1 At the very bottom of his leather gym bag, buried beneath the dirty towels, I found a strip of pink lace. I held the thin string, which was embellished with cheap pink sequins, and let it dangle right in front of Conrad’s face. “Care to explain what this is?” He didn’t even blink. “It’s a promotional giveaway from the tennis club. I must have grabbed the wrong bag by mistake. Stop being so paranoid.” A second later, his phone rang from an unknown number. I pressed the speaker button before he could reach it. A woman’s voice filtered through the line, dripping with mockery. “Echo, darling, your husband tells me your taste in lingerie is about as exciting as a discount rack at a local flea market. I’m sending you one of my gently worn pairs, just so you can take notes and learn how to please him.” Conrad snatched the phone, stabbing the screen to cut the call, his face turning an angry shade of crimson. The woman on the line was Kate, the head tennis coach at the elite Skyline Club. She was also the trophy wife of the billionaire who owned the entire establishment. Conrad shoved the phone back into his pocket, tugging at the collar of his tight shirt. “Don’t listen to her, she’s just joking around. She’s an important client, Echo. She’s just a bit wild and unfiltered.” I stared at the compression shirt he wore, which was meticulously designed to show off his sculpted chest and shoulders. “A client? A client who somehow knows my exact underwear size? A client who leaves her personal belongings in your gym bag?” “Echo, must you be so incredibly narrow-minded?” Conrad pushed past me with an irritated sigh, heading toward the foyer to put on his shoes. “I spend every single day networking, trying to please these wealthy socialites just to keep my head above water. If I don’t embed myself in their circle, are you going to help me hit my sales quotas next quarter?” I looked down at the limited-edition tennis shoes he had recently purchased. “So your idea of high-society networking is wearing skin-tight gear to play private matches with other men’s wives?” “What do you know about it?” Conrad let out a cold sneer, his voice laced with condescension. “It’s called elite socializing. You spend your entire life cooped up in that dusty architectural design firm, with nothing in your head but blueprints and grocery lists. We don’t even have a single thing in common anymore.” He pulled the front door open, stepping halfway out into the corridor. “I won’t be back this weekend. The club is hosting a private, closed-door training retreat at the Crestview Resort upstate.” I rushed after him, grabbing the heavy strap of his tennis bag. “Conrad, we haven’t been intimate in three months. I can count the number of times you’ve actually slept in our bed on one hand.” He spun around, looking at my hand on his bag with sheer disgust. “Echo, can you please learn to control your basic physical urges? I am absolutely exhausted from playing tennis all day. I simply do not have the energy to satisfy you.” He pointed a finger at the calendar hanging on the refrigerator. Several small circles were scattered sparsely across the grid. “We agreed on the rules: once a month, maximum. You already used up your turn last week. Stop clawing at me like a starved animal.” The heavy security door slammed shut, the sound echoing through the empty apartment. I stood in the silence, the rough texture of the bag strap still burning in the palm of my hand. Five years ago, when we first married, he wasn’t like this. Back then, he had run through a freezing rainstorm across the city just to bring me hot pastries from a bakery I had casually mentioned. I didn’t know exactly when the tennis racket had replaced me, or when those wealthy women in their short skirts had become the vital connections he claimed to despise yet chased so relentlessly. The coldness at home began to bleed into my professional life. By Friday evening, our design team was hosting a celebratory dinner. We had just secured a massive contract with Vanguard Holdings, the industry giant, and everyone was in high spirits. As the drinks flowed, the atmosphere in the private dining room grew rowdy. A few of the younger interns insisted on playing a game of Truth or Dare. The empty wine bottle spun rapidly on the marble tabletop, finally slowing down to point directly at me. “Echo, truth or dare?” Hailey, one of the junior assistants, gave me a mischievous nudge. Even Dominic, the reclusive billionaire owner of our design firm, was present tonight. He sat at the head of the table, silently swirling a glass of deep red wine, his expression unreadable. “Truth,” I replied, rubbing my temples to ward off a headache. “You and Conrad have been married for several years now, right?” Hailey asked, leaning in with a grin. “How many times a week are you guys actually getting it on?” The moment the question was uttered, several married male colleagues began to chuckle and cheer. “Hailey, that’s a silly question. Echo’s husband is practically a gym rat, look at his physique. They must be doing it daily!” “Exactly! No wonder Echo always looks so focused, she must be very well taken care of at home.” Under the table, my fingers gripped the fabric of my dress so tightly my knuckles turned white. How many times a week? I couldn’t even remember the last time I had seen him walk around our bedroom without a shirt on. “He’s been very busy with a major project lately,” I replied, keeping my voice neutral. “We’re both just exhausted.” Camille, the deputy director who had always viewed me as a threat, let out a sharp, mocking laugh. “Busy? Busy working late, or busy serving someone else?” “Echo, you really need to keep a tighter leash on him,” she continued, her eyes glittering with malice. “Young girls these days love fit, handsome men like your husband. You wouldn’t want him getting fed so well outside that he has nothing left for you at home.” “Watch your mouth, Camille,” I said, my voice dropping to a cold whisper. “Oh, come on, it was just a joke! Why are you getting so defensive? Unless, of course, I hit a nerve?” She covered her mouth, her shoulders shaking with laughter. At the head of the table, Dominic set his glass down. The heavy crystal clacked against the marble, the sharp sound instantly silencing the room. “That is enough,” Dominic said, his voice quiet but carrying an immense weight. “Echo’s architectural drafts for the Vanguard project were flawless. If you have so much free time to analyze her marriage, perhaps you should spend the weekend re-evaluating next week’s budget sheets.” The dining room went completely still. Camille’s face flushed red, and she quickly looked down, not daring to utter another syllable. I picked up the shot glass of neat tequila in front of me and swallowed it in one gulp, letting the burning liquid scorch its way down to my stomach. By the time the dinner ended, the alcohol had settled heavily in my limbs. The cool night air hit me, making the world spin. I leaned against a cold lamppost, retching until there was nothing left but bile. A hand appeared in my line of sight, holding a cool, wet wipe. “Thank you,” I muttered, wiping my mouth before looking up. Dominic stood beside me, his dark coat draped over his shoulders as he opened the door of his sleek black sedan. “Get in. I’m driving you home.” His tone was quiet, leaving no room for argument. I sat stiffly in the passenger seat, the cabin filled with the faint, soothing scent of rich agarwood, a welcome relief from the stale cigarette smoke of the restaurant. “Mr. Dominic, I’m sorry for the trouble,” I whispered, shrinking back into the leather seat. Dominic started the engine, the luxury watch on his wrist catching the dim glow of the dashboard. “Does your husband play tennis at the Skyline Club?” he asked suddenly. I blinked, staring at his sharp profile. “How did you know?” “Because I own it,” Dominic replied, a faint, cynical smile touching his lips. “And Kate is my wife.” The revelation felt like a physical blow to my chest, instantly burning away the lingering fog of the alcohol. “Mr. Dominic, I…” “What are you going to say? That they are just a dedicated coach and an enthusiastic member?” Dominic pulled the car over to the curb, turning his head to look at me. “Your husband spent two hours in my wife’s private locker room last week. When the housekeeping staff went in to deliver fresh towels, they found the door unlocked.” I gripped my seatbelt, my knuckles turning white. “Since you knew, why didn’t you stop them?” “Because I need bulletproof evidence,” Dominic said, his voice dropping to a low, chilling whisper. “Evidence that will allow my lawyers to strip her of every single penny of my fortune in the divorce.” He leaned closer, his warm breath brushing against my ear. “So, Echo, do you want to play the part of the humiliated, silent wife, or do you want to partner with me and leave them both with absolutely nothing?” I looked into his dark eyes. There was no anger there, only the cold, calculated precision of a businessman. “What do you need me to do?” I asked, my voice barely a whisper. Dominic smiled, his finger gently brushing against my cheek before lingering on my lower lip. “A great many things. To start, you will accompany me to the resort retreat this weekend.” When I finally entered my apartment, the lights were off. I stepped out of my shoes, preparing to wash up, when I heard low, muffled voices coming from the balcony of the master bedroom. The door was slightly ajar, the only illumination coming from the blue glow of a phone screen reflecting off Conrad’s face. He was wearing nothing but gym shorts, leaning back in his chair with an excited, breathless grin. “She found the lace thong you left,” Conrad whispered into the phone, letting out a soft chuckle. “Don’t worry about it, I made up a quick excuse and she bought it. That stupid woman doesn’t know any better.” “Is the private pool villa booked for the weekend? Perfect. Make sure to bring those short tennis skirts, babe. I love the way they look on you.” “Alright, I have to go, she’ll be back soon. Love you, bye.” He hung up, humming a cheerful tune as he stood up to head toward the bathroom. I stood in the shadows, staring at his broad, muscular back. The anger that had simmered in my chest for months suddenly went cold, replaced by a deep, hollow indifference. I stepped into the room, flipping the light switch. Conrad jumped, startled, clutching his chest as he stared at me from the bathroom doorway. “Do you have to sneak around like a ghost? You nearly gave me a heart attack!” “Who were you talking to?” I asked, my voice entirely flat. “A client, they were asking about project deadlines. I told you I’m incredibly busy.” He avoided my gaze, turning to walk into the bathroom. “Does your client usually call you ‘babe’?” I followed him, blocking the doorway. Conrad’s face darkened instantly. “Echo, are you losing your mind? That was Mr. Harrison, the director of the club. He’s fifty years old and calls everyone ‘babe’ as a joke. Are you really going to interrogate me over this?” “And the perfume on your shirt? Chanel Chance. Does Mr. Harrison wear that too?” I pointed to the dirty shirt sitting in the hamper. Conrad snatched the shirt, tossing it violently into the washing machine. “That’s Coach Kate’s perfume. We play close matches, a little scent rub-off is completely normal. You are acting like a paranoid lunatic. I can’t stand being in this house for another second!” He slammed the bathroom door shut, the sound rattling the frame. I looked at the closed door, a dry laugh escaping my throat. How had I ever convinced myself that this man was reliable and ambitious? He was nothing more than a cheap opportunist, willing to discard every ounce of his dignity to climb into a world where he didn’t belong. On Saturday morning, Conrad woke up early. He stood before the mirror, meticulously styling his hair and dousing himself in a heavy musk cologne. “Where exactly is this closed-door retreat being held?” I asked, leaning against the doorframe. “Crestview Resort. The club booked the entire estate,” he replied, not even bothering to look at me as he adjusted his collar. “I’ll go with you. It’s been a while since I had a weekend getaway.” Conrad’s hands froze on his collar. He turned around, his brow furrowed in deep annoyance. “What would you even do there? This is an exclusive event for members of high social standing. You don’t even know how to hold a tennis racket, Echo. You’d only embarrass me.” I walked over, reaching up to smooth his lapel. “Really? Because I heard spouses and partners were invited to this one.” “Who told you that? Spouses are absolutely not allowed. Stop listening to idle gossip.” He pushed my hands away impatiently, grabbing his heavy gym bag. “I’m leaving. I’ll go straight to the office on Monday, so don’t bother calling me.” I watched the front door swing shut, then pulled out my phone and sent a quick text to Dominic. “He’s on his way.” Two minutes later, the reply came. “My car is downstairs. Come down.” When I stepped out of the building, a sleek black Maybach was idling at the curb. Dominic sat in the spacious backseat, reviewing a printed spreadsheet. “Have you made up your mind?” he asked, closing the folder and looking at me. “Yes, Mr. Dominic. Tell me what you need me to do.” I slid into the leather seat, buckling my seatbelt. “Once we arrive at the resort, you only need to play your part,” Dominic said, looking out the tinted window with a cold, predatory gaze. “Leave the rest to me.” The drive to Crestview Resort took a little over two hours. By the time we arrived, the club’s activities were already in full swing. From a distance, I could easily spot two familiar figures on the pristine grass court. Conrad, dressed in crisp white tennis whites, was moving dynamically across the court, his gaze locked on Kate. Kate was wearing a short, pleated pink skirt. With every leap and strike, her skirt fluttered high, revealing the matching tight shorts beneath. A small crowd of wealthy spectators gathered around the court, cheering after every volley. “Your husband certainly has remarkable stamina,” Dominic remarked, standing beside me with an unreadable expression. “My wife is usually exceptionally selective, but it seems she found someone who can keep up with her pace.” I watched Conrad on the court, his face adorned with a fawning, attentive smile as he carefully unscrewed a bottle of water and handed it to Kate. “Mr. Dominic, when do we begin?” I asked. “Why the rush? A good show requires the audience to be fully seated first.” Dominic turned, walking toward the resort’s private VIP lounge. “Come with me. Let’s go meet the spectators of our little play.” Inside the luxurious VIP suite, several middle-aged men were lounging on leather sofas. These were the major shareholders of Vanguard Holdings, close personal associates of Dominic, and regular guests at the country club. “Dominic! What brings you out here today?” a stout, wealthy executive called out, his gaze lingering on me for a moment. “Just bringing a friend out to enjoy the fresh air,” Dominic replied smoothly, gesturing toward me. “This is Echo, the lead architect in charge of the new Vanguard development project.” The men exchanged polite greetings, but the conversation quickly drifted back to the tennis club. “Dominic, your lovely young wife has been making quite a splash at the club lately. I hear she’s been spending an awful lot of time with one of the newer members?” one shareholder remarked, his tone half-joking but laced with meaning. Dominic’s expression remained perfectly calm as he took a sip of his tea. “Young people enjoy the sport. Kate is simply doing her job as a coach.” “Is that so? I heard the fellow even has the keys to your private townhouse.” The shareholders exchanged knowing, amused glances. I sat quietly on the sofa, my palms slick with cold sweat. I had assumed Dominic merely wanted to catch them in the act privately, but he had invited the most powerful board members of his conglomerate to watch. He didn’t just want to divorce Kate, he wanted to completely obliterate her, and crush Conrad under his heel in the process. Kate glanced over her shoulder, catching Conrad’s eye, and the two of them walked toward the private villa suites, one after the other.

