It all started with something incredibly small. After Mia finished introducing herself to the class, our homeroom teacher was looking around, trying to figure out where to seat her. Oliver raised his hand and said, “Mr. Davis, she can sit next to me.” A collective “Ooooh” went up from the class. Then, eyes started darting toward me, some subtle, some blatant, curious to see my reaction. Everyone knew Oliver and I had practically grown up together. Everyone also knew that every time seats were reassigned after exams and I asked if we could sit together, he always made some excuse about preferring to sit alone and turned me down. I looked up at Oliver. He didn’t notice my gaze; he was too busy exchanging a knowing smile with Mia as she looked out from the front of the classroom. Watching that scene unfold, for some reason, I suddenly felt deeply, bone-tired. 01 The teacher left after Mia took her seat. It was a passing period, so the classroom quickly grew loud again. I could hear the whispers. I could feel the glances shifting from Mia to Oliver, and finally, inevitably, landing on me. I kept my head down, focusing on my work, completely ignoring the stares. It wasn’t until Mia finished unpacking her bag, turned around, and smiled at me brightly that I finally looked up. “Serena! It’s been so long,” she said, her voice warm and familiar, acting as if the ugly fallout between us two years ago had never happened. I didn’t look at Oliver sitting next to her. I kept my eyes fixed entirely on Mia. Polite, distant, and perfectly composed, I gave her a small nod. “It has.” Before she could react, I looked back down at my Physics homework. My complete lack of interest in catching up was glaringly obvious. Mia, who was always excellent at reading a room, knew when to back off. She turned back around, abandoning her usual act of pretending everything was perfectly fine. Chloe, who sat next to me, was practically vibrating out of her seat. She looked like she was dying to know what was going on, but the bell rang. Plus, the people involved were sitting right in front of us; even a whisper would be heard. So, she passed me a note. It read: WHAT IS GOING ON?!?!?!?! I could practically feel her desperation through the sheer number of exclamation marks. I crumpled the note in my hand and glanced at the row in front of me. Oliver and Mia had their heads close together. Oliver was pointing at something in the textbook for our next class, talking to her in a low voice, probably explaining where we were in the syllabus. The angle of his profile looked so incredibly gentle. Oliver rarely showed that kind of patience. Most of the time, he was aloof and easily annoyed with people. I remembered a time when I missed a few days of school because of a bad fever. When I came back, he was helping me catch up on Physics. After barely explaining two concepts, he got frustrated, frowning as he said, “Serena, how can you be this slow?” I wasn’t slow; he just didn’t have any patience. I used to think that was just how he was—impatient with everyone. But looking at him now, I realized he wasn’t impatient. He just wasn’t patient with me. 02 The next class was AP Calculus. As the period was winding down, Mr. Harris called my name. “Serena, could you go to my office and grab those two stacks of practice tests? Pass them out; they’re homework for tonight. We’ll go over the examples tomorrow morning.” I nodded and stood up to leave. Chloe immediately jumped up too. “Mr. Harris, I’ll go help Serena.” It wasn’t until we were out in the hallway that she finally lowered her voice and asked, “Serena, what is the deal with you, Oliver, and the new transfer student?” I paused. I knew Chloe was just worried about me. After all, my crush on Oliver was the worst-kept secret in school. Oliver and I lived next door to each other. In the eyes of our parents, we were childhood sweethearts. I had liked him for as long as I could remember. Oliver was popular. He was handsome, got great grades, and had a good reputation. He also had this laid-back, effortlessly cool vibe that made him incredibly well-liked. A teenage crush is a funny thing. No matter how hard you try to hide it or act careful, your feelings always manage to leak out through your eyes. Everyone could see it. They teased us, shipped us, linked our names together constantly. Oliver definitely knew, too. Sometimes, he’d even lean into the teasing, making harmless little jokes that only fueled the rumors. It felt like this unspoken, mutual understanding. A quiet kind of intimacy. But we never actually talked about it. Aside from focusing on getting into a good college, I honestly didn’t fully understand Oliver. There was a time when he was so gentle with me it was confusing. But the moment I gathered the courage to ask him what it meant, he’d turn cold and smoothly change the subject, making it seem like I had just misunderstood everything. I’m not the type to force things or chase after someone who doesn’t want me. When he pulled away, I naturally pulled back too. But the second I created distance, he’d start paying attention to me again. Chloe once told me that Oliver just liked the attention I gave him. He liked knowing I liked him. He didn’t want to date me, but he didn’t want to lose me, either. I never really understood that. In my world, you either like someone or you don’t. If you like them, you date them; if you don’t, you make it clear. But I have to admit, Oliver’s hot-and-cold routine made it impossible for me to fully categorize him as ‘just a friend.’ What really gave me hope happened recently, right after our midterms. My grades were strong across the board, but my Chemistry score was a little low. We were about to choose our tracks for senior year—STEM or Humanities. My counselor had even pulled me aside to suggest I lean towards STEM, but I personally preferred Humanities because I wanted to go into international relations. But Oliver said to me, “Serena, choose the STEM track.” His tone was casual, but it felt like a promise. “Let’s go to the same college.” I froze at the time. My ears turned red, and I tried to play it cool as I asked, “Is that a promise?” He just looked at me with a smile, not saying a word, and my hope was instantly reignited. I was like a fish. Every time I felt like I was suffocating and about to give up, he’d splash a little water on me, just enough to keep me alive. But now that Mia was back, I guess he didn’t feel like sparing me even a few drops of water anymore. I sighed, and Chloe looked at me with concern. I didn’t want to hide anything from her. I knew she cared. But honestly, the history between me, Mia, and Oliver wasn’t as complicated as she probably thought. 03 Mia and I went to the same middle school. She transferred into our class in the middle of 8th grade because her dad got a new job in the city. By that time, friend groups were pretty solidified. Plus, Mia was really pretty, so it was hard for her to fit in at first. I was generally well-liked, easy to talk to, and got good grades, so Mia gravitated towards me. She sat diagonally behind me, separated by an aisle. One morning, I didn’t have time for breakfast, and by the time homeroom was over, my stomach was growling loudly. I asked my desk mate if she had any snacks. Somehow, Mia heard me. She handed over her muffin, her eyes curving into a sweet smile. “I happened to buy an extra one this morning. You can have it.” I felt a bit awkward, but later on, she’d come up to me with this completely innocent vibe, asking questions about assignments. I always patiently helped her. Eventually, whenever there was a group project or an event, I’d bring her along, and that’s how she became part of my friend group. And that’s how she met Oliver. Back then, Oliver and I were truly just “childhood friends.” Although we hadn’t defined anything, just like now, he wasn’t hot and cold back then. If he skipped class to play video games, he’d bring back my favorite fries. He’d cover for me so I could sneak out to concerts. Once, during P.E., I sprained my ankle. Our classroom was on the top floor, and he piggybacked me up and down the stairs every single day. He stayed by my side through all my physical therapy. In those countless moments where I felt like I couldn’t handle the emotional whiplash of liking him anymore, I’d pick up one or two of those memories. Those hazy, beautiful moments became my motivation to keep going, making me believe that my obvious crush might actually lead somewhere. The turning point in our relationship probably started when Mia transferred to our school. Mia had moved around a lot as a kid because of her dad’s job, so she was much more socially adept and smooth than the rest of us. She was incredibly good at reading people. So, very quickly, I considered her a real friend. At that time, I hung out with Oliver a lot, and naturally, she got to know him through me. But when the three of us were together, she rarely spoke. She usually just sat quietly and listened. She seemed so harmless. It took me a long time to realize that whenever she and I were alone, the conversation would somehow always veer towards Oliver. His likes, his dislikes, embarrassing stories from his childhood, what made him happy or angry… Through me, Mia learned everything there was to know about Oliver, without ever having to spend much time with him one-on-one. She even teased me about my obvious crush on him, acting just like any other supportive best friend. There isn’t much to say about what happened next. A new movie starring an actor Oliver liked came out. I asked him to go see it, but he said he was busy. Later, my friends dragged me to the mall. By coincidence, we ended up near the movie theater, just in time to see Oliver and Mia walking out. Unlike the usual quiet dynamic when it was the three of us, Mia was laughing beautifully, and Oliver, looking unusually gentle, was gesturing animatedly as they talked, probably discussing the movie plot. I had never known that the usually quiet Mia had such an energetic side. I also never realized that the two of them were that close behind my back. I froze. It was too late to hide. When Mia and Oliver looked up and saw me, Mia’s face stiffened. She