little less flashy. When I married your father, I didn’t even have a real gown!” She rattled off her excuses rapidly. Her tone was practiced. It was entirely rehearsed. My legs suddenly felt like lead. “Mom, you knew about this. Didn’t you?” My mother paused. Her eyes darted away from mine. “Jules, my hands were tied. I’ll explain everything once the reception is over.” My voice shattered the quiet room. “So you all knew! You all conspired behind my back to strip me of my dress and give it to her!” Total silence fell over the room. The only sound was the hum of the air conditioning vent overhead. The cold air hit my face, freezing me to my very core. “Mom, am I actually your daughter?” Memories flooded my brain. Every single year on our birthday, Hailey was the one who blew out the candles. I used to beg for a second cake so I could have a turn. My mother always said buying two cakes for twins was a waste of money. She promised we would alternate years. But every year, without fail, she pulled Hailey up to the table. When we were in middle school, the neighbor’s house caught fire. The flames spread to our siding. I was trapped in bed with a broken ankle. They completely forgot about me. They grabbed Hailey and ran out into the street. Thank God the fire department arrived in time. After high school, Hailey completely bombed her SATs and didn’t get into a single good college. My scores got me into Cornell. My mother secretly called my guidance counselor and tried to force me to take a gap year. When I refused, she dropped to her knees in the kitchen and begged me. She said if I went to an Ivy League school while Hailey stayed home, the humiliation would kill Hailey. Hailey locked herself in her room and cried for two straight weeks. But what about me? What did I ever do wrong? Hailey stole everything I ever earned, and I was just supposed to swallow the pain. Was I cursed to be treated like garbage for the rest of my life? 3 My mother looked away, her voice sharp and defensive. “You are the older sister. It is your duty to accommodate her. Hailey can’t handle failure. You are tough. You can take the hits. What is the big deal?” Standing behind her, Hailey peeked out. Her eyes were red and swimming with tears. She looked like a terrified little deer. “Please don’t fight. It’s all my fault.” She sniffled, her voice trembling. “Jules, please don’t be mad at Mom. Someone maliciously ruined my dress. I didn’t want to steal yours, but Carter swore you wouldn’t mind because we’re sisters.” “If you really hate me for it, I’ll take it off right now.” I looked at her with pure disgust. “Great. Take it off.” All the blood drained from Hailey’s face. She stood frozen, awkwardly clutching the expensive lace skirt, biting her bottom lip as huge tears rolled down her cheeks. I let out a bitter laugh. “What are you waiting for? Take it off.” My mother lunged forward, putting herself between me and her precious favorite child. She raised her hand and slapped me hard across the face. “Have you lost your damn mind?! Are you trying to humiliate your sister on purpose?!” The left side of my face went completely numb. I didn’t cry. I actually smiled. For twenty-five years, no matter who was at fault, my mother always protected Hailey. I looked my mother dead in the eyes, speaking with absolute clarity. “I am walking down that aisle in my wedding dress, or I am walking out that door and filing for divorce. And I will never come back to this family again.” Carter panicked. He grabbed my wrist, his voice shaking. “Jules, stop acting like a psycho! There are two hundred guests sitting out there waiting for us! If you walk out now, my family will be a laughingstock!” Hailey spoke up again, her voice tiny and sweet. “Actually, I have an idea. If Jules is really this upset, we shouldn’t force her. We look identical anyway. Even Mom gets us confused sometimes. I can just put the veil over my face, go out there with Carter, and do the vows for her.” Carter’s eyes lit up. “That’s brilliant. We’re in completely different ballrooms. Nobody will ever notice.” My mother nodded in aggressive agreement. They stood there plotting, treating me like I was completely invisible. It was so absurd I wanted to vomit. I violently wrenched my wrist out of Carter’s grip. I didn’t know I had that much strength in me. “Do whatever the hell you want.” I grabbed my clutch off the vanity and headed for the door. Carter stepped in front of me, blocking my path. “You can’t leave. If Hailey is on stage pretending to be you, what happens if someone sees you walking through the lobby?” My mother bit her lip. She grabbed a thick spool of silk ribbon from a floral arrangement on the table and shoved it into Carter’s hands. Tie her up. “I am not letting you ruin Hailey’s perfect day,” my mother said coldly. “You’re just going to have to wait in here.” “Are you people insane?!” I swung my fists, hitting Carter in the chest and the face. I kicked at his shins, fighting like a wild animal. But I was just one woman against two people. Carter clamped a hand over my mouth, binding my wrists tight with the thick ribbon. Together, they shoved me into the massive, heavy oak wardrobe in the corner of the room. Carter looked at me through the narrowing crack of the door, his face twisting with pity. “I promise I’ll let you out the second the reception is over, Jules. Just sit tight.” The very last thing I saw before the door shut was Hailey. She was standing behind Carter. She looked right at me, and the corners of her mouth twitched up into a sickening, victorious smirk. 4 Click. The lock turned from the outside. The wardrobe plunged into pitch black. The only light came from the tiny gap under the door. Muffled through the heavy wood, I could hear the DJ in the Emerald Room hyping up the crowd. I heard the bass of the music. I heard the distant cheering of the guests. Those cheers were meant for me. Now, every single clap felt like a needle driving directly into my eardrums. My chest ached so badly I couldn’t breathe. Thump. Thump. Thump. I threw my entire body weight against the heavy doors. The wood barely rattled. Nobody outside responded. The only result was a blinding pain shooting through my shoulder. The silk ribbon cutting into my wrists felt like razor wire. Every time I struggled, the friction burned my skin raw. I don’t know how many hours passed. The music outside eventually faded into nothing. I slumped against the back of the wardrobe, gasping for air, completely exhausted. Warm blood trickled down my hands, soaking the ribbon and turning it sticky against my skin. By the time the hotel fell completely silent, it was late into the night. Suddenly, I heard heavy footsteps entering the suite. I let out a desperate, muffled scream through the gag and threw my good shoulder against the door with everything I had left. Click. The wardrobe doors were violently yanked open. A terrified housekeeper and the hotel’s night manager stared down at me. “Oh my god! What happened to you?! Who locked you in here?!” the manager yelled. The harsh overhead lights blinded me. I squeezed my eyes shut as silent tears streamed down my bruised face. “Call the police.”

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