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1 At the altar, right when we were supposed to exchange rings, my fiancé suddenly stepped down. “I have to take care of something. I’ll be right back.” Before I could even utter a word, he was already rushing down the aisle. Everyone’s eyes followed him as he made a beeline for his childhood best friend, Nina, who was sitting in the front row. He took a water bottle from her hands, twisted the cap off, handed it back, and sprinted right back to the altar. “We didn’t lose any time, right? It was barely ten seconds.” I stood there, frozen. My heart had leaped into my throat, genuinely believing there was some sort of emergency. But to him, Nina was always the emergency. She took precedence over everything. Just like the fifteen minutes we lost waiting for her to arrive so we could take our engagement photos, or the two hours I spent waiting in the cold because he had to drive out of his way to pick her up from work. I didn’t know how many more of these ten seconds, fifteen minutes, or even hours, days, and years I would have to endure in the future. The officiant looked incredibly uncomfortable, trying to laugh it off and save the atmosphere, but the tension in the room was too thick to salvage. “And the groom steps down… uh, the groom is…” I reached over and took the microphone from his hand. In those ten seconds, something inside me snapped. The flame went out. I didn’t want to do this anymore. My eyes stung with unshed tears. I was wearing a heavy, elaborate lace gown, balancing on high heels, straining to present the most flawless version of myself. Yet, I could never compete with Nina, who sat quietly in her corner. She didn’t have to do a thing. His eyes always lingered on her. All she did was struggle with a bottle cap and cast a single, helpless look in his direction, and Derek went flying to her rescue. Ten seconds. It sounded like nothing. But in those ten seconds, it felt as though someone had taken a cold blade and carved a hollow space into my chest. The pain radiated through my entire body. I brought the microphone to my lips. “The wedding is canceled. I’m sorry to have wasted everyone’s time. Please enjoy the reception on me, and all wedding gifts will be returned.” With that, I turned around and walked away. Derek followed me into the dressing room, his face a mask of confusion. “Why are you doing this? Just because of those ten seconds?” I pulled the curtain shut to change out of my gown. “Yes. Because of those ten seconds.” “That’s ridiculous!” Derek argued through the curtain. “We didn’t even lose any time. This morning, when you got stuck in traffic and we were delayed for ages, you didn’t throw a fit like this.” I stepped out in my normal clothes. The gown had felt so heavy, a weight that required absolute certainty to carry. Ten seconds wasn’t the problem. The traffic delay this morning wasn’t the problem. Time was never the problem. He just couldn’t comprehend it. Why did she always come first? What did that make me? I was simply tired of being relegated to the background of his life. Derek softened his voice, trying to placate me. “Are you jealous? Gwen, she’s like a sister to me. She has hypoglycemia, and that was glucose water. I was just being careful. If she fainted at our wedding, it would have ruined the whole day anyway.” I looked at him, feeling a profound, hollow disappointment. She was surrounded by people who could have easily helped her. But he believed only he could save her, abandoning his own wedding ceremony to do so. The only logical explanation was that she held the absolute center of his heart. Just like during our engagement, when he insisted we wait for Nina to arrive before we took our official photos, leaving me standing in heels until I was on the verge of fainting. Just like the night he made me wait downstairs in a torrential downpour so he could pick her up. He hadn’t even left me an umbrella, and his car splashed muddy water all over me as he sped off. I had waited in the dark for hours that night, only to receive a text: Gwen, take a cab home. I need to help Nina sort some things out. I was always the one who had to compromise. Just like in those ten seconds at the altar, he couldn’t choose to stay by my side. I packed my things and left the venue. Settling into my car, a wave of relief finally washed over me. I had looked forward to this wedding so much. I used to think marrying the man I loved was the greatest blessing in the world. But the red flags had been there all along; I had just chosen to blind myself to them. In our family, there was a strict tradition. Before the wedding, the groom had to handwrite the marriage covenant, a sacred vow, letter by letter, with absolute precision to show his devotion to his bride and the marriage. But when Derek sat down to write it, he gave up after just two words. “I haven’t written anything by hand in years. This is too tedious. It’s just an outdated tradition anyway.” He procrastinated for months, suggesting we just print it out because it would look neater. My mother, who was very traditional, held this custom close to her heart. I kept pleading with him to finish it. “Just do it for me, please? My mother really cares about this. She wants to keep the covenant.” But Derek never listened. A simple hundred-word covenant took him a year, and he still hadn’t finished it. When I looked at the parchment, there were only five words written: two from his first attempt, and three more that I had practically begged him to write over the past year. It was supposed to be a test of his devotion, and he had failed miserably. What was he doing during that year? He was busy running errands for Nina, comforting her, anticipating her every need. He could spend hours sketching designs for her or writing out her grocery lists, but he couldn’t spare ten minutes for our covenant. In the end, I had been foolish enough to mimic his handwriting and complete the covenant myself, effectively marrying myself. As I quietly unpacked my things back at my apartment, the illusion of his love finally shattered. It was painful, but facing the truth brought a strange sense of peace. That afternoon, Derek’s mother called, demanding I come over to their estate to explain myself. I agreed. Things needed a clean break. True to form, Derek, who was supposed to pick me up, never showed. I wasn’t even surprised. Looking back, I had bent over backward to win his family’s approval. Whenever they wanted to get rid of their high-end junk, they dumped it on me to sell. I would leave their house loaded down with heavy boxes, spending my free hours after work finding buyers, negotiating prices, and shipping packages. When I transferred the money to his mother, all I ever got was a lukewarm, “We took a loss on this. You should have gotten more.” I was their unpaid liquidator, a convenient tool to turn their trash into cash. And because I wanted to please them, I smiled and took it. And what did I get in return? We had planned a modest wedding, inviting only close acquaintances, yet his parents couldn’t even bother to show up on time. They told us they would arrive later, just in time for the toasts. How ironic that we didn’t even make it that far. When I arrived at the Barlow estate, Derek’s mother immediately tried to put me to work. “Gwen, go up to the attic and organize those old books. They’ve been sitting there forever and they’re covered in dust.” She didn’t even offer me a dust mask. I didn’t budge. “Say whatever you have to say. I have places to be.” The room went dead silent. Everyone stared at me, including Derek. In the past, he would have found his mother’s demands perfectly reasonable. If a man truly loves a woman, how could he be blind to her humiliation? He let his family treat me like a maid under the guise of bonding. Now that I was refusing to play along, I actually saw a flicker of reluctant respect in their eyes. My love for Derek had been the very weapon they used to control me. Derek’s father cleared his throat. “What Derek did at the altar was inappropriate, yes. A wedding requires solemnity. But it’s hardly a reason to call off the entire marriage. We can always reschedule for another date.” I reached into my bag and pulled out the jewelry boxes. They held the bridal jewelry suite Derek had given me for our engagement. It was a traditional five-piece set consisting of a necklace, bracelet, earrings, a ring, and a tiara, symbolizing five blessings. But Nina had been allowed to look through the collection first and had taken the finest pieces. She was probably wearing them right now. Derek had let her do it, promising he would buy replacements before the wedding. He never did. I had to wear my own jewelry to fill the gaps on our wedding day. My five blessings had been reduced to two. “There won’t be another wedding,” I said quietly. “I’m here to call off the engagement permanently. As you both pointed out from the beginning, we were never a good match.” Derek’s father frowned. “Your mother was so eager to see you married. You’ve come this far. What do you gain by making a scene over nothing? How are you going to explain this to her?” He wasn’t wrong about my mother. She was currently undergoing cancer treatment in the hospital. Her greatest wish was to see me settled. She wanted to see me in a wedding dress, but more than that, she wanted to know I had a partner to walk beside me through this difficult life. That was why I had tolerated Derek for so long. I wanted to make her happy, believing a joyful event might even aid her recovery. When you have no control over a tragedy, you start putting your faith in miracles. I looked at Derek’s father, then at Derek himself. He looked smug, clearly agreeing with his father and expecting me to capitulate. His mother scoffed. “Being this petty never ends well. Such a massive overreaction over a bottle of water. I suppose this is the kind of behavior one expects from a broken home.” They only wanted a servant who would bow her head and take the blows. Their judgmental eyes felt like needles piercing my skin. Steeling my spine, I raised my voice. “That’s enough! Call me petty, call me dramatic, call me whatever you want. I am done playing this game. You can find someone else to exploit.” They seemed to have forgotten that they wouldn’t even allow my mother to attend the ceremony. Because of her illness, my mother had worked tirelessly with her physical therapists to stabilize her condition just so she could be there. I had begged them to let her come. “How is it fair that my own mother can’t attend my wedding? I understand we need to adapt some parts of the venue for her, but can’t she at least sit down for the meal? Can’t she just watch me walk down the aisle and take a photo with me?” They had refused, claiming her medical equipment and frail appearance would ruin the aesthetic and bring bad luck to the marriage. In the end, my mother had smiled through her tears and comforted me. “It’s alright, sweetheart. Just show me the video afterward. That will be enough for me.” Yet, when Nina asked to bring her friend’s disabled mother in a wheelchair to sit in the front row, Derek and his parents had readily agreed. They barred my own mother to protect the vibe of the wedding, but welcomed a complete stranger in a wheelchair without a second thought. Leaving the Barlow estate, the cool afternoon air felt incredibly sweet. Letting go was far easier than I had ever imagined. Derek didn’t run after me. Perhaps he truly didn’t care, or perhaps he assumed I was just throwing another tantrum and would crawl back. It didn’t matter anymore. I threw myself entirely into my work and spending every spare moment with my mother. But then, trouble started mounting at my job. One disaster followed another, and my supervisor began dumping piles of files on my desk. “Get these done tonight,” he ordered. I pulled three consecutive all-nights. Every time I slipped into the hospital ward late at night, my mother was already asleep. I could only steal a quick look at her pale face before rushing back to the office to work. Exhausted, I finally tried to protest. “Sir, this isn’t even my department. Couldn’t we…” He cut me off with a snarl. “Everyone else is working hard. You’re the only one complaining about helping out.” I swallowed my anger and went back to my desk, pushing through the crushing fatigue. Around three in the morning, starving and lightheaded, I ordered some takeout. As I went downstairs to pick it up, I heard voices near the entrance. It was Derek, talking to my supervisor. I stood frozen in the shadows as I realized they knew each other. They were old fraternity brothers. My supervisor shrugged, nudging Derek. “Are you sure this much work is okay? She’s going to be exhausted.” Derek shrugged, a smug smile on his face. “She needs to learn a lesson. Once she realizes how hard things are out there, she’ll stop throwing these tantrums. I don’t want to have to beg her to come back. Thanks for the favor, man. I owe you a nice dinner.” I stood there clutching my cold takeout, my mind going completely blank. All those grueling hours, the endless red tape, the sleepless nights, it wasn’t a standard workload. It was a trap manufactured by the man I had almost married to break my spirit. I didn’t go back upstairs to finish the files. I walked out, got into my car, and drove straight to the hospital. Sitting by my mother’s bedside, I took her hand. “Mom, that family friend’s son you wanted me to meet… is he still available?” The next morning at the office, my supervisor launched into a tirade, screaming at me in front of the entire department. I stared at his moving lips, the dark circles under my eyes heavy and throbbing. I could still hear his laugh from the night before, trading my misery for a steak dinner. How could people be so cruel? I just wanted to do my job, live my life, and escape a toxic relationship. Why did they have to tear me down? The tears finally spilled over, hot and angry. When he called me “selfish” for the third time, I gathered the thick stack of files on my desk and hurled them straight at his face. As I walked out of the building, I ran into Derek in the lobby. His eyes lit up with triumph, believing his little lesson had worked perfectly. “I booked a table at that Italian place you like,” he said, stepping into my path. “Come on, stop being stubborn.” He was waiting for my surrender, waiting for me to cling to him for warmth. But looking at him now, all I felt was absolute disgust. I pushed past him and walked out into the sunlight. Three days later, I walked out of the registry office, a gold band on my finger. A gentle, steady voice sounded beside me. “The actual wedding ceremony will take a bit more time to organize. I want to make sure everything is perfect for you and your mother.” I looked up at Nathan. Suddenly, a shadow fell over us. Derek had tracked me down using an old location-sharing app we had never deactivated. He stared at the red leather folder in my hand, his eyes practically bulging out of his skull. “Gwen, what the hell are you doing?”

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1 On the night Toby was rushed to the ICU, I begged Bennett for a loan. He stayed glued to his trading screens, dismissing my brother as [a bottomless pit] and telling me to ask my relatives instead. In the hall, I heard him call Paige. [I just wired the three hundred thousand dollars to your account,] he said, explaining it was a [playground fund] for her finance thesis. His tone was achingly tender. My phone lit up with Paige’s post: [Huge thanks to my favorite mentor!] alongside a stock chart marked with a heart. I pressed a hand to my stomach, where a seven-week life grew. When Bennett emerged, he coldly asked what he got out of supporting my [freeloading family]. I said nothing, simply signing the divorce papers I’d carried. Then, I drove to the clinic. He was right. From now on, I would live for myself. Standing outside the clinic door, I stared at the appointment slip in my hand. In three days, this child would be gone, disappearing from my life just like my marriage. The cold autumn wind slipped down my collar, making me shiver. I hailed a cab, intending to go back to our apartment to pack a few bags of my clothes. But when I reached the front door and entered the passcode, the lock beeped in error. I tried three times. On the fourth attempt, the system automatically locked down. Standing in the cold corridor, I dialed Bennett’s number. “Did you change the house code?” His voice was flat, completely devoid of guilt. “Yes. Paige needs to stay there for the next few days to monitor the night markets. It would be awkward if you were around. Take your mother and stay at a motel.” A suffocating chill settled over me. I swallowed the bitterness in my throat, my voice cracking. “Bennett, that is my home.” Bennett let out an annoyed sigh. “Nora, you need to look at this through a logical lens. Even if your brother survives, what is his trajectory? He’s a community college dropout destined for a dead-end blue-collar job. Paige is different. She is a prime asset. A hundred grand in her hands could easily double in two years. Your mother is constantly weeping, and if she stays at the apartment, it will ruin Paige’s concentration.” In the background, the relentless tapping of his keyboard never paused. Bennett was always like this, calculating, cold, and entirely objective. To him, everything was a matter of cost-benefit ratios and investment returns. In his financial universe, people were strictly categorized by their market value. My family and I were simply a failing stock, a liability not worth a single cent of his resources. I remembered the spring of our first year of marriage, when Bennett had visited my mother’s small house. My mother had just received her retirement payout, a modest thirty thousand dollars. Bennett had sat on her worn sofa, looking incredibly professional. “Mom, keeping this cash in a standard savings account is a waste. Let me manage it for you in a high-yield portfolio. It’s a guaranteed win.” My mother hadn’t hesitated. She immediately transferred the funds to him. When I tried to stop her, she had smiled and patted my hand. “He’s family, Nora. He would never let us lose.” Over the next year, I asked him about the portfolio a few times. The first time, Bennett didn’t even look up from his laptop. “It’s in a long-term accumulation phase. Don’t worry about it.” The second time, he frowned. “Stop obsessing over pocket change.” It wasn’t until the night before, when Toby urgently needed surgery, that I began digging through our bank statements and transaction history. My fingers had trembled as I scrolled through the digital ledgers. My mother’s thirty thousand dollars had never been put into a retirement portfolio. Six months ago, Bennett had transferred the entire sum into an account labeled: Paige’s Practice Fund. My mother’s lifetime savings, accumulated through decades of hard, backbreaking labor, had been casually handed over to keep Paige amused. Recognizing the depth of his cruelty, I didn’t waste another breath. I hung up the phone. Wiping away my tears, I looked down at the diamond band on my ring finger. With a sudden sense of finality, I walked into a jewelry store at the corner of the street. I slipped the ring off and placed it on the glass counter. The jeweler held it up to the light, turning it slowly. “The resale value on these isn’t great.” “How much?” “Three thousand.” It was just enough to cover Toby’s next round of medication. I handed over my ID, watching the ring slide away. It left a faint, pale indentation on my skin, the only proof that the last two years had actually happened. With the cash in hand, I bought myself a few basic clothes, wired the rest to my mother, and immediately called a divorce attorney. “I need you to draft a formal divorce petition as quickly as possible.” This marriage was over. The next morning, I went straight to the hospital to sit with my brother. My mother was sitting by his bed, her eyes bloodshot from a sleepless night. I rubbed her back gently, trying to soothe her. “Mom, the doctors said Toby is stable. Once the employer’s liability insurance pays out, the rest of the surgeries and physical therapy will be covered. We’re going to get through this.” My mother nodded silently, scrolling through her phone to pass the time. Suddenly, her hand froze, and the color completely drained from her face. Sensing something was wrong, I leaned over to look at her screen. It was Paige’s social media page. Over the past few days, her follower count had exploded because she had been posting curated snippets of her life with Bennett. Her latest video was beautifully shot. The camera panned across a pristine, sunlit home office. The caption read: Mentor says a workspace must be tranquil to see the market clearly, so he customized this desk just for me. It was a bit too high, so he personally sawed off the legs so I can trade comfortably twenty-four hours a day! As the camera focused on the rich grain of the wood, my breath caught in my throat. I knew that desk. It was my wedding gift, a hand-carved oak writing desk my mother had spent months crafting with her own hands, polishing every inch of the unique grain. Now, it had been butchered, its legs hacked off to serve as Paige’s trading station. A wave of humiliation and fury rushed to my head, making my chest tighten. Without thinking, I logged into my verified account and left a comment directly under the video: I am Bennett’s wife. That desk was a personal wedding gift handcrafted by my mother. You are living in a married man’s apartment and bragging about destroying his wife’s property. Do you have any concept of boundaries? The comment spread like wildfire. Within hours, thousands