looked briefly embarrassed, but quickly recovered, flashing her usual smile and saying hi. Oliver, on the other hand, immediately started making excuses: “Mia likes this actor too. Since you don’t really like him, I just came with her.” Mia. Such an intimate way to say her name. My gaze shifted from his face to Mia standing behind him. I noted her unnatural expression, but I didn’t call her out. Because I clearly remembered that when I first told her about Oliver’s favorite actor, she looked confused and asked me who he was and if he had been in anything famous. There isn’t much else to the story. Even though she knew I liked Oliver, and even though she used me to get close to him and gather information, they weren’t actually dating at the time. She had the right to do whatever she wanted. I was just disgusted by her manipulation. I’m not a pushover. After that, I naturally distanced myself. I stopped hanging out with her, and my attitude grew cold. I didn’t say anything publicly, but I actively avoided any gathering she was at. The friends who used to invite her only did so because of me. After I bailed a few times, my friends—though they didn’t know what happened—stopped inviting her too. “She’s nice, gentle, and always says the right thing, but for some reason, she just feels… off. Like she’s not genuine.” “Serena, weren’t you guys super close? You brought her breakfast, let her copy your homework, tutored her… why are you shutting her out now?” I shook my head and avoided the topic. I feel like I was raised well enough to know that no matter what, I don’t like talking behind people’s backs. It’s petty. I never expected that one day, Oliver would be the one to confront me about her. He looked at me with an icy, disappointed expression, asking through gritted teeth, “Serena, are you the one leading the charge to isolate Mia?” Even though it was phrased as a question, the certainty in his tone told me he had already found me guilty. I felt like I was being accused out of nowhere. But my temper is usually pretty even, so I patiently asked, “What makes you think that?” He asked back, “Then why has everyone around you stopped talking to her?” That was probably his version of being diplomatic. I don’t know what Mia said to him, but my pent-up anger exploded. I looked at Oliver and said coldly, “I don’t respect her character.” What followed was an argument I’ve mostly forgotten. It was probably Oliver desperately trying to convince me that Mia was a great girl and that I shouldn’t be prejudiced against her. That was the beginning of the end. Later, Mia even came to apologize to me. But her apology felt more like a thinly veiled taunt, a way to show off. I looked at the smugness hidden beneath her apologetic smile, clutched my books, shoved her lightly, and said coldly, “Get out of my way.” I really didn’t use much force, but she stumbled backward as if she lost her balance, hitting the wall hard. Her eyes went red as she asked, “Serena, do you really hate me that much?” Before I could answer, someone yanked me hard from behind. Caught off guard, I almost fell. I turned around to see Oliver. He looked at me coldly, acting like a white knight defending Mia. “She sincerely apologized. What more do you want?” He paused, then added, “Besides, she didn’t do anything wrong in the first place.” My wrist throbbed from his grip. The books I was holding scattered across the floor, bruising my foot. Mia nervously tugged at the hem of Oliver’s shirt, telling him not to fight with me because of her. Such hypocrisy. I was young and hot-headed then. Even though angry tears welled in my eyes, I stubbornly refused to let them fall. I looked coldly at Mia and said bluntly, “Mia, you are truly disgusting.” Then I turned to Oliver and said, “Oliver, you’re an idiot.” I don’t know how Mia acted around Oliver in private, but I can imagine. From me, she knew Oliver inside and out. So she always knew exactly how to appeal to his tastes, possessing an uncanny, “perfectly timed” alignment with all his preferences. Oliver took those coincidences as fate, and his feelings for her grew. Even if he later realized that everything she knew was just information she gleaned from me, Oliver probably just chalked it up to her being jealous. Mia, the beautiful, perfect girl in his mind. After that, Oliver and I basically stopped talking. He and Mia grew closer, and the bond that used to be ours was replaced by hers. He studied with her, went to museums with her, and took her to our secret spot. One day, I pushed open the door to the school roof and saw them sitting side-by-side, looking at the sky and eating ice cream. They looked so comfortable together. After that, we just ignored each other. I remember for a very long time, Oliver and I didn’t exchange a single word. Until the beginning of freshman year of high school, when Mia moved back to her home state. I forget who gave who the out. Time has a way of blurring things, and distance does too. Oliver and I slowly went back to normal, even though the cracks were still there. We tacitly agreed never to bring up Mia, to the point where it felt deliberate. Until today, when Mia suddenly reappeared in our world.