of people were calling out Paige for being a home-wrecker. Her comment section was flooded with backlash, and her account was quickly overwhelmed by public outrage. But I never anticipated how fast and ruthless Bennett’s retaliation would be. That afternoon, Toby’s nurse walked into the room with a conflicted expression. “I’m sorry, but we’ve been informed that your brother’s treatment can no longer be covered by the company’s insurance policy.” I stood up, my heart hammering against my ribs. “What do you mean? We finalized the paperwork with his employer yesterday. It was a clear-cut workplace injury.” The nurse sighed. “The company’s representative called an hour ago. They’ve retracted their initial statement and are denying all liability. Without the insurance coverage, we can’t proceed with his upcoming surgeries or his specialized medications. We’ll have to pause his active treatment.” My mother gasped, sinking back into her chair. I knew exactly who was behind this. Controlling my rage, I stepped into the hallway and called Bennett. “You had my brother’s insurance claim revoked, didn’t you?” His voice on the line was as cool and detached as ever. “Yes, Nora. Consider this the price for your public jealousy.” “You did this because I told the truth about her?” I whispered. He let out a soft laugh. “Paige’s video was performing exceptionally well. It had massive commercial value, a perfect marketing investment. Your little emotional outburst ruined her momentum and disrupted my financial strategy.” “I am simply teaching you a lesson in accountability.” As the call disconnected, the last trace of warmth in my heart died. If Bennett was going to block our path to a peaceful settlement, I would fight him in court. I sat in the hospital corridor, compiling every document, every incident report, and every witness statement to prepare a lawsuit against Toby’s employer. But before I could even file the paperwork, the narrative online shifted overnight. A wave of paid articles and coordinated posts began saturating every major platform: Greedy Family Attempts to Extort Local Company Over Minor Injury Jealous Wife Slanders Rising Influencer After Financial Dispute The Ultimate Parasitic Family The hashtags quickly climbed the trending lists. The articles completely twisted the truth, claiming my family was faking the severity of Toby’s injuries to secure a massive payout, and that I had maliciously targeted Paige out of spite. The public, easily swayed by the coordinated media campaign, turned their anger toward us. I stared at the screen, my fingers cold. Bennett was pulling the strings, determined to destroy not just my brother’s chance of recovery, but my family’s reputation. By evening, the online hostility spilled into the real world. Three angry online vigilantes bypassed hospital security and stormed into Toby’s ward. Before I could even react, the sharp, toxic smell of chemical paint filled the room. My mother acted on pure instinct, throwing her body over Toby’s fragile form. The heavy, dark paint splashed across her back, staining her hair and clothes. But even with her protection, some of the paint splattered onto Toby’s open surgical wounds. The harsh chemicals instantly irritated his skin, causing his body to convulse. His heart monitor began beeping erratically, and his face turned a sickly grey as he slipped into unconsciousness. “Doctor! Please, someone help!” I ran into the hallway, screaming for the medical staff, my hands shaking violently. The medical team rushed in, pushing us out of the room as they began emergency resuscitation. Thirty minutes later, the lead surgeon walked out, his face grim. “The chemicals have caused a severe infection in his wounds, triggering a high fever and putting immense strain on his organs. He is in critical condition. We need to operate immediately, but we need the payment secured first. You need to find the funds, and fast.” I leaned against the cold hospital wall, feeling the weight of complete despair. I didn’t care about the lies they told about me, but I couldn’t let my brother die. Just then, the sound of footsteps echoed down the hall. Bennett stood there, looking immaculate in his tailored suit, his expression perfectly calm. Beside him, Paige was clinging softly to his arm. They stood side by side, looking down at my disheveled, paint-stained figure. Bennett glanced through the window of the ICU. “Nora, I can write the check right now and bring in the best specialists to save your brother.” “But first, you will release a public statement clarifying that Paige never interfered in our marriage. You will state that you acted out of marital insecurity, and that your previous comments were entirely baseless slanders.” I clenched my fists, my fingernails biting deep into my skin. “Bennett, I have done nothing wrong.” Bennett’s expression hardened, his patience completely exhausted. “Stubborn to the end.” Without another word, he placed a hand on Paige’s waist, guided her turn, and walked away. I spent the entire night sitting by Toby’s bedside, watching his shallow breathing, completely powerless. The next morning, my phone buzzed with a text message from an unknown number: Come to the lobby of the Grand Regent Hotel if you want to see a show. It was from Paige. A terrible dread pooled in my stomach. I ran out of the hospital and hailed a cab to the hotel. The moment I stepped through the grand glass doors of the lobby, the bright flashes of cameras blinded me. A mob of reporters and photographers had blocked the entrance, trapping someone in the center of the crowd. It was my mother, standing alone, looking incredibly small and frail. The reporters were shouting questions at her, their voices sharp and predatory. “Ma’am, is it true your daughter fabricated the affair allegations to ruin a young girl’s career?” “Is your family trying to extort money because you can’t afford your son’s lifestyle?” My mother’s shoulders shook violently under the weight of the cameras. Then, she lowered her head and bowed deeply to the crowd. “I am sorry. It was my fault. I thought my daughter’s marriage was failing, and in my confusion, I pressured her to write those things online. It was entirely my doing. Please do not blame anyone else.” The crowd erupted into murmurs of disgust. A few aggressive onlookers stepped forward, throwing eggs and trash at her. The yellow yolk ran down her grey hair, staining her coat. “Get away from her! Leave my mother alone!” I screamed, trying to force my way through the thick crowd of reporters. But the crush of people was too strong, and someone shoved me backward. I lost my balance and crashed heavily onto the marble floor. In the chaos, people kept jostling, and a heavy boot stepped squarely onto my lower abdomen. A sharp, blinding pain shot through my body, making me gasp for air. Seconds later, a warm wetness began to spread down my legs, staining my skirt a deep, dark red. Shivering from the pain, I struggled to lift my head. The world was beginning to spin, but through the blurry haze, I saw Bennett standing near the elevators. I reached out a trembling, blood-stained hand toward him, my voice barely a whisper. “Bennett… please, help me…” He looked down at me, his eyes entirely blank. “Stop acting, Nora,” he said, his voice cold and distant. “Your mother has already apologized. I’ll take care of your brother’s medical bills.” He turned his back on me and walked away with Paige. The world went completely black. When I opened my eyes again, the sterile smell of a hospital room filled my senses. A doctor was standing by my bed, his expression incredibly gentle but heavy with pity. “Nora, the physical trauma to your abdomen, combined with the severe internal bleeding and the delay in treatment, has caused irreversible damage. I am so sorry… but you will not be able to carry a child in the future.” I stared at the ceiling, unable to shed a single tear. When you reach the absolute limit of pain, there is only numbness left. I slowly pushed myself up, reached into my bag, and pulled out the signed divorce papers. I placed them quietly on the bedside table. Within the hour, I helped my mother transfer Toby to a different hospital. From this day on, Bennett, you and I are completely even.

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Late night gaming sessions always have a way of spiking your blood pressure. Our team’s Support player was absolutely feeding. After getting flamed relentlessly by the rest of us on voice chat, she just went AFK. A few minutes later, she reconnected. Her voice came through the mic, trembling and choked with heavy sobs. “I’m sorry… I’m so sorry…” “I was just drawing a bath for my baby. I put him in the tub…” “And I… I forgot to turn off the immersion heater…” “The water is boiling. He’s not moving. What do I do?” 1 I sat there, completely stunned. I glanced at the Support’s in-game name. It was “GamerPrincess”. A total stereotype. Our Jungler started yelling into his mic. “Lady! Can you quit with the creepy act in the middle of the night?” The ADC chimed in. “If you want to troll, just disconnect. Playing a horror soundboard isn’t funny. Let’s just surrender.” He initiated a surrender vote. But our Mid laner, who hadn’t used his mic all game, instantly voted no. The match dragged on. Princess was still wailing through the headset. “It’s real… my baby… he’s gone…” “What do I do? Oh god, what do I do…” Her panic sounded incredibly raw and helpless. If this was an act, she deserved an Oscar. I couldn’t hold back anymore. “I have literally never heard of anyone boiling a kid in a bathtub. What planet are you living on?” Princess sobbed uncontrollably, her words breaking apart. “The water… it was fine… I just wanted to play one quick game… I thought it would get cold…” “And then you guys started flaming me in the chat. You kept calling me trash…” “I panicked. I just cranked the heater to the max and ran back to my keyboard… I didn’t think…” “But… oh god…” She suddenly stopped talking. For two or three seconds, there was dead silence. Then, her tone shifted entirely. It dropped into a vicious, venomous snarl. “It’s your fault for cursing at me! This is all your fault! All of you!” “I will never let you get away with this!” 2 We were all completely dumbfounded. Who the hell blames random internet strangers for something like that? Even the toxic Jungler softened his tone, trying to sound reasonable. “Hey, lady, calm down. Take the kid out of the water and dial 911. Maybe the paramedics can do CPR…” Princess just cried harder, her voice piercing. “It’s too late… he’s completely still. His skin is so red… the water is scorching…” “He’s not breathing. There’s no pulse…” “He’s dead… he’s really dead…” “You killed him. You all killed him…” The ADC couldn’t take it anymore. He typed furiously to our Mid laner in the team chat: Just vote yes! Something is seriously fucked up at the Support’s house! Turn on your headset and listen to her! The Mid laner finally typed back: Crazy bitch. Fine, I’ll vote. The surrender screen popped up, and we all clicked yes immediately. The post-game lobby closed, cutting off her endless, cursing sobs. I let out a massive sigh of relief. I took off my headset, having zero desire to queue up for another match. That whole ordeal completely ruined my night. But a few minutes later, things took a terrifying turn. A friend request popped up on my Discord. The attached message read: Jungler from the last game. It felt weird, but I accepted it. The second the chat opened, he sent a flurry of messages. Dude, we are screwed. What if that crazy woman actually killed her kid? What if she comes looking for us? I typed back, confused. How did you even find my Discord tag? He answered line by line. Are you blind? You can see linked accounts on the server tracker. But that’s not the point. That match we just played was on the local matchmaking server. That means that Support player lives right here in our area! She said she wasn’t going to let us get away with it. She might actually be able to track us down! Reading that last sentence, my fingers literally started to shake over the keyboard. 3 I forced myself to take a deep breath and typed back a reassuring message. Stop scaring yourself. Nobody can track down a specific apartment just from a local server ping. I was trying to comfort him, but I was really just trying to convince myself. The Jungler replied instantly. I added the ADC who flamed her too. He lives in the Grandview Apartment complex. Just like me. What about you? Holy shit, me too! I typed out, but quickly tried to rationalize it. Wait, this complex has over fifty thousand residents. It’s totally normal for a local server to match us up. He asked another question. The creepiest part is, the ADC and I both live in District 4. You? Same here. By the time I hit enter, a cold sweat was already gluing my shirt to my back. The Jungler kept firing off messages. I knew it. Hold on a sec. I just added the Mid laner. Let me see what his deal is. If the three of us living this close is a coincidence, there’s no way he lives here too. I stared at the screen. Alright. Go ask. I’ll wait. Waiting was pure torture. My imagination started running wild. I opened up the local subreddit for our city, figuring I might as well check if there was any breaking news about an ambulance at Grandview. I wish I hadn’t looked. What I found almost stopped my heart. Something did happen in District 4. The details matched exactly what that “Princess” had been crying about. A young mother, home alone. Left an infant in a portable tub with a faulty immersion heater. Got distracted playing video games. The water boiled. The baby died. It was a real, documented tragedy. But when I looked at the timestamp on the news article, I felt completely sick. The article was posted exactly seven days ago. If this just happened tonight, there would be no police report or detailed news coverage. Right then, the Jungler messaged me again. The Mid laner lives in Grandview too! Something is seriously wrong here. I’m making a group chat. A drop of cold sweat rolled down my forehead and hit the desk. 4 There were four of us in the group chat. Everyone except the dead baby’s mother. I didn’t even read what they were saying. I just copied the Reddit link and slammed it into the chat. Look at this first! Tell me this isn’t exactly what happened in our game tonight! It took them less than a minute to completely lose their minds. The Jungler, always paying attention to the details, pointed out the worst part. Did you guys read to the bottom? The husband came home from work and chopped his wife to death with a kitchen knife! I clicked the link again and scrolled down. He was right. The husband murdered her in a blind rage. She died seven days ago, the Jungler typed. Today is the seventh night. You guys know what that means, right? The ghost comes back for revenge. The chat exploded. Chris, the Mid laner, typed in all caps: I DIDN’T EVEN USE MY MIC! WHY THE HELL AM I DRAGGED INTO THIS GHOST SHIT?! Tyler, the ADC, was panicking. We need to call the cops. 911 right now. If we wait until something happens, we’re dead. The Jungler shot that down immediately. If it’s a dead woman looking for revenge, what exactly are the cops going to do? Shoot a ghost? We need a real plan. I knew we had to do something, but my brain was completely fried. The whole situation was beyond logic. Suddenly, a private DM popped up from Tyler. Did the Jungler ask for your exact address? Did you give it to him? I replied honestly. I just told him District 4. He didn’t ask for my building number. Tyler’s response was chilling. He asked for mine, but I didn’t give it to him. That’s why he didn’t dare ask you. I felt a knot form in my stomach. What are you trying to say? The Jungler is sketchy, Tyler typed. He tracked us all down. He acts like he already knows where we live. He made this group chat. Watch. I bet he’s going to suggest some crazy plan to get us all together. Literally one second after Tyler sent that DM, the Jungler typed in the main group chat: Guys, I have an idea. I don’t know if you’ll go for it, but hear me out. Tyler called it perfectly. This nightmare was getting way too complicated. 5 Before I could even type a response, Tyler was already playing along in the group chat. Let’s hear it. What’s the plan? The Jungler started laying it out. Look, if I could find all of you through game data, a vengeful ghost can definitely find our front doors. Sitting here waiting to die is a terrible idea. I say we take the initiative. We go to her apartment. We bring something to offer her. We apologize sincerely. If we show her we are genuinely sorry, maybe she’ll let us live. Reading that insane proposal, my first thought was: He wants us to just deliver ourselves to a haunted murder scene? Tyler’s private DM popped up again. See? I told you. He’s trying to lead us into a trap. I agreed completely. You’re right. But why? We don’t even know this guy. Why would he want us dead? Play along in the group, Tyler instructed. Let’s force him to show his hand. Maybe this Jungler is working with whatever is haunting that place. It made sense. I switched back to the main chat. To my absolute shock, Chris, the Mid laner who had been raging a minute ago, suddenly agreed with the Jungler. Chris typed: I’m fine with going. But do you even know which building and apartment this crazy woman lived in? The Jungler replied: The news article probably has clues. If not, I can ask around the complex. Everything was perfectly aligning with the Jungler’s script. He held all the cards. If he gave us a random address, we’d have no choice but to follow him blindly in the dark. But right then, Tyler finally dropped a massive bomb in the group chat. Don’t bother asking around. I know exactly which building and which apartment she lived in. The chat went dead. I couldn’t believe what I was reading. 6 I frantically messaged Tyler in private. Are you insane?! You actually know where the murder happened? How?! Tyler replied instantly, sounding incredibly smug. Are you an idiot? I’m going to give them my own apartment address. I want to see how the Jungler reacts. Let’s see if he really has the guts to show up at a random door. I exhaled loudly. It was a bluff. In the group chat, the Jungler was already pressing him. You know? How the hell do you know? Tyler kept weaving his lie. Because I’ve been following this case since day one. And unfortunately… I actually know her husband. He didn’t give the Jungler time to process that before pushing the issue. Enough talking. Are we doing this or not? If we are, I’m dropping the address right now. I thought this aggressive push would make the Jungler back off. Instead, the Jungler agreed immediately. Hell yes. Send the address. I froze. Tyler typed out a detailed building and apartment number without missing a beat. Then he added a provocative challenge. This is it. Well? Are we heading out? Meet at the front door? I was totally lost. Were we really about to have a midnight meetup at Tyler’s place to test this guy? I was just about to type out an excuse to stay home. But before I could, Chris broke his silence again. His tone was dead serious, completely devoid of his previous panic. Who exactly are you, Tyler? What kind of sick game are you playing? What did we ever do to you? I stared at the screen, thoroughly confused. Right below that message, Chris uploaded an image. It was a screenshot of his private DMs with Tyler. I looked at the image and my blood ran cold. The conversation was nearly identical to the one Tyler was having with me. Tyler had told Chris he was suspicious of the Jungler, and that he was going to post a fake address to test him. But the real gut punch was the message Chris sent right after the screenshot. The address he just posted isn’t his apartment! That is the actual address where the baby was killed! 7 My brain practically short-circuited. This Tyler guy was an absolute psychopath. He was privately playing the voice of reason, manipulating me and Chris to doubt the Jungler, while simultaneously baiting all of us to walk right into a literal slaughterhouse! But the biggest question remained. How did Tyler know the real address? And what did he want from us? With the lie exposed, Chris kept the pressure on in the group chat. You told us it was a fake address to test the Jungler. You lied. What are you actually trying to do? Cornered by the evidence, Tyler didn’t back down. He sounded completely justified. I don’t have a hidden agenda. You have to believe me. I lied because I had absolutely no other choice. I’ve spelled it out as clearly as I can. Do you guys seriously not understand? I lost my temper and typed furiously. Understand what?! What kind of sick bullshit are you pulling in the middle of the night?! Chris was on the exact same page. Drop the act. Who are you? Did you hack the game to force us all into the same lobby? Tyler responded with a heavy dose of frustration. I told you I was forced into this. Do you not get it? I am being threatened! I swear to God, I have no idea how we ended up in the same match. That wasn’t me. But look in the mirror for a second. Are you all really going to pretend you have absolutely zero connection to that dead woman? I was furious. Keep my name out of your mouth! I don’t know that woman! The Jungler, who had been quiet, chimed in with question marks. Don’t try to drag me down with you! Before Chris could defend himself, Tyler tagged him directly in the chat. Hold on, Chris. Care to explain how you knew the address I posted was the actual murder scene? A massive realization hit me. The Jungler and I had completely missed the most glaring flaw in the room! If Chris didn’t know the dark history behind that address, how did he make that judgment so fast?

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1 For the three years we dated, Jimmy proudly wore the badge of an emotionally stunted guy who just didn’t get romance. So my best friend, Poppy, stepped in to be his wingwoman. From massive life plans to the most intimate details of our bedroom life, he consulted his guru Poppy on absolutely everything. Whenever I voiced my discomfort, Jimmy always had the same excuse. “Nora, stop overreacting. Poppy knows you better than anyone.” “I only ask for her help to keep our relationship solid.” Then came the day of my company physical. The doctors found a suspicious shadow on my lung. I texted a picture of the report to Jimmy. His knee-jerk reply popped up instantly. “Damn. Wild.” A second later, the message was unsent, replaced by a flood of overly sweet, sickly romantic paragraphs. I knew exactly what had happened. The wingwoman had taken over the chat. In the past, I wouldn’t have overthought it. But today was different. Staring at those two lines of text on my glowing screen, a sharp, bitter sting gathered behind my eyes. It was drizzling outside. By the time I finally pushed the front door open, it was already ten at night. The apartment was thick with stale cigarette smoke. A fresh bouquet of Stargazer lilies, the flowers I absolutely despised, sat dead center on the coffee table. I peeled off my damp trench coat and looked over at Jimmy. He was glued to his monitor, furiously clicking his mouse. “Didn’t we agree you were going to pick me up? I waited outside the clinic for over an hour.” He furrowed his brows, his eyes never leaving the screen. “I’m in the middle of a raid right now.” “Besides, you made it back perfectly fine on your own. Why did I have to be there?” My hand froze on the strap of my purse. I couldn’t even put into words how hollow my chest felt. When the doctor first showed me that scan, my entire being ached for Jimmy to walk through the door. I wanted him holding my hand, facing this terrifying unknown right beside me. But now, looking at him sitting right there in our living room. It suddenly felt like his presence didn’t matter at all. I hesitated for a second before dropping the medical folder onto the desk right in front of his keyboard. “There’s a shadow on my lung. The shape is highly irregular. The doctor told me to mentally prepare for the worst.” “I don’t drink, I exercise, I live a clean life.” “The only possible cause they gave me was prolonged, heavy exposure to secondhand smoke.” Jimmy finally stopped clicking and looked up. His face twisted into an annoyed scowl. “So you’re blaming me now?” “Nora, stop being so dramatic. Secondhand smoke isn’t nearly as deadly as the internet makes it out to be.” “The final biopsy isn’t even back yet. Can we not make every single thing my fault?” The exact same hurtful deflections. The exact same callous apathy. The old me would have cried. I would have felt profoundly wronged and dragged him into a screaming match right then and there. But tonight, I just stood perfectly still, letting the silence stretch. The heavy tension was suddenly broken by the bathroom door swinging open. Poppy stepped out into the hallway. Before she even opened her mouth to speak, Jimmy instantly crushed his cigarette into the ashtray and scrambled to crank the window wide open, looking incredibly guilty. I have chronic sinusitis. I cannot tolerate the smell of smoke. I spent three years begging Jimmy to quit, and my words meant nothing. Poppy just gave him a single look, and he folded completely. A dry, self-deprecating smirk tugged at the corner of my lips. Poppy nodded in approval, radiating the smug energy of a victor. “Jimmy, you’re bullying Nora again.” “Did you forget all the ground rules I taught you? Apologize to her right now.” The defensive, aggressive edge Jimmy just aimed at me melted away in a heartbeat. He shrugged, reluctantly shifting his gaze back to me. “Sorry, babe. Don’t be mad.” he muttered, his tone flat. “It’s all my fault, okay? I’m apologizing.” Seeing Poppy still glaring at him with her arms crossed, Jimmy let out a heavy sigh and picked up his phone to open a delivery app. “Flowers, boba tea, and a mango mousse cake.” “The ultimate apology trio. I’m doing this right, aren’t I, Poppy?” Poppy flashed him a thumbs-up and walked over, looping her arm through mine with a bright smile. “See, Nora? Aren’t I the best relationship coach ever?” “As long as I’m around, I guarantee you two will have smooth sailing.” I don’t eat mango. I am highly allergic to flower pollen. Every single item he just ordered was Poppy’s favorite. Too exhausted to even argue, I yanked my arm out of her grip in disgust and started walking toward the bathroom. Halfway down the hall, my feet stopped dead. My entire body went rigid as I stared blankly at the floor right beneath Poppy’s feet. She was standing on a vintage cashmere cardigan. The one I kept safely folded in the back of my closet, the one I cherished too much to even wear. I shoved her aside and dropped to my knees, frantically scooping up the fabric. Jimmy immediately rushed forward to catch Poppy by the waist. He barked at me without a second of hesitation. “Nora, what the hell is wrong with you tonight? Just because you’re in a bad mood doesn’t mean you get to take it out on other people!” Poppy quickly wedged herself between us, looking down at me with wide, teary eyes. “Nora, please don’t be mad.” “Jimmy was just worried I’d catch a cold walking out of the shower barefoot, so he grabbed this sweater for me to step on.” “If you’re upset, I’ll buy you a brand new one tomorrow.” That cardigan was the very last thing my grandmother left me before she passed away. I had told Jimmy the story behind it countless times. But he never retained a single word. Instead, he memorized that Poppy preferred her shower water at exactly a hundred degrees. He remembered that she hated wearing slippers on hardwood floors. Because of that, he felt entirely justified pulling my dead grandmother’s keepsake out of my closet to use as a makeshift bath mat. It felt like someone had shoved a fistful of cotton down my throat. I couldn’t breathe. I carried the sweater to the bathroom sink, desperately running the tap over the dirty footprints. But this cardigan was just like our relationship. No matter how hard I scrubbed, the stain wasn’t going to come out. My knuckles turned stark white under the freezing water. The ache in my chest was blinding. Right as a tear threatened to spill over my lashes, Jimmy’s arms wrapped tightly around me from behind. He rested his chin heavily on my shoulder. His voice dropped into a register of tenderness I had never heard from him before. “I am so sorry, Nora. I swear to god I didn’t mean to do that.” “I know you’re terrified about the medical results right now, and I never should have snapped at you.” “I promise you, I’m taking the next few days off to stay right by your side.” “Remember what we promised each other when we first started dating? Whatever happens, we face it together.” Finding someone you truly love is so incredibly hard. Flashes of our three years together flickered through my mind. The ice around my heart began to crack, just a little. I took a shaky breath, turning my head to respond, but Jimmy suddenly let go of me. He stepped back, pulling up the notes app on his phone. “Wait, what was the next line again?” “Poppy, the script you wrote me is way too long, I can’t memorize all this.” A familiar peal of laughter echoed from the hallway. “Oh my god, Jimmy, you are such an idiot.” “Just tell her you love her and she’s your whole world! Any girl would melt hearing that.” Poppy leaned casually against the doorframe, looking at Jimmy with playful mockery. “You big dummy, what would you ever do without me?” Jimmy turned back toward her, a smirk playing on his lips. He flicked his wet fingers, splashing water right onto Poppy’s cheek. “Good thing I’ve got you then, isn’t it?” “As long as you’re sticking around, I’ve got nothing to worry about.” The two of them instantly devolved into a playful wrestling match. Poppy scooped up a handful of water to splash him back. Her long acrylic nail caught the soaking wet cashmere in the sink. There was a sickening rip. A massive tear ripped straight down the center of the sweater. The laughter stopped instantly. Poppy stepped forward to look at the damage, but Jimmy grabbed her wrist before she could reach the sink. “Did you crack your nail? Does it hurt? Let me see, do we need to take you to urgent care?” Poppy glanced at me, shaking her head with an exaggerated sigh. “I’m not that fragile. You better go coddle your girlfriend. Not every girl is as forgiving as I am.” Jimmy refused to listen. He inspected her acrylic nail over and over again, practically dragging her out the door to get it looked at just in case she had damaged her real nail bed underneath. The front door slammed shut. I looked down at my pale, trembling hands submerged in the basin. Just last month, I slammed my hand into a filing cabinet at the office. My nail ripped in half, and it bled for nearly an hour. I sent Jimmy a picture, begging him to come meet me at the clinic because I was feeling faint from the pain. All he texted back was a skull emoji. “Told you having those long claws would get in the way of working. Bet you learned your lesson now.” When Poppy found out, she chewed him out for being so insensitive. He swore up and down that the next time something like that happened, he would shower his partner with care and attention. He didn’t break his promise. He just gave all that care and attention to someone else. The old cut on my finger had reopened from scrubbing the sweater. A thin ribbon of red bloomed into the soapy water. I quietly patched up my finger with a bandage. I dug out my sewing kit and sat on the edge of the bed, trying to stitch my grandmother’s sweater back together. Halfway through, my phone chimed on the nightstand. I thought it would be Jimmy checking in. It was a text from Sarah, the HR manager at my company. “Hey Nora, so sorry to bother you this late.” “The whole office heard about your medical news.” “God, you and your boyfriend were just talking about getting engaged. You must be an absolute wreck right now.” “The regional director said you should take as much paid leave as you need. We can put the London transfer and all your current projects on hold for now.” I honestly thought I had gone numb to it all. But the second a stranger offered me an ounce of genuine sympathy, the dam completely broke. I was so terrified of the disease growing inside me. I was so crushed by Jimmy’s chilling indifference. After hesitating for a long time, my breaking heart won out, and I sent him a message asking where he was. Jimmy immediately answered with a FaceTime call. But when the screen connected, it was Poppy’s face staring back at me. She held up a massive cluster of cracked crab legs, grinning over her shoulder at Jimmy, who was meticulously picking the meat out of the shells for her. “I told you to text her where we were going, but you never listen.” “See? Now the missus is calling to check up on you.” She spun the camera back to herself, looking right at me. “Don’t stress, Nora. I’m keeping a close eye on him for you.” “We were going to invite you to the seafood spot, but we figured you probably didn’t have an appetite with everything going on.” “Don’t worry though, I know exactly what you like. We’ll bring you back some leftovers.” I didn’t say a single word. I just stared at the screen, watching Jimmy methodically crack open another shell. In our three years together, he had never once peeled seafood for me. Whenever I asked, he would roll his eyes. “Can you not be so high maintenance? I’m a guy, I don’t do that delicate crap.” Yet right now, the pile of perfectly extracted crab meat on Poppy’s plate looked like a small mountain. A suffocating wave of exhaustion washed over me. I hung up the phone and crawled under the duvet, desperately wanting sleep to erase this miserable reality. But the pressure of real life hung over my neck like a guillotine. I tossed and turned, completely unable to close my eyes. Jimmy finally unlocked the front door around two in the morning. He walked into the bedroom, pressed a cold hand against my forehead, and let out a soft sigh. “Still feeling sick? Stop spiraling and get up, I brought you some food.” “The lab results aren’t even finalized yet. I bet it’s just like last time, some random bug that means absolutely nothing.” When we first started dating, I did fake being sick once to test him. He had a filthy mouth and zero sense of romance. I genuinely couldn’t tell if he actually liked me or was just passing the time. So I exaggerated a headache into a severe fever to see what he would do. I remember it was pouring rain that night, and the downtown traffic was entirely gridlocked. Jimmy was so terrified something bad was happening to me that he abandoned his car, threw me over his shoulders, and sprinted six blocks in a torrential downpour to get me to the emergency room. When the doctor told him it was just a mild cold, he yelled at me right there in the lobby. He said some genuinely nasty things. But sitting in that plastic hospital chair, my heart was soaring. Because in that moment of raw panic, I knew he loved me. After that night, no matter how harsh or obnoxious Jimmy could be. I never once thought about giving up on him or walking away from us. Until Poppy entered the picture. His wingwoman carefully, methodically trained him into the textbook definition of a perfect boyfriend. But this perfect boyfriend no longer belonged to me. I felt something cold brush against the back of my neck. Jimmy’s fingers gently swept a stray piece of hair behind my ear. But I truly couldn’t tell anymore. Was this a trick Poppy had coached him on? Or was it a rare, fleeting moment of genuine affection? I kept my back turned to him in the dark. Neither of us spoke another word. I didn’t sleep a single second. When the sun came up, Jimmy left early for the office. He left a breakfast plate on the counter, perfectly following Poppy’s nutritional instructions. It was a runny poached egg and a kale salad. Two things that made my stomach turn. I didn’t touch it. I threw on a hoodie and walked down to the neighborhood park to get some air. Nothing about the streets had changed. But the person who used to hold my hand while we walked here was entirely gone. My legs finally gave out from exhaustion, and I carried my heavy heart back up to our apartment. I pushed the door open and froze. The hallway was completely barricaded with boxes. Poppy was standing in the living room, pointing aggressively as delivery workers dragged furniture around. Jimmy was right beside her, happily packing my belongings into cardboard boxes. He was rambling off a checklist. “We need to swap the blinds for total blackout curtains. Poppy is a light sleeper and hates the morning sun.” “The pillows have to go too. Poppy only sleeps on memory foam.” “And the couch is way too depressing. Poppy likes warm neutrals, let’s get a cream-colored one.” I watched the two of them systematically erase every trace of my existence from the apartment. I stepped into the room, my voice trembling with disbelief. “Jimmy, I’m not even dead yet. Are you really in such a goddamn rush to let Poppy replace me?” Jimmy instinctively stepped in front of Poppy, shielding her. His face darkened. “What the hell kind of crazy talk is that? People were right, sick patients are impossible to deal with.” “You were the one crying about how unromantic I was. That’s the only reason I asked Poppy to come over and help me redesign the place for you.” “I try to do something nice, and you’re acting like an ungrateful psycho.” Poppy peeked out from behind his shoulder and stuck her tongue out at me. She casually wrapped her arms around Jimmy’s bicep. “Nora, don’t be paranoid. I’m just here to take care of you, not ruin your relationship.” “Oh, wait, why is your neck all red? Don’t tell me you guys were…” She turned and swatted Jimmy playfully on the chest, tugging at the collar of his dress shirt. “Nora is literally sick, and you still couldn’t keep your hands off her last night?” “Once I move in here, I’m keeping a very close eye on you two. No funny business.” Jimmy chuckled, leaning his face intimately close to Poppy’s. “You’re gonna police my sex life now?” “What happens if I get the urge? Are you going to step up and handle it for her?” Watching them flirt inches from my face snapped the final thread of my sanity. I grabbed the glass vase off the table and hurled it directly at the wall behind them. It shattered with a violent crash. Jimmy jumped back, releasing his grip on Poppy. “Nora, are you psychotic?!” “That is Poppy’s favorite vase! She carried that all the way back from a vintage boutique in Milan last month!” A hollow, venomous laugh ripped its way out of my throat. My entire body was shaking with fury. “Oh, you have an incredible memory when it comes to Poppy, don’t you, Jimmy?” “You remember she bought that vase in Milan. You remember she hates sunlight. You remember she needs memory foam and neutral aesthetics.” “But do you remember that I have chronic sinusitis? Do you remember that the pollen in those goddamn flowers put me in the hospital last year?” “Do you remember that I am a patient who might have lung cancer and could drop dead at any minute?!” Jimmy froze completely. He couldn’t answer a single question. His mouth opened and closed, entirely stripped of his usual arrogance. He looked like he wanted to apologize. But right at that exact second, Poppy stepped out from behind him. She closed the distance between us, grabbing my wrists before I could step back. “Nora, please don’t yell at him. We are literally just trying to help you.” I tried to violently rip my hands out of her grip. Her fingernails dug painfully into my skin. She leaned in close, dropping her voice to a vicious, venomous whisper only I could hear. “You’re so pissed off, aren’t you, Nora? You feel so victimized.” “Well, did you ever stop to think about how miserable I’ve been playing the ugly sidekick all these years?” “We come from the exact same background. Why the hell do you get the six-figure job and the perfect boyfriend?” “Since you insist on being better than me at everything, I am going to burn every single thing you love to the ground today.” Before I could even process the words, she yanked my arm forward and threw her own body violently backward toward the floor. She let out a blood-curdling scream. “Nora, I swear I didn’t tell Jimmy about you faking your illness!” “Please, just believe me this one time, stop hurting me!” A split second before she hit the hardwood, Jimmy lunged forward and caught her in his arms. He stared at her terrified face for two seconds before turning to me with eyes full of absolute hatred. “You’re faking it again?!” “I let it go the first time, and now you think you can forge a medical document to pull this manipulative bullshit on me?!” “No wonder your grandmother died so young, you probably drove her to an early grave with this toxic behavior.” “You like playing sick? You like assaulting people? Fine, keep playing your sick little games alone!” “Whenever you finally decide to grow the hell up and stop acting like a lunatic, maybe I’ll bring Poppy back here!” He grabbed Poppy by the hand and dragged her out the door. The heavy oak slammed shut behind them, rattling the picture frames on the walls. I stood completely alone in the center of the living room, looking around at the ruins of my life. Everything had changed. Every person, every object, it was all utterly foreign. The framed photos on the mantle had been replaced by Poppy’s selfies. Poppy’s silk pajamas were draped over my side of the bed. Even the study, the bathroom. Poppy’s fingerprints were permanently burned into every square inch of this apartment. My belongings were nowhere to be found. In this home, in this relationship. There hadn’t been any room for me in a very, very long time. Tears slipped down my cheeks, entirely silent. I took one long, shuddering breath, pulled out my phone, and slowly typed out a message. “Sarah, I’m taking the transfer. I’ll go to London.” I slowly turned in a circle, taking one final, agonizing look at the walls I had called home for three years. I picked up my suitcase, walked out the door, and never looked back.