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I kidnapped a trust fund kid. But this rich boy was severely depressed. Every day, he was either trying to get himself killed or actively seeking out ways to die. To keep him from kicking the bucket on my watch, I glued my eyes to him 24/7. Then one day, he looked at me with deep, passionate sincerity and said, “Before, I wanted to die. I really did. But now that I’ve met you, I look forward to tomorrow more than anything.” Wait, hold up! I’m the kidnapper here! How did I end up getting zero ransom money and losing my heart in the process?! 1 My name is Maya, and I’m a kidnapper. A broke, desperate kidnapper. I needed money. Like, really needed it. So, I took a massive risk and kidnapped Oliver Vance, the youngest son of the CEO of Vance Enterprises, planning to demand a $500,000 ransom. I never expected this trust fund baby to have severe depression. Before I could even send the ransom note, this idiot tried to off himself every other day. I was getting sick and tired of saving his life. Finally, one day, he said, “I’m done trying to kill myself. Why don’t you just kill me instead?” I’m a kidnapper with professional standards. I absolutely do not kill the hostage without a very good reason. But I really, really needed the money. I thought about it long and hard, and finally decided to grant his wish: “Then you’re going to have to pay extra!” But as a rookie kidnapper, I just didn’t have the heart to actually gut him. Oliver was a textbook rich kid. Clean-cut features, perfect teeth, and unfairly handsome. In all my years, I’d never seen a guy this good-looking. As a girl who hadn’t seen much of the world, I couldn’t help but want to poke his cheek every now and then. Oliver was usually gloomy and withdrawn, and sometimes he would just inexplicably start crying. I felt like I was the one making him cry. I felt guilty. I tried my absolute best to comfort him: “Don’t be scared, I only kidnapped you for the ransom. I’m not going to kill you.” “How much are you asking for?” His voice sounded so pure. I held up five fingers: “$500,000.” Hearing that, he lowered his eyes, seemingly unsatisfied with the price. I said, “Should I offer a discount?” He shook his head. “Then should you try haggling?” He said melancholically, “I really am a worthless person…” Me: ??? He asked me back, “Do you really think I’m only worth $500,000?” I felt like something was wrong with his brain, and said hesitantly, “Then five million?” He sighed, seemingly feeling it was still too cheap. After discussing the price with him, I sat nearby and started writing the thirteenth ransom note to his dad. Why the thirteenth? Because I had already written twelve! As I wrote, I asked Oliver, “Why hasn’t your dad sent the money yet? Does he also think my asking price is too low?” The world of the rich—I don’t understand it, but I am deeply shocked by it. “I don’t know. How did you write the letter? Read it to me.” I said “Okay” and started reading: “Dear Mr. Vance, Hello. How is your health lately? I have kidnapped your youngest son, Oliver. Please wire $500,000 to the following account: 62167xxxxxxxx. Thank you! Please do not call the police, otherwise I will kill the hostage before they arrive.” “…” “How is it? Is there a problem?” “It’s not aggressive enough.” “Then how should I write it?” I handed him the pen and paper. “Why don’t you write it for me?” Oliver reluctantly agreed: “Fine.” I was just about to untie his ropes, but then I had a second thought: What if he runs away? “I won’t run,” he said. I hesitated, still too afraid to untie him. “I really won’t run,” he added. “I swear on my honor as a student.” Fine. Because of that sentence, I trusted him and untied the ropes. He rubbed his sore arms, then picked up the pen and paper. I have to say, not only was he good-looking, but his handwriting was also incredibly neat. How could someone this perfect exist in the world? It’s just… The letter he wrote went like this: Hey, old man Vance, your son is in my hands right now! Wire $500,000 to the account below, and make it snappy! Don’t you dare short me a single cent! Don’t call the cops, or I’ll kill him! “Oliver, is it really okay to write it like this?” I stared at the ransom note he wrote, lost in thought. “It only sounds aggressive if you write it like this.” I thought about it and felt his reasoning was sound. Just as I was about to put the letter in the envelope, he suddenly said, “Maybe we should ask for five million. I feel like I’m worth more than this.” I shook my head firmly: “No, I only want $500,000.” I decided to send the letter the next day. But that night, I had a dream. I dreamed I was caught by the police, and Mr. Vance was screaming at the top of his lungs nearby: “I wired you $500,000 thirteen times! Couldn’t you just ask for it all at once, damn it! If you wanted it in installments, you should have at least said something!” I was crying uncontrollably: “I’m sorry, I forgot to turn on my bank text alerts!” I woke up with a start, my