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After my cousin Lexi stole eight of my boyfriends in a row, I decided it was time for a little revenge. I took her photos and used them to catfish an obsessively possessive guy online. His name was Silas. He was over six feet tall with a face sculpted like a fallen angel and a perfectly shredded core. More importantly, he had obscene amounts of money. Once we started talking, I never had to buy my own food, clothes, or necessities ever again. He would randomly wire five figures to my account just because he felt like it. On our one hundred day anniversary, he sent me a picture of a heavy metal chain. “Baby, if you ever dare to leave me, I am going to lock you up.” That was exactly what I was counting on. That very same day, I texted him a breakup message, blocked his number, and deleted his contact entirely. Half a month later, Lexi was right in the middle of flirting with boyfriend number nine when the front door of the cafe swung open. Silas walked in. 1 I always knew Silas would come hunting for me. I just never expected him to track me down this fast. We lived across the country from each other. Aside from giving him Lexi’s real name and face, every single piece of information I fed him was a complete lie. But looking at him now, I had to admit the photos did not do him justice. Seeing that impossibly gorgeous face appear right in front of me caused my traitorous heart to skip a heavy beat. He did not even glance my way. His eyes swept over the room with cold indifference before he walked straight toward Lexi. At that exact moment, Lexi was proudly clinging to the arm of the guy I was supposed to be dating. Silas seamlessly wedged himself between them, his gaze fixed purely on Lexi. “Is this guy your boyfriend?” Standing next to a physical masterpiece like Silas made my slightly above average boyfriend look like an absolute nobody. Lexi’s eyes practically sparkled with greed. She shoved the guy she had just spent weeks stealing right out of her way without a second thought. “No way. He belongs to my cousin over there. They got into a fight, and I was just trying to play peacemaker.” She flashed me a sickly sweet smile. “Avey, come on. You two need to make up already.” Just as expected, the dark hostility swirling in Silas’s eyes faded the second she said those words. The corner of his mouth curved upward into a breathtaking smile. He stared at Lexi without blinking. Watching them together felt like staring directly into the sun. I lowered my head and dug my fingernails into my palms. I kept repeating the same thought in my head. Was this not exactly what I wanted? With Silas in the picture, Lexi would never try to steal my boyfriends again. I could finally date like a normal person. I was supposed to be thrilled. But my mind kept dragging me back to all the memories I shared with Silas. During those three months together, I experienced what it felt like to be loved with absolute, undivided devotion. Whenever work got too chaotic and I skipped meals, my stomach would twist into agonizing knots. Silas would wire me money for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, demanding proof that I was eating properly. He shared every mundane detail of his day with me. It felt like he was standing right beside me, holding my hand through life. When he found out I had a thing for muscular guys, he started practically living at the gym. Every single night, he sent me videos of his progress. He would even dim the lights, take off his shirt, and dance just to make me smile through the screen. Even through a phone, the raw burning affection in his eyes was impossible to ignore. Thinking about how all of that devotion now belonged to Lexi made my chest ache. It felt like my heart was soaking in a glass of freezing, bitter lemonade. 2 Silas had not noticed my existence at all. He kept his focus entirely on Lexi. His voice was velvet soft, yet laced with a dangerous undertone. “Since he is not your boyfriend, do I have the honor of claiming that spot?” Lexi tilted her chin up and shot me a look of pure, unrestrained triumph. Her expression was screaming at me. Look at this. Everyone wants me, and absolutely no one wants you. She let the silence stretch out just long enough to look dignified before giving Silas a slow nod. “That depends entirely on how you treat me.” Silas chuckled softly. “I promise you will be more than satisfied.” My knuckles turned white. I did not even have the courage to look up and see how sickeningly sweet they looked together. My brain decided to torture me by replaying all the obsessive, whispered promises Silas used to tell me late at night. “Baby, do not ever leave me. I cannot breathe in a world where you do not exist.” “If you ever abandon me, I will hunt you down and we can leave this earth together.” I fully admit that I fell for him. No one had ever made me feel like I was the center of their universe before. But that exact overwhelming affection was why I had to cut ties and run. People always say that men with his kind of dark obsession never change their minds once they lock onto a target. But the face he locked onto was Lexi. There were countless nights we spent on the phone where I could hear the dangerous, heavy rhythm of his breathing. When his mind went to those dark places, the face he was picturing belonged to my cousin. If I kept the game going, the only person who would end up shattered was me. So when our one hundred day anniversary rolled around, Silas demanded we meet in person. “Baby, I have my ID and passport ready. The second I see you, we are going straight to the courthouse.” He told me he had lawyers drawing up the paperwork to transfer all his properties and shares into my name before we even signed the marriage certificate. He said he wanted it to be my personal safety net. He even promised to fly us to Europe to plan the wedding of my dreams. He was fully prepared to give me the world. The more he talked, the more my heart shattered into pieces. None of those beautiful promises actually belonged to me. So I cut him off, typed out a brutal breakup text, and blocked his number before he could even process what happened. Lexi suddenly called my name, ripping me out of my downward spiral. “Avey, Silas is taking me out for an amazing dinner. You should totally tag along!” I knew exactly what she was doing. She wanted a front row audience to show off her incredibly rich, impossibly handsome new prize. The smart move was to walk away. Going would only inflate her ego and make me feel infinitely worse. But somehow, I still found myself following them to the restaurant. Once we sat down, Lexi started ordering platters of exotic seafood. Silas paused, giving her a very strange look. “Baby, I thought you absolutely hated seafood. You always told me the smell made you sick.” Lexi froze with the menu in her hands. She shot me a highly calculating look. She recovered instantly, batting her eyelashes. “Well, do you not like it?” She gambled, and she won. The dark clouds in Silas’s eyes instantly cleared up. “I knew my girl would remember my favorite foods.” I sat with my head bowed the entire time, feeling like an absolute ghost haunting their date. I managed to keep my mouth shut until Lexi confidently ordered a massive slice of mango cake for dessert. My chair scraped loudly against the floor. Silas was deathly allergic to mangoes. But knowing his twisted, obsessive personality, if Lexi ordered it for him, he would view it as a punishment from his girl and eat the whole thing with a smile on his face. It could literally kill him! The words exploded out of my mouth before I could stop them. “You cannot order that!” Silas snapped his head toward me. His gaze cut through me like a frozen blade. He looked annoyed by the interruption, but there was a heavy layer of deep, penetrating suspicion in his eyes. I scrambled to find an excuse. “You guys already ordered all the entrees you wanted. I want to swap the dessert for strawberry shortcake.” I absolutely despised strawberry shortcake, just like I despised watching the two of them sit together. I made a silent vow to myself right then and there. This was the absolute last time I would ever interfere. Whatever happened between them from now on was none of my business. I tried to convince myself that they were perfect for each other. With Silas keeping her busy, Lexi would leave my love life alone. This was a massive win for me. But the only thing answering my logic was the suffocating, bitter ache spreading through my chest. 3 After that agonizing dinner, I threw my entire soul into my job. I worked myself to the bone, desperate to treat my online romance with Silas like a fever dream I could just sweat out. Just when I thought I was finally moving on, I walked out of my apartment building and saw Silas leaning against a car, waiting in the shadows. I genuinely thought my mind was playing tricks on me. I checked my phone. It was past ten at night. Silas pushed off the car and started walking slowly toward me. Panic rooted my feet to the pavement. I started twisting the hem of my shirt, my heart hammering against my ribs. “Silas. What are you doing here?” His next words sent a violent shiver crawling all the way down my spine. “Does Lexi have any close friends? The kind of friends who might have total access to her phone?” “She does not feel like the girl I have been looking for.” A massive wave of pure, terrifying joy crashed over me, only to be violently shoved back down by reality. He figured out Lexi was not the girl he fell for. But did that even matter? The only reason he loved me was because he thought I looked like her. Since he arrived in town, he had not shown a single shred of interest in the real me. Rather than dragging the messy truth into the light and ruining everything, it was safer to just let the misunderstanding continue. I put on my best confused face. “Really? I thought you two looked amazing together. You are literally a match made in heaven.” Silas stared at me with razor sharp intensity. He let the silence stretch for an agonizing minute before finally speaking. “I am thirsty. Take me up to your place so I can get a glass of water.” He did not even wait for me to agree. He simply walked past me and headed straight for the lobby doors. I knew Silas well enough to know that once he decided to do something, trying to stop him was completely useless. I hurried to catch up with him. But the exact second I unlocked my front door, absolute dread washed over me. The blood froze in my veins. Right there on the entryway table, nestled between expensive little decorative pieces, sat an old, scuffed up smartphone. It was the exact device I used to catfish him. After the breakup, I could not bring myself to wipe the memory out completely. Whenever the loneliness got too loud, I would turn it on and read our old messages. More importantly, it held all the videos of his workouts and dances. I was so hopelessly addicted to looking at him that his shirtless photo was still set as the lock screen. I lunged forward, desperate to grab the phone and shove it in my bag. But Silas had much longer legs and a much faster reaction time. He clicked his tongue. “Keeping a piece of trash like this out in the open? There must be some heavy secrets hidden in here. Does this belong to you, or does it belong to Lexi?” Using his massive height advantage, he snatched the phone right off the table. His thumb hovered dangerously over the power button. It was completely over. In a matter of seconds, he was going to realize the girl he had been pouring his soul into was not Lexi. It was me. I heard the distinct mechanical click as he pressed the button. 4 Right before Silas could look down at the screen, pure survival instinct took over my entire body. I let out a desperate shout and literally launched myself at him, stretching my arms as far as they could go to snatch the device. I did not care how crazy I looked. Before I even realized what was happening, his arms instinctively wrapped around my waist to catch me. We both froze completely still. I could clearly see the violent struggle flashing through his dark eyes. His first instinct was definitely to drop me straight onto the hardwood floor. But after a tense second, he let out a heavy breath and gently lowered my feet to the ground. He still kept the phone completely out of my reach. My panic about the phone vanished for a split second, replaced by pure shock that he actually caught me. I remembered a time we were on a voice call and I heard a girl screaming, followed by a loud crash on his end. Silas had coldly explained that some girl tried to fake a trip and fall to land in his arms. Because he was distracted talking to me, she managed to brush her hand against his sleeve before he violently shoved her to the floor. He threw that expensive dress shirt directly into the trash the second he got back to his office. He swore to me that he would never let another woman touch him, and he would never touch anyone else. But just now, he caught me. Did that mean I was somehow different in his eyes? Before I could unravel that thought, his dark, teasing voice echoed from above me. “Why are you panicking? Now I really need to see what kind of secrets you are hiding.” He lifted the phone high above his head and pressed the power button again. I was nowhere near his height. I could not reach it even on my tiptoes. Despair swallowed me whole. I shut my eyes tight, waiting for the explosion. Until I heard Silas mutter, “Why will it not turn on?” I cracked an eye open. The screen was completely black. The battery was dead. Then I remembered. I had stayed up until two in the morning watching his old dance videos and completely forgot to plug it into the charger. Silas leaned down, bringing his face dangerously close to mine. “Avery, what exactly are you hiding?” I found my voice and snapped back at him. “What does it matter? I am not Lexi, so my business has absolutely nothing to do with you!” The corner of his mouth twitched. “Fair point. You have nothing to do with me. I am leaving.” When the heavy door clicked shut behind him, my knees finally gave out. I slid down the wall and hit the floor. The air in my apartment was still thick with the scent of sandalwood. It was the exact cologne I had picked out for him online. Before me, he hated wearing scents. Afterward, he wore it every single day just to prove he was listening. He used to tell me that one day, he would wrap me up so tightly in his arms that the scent would sink into my skin permanently. But none of that mattered anymore. I made a silent promise to myself right there on the floor. I needed to stay as far away from him as possible. We belonged to two completely different worlds now. It was over.

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1 At City Hall, the clerk pushed our papers back. Harrison was still married. His jaw tightened as he coaxed me to wait one more month to finalize things with Jane. I believed him. Instead, I watched him live her life online. He took her whitewater rafting and skiing in Aspen while ignoring my requests. I waited months for a Santorini reservation, only to see him take her, kneeling at the altar and tying a blessing cord on her wrist. He threw her the wedding we never had. The roses, the chiffon drapes, the entrance song—all were my choices, stolen for her day. In the video, Jane wore the gown I’d tailored, glowing under the lights I designed. I asked if he ever loved me. He stayed silent, then kissed her forehead. “I hate you,” he said. Finally, I understood. Hatred is just unfinished love. And I was done waiting. I closed out of the wedding video Jane had texted me and caught a cab straight to the hotel. The hallway was littered with champagne roses. Half of a dismantled white chiffon arch leaned against the wall. Even the broken string lights scattered across the carpet were the exact ones I had bought for my own wedding. The hotel banquet manager walked up to me holding a clipboard. “Miss Phoebe, I just need your signature on the final vendor clearance.” I froze for a second before taking the clipboard. Right there on the dotted line, printed in bold black ink, was Harrison’s name. It hit me all at once. He did not just steal my entire wedding concept and give it to Jane. He had actually put me down as the point of contact to clean up their mess. I signed my name, turned around, and pushed open the heavy double doors to the bridal suite at the end of the hall. The moment the door opened, my feet rooted to the floor. Jane was still wearing my custom gown. She was sitting squarely on Harrison’s lap, leaning her flushed, seemingly drunken face against his cheek. Her lipstick was smeared right at the corner of his mouth. Harrison was a massive germaphobe. Normally, if I tried to kiss him right after dinner, he would frown, push me away, and tell me to go brush my teeth first. But right now, he was not pushing Jane away at all. Instead, his hands were resting firmly on her waist, holding her steady so she would not slip. Jane turned her head and noticed me standing there. She bit her lip and shrank back into Harrison’s chest. “I am so sorry, Phoebe. I had a little too much champagne and lost my balance. Harrison was just catching me.” His first instinct was not to let her go. It was to tighten his grip and pull her closer, shielding her against his body. I stared at the expensive silk of my wedding dress, now wrinkled and stained. “Why are you wearing my dress?” Harrison looked up at me. His tone was perfectly flat. “Jane never got to wear a wedding dress when we got married. It has always been a heavy regret for her.” “You can just buy a better one later.” Jane’s eyes welled up with tears that immediately spilled over her lashes. “Phoebe, please do not be mad at him. I will take it off right now and give it back to you.” She reached behind her back, pretending to struggle with the zipper. Harrison immediately caught her hand. “Do not take it off. The AC is blasting in here, you will catch a cold.” He personally adjusted the shoulder strap that had slipped down her arm, then picked up his suit jacket and draped it over her shoulders. Watching how incredibly gentle he was with her brought back a bitter memory. When I went for my first fitting in that exact dress, the zipper caught the skin on my back. The pain was so sharp I broke out in a cold sweat. I called out for Harrison to come into the fitting room and help me. He stood completely still on the other side of the velvet curtain. His voice was freezing cold. “It is not appropriate for me to go in there. Just call a sales associate.” It was not about being appropriate. It was just because the woman inside the curtain was me. I did not say another word. I walked straight past them toward the vanity mirror and reached for the velvet ring box sitting on the glass. The second my fingers grazed the box, Jane lunged forward and slammed her hand over it. “I wore this ring tonight. Can I just keep it until tomorrow? I promise I will return it then.” I gripped the box and yanked it hard. Harrison immediately clamped his hand around my wrist. His grip was terrifyingly strong. My bones ground together in pain. “It is just a piece of jewelry. Stop backing her into a corner.” All the color drained from my face. Cold sweat rolled down my temples from the pain. He did not even look at me. He just leaned down and asked Jane in a soft whisper. “Did that scare you?” Jane shook her head, her fingers gripping the lapel of his shirt like a lifeline. Harrison finally turned his head to look at me, his brows pulled together in deep annoyance. “Just go home.” “Tomorrow morning, I am taking Jane to the lawyer’s office to finalize the asset division.” “Once the paperwork is signed, we are completely finished. I will make this right with you then.” I ripped my wrist out of his grip. I left the ring, turned my back on them, and walked out of the hotel. The second I got into a taxi, my phone lit up. Jane had used Harrison’s phone to text me a photo. In the picture, she was wearing my wedding ring, and her hand was completely engulfed in Harrison’s palm. The next morning, Harrison called me. He told me to bring my birth certificate and ID to his lawyer’s office. He wanted me to personally witness him and Jane signing the final asset division. “I want you there so you stop overthinking and realize I have absolutely nothing left to do with her.” I packed my documents in my bag and pushed open the glass door to the conference room right on time. Jane was wearing Harrison’s jacket again. Her bare feet were resting right next to his knee. Harrison was leaning over, carefully applying a bandage to a tiny scratch on her ankle. His touch was incredibly light. I remembered the time I wore new heels and the blisters bled so badly I could barely walk. He did not even step out of the driver’s seat. He just rolled down the window and stared at me. “There are spare flats in the backseat. Put them on yourself.” But now, he was holding Jane’s foot like she was made of antique glass that would shatter if he breathed too hard. Hearing the door open, Jane made a fake attempt to pull her leg back. Harrison caught her ankle to keep her still. “Stop moving. If the cut reopens, you are going to cry about the pain again.” He smoothed the edges of the bandage before finally looking up at me. He pointed to the empty leather chair across the table. The lawyer slid two thick stacks of paper into the center of the table. I thought it was the final divorce decree. But when I read the bold font at the top of the page, a loud ringing started in my ears. “Deferred Asset Division Agreement.” I pointed at the thick stack of paper and looked right at Harrison. “What the hell is this?” Harrison leaned back in his chair, his tone leaving absolutely zero room for argument. “Jane is in a very fragile state right now.” “The art gallery, the lakehouse, and the offshore trust fund will remain exactly as they are.” “Once her mental health stabilizes, we will deal with the paperwork.” I stared at him. “Yesterday you told me you were cutting ties completely today. How exactly is keeping joint assets cutting ties?” His expression darkened instantly. “Property is property. Feelings are feelings.” “Stop twisting every single thing into some kind of romantic conspiracy.” Jane looked at me with bloodshot eyes, massive tears rolling down her cheeks. “Phoebe, I am not trying to compete with you.” “I am just so terrified that once I sign my name, every single memory I have left of him will be erased.” Harrison pulled a tissue from the box and reached out to wipe the tears from her face. The warm pad of his thumb gently traced the corner of her eye. Watching them, my throat closed up tight. Whenever I cried and fought with him, begging him to show he cared, he never once comforted me. He would just slide the entire box of tissues across the table. “We will talk when you stop being hysterical.” The lawyer pulled out a single sheet of paper and slid it in front of me. “Miss Phoebe, this is a declaration confirming you consent to Mr. Harrison and his ex-wife maintaining joint assets. Please sign at the bottom.” Harrison looked at me, lowering his voice into a warning. “The more gracious you are about this, the easier it will be for her to let go of the past.” “Phoebe, you have always been the mature one. Do not throw a tantrum right now.” I picked up the heavy metal pen and dragged a thick, black line straight through the signature box. I dropped the pen onto the mahogany table. “I refuse.” Seeing the blacked-out signature, Jane let out a weak gasp and slumped directly into Harrison’s chest. “I shouldn’t even be alive. I am just a burden to everyone around me.” Harrison immediately wrapped his arms around her, rubbing her back to calm her down. He looked up at me. His eyes were like absolute ice. “Phoebe, are you really not going to stop until you completely humiliate everyone in this room?” I did not give him an answer. I turned around and walked out of the conference room. The second I stepped into the hallway, my phone started ringing. It was the city hospital. “Miss Phoebe, your mother’s cardiac surgery has been moved up. We have to operate this afternoon.” “It is a highly critical procedure. We need a family member here immediately to sign the consent forms!” I rushed to the hospital as fast as humanly possible. The charge nurse shoved a massive stack of liability waivers into my hands. “Sign these quickly, the surgical team is waiting.” Looking at the dense paragraphs listing every possible fatal complication, my hands shook so violently I could barely hold the pen. Harrison had promised me he would be right by my side today. He had officially met my mother as my fiancé and swore to her that he would be there to hold my hand while she went under anesthesia. I pulled out my phone and called him. The first call rang out completely. The second call was sent straight to voicemail. On the third try, the line finally connected. But the only sound coming through the speaker was Jane’s hoarse, breathless sobbing. “You cannot throw this picture frame away! It is from the first time we went to the beach together!” I took a deep, trembling breath and asked him. “Where are you?” Harrison sounded completely exhausted. “Jane said she needed to grab a few things from the lakehouse. Looking at all her old stuff completely broke her down.” “I cannot just abandon her here while she is like this.” I kept my voice dead level. “My mother is about to be wheeled into open-heart surgery. You promised you would be here.” The line went dead silent for two seconds. Then, he spoke with absolute, chilling entitlement. “Your mother is surrounded by top surgeons, and she has you.” “Jane only has me right now. She cannot be left alone.” Listening to his voice, I closed my eyes. I remembered the very first time I brought him home for dinner. My parents spent the entire afternoon cooking a massive feast of his favorite foods. Halfway through the meal, Jane texted him. [I found my old wedding ring. I am having a panic attack.] Harrison dropped his fork, muttered an excuse about a corporate emergency, and walked out the front door without looking back. He left me sitting alone at the dining table, staring at my confused parents and the cold food. Now, the woman lying on a stretcher waiting to have her chest cut open was my mother. And he still chose Jane without a second of hesitation. “Do whatever you want.” I hung up the phone, gripped the pen, and signed my name on every single liability waiver. After they wheeled my mother through the double doors, I sat entirely alone on the freezing plastic bench in the waiting room. My phone screen lit up. I was scrolling through Instagram and saw Jane’s latest story. She had set it so only I could see it. In the photo, Harrison’s dress shirt sleeves were rolled up, and he was carefully adjusting a massive wedding portrait of the two of them on the wall. Jane was barefoot, wearing his oversized slides. His jacket was draped over her shoulders again. The caption read: [He said he would cut ties, but his hands always catch me first.] Staring at that picture, I thought about the very first day I moved into his apartment. I brought out the only framed photo we had together and tried to put it on his nightstand. He took the frame and placed it face down in a drawer. “Do not leave pictures out in the bedroom. Visual clutter ruins my sleep.” At ten thirty that night, Harrison finally walked into the surgical waiting room. “Your mom made it out fine, didn’t she?” “Stop acting like the sky is falling every time something happens. You are just stressing yourself out for nothing.” I looked up at him. “You knew the mortality rate for this surgery was incredibly high. You knew she might never wake up. And you still chose to go hang a picture frame with her?” His brow furrowed into a tight knot. “Jane is in a very dark place mentally. The doctor said she cannot handle any emotional triggers.” “Can you just be a little understanding for once? Stop treating everything like a competition with her.” Right on cue, his phone vibrated. It was a voice note from Jane. “Harrison, I am too scared to sleep in the lakehouse alone. Please come back.” Harrison stood up from the bench almost instinctively. I reached out and grabbed the cuff of his shirt. “If you walk out of this hospital tonight, you and I are completely finished.” He looked down at my knuckles gripping his sleeve. He did not look panicked. He did not even stop moving. He just gave me a look of pure, unadulterated exhaustion. “Stop using breakups as a threat.” “Phoebe, you have always been the rational one. Do not start throwing cheap, dramatic tantrums like she does. It is not a good look on you.” He ripped his sleeve out of my grip and walked out of the corridor with long, confident strides. I watched his back completely disappear around the corner. Then I raised my left hand and pulled the diamond engagement ring off my finger. I picked up my phone and called the county clerk’s office. “Hello. I need to secure the absolute first appointment for a marriage license tomorrow morning.” The next morning, Harrison did not come home. Around seven, he sent a text. [Jane finally fell asleep after taking her medication. I will take you out to dinner tonight.] I read the message and put the phone in my pocket. At ten o’clock, another message came through. [I know I lost my temper last night, but I was just trying to keep her calm. Stop forcing me to choose.] I stared at the screen and let out a dry laugh. I was never the one forcing him to choose. It was just a simple fact that the moment Jane appeared, his gravity shifted entirely to her. And then he would turn around and demand that I be the understanding one. The mature one. At noon, Harrison walked into the hospital room. “Your mom’s vitals are stable now, right?” He pulled up a chair and sat down. “I wasn’t out partying last night. Jane kept screaming my name in her sleep. I was terrified she was going to hurt herself if I left her alone in that big house.” I stopped what I was doing and looked at him. “Because she screamed your name, it was perfectly fine to leave my mother bleeding on an operating table?” Harrison fired back instantly. “Your mom had a team of surgeons looking after her, and she had you.” “Jane had absolutely no one but me.” The words landed on me with the weight of a feather. I was too drained to even feel angry anymore. I just felt a deep, freezing finality. Seeing my silence, Harrison assumed I was doing exactly what I always did. Swallowing my feelings and backing down. His voice softened, and he reached out to grab my hand. “Alright, enough fighting.” “As soon as your mom is discharged, we are going straight to City Hall to get legally married.” I pulled my hand away before he could touch me. “You told me you were in no rush. Why the sudden desperation to get the paperwork signed?” He pulled his hand back, his tone filled with absolute certainty. “Because once we are officially married, Jane will see that I have my own family. It will finally force her to give up.” A sudden laugh escaped my throat. It was so pathetic I could feel tears prickling the corners of my eyes. He was not rushing to marry me because he loved me. He was only doing it because Jane was suffocating him, and he needed a human shield to block her. “So I am just a tool you are using to make her back off?” The color drained from his face. “What kind of crazy logic is that? That is not what I meant.” “You are the woman I want to marry. Jane is just my past. The only thing I feel for her is a lingering sense of responsibility.” Before he could finish his sentence, his phone started ringing in his pocket. It was Jane. He glanced at the screen and hit decline. The phone immediately started ringing again. On the third ring, he caved. Jane’s hysterical, ear-piercing sobs echoed through the speaker. “Harrison! The maid threw away the porcelain bowl I bought for the cat!” “If you let them throw away the bowl, you are just throwing me away too!” Harrison shot up from the chair. The annoyance he had directed at me just seconds ago completely vanished, replaced by sheer panic. “Baby, please stop crying. Do not dig through the trash, you are going to cut your hands. I am on my way.” He grabbed his jacket off the back of the chair. I leaned against the wall and calmly reminded him. “You said you were having dinner with me tonight.” He paused for a fraction of a second, his back still turned to me. “She is in a crisis.” “Can you please stop keeping score over every little thing?” He pushed the door open and practically ran down the hall. This time, I did not stay in the room waiting for him to come back. At two in the afternoon, I took my documents and walked into City Hall. I filled out the registry, signed the documents, and stood before the clerk. When the heavy ink stamp slammed down on the paper, I took my crisp, brand new marriage certificate and slid it into my purse. At six in the evening, Harrison finally remembered I existed. He called me. “I handled the situation. Pack your things.” “Tomorrow at nine AM, I am taking you to City Hall to get the license.” I looked out the window at the setting sun and gave him a three-word answer. “No need anymore.” The line went dead silent. His voice dropped an octave, laced with warning. “What does that mean? Phoebe, are you seriously throwing another tantrum?” I did not offer him a single syllable of explanation. I hung up the phone and blocked his number. At eight that night, Harrison pushed open the door to his apartment. Half of the shoe rack in the entryway was completely empty. My clothes, my books, my skincare bottles. Every trace of me was gone. The panic finally hit him. He started aggressively calling my phone. Over a dozen calls, all sent straight to voicemail. He opened his social media app, ready to send me a furious message. Instead, he saw the post I had uploaded that afternoon. It was a photo of two marriage certificates sitting side by side. The caption was just one sentence. [Starting today, everything is brand new.] Harrison stared blindly at the screen. The unsigned divorce decree slipped out of his fingers and hit the floor.

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While filling out my handwritten wedding invites, I mindlessly browsed a popular forum on my phone. A trending thread grabbed my eye. [What is the wildest thing you’ve ever done for a best friend?] The top reply held over twenty thousand upvotes. [The craziest thing I ever did was giving the guy I loved deeply to her.] [Back in high school, my best friend and I liked the same boy. The twist? He didn’t love her—he loved me.] [I wanted her happy. So I secretly took his love letter meant for me, passed it to her, and pulled away entirely to let them date.] [Ten years have passed, and they’ll marry next month. Truth is, I never stopped loving him. Yet I have no regrets. We spent one night together after heavy drinking, and that single memory carries me through every year.] The comment section turned brutal. Half mourned her sad love story, while the rest slammed her as fake for sleeping with her closest friend’s fiancé yet playing the martyr. A response to that top post sent chills down my spine, filled with ten years of stifled regret. [So that night wasn’t just a drunk dream. It really happened.] [Sophie, I only dated her because I thought you never cared for me. If you loved me all along, why did we throw away ten years?] My hand lurched sharply. The gold ink pen scratched a thick, ugly mark across the pricey wedding invitation cardstock. My one closest friend in the whole world was Sophie. No. That was impossible. The world is a massive place. There has to be more than one Sophie out there. This was just a sick coincidence. My fingers were trembling so badly I could barely tap on the girl’s profile. The page was entirely blank. No posts. No photos. But my eyes instantly locked onto the short bio written right under her username. “I just want a steady kind of happiness.” The phone slipped from my sweaty palm and clattered against the hardwood floor. Ever since we were kids, Sophie had used that exact same quote on every single social media platform she owned. My name is Gwen. It means steady. So all these years, Sophie wasn’t praying for her own happiness. She was praying for mine. I leaned over to pick up my phone, my vision completely blurring as tears spilled down my cheeks without my permission. Sophie had not replied to his comment. But the man, my fiancé David, was still flooding the thread, begging her in front of thousands of strangers. [You have let her have her way since we were kids. But I am not a toy you can just pass around. I am a living, breathing person. What gave you the right to hand me over to her?] [I hate that you always put her first. I hate that you always martyr yourself. I hate that you loved me but spent ten straight years pretending you didn’t.] [Sophie, when are you going to finally live for yourself?] Even David knew it. I was always the most important thing in Sophie’s universe. We met when we were seven. Growing up, she let me have the best of everything. It started with the biggest, juiciest strawberry in the fruit bowl. Then it was the lead princess role in the middle school play. Later, it was the Ivy League. Everything she could possibly give me, she gave me. In high school, Sophie and I were the top two students in our graduating class. There was only one early admission recommendation letter for Columbia University. To make sure I got it, she purposely left an entire page of her final AP Calculus exam completely blank. I cried my eyes out and called her an idiot. She just laughed, flicked my forehead, and told me she could get into any college she wanted without a fancy letter. She told me to just wait for her in New York. In the light of day, Sophie had sacrificed so much for me. I never imagined that in the shadows, she was still playing the puppet master of my happiness. She even gave up the man we both loved, quietly slipping him into my hands. But Sophie, did you ever stop to ask if I wanted him like this? I collapsed over my desk, sobbing until I couldn’t pull air into my lungs. I looked up and saw our gorgeous engagement photos framed on the wall. I looked down and saw the ruined wedding invitations scattered across the desk. In the corner of the room sat the pristine boxes of wedding favors David and I had spent hours picking out together. Silk ribbons, fairy lights, custom wooden gift boxes. There was so much stuff. It practically suffocated the room. Every memory I had of David began flashing behind my eyes like a relentless movie trailer. At seventeen, he stood in the freezing rain just to buy me my favorite hot latte before first period. At twenty, he drove three hours to a remote monastery and hiked up a mountain to get me a protective charm before my semester abroad. At twenty-two, my mom suffered a massive stroke. The medical bills were a bottomless black hole. David took the fifty grand he had scraped together from years of grueling side hustles and shoved it into my hands, leaving himself with barely enough cash for groceries. That money was his sacred startup fund. He had dreamed about his own tech company for years. But when he gave it to me, he didn’t even blink. He just called me silly for crying. He said my mom was his mom, and saving her was the only thing that mattered. His warm smile. His soft kisses. The way all my anxiety melted the second he pulled me into his chest. It was all so beautiful. So unforgettable. But none of it was meant for me. I swiped past the final photo in my camera roll and harshly wiped my eyes. Some delusions need to be shattered. I walked like a mindless zombie toward Sophie’s apartment building. Just as I turned the corner, I froze. David and Sophie were standing near the alleyway, locked in a heated argument. My chest tightened painfully. I quickly shrank back into the shadows of a nearby building. David was supposed to be on a business trip in Seattle. A flight from Seattle takes hours. That meant the absolute second he saw that Reddit post, he dropped everything and rushed back like a madman. Was he really that desperate to claim her? David had a vice grip on Sophie’s wrist. She was struggling wildly to pull away. “David, let me go!” “You are marrying Gwen in literally three weeks. What is the point of bringing this up now?” David stared at her, his eyes dark and frantic, his voice completely wrecked. “The point is everything!” “Gwen and I haven’t signed the marriage license yet. We can cancel the catering, the venue, everything. I will go to her right now and confess. She can put all the blame on me and hate me for the rest of her life.” “Sophie, I have missed out on you for a decade. I am not going to miss out on you for a lifetime. Please, just stop pushing me away.” Before she could speak, he yanked her against his chest and crashed his lips down onto hers, completely losing control. Sophie pushed against his chest for a second. Then her hands curled into his shirt, and she gave in. They kissed with a raw, violent desperation. It was as if they were trying to suck ten years of stolen time out of each other’s lungs. I opened my mouth to scream, to stop them, but my throat was sealed shut. Not a single sound came out. My stomach violently turned inside out. I slumped against the cold brick wall and began to dry heave. David, when you were swallowing her sighs, did you ever once think about the woman who has loved you for the last ten years? My entire twenties had been nothing but a pathetic joke. Smack. A sharp slap echoed in the alley, breaking the kiss. Sophie shoved David away with all her strength. Her eyes were bloodshot as she screamed at him. “Do you have any idea how long Gwen has been dreaming about this wedding?” “You don’t, but I do! She has been planning this for ten years. She has wanted to be your wife since we were seventeen!” “She literally starved herself for six months just to fit into that dress. We designed that gown together, David! She sat there hand-writing every single invitation until her fingers cramped…” “You are going to give her this wedding. I swear to God, if you do anything to break Gwen’s heart, I will kill you myself!” “What happened today never happened. We are never seeing each other alone again.” David grabbed her by the shoulders, shaking her slightly. “Do you honestly think I want to hurt her? Seeing Gwen cry is the worst thing in the world to me.” “But the only thing worse than breaking her heart is losing you again.” “That night in my apartment, are you going to pretend that never happened too? If you hadn’t posted that online, I would have gone to my grave thinking it was just a booze-fueled hallucination. But I had you. You were mine. How do you expect me to just walk away from that?” He dove in and kissed her again. This time, Sophie didn’t fight back at all. Tears streamed down her face as she wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him back with equal fire. David suddenly scooped her up in his arms and carried her inside the building. The dried tears on my face felt tight and itchy. It was the middle of summer, but I was shivering so violently my teeth chattered. I stumbled out of the shadows and followed them inside. I stood in front of Sophie’s door for what felt like hours. Finally, I pulled out the spare key Sophie had given me for emergencies. I took a deep breath and twisted the lock. The heavy, sickening scent of sweat and sex hit me the second the door cracked open. I clutched my stomach and gagged. Hearing the noise, the two naked bodies tangled in the sheets jerked up in pure terror. Both sets of eyes locked onto me. David moved with lightning speed, throwing the heavy duvet over Sophie to cover her nakedness and protect her dignity. This man, who cared about his image and reputation more than anything else in the world, threw away every ounce of his pride. He stepped out of bed, completely exposed, and stood between me and the bed. “Gwen, please don’t be mad at Sophie. This is entirely on me.” “You know she values your life more than her own. She never wanted to betray you. I lost my mind. I forced myself on her. You can hate me, but please don’t hate her!” I stared dead into David’s panicked eyes and let out a hollow, broken laugh. To protect his precious Sophie, David was willing to look like a monster. He was ready to take every drop of the blame just to keep her hands clean. So this is the power of a high school sweetheart. With me, he was always so rational, so gentle, so painfully composed. But for Sophie, he was willing to bow down. He was willing to lose his damn mind. I glared at him, pure venom dripping from my voice. “Forgive her? My absolute best friend in the world just spread her legs for the man I am supposed to marry. How exactly do I forgive that?” “Sophie, David, you both make me sick. I never want to see either of you again.” Hearing the absolute fury in my voice, Sophie scrambled out from under the covers. She crawled across the cold floor, her eyes swollen and red, and grabbed tightly onto the hem of my jeans. “Gwen, please! Today was a mistake. It is all my fault. I seduced him. I practically threw myself at him.” “He only has you in his heart. You are the only woman he actually loves. I know how much you love him, Gwen. I know how badly you want this wedding. Please, don’t throw your entire future away because of a stupid, impulsive mistake. Please!” David grabbed a knit blanket from the armchair and gently wrapped it around Sophie’s bare shoulders, handling her like she was made of fragile spun glass. His eyes briefly flicked to my shaking shoulders, and a tiny frown creased his forehead. He opened his mouth, wanting to say something to comfort me, but closed it a second later. Instead, he simply reached for the remote on the nightstand and turned the air conditioning up. He still remembered. Today was the first day of my period. I was always prone to agonizing cramps when I got cold. Sophie yanked aggressively on David’s arm, screaming at him in total panic. “David, tell her! Tell her I manipulated you into this! Tell her it was just a moment of weakness, and that you have only ever loved her! Tell her she is the only woman you want to marry!” David wanted to refuse, but the second he looked into Sophie’s desperate, begging eyes, he faltered. He knew her better than anyone. If he didn’t do exactly what she said right now, she would never speak to him again. He swallowed hard, the words clawing their way out of his throat. “Gwen, please forgive me.” “You are the one I love. You are the only one I want to marry.” “Can you just give me one more chance?” He was speaking to me, but his eyes never once left Sophie’s tear-stained face. I looked down at the floor, laughing so hard new tears sprang to my eyes. They were literally fighting to take the bullet for each other. They looked like star-crossed lovers pushed to the brink by a cruel world, while I felt like the evil wicked witch trying to tear true love apart. It was poetic, really. They had always loved each other this fiercely. From the day we met until this exact second, they had been carrying this tragic, earth-shattering romance in secret. I was the third wheel. I had always been the third wheel. I didn’t waste another breath on them. I turned around and walked out the door, feeling completely numb. Why was it that I wanted to hate them so badly, but my heart just felt painfully empty? When I got back to my apartment, I opened my laptop and pulled up the email from the tech firm in Silicon Valley. “I will take the project manager position. I accept your offer.” My eyes drifted to the stack of wedding invitations sitting on the dining table. My fingers twitched. David, Sophie. You two have done so much for me behind my back. Let me do one last thing for you. I picked up my pen and methodically crossed out my name on every single invitation, writing Sophie’s name in its place. Consider this my final parting gift. The next morning, I dragged my exhausted body downstairs to throw away the trash. When I looked up, I saw David and Sophie standing near the entrance of my complex, wrapped in a tight embrace. Sophie was holding a paper bag of fresh croissants, and David had a tray of iced coffees. My exact breakfast order. Even though I had already decided to leave the country and let them be together, a vicious sting still hit the back of my eyes. Suddenly, I heard heavy footsteps. My mom was marching down the sidewalk, her arms loaded with massive bags of wedding decorations. She stopped dead in her tracks. The girl she had treated like a second daughter, and the man she proudly bragged about to all her friends, were standing right in front of her, shamelessly clinging to each other behind my back. Before I could even shout a warning, my mom hurled a heavy bag of decorations straight at Sophie’s head. “Sophie! You are supposed to be Gwen’s best friend! You are literally trying to steal your best friend’s fiancé? Are you that desperate for a man?” “You disgusting piece of trash! I will kill you both!” David instantly pulled Sophie behind his back, shielding her with his own body as my mom slapped and clawed at him. Sophie peeked out from behind him, sobbing hysterically as she tried to grab my mom’s hand. “Mrs. Harper, please, you have to listen to me! It isn’t what it looks like…” My mom ripped her hand away and slapped Sophie square across the cheek. “Save your bullshit! I saw it with my own two eyes!” David shoved Sophie firmly behind him. Seeing the bright red handprint blooming on her pale skin, his shoulders began to shake with pure rage. My mom raised her hand to strike again, completely blinded by anger. David finally snapped. He shoved my mom backward with brutal force. “Stop acting like a crazy old bat!” “I liked Sophie from the very beginning! If she hadn’t taken pity on your pathetic daughter and forced me to date her, Sophie and I would have been married years ago!” “Sophie is the greatest thing that ever happened to Gwen. She gave Gwen everything! Your daughter is the one who stole from her! Gwen is the one who owes her!” My mom’s eyes went wide with sheer horror. She pointed a trembling finger at the two of them, her mouth opening and closing as she tried to pull in a breath. Then, her eyes rolled back, and she collapsed onto the concrete. “Mom!” I screamed, sprinting across the courtyard with tears flying from my eyes. The moment they saw me, all the color drained from David and Sophie’s faces. Pure terror replaced their anger. They knew I had heard every single word. The ambulance arrived in minutes. The three of us loaded her in and sat in suffocating silence during the ride. It felt exactly like the day she had her stroke six years ago. Back then, David did everything in his power to save her. He gave his money, his time, his sanity. But this time, she was in a hospital bed because she caught him cheating and he pushed her to the ground. Thankfully, the ER doctors stabilized her quickly. They said she just suffered a severe panic-induced fainting spell and would wake up soon. I let out a shaky breath, feeling a massive weight lift off my chest. Standing in the sterile hospital corridor, David and Sophie took turns begging for my forgiveness, their voices cracking with guilt. I just nodded, my face entirely blank. “As long as my mom is okay, that is all that matters.” Seeing how incredibly calm I was, the guilt in David’s eyes only deepened. He reached out and grabbed both of my hands, squeezing them tight. “Gwen, I am so sorry. I swear I am going to marry you. I will take care of you and your mom for the rest of our lives. I will never make you cry again.” Sophie wiped her eyes, offering me a fragile, watery smile. “You are going to be the most beautiful bride in the world, Gwen.” I looked down at the linoleum floor and smiled softly. They had absolutely no idea. This wedding didn’t belong to me anymore. On the day of the wedding, while the sun was barely coming up, I was already sitting in first class on a direct flight to San Francisco. I was officially a Silicon Valley corporate drone. David, Sophie. I really hope you enjoy my gift. … Back at the venue, David stood at the end of the aisle, strangling a custom bouquet. His palms were sweating through his tailored suit. The massive mahogany doors swung open. David held his breath, a practiced smile on his face as he prepared to see Gwen. But he froze. The only person standing in the doorway was Sophie, wearing a gorgeous bridesmaid gown. Where was his bride? Sophie sprinted down the aisle, her face pale with panic. “David! Gwen is gone! I have ripped the entire hotel apart and she isn’t here!” Right on cue, the confetti cannons exploded from the ceiling. The massive digital screen behind the altar flashed with elegant gold lettering. Groom: David. Bride: Sophie. The blood drained from David’s face as reality finally crashed down on him. He ripped his phone from his pocket and frantically dialed Gwen’s number. He was met with the cold, automated voice of the operator. “We’re sorry, the number you have dialed is currently out of service.” Gwen was gone.

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Out of nowhere, some self-proclaimed “Judge” popped up on the national college forums, vowing to expose the true colors of every popular, high-achieving student on campus. For the past three months, student representatives from the top Ivy-tier universities had been falling from grace one by one. They were outed for bullying, cheating, and cheating on their partners. Their scholarships were entirely revoked. One girl from a low-income family even buckled under the immense psychological pressure and jumped from an eighth-floor dorm window. Overnight, paranoia gripped universities across the country. The very next day, right before my mandatory major seminar began, a tall girl with sharply stunning features walked into our lecture hall. Her eyes scanned the room, lingering for two seconds on Noah, my childhood best friend and the undisputed campus heartthrob. Then, her gaze locked dead onto me, the girl sitting comfortably in the top one percent of the grading curve. “Hey everyone. From this moment on, I will be using the utmost fairness to expose those who do not deserve their pedestals.” 1 When The Judge first surfaced on the forums, everyone treated it like a joke. “What kind of edgy Judge is this? What a clown.” “Just some clout chaser desperate for attention.” That was until the student icons of the top three universities were completely wiped out over the span of three months. No one was spared. The prodigy of Alden University, a future star in the physics world, was outed for having zero basic life skills. The Judge claimed she relied entirely on her boyfriend to spoon-feed her and manage her life. The genius fell from grace overnight. The Student Body President at Bancroft College was exposed for abusing her power and facilitating campus bullying. By the next morning, she was impeached, and her mugshots were plastered all over the internet. Then came Laura, the stunning but impoverished sweetheart of Camden University. She was once the literal poster girl for the school’s social media admissions campaign. The Judge accused her of two-timing multiple guys and having an inappropriate relationship with a professor. As soon as the scandal gained traction, Camden University scrambled to save its reputation. They instantly revoked three years’ worth of Laura’s scholarships and suspended the professor in question. Outside the college forums, the internet trolls absolutely worshipped this anonymous vigilante. “Full support for judging all these fake elitists! Hell yeah!” “This is so satisfying to watch. I’ve always hated these snobby college kids. Why should they get all the societal perks? They’re the reason class inequality exists!” Inside the national college forums, however, the atmosphere grew increasingly suffocating. No one knew if they were going to be next. “Our school, Dalton University, is ranked fourth nationally. You don’t think the next target is…” As I walked across campus, I could feel several pairs of eyes subtly darting in my direction. “You mean Amanda?” “It has to be. She takes the national valedictorian scholarship every single year, and she’s the President of the Student Coalition. That creep definitely has eyes on her.” “Man, I feel bad for Amanda. She’s actually really nice.” “Yeah, well, people said Laura was nice too. Look what happened after all her dirty laundry got aired out. She took her own life. People have multiple faces.” Noah glanced at my expression, his jaw tight. “I heard this psychopath usually starts digging by questioning the people closest to the target. If she comes to me, I’m going to absolutely tear that clown apart.” I pulled my gaze away from the whispering crowd and smiled. “You don’t need to do that. Whatever she asks, just tell her the truth.” Honestly, I was more worried she wouldn’t be able to dig up anything at all. On the second day after Harper transferred to our school, I had my English public speaking competition. I was on stage, delivering my speech with perfect flow, when the background music suddenly cut off. A figure stormed onto the stage and snatched the microphone right from my stand. “I am reporting contestant number three, Amanda, for plagiarizing someone else’s transcript! She is violating the rules of this competition!” 2 The faces of the ten judges in the front row dropped instantly. Harper looked at me, raising an eyebrow. Her smile was laced with pure provocation. “I demand a secondary review of her manuscript. We absolutely cannot cover up this kind of blatant cheating!” The faculty member in charge of script vetting shot up from his seat. “That is impossible. All contestant scripts undergo a rigorous screening process.” “Miss, I know you feel a strong sense of justice, but you cannot just throw baseless slander around!” Harper clearly hadn’t expected a professor to stand up and challenge her. Her face darkened, the hostility in her eyes thickening. She let out a cold scoff and muttered under her breath. “You’re all rotten to the core.” I stood on the stage, completely silent. I just watched quietly as she manipulated the LED screen behind me, displaying my exact transcript. She pointed out which sentence came from where, how I had heavily spun the text, spinning a wildly convincing narrative. She was smart. Speech script paraphrasing has always been a gray area. The themes are practically identical, and the sentiments are universal. If you force two speeches side by side, you can always find a couple of sentences that mean the exact same thing. The school rules dictated that if plagiarism was confirmed, the student would be permanently banned from competing. If it was only suspected, the student would be temporarily disqualified and could only try again the following year. But I needed to win this exact competition to apply for my study abroad program before this year’s deadline. And this exchange program was my one and only shot, an opportunity I had secured after sending countless emails back and forth with a foreign mentor. When Harper finished her presentation, the judges in the audience exchanged nervous glances, their faces twisting in visible dilemma. They knew me well. They knew my actual capabilities. But they also knew that if they openly trusted me right now, Harper would very likely drag them down into the mud too. That was exactly how Laura’s professor had been “judged.” “Amanda, maybe we should…” “I understand.” I gave a blank, emotionless bow and walked straight out of the auditorium. 3 Threads about me flooded the forums almost immediately. But the comment sections were dead, eerily quiet. Other than Harper, no one dared to speak up. It had been this way for a while now. Whenever the last victim was being judged, anyone who spoke up in her defense was instantly branded as an accomplice and canceled just as hard. A thick fog of tension and terror blanketed the campus. The speech competition was just her warning shot. It wasn’t anywhere near the intensity of her previous purges. For the next few days, I lived like a criminal under 24/7 surveillance. Harper’s eyes were everywhere. In the lecture halls, the dining hall, the dorm corridors. When eating at the dining hall, Noah and I always had a habit of sitting at the second table by the window. The moment we sat down, Harper materialized right next to me. “Amanda, I noticed you sit here every single day. The dining hall has open seating, yet when it’s packed, no one else dares to take this spot.” “Are you leveraging your title as Student Coalition President and class rep to exercise special privileges?” I glanced over my shoulder. There were massive patches of empty seats all over the cafeteria. Before I could even open my mouth, Noah snapped back. “Where we sit is none of your damn business. Do you really have nothing better to do?” She glared at Noah, looking genuinely offended. “Noah, I am warning you for your own good. Stay away from her, so you don’t get dragged down when she eventually crashes and burns!” Noah let out a harsh laugh. “Who the hell are you?” A flicker of genuine hurt crossed Harper’s face, quickly replaced by a look of bone-deep hatred aimed right at me. She spun around and stormed off. The very next day, the seats I usually occupied were coated in industrial rubber cement that couldn’t be scrubbed off. Then came the annual need-based financial aid review. As usual, the academic advisor assigned me to be the head of the review committee. Harper immediately stood up and loudly objected in front of everyone. “Why is Amanda the default head of this committee? I did my research. She has led the financial aid review every single year, and every single year, the grant goes to Sarah. I have every reason to suspect this committee is completely rigged!” The advisor gave her a tired look, sighing in defeat. “Fine. You can join the review board too.” But during this year’s review, Sarah’s application was missing a crucial document. The student who suddenly looked best on paper was Brad, a guy whose family was actually doing quite well. I received a text from Sarah. “Amanda, I was too embarrassed to hand in my paperwork back then. You only made me apply because you found out how bad things were at home.” “Thank you for taking care of me these past three years. But please, don’t give me the grant this year. I don’t want to drag you down.” My heart ached. I gritted my teeth and turned to the committee. “Sometimes the faculty has leftover, unused grant slots. Why don’t we try applying for one of those on Sarah’s behalf?” “Absolutely not!” Before anyone else could speak, Harper spearheaded the opposition. “Sarah couldn’t even put a complete file together, and you claim you aren’t playing favorites? I knew these past few years of grants were dirty. Tell us, Amanda, how much of a kickback have you been taking from Sarah’s money?” When she sabotaged my competition, I barely felt a thing. But this was about whether a genuinely impoverished student could get the help she desperately needed to survive. I absolutely refused to let her ruin this! Suppressing my fury, I fired back. “I am simply applying for an unused surplus slot. We aren’t taking money away from anyone else. Why shouldn’t we try?” Harper sneered. “Look at you. You top-tier students always think you’re the ones following the rules. But the second it touches your own interests, the rules mean absolutely nothing to you!” “You’re all just a bunch of rotting hypocrites.” I stared at her, my eyes entirely dead. I picked up my pen and, completely ignoring her protests, wrote Sarah’s name onto the application form. The day the financial aid results were posted, I went viral. Dozens of clickbait accounts plastered my face across social media. [Dalton U’s Amanda: Where is the federal financial aid really going?] [The God of Justice challenges the campus elite! I’m voting for the grassroots Judge!] [Campus is a mini-society, and Amanda thinks she’s a dictator.] Every time I opened an app, I saw heavily edited, meme-ified videos of my argument with Harper captured by the CCTV cameras. I had officially become the new target of the purge. 4 The reason I’m only bringing this up now is that in the previous three purges, the real trial didn’t start when Harper physically walked onto campus. It started the moment she weaponized the internet to hold her kangaroo court. Social dynamics are a web, and the internet is the thickest, most suffocating spiderweb in existence. The moment a flawed person is thrown into it, the threads quickly wrap around them until they choke. Harper’s only job was to point out the very first flaw. Soon enough, my entire life was dug up by the masses. Everything about me was slapped with a massive question mark. How did I even get into Dalton? How did I become the Student Coalition President? What dirty tricks was I using to win all those competitions? Seeing the wild speculation and disgusting rumors, Noah was furious enough to go hunt Harper down. I reached out and gently held him back. “The favor I asked you to do. How is it going?” He nodded sharply. “I should have the results by today.” I exhaled in relief. Good. Time was running out. But I hadn’t expected Harper to strike even faster than I calculated. Monday was the general election assembly for the entire Student Body and Coalition. The auditorium was packed with judging faculty and students running for office. I pulled up my slides and began my reelection pitch for Coalition President. “In the coming year, I will continue to work tirelessly to serve all of you. I hope I can count on your vote!” The professors in the front row nodded in satisfaction, but their expressions suddenly shifted as they looked past me. I turned my head. Harper was standing at the entrance. She walked slowly up to the podium, shoved me aside, yanked my flash drive out of the computer, and jammed hers in. One of the professors frowned deeply. “Miss, if you are planning to run for a position, please wait for your turn.” Harper shot her a look and rolled her eyes dramatically. “I couldn’t care less about your little elections. Do you really think everyone wants to kiss up to your bureaucratic nonsense?” Hearing such blunt disrespect, several professors scowled. The Dean of the college, sitting dead center in the front row, watched quietly and said nothing. Harper opened a folder full of screenshots, set up her phone on a tripod, aimed the camera right at my face, and started a live stream of her purge. Then, she spoke, her voice ringing with absolute certainty. “I believe Amanda is entirely unfit to continue serving as Student Coalition President.” “Furthermore, she is unfit to even be a student at Dalton University!”

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1 My older brother, Simon, was born with selective mutism and severe autism. To cure him, our mother tried every desperate measure imaginable. When I was a year old, I accidentally rolled off the bed and started crying hysterically. Miraculously, Simon spoke his very first words. “Sister… fell. It hurts.” “Mom, make it better for sister.” But the moment I stopped crying, Simon sank back into complete silence. My mother looked at me, and her eyes filled with a sudden, terrifying hope. From that day on, I became Simon’s speaking doll. The longer my mother made me cry, the more words Simon would speak. Over the years, I learned to perform on cue. Whenever Simon had a recitation competition, I would force myself to cry bitterly for exactly thirty minutes. Not a second more, not a second less. But there were times when the tears wouldn’t come. During those times, Mother would resort to any physical pain to coax them out. The longest I ever cried was when I fell down the stairs and broke my arm. Simon practiced his speech all night, and the next day, he won first place. To celebrate, Mother bought me a massive chocolate cake. Everything changed on the day Simon was scheduled to meet his wealthy biological father. Simon froze, unable to squeeze out a single word, and his father left in deep disappointment. Mother snapped. She screamed hysterically, shaking Simon by the shoulders. “If you don’t speak, your father will never come back! Without him, there’s no point in me living!” “I am going to cure you once and for all today!” She grabbed my arm and dragged me up to the rooftop of our apartment building. She tied a rope around my waist and suspended me over the edge, hundreds of feet above the cold concrete pavement. I could see the old rope fraying, thread by thread. But this time, I didn’t cry. I looked up at Simon and gave him a bright, beautiful smile. Because Simon had once whispered to me that he loved seeing me smile. Suspended in the empty air, the wind lashed against my face, making my body swing violently. The knots around my waist bit deep into my skin, burning like fire. I kept my eyes fixed upward, refusing to look down. Simon’s face was deathly pale, his eyes wide with terror as he stared at the fraying rope. He was shaking so hard he could barely stand. He didn’t dare raise his voice to provoke our mother, so he just desperately pulled at her sleeve, pointing at the rope, begging her to pull me back up. But Mother refused to listen. She wept, screaming at him. “Simon, I don’t want to hurt you!” “But if you hadn’t stood there like a mute in front of your father, would I have to do this?” “Your sister is suffering today because you are useless!” Simon flinched, looking at me with absolute despair. I looked down at the frayed threads near my waist, then back up at my brother, mouthing silently: Don’t worry, Simon. I had realized long ago that in this family, my tears were a commodity. My mother would pinch my thighs to make me cry before Simon’s doctor appointments. She would find ways to hurt and humiliate me before his school events. The harder I cried, the more Simon spoke, and the happier Mother became. The time I broke my arm, I spent the entire night shivering in pain. But Simon had stayed by my hospital bed, clumsily practicing his words over and over. When he won his trophy the next day, Mother was ecstatic, buying me that giant cake. Back then, I was foolish enough to believe that my pain could buy a little bit of sweetness. But Simon was different from our mother. Mother only cared about the results of her sick experiments. Simon, however, carried an immense burden of guilt every time I was hurt. He would secretly hide candies in my pockets, whisper “don’t cry, sissy” in my ear, and sit by my bed when the pain kept me awake at night. I could never hate him. The wind grew stronger, and I felt my body drop another fraction of an inch as the rope groaned against the concrete ledge. A broken, strangled sound finally tore from Simon’s throat. “Stop… stop… save sissy…” Hearing him speak, Mother’s face lit up with a manic joy. “Keep going! Say more!” She didn’t notice that the moldy hemp rope was unraveling at its thinnest point. Another gust of wind caught me, swinging my body outward. The sudden pressure against my ribs was so agonizing that I nearly let out a scream. Seeing this, Simon lunged forward, his knees slamming hard against the gravel on the roof. Ignoring the pain, he grabbed the rope near Mother’s hands. “Save sissy…” “Mom, please…” But Mother, completely consumed by her delusion, shoved him away. “Now you’re scared?” “Why didn’t you speak yesterday? Your father looked at you like you were defective! If you don’t speak, he is never coming back!” “Without him, I have nothing!” Below us, a crowd was gathering on the street. People were pointing, shouting, and recording with their phones. But Mother was oblivious to the chaos. Like a desperate gambler who had finally hit a winning streak, she grabbed her phone, hit record, and shoved it in Simon’s face, forcing him to keep talking. “Speak! Tell me you’ll speak to your father next time!” She didn’t care that her daughter was hanging by a thread over an abyss. She only cared about the audio file. Simon was on the verge of collapse. Looking at me, his voice trembled violently, but he didn’t dare stop, terrified that if he fell silent, she would let go of the rope. “Sissy, don’t be scared…” “Mom, save… sissy.” I stared up at him, my throat tight. I knew he wasn’t choosing to be silent. He was sick. But Mother refused to accept his diagnosis, preferring to use my life as his medicine. As the minutes dragged on, Simon’s voice grew raspy, every word sounding as if it were tearing his throat apart. “Dad, Dad…” But Mother wanted more. She wanted him to sound natural, to sound like a normal child. “Keep going!” “Say you want your father to come home!” Her voice was shrill, cutting through the wind. Simon’s face was flushed, tears streaming down his cheeks as he struggled to force the words out. “Dad… come back…” “I will… be good…” “I will… speak…” His entire body was convulsing with the effort. Yet, the only thing in Mother’s eyes was an increasingly manic excitement, as if she were looking at a machine she had finally fixed. Suddenly, Simon went quiet. His eyes locked onto the rope near the ledge, and his face turned translucent with horror. He saw it. The rope was down to its final threads. Simon screamed and lunged for the rope to pull me up, but Mother, assuming he was trying to back out, yanked the line backward, shrieking at him. “Just a little more!” “Once we get through today, you’ll be cured! We’ll be a family again!” Frantic, Simon struggled to wrest the rope from her grip. Mother lost her footing, stumbling backward, and the rope slipped through her fingers. My body dropped several feet in a sudden, violent plunge. My heart stopped, and a terrified scream escaped my lips. That scream finally broke the tension below. The onlookers panicked, and sirens began to wail in the distance. Hanging there, I felt a deep, hollow exhaustion. It wasn’t a physical fatigue. It was a weariness that went down to my bones. I had lived a short life, but I had never lived a single day for myself. My tears belonged to Simon’s progress; my pain was the proof of Mother’s methods. My entire existence was defined by how much of myself I could sacrifice. But Simon was the only one who hated seeing me cry. The clearest, most deliberate sentence he had ever spoken to me was that he loved my smile. Thinking of that, I decided I didn’t want to cry anymore. Suddenly, the heavy metal door to the rooftop was kicked open. My father had finally arrived. The moment he saw me dangling over the edge, he froze, his face turning entirely pale. He sprinted to the ledge, his hands gripping the rope alongside Simon, the veins in his arms bulging with exertion. Seeing the state of the rope and my bloodless face, he knew I didn’t have minutes left. He turned and roared at my mother, “Are you out of your mind!” But Mother was completely detached from reality. She laughed, her shoulders shaking with excitement. “Just a little more, Charles!” “Simon is speaking! He’s almost cured!” “We can get back together now! We can have our family back!” Charles evaluated the situation quickly. He knew he couldn’t reason with her. Although sirens were approaching, the rescue teams wouldn’t make it to the roof in time, and the rope was seconds away from snapping. He had to play into her delusion. He clenched his teeth, forcing his voice to soften. “Let Tessa up first, Eleanor.” “Pull our daughter up, and I promise I’ll sign the remarriage papers. I’ll do whatever you want.” “You wanted to prove to Valerie that you didn’t lose, right? We can do that. Just pull her up.” Eleanor froze. In her twisted mind, she had just won everything. Her son was speaking, and her husband was returning to her. Weeping with joy, she let go of her end of the rope and ran to tie the remaining slack to a heavy concrete pillar on the roof, believing it would secure me. She didn’t realize that the fibers of the rope were already severed at the ledge. Eager to secure her victory, she demanded they go to City Hall immediately. She didn’t trust verbal promises; she wanted the paper. To prevent Charles and Simon from pulling me up without her, she dragged them toward the exit. “The rope is tied to the pillar; she’ll be fine for an hour!” “If you don’t come with me to sign the papers right now, I’ll cut the rope myself!” Charles looked as if he wanted to strangle her, but looking at my fading consciousness and the fragile state of the rope, he had to comply to keep her from doing something even more drastic. Eleanor locked the heavy metal door to the rooftop behind them, dragging Charles down the stairs. Simon, left on the other side of the door, kicked and pounded on the metal, his voice growing hoarse as he screamed through the small iron grate. “Hold on, sissy! I’m here! I won’t leave you!” During the drive to City Hall, Charles’s mind was entirely consumed by his daughter hanging from the building. Beside him, Eleanor was laughing and crying, clutching his arm. “We’re going to start over. Simon is speaking. Our family is whole again.” At the registry, Charles signed his name with a trembling hand, his heart sinking into his chest. And at the exact moment Eleanor held up the fresh marriage certificate, weeping with triumph, the frayed rope on the rooftop finally snapped. A dull, terrible crack echoed across the empty roof. Simon watched from the window as my body plunged toward the earth. He let out a soul-shattering scream. I hit the emergency cushions the onlookers had set up below, but the impact from that height was too massive. The world went completely black. Simon sprinted down the stairs, falling and scraping his knees, before throwing himself into the ambulance beside me. Meanwhile, Eleanor and Charles were caught in a sudden traffic jam on their way back. An ambulance with blaring sirens sped past their car. Charles felt a sudden, icy dread in his chest. Beside him, Eleanor was still smiling, planning their future. “Charles, we’re going to live a good life now. I’ll take care of you and the children.” Charles couldn’t say a word. At the hospital, Simon was already standing outside the operating room. Covered in my blood, he stood there like an empty shell. For the first time in his life, without any prompting or pain, he spoke in full, coherent sentences. He begged the surgeons to save his sister, crying that she was terrified of pain, that he had promised to buy her a cake, that she couldn’t die. But the fluency of his words was nothing but a cruel irony. It was exactly what our mother had wanted, but it had cost my life. After what felt like an eternity, the surgeon stepped out of the room, lowering his head. “I am sorry. We did everything we could…” Simon stood frozen. At that moment, my spirit detached from my body. I looked down at the operating table, seeing my pale, blood-stained face. I was dead. Simon pulled out his phone and dialed Mother’s number. Eleanor answered, still talking excitedly about the marriage certificate. Simon let out a ragged sob. “Sissy is dead.” Eleanor’s voice faltered. “That’s impossible. The rope was tied. She was fine when we left. You’re just upset, Simon.” But Charles had already grabbed the wheel, turning the car around and speeding toward the apartment building. When they arrived, the police had already broken open the rooftop door. Eleanor ran to the pillar, her eyes locking onto the severed hemp rope. She froze, stumbling toward the ledge. Looking down, the dark, dried pool of blood on the concrete pavement below pierced Charles’s eyes. He collapsed, clutching his head as he let out a guttural cry of grief. Eleanor gripped the railing, her face entirely bloodless. The marriage certificate slipped from her fingers, drifting slowly down into the wind.

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