forehead covered in sweat, and shook Oliver awake: “Oliver, Oliver, wake up!” He opened his sleepy eyes and asked what was wrong. “I think I forgot to turn on my bank text alerts.” “…” 2 Guys, the perfect Oliver is not perfect. Ever since I tied him up and brought him to this mountain warehouse half a month ago, I never realized he was such a neat freak! This morning, I was planning to mail the ransom note, but Oliver absolutely refused to go without taking a shower first. I had no choice but to take him to the mountain spring to rinse off. He dawdled and washed for over half an hour. When we finally got back, I had just tied him up when he insisted I tie his shoelaces. “Your shoelaces are tied perfectly fine!” “The butterfly wings are uneven. It’s bothering me.” “…” After adjusting his shoelaces, I went out to mail the letter and turned on my bank text alerts while I was at it. I checked my balance. No $500,000. But right as I walked out of the bank, I spotted two police officers not far away. I shuddered. Were they here to catch me?! I scurried back into the bank, peeked half my head out from behind the door, and observed. I saw a police officer holding a photo and asking a passerby, “Have you seen this person?” The passerby glanced at the photo and shook his head: “Never seen him.” “If you see this person, please call the police immediately.” The passerby’s sense of justice flared up: “What did this guy do? I’ve trained in MMA for a few years, maybe I can help you catch him.” He even rolled up his sleeves to show off his muscles. The police officer sternly refused: “No! This man is a ruthless, bloodthirsty kidnapper. Do not engage him directly. You must call the police!” Hearing this, I was scared out of my wits. What should I do? What should I do? The police are here to catch me! I’m going to jail! I waited until the police were far away before I dared to sneak out. I was so scared I practically wet my pants. I didn’t even dare to mail the ransom note, and hurried back to the abandoned warehouse as fast as I could. “Oliver! Oliver! What are we going to do? Waaaaah…” As soon as I got back, I ran straight to Oliver, hugged him tightly, and cried uncontrollably. I felt like if he wasn’t tied up, he probably would have pushed me away long ago. “What’s wrong?” he asked. “The police are here to catch me. What do we do?” I said while wiping away tears. “I saw with my own eyes the police asking people around with my photo! I’m done for! Waaaaah!” Oliver pondered for a moment, then said, “Maybe my dad called the police.” When he said that, I cried even louder. “My dad called the police, so you should just kill me.” Right! I should kill him! I… I’ll do it! I’ll kill him right now! I pulled a dagger out of my backpack and waved it around Oliver’s neck. He closed his eyes, waiting for me to slit his throat. But my hands kept shaking, shaking, shaking like a leaf. I couldn’t stop them! Clang! I dropped the dagger. I… I couldn’t do it! Oliver seemed very disappointed. Just as I was crying, snot bubbles popping one after another, Oliver suddenly asked me how the police questioned the passerby. I recounted the incident while sobbing. Oliver’s face darkened: “Relax, the person they’re looking for isn’t you.” “How is that possible? I’m the kidnapper!” “Ruthless, bloodthirsty. Does that sound like you?” “…No… it doesn’t.” But hearing Oliver say that put my mind at ease. I went to the mountain spring pool and splashed water on my tear-stained face. Suddenly, my phone buzzed. It was my little brother, Leo. “Sister, the nurse taught me how to fold paper boats today. When are you coming back? I want to fold paper boats with you.” “Sister will be back very soon. Leo has to be a good boy and listen to the doctor, okay?” “Okay.” I put my phone back in my pocket and gathered some firewood nearby, planning to boil some water for instant noodles when I got back. But when I returned with an armful of dry wood, I caught Oliver rummaging through my backpack! “How did you untie the ropes?!” He didn’t even look up, pulling a wafer cookie out of my bag. “My arms were falling asleep, so I untied them to stretch. Why are you back so early? I haven’t had time to tie myself back up yet.” No wonder the snacks in my bag kept disappearing. I had assumed I ate them and forgot. “Since you have this skill, why didn’t you sneak away when I wasn’t looking?” He took a bite of the wafer cookie and said, “Why do you overestimate yourself so much? I could run away even when you are looking.” “…” I dropped my head, feeling a deep sense of defeat. After Oliver finished the cookie, he ripped open a bag of chips. Seemingly bored, he suddenly asked me my name. “Maya.” “Like ‘Maya the Maya’?” “Like ‘Maya’ as in the illusion.” “Oh, Little Sprout, you should wash your hands of this business early. You’re not cut out for this line of work.” “I’m only doing this one job.” I asked the question that had been buried in my heart for a long time. “Why are you always so unhappy?” “Because I have depression.” I suddenly understood: “Ah? No wonder you’re always looking for death.” He corrected my wording: “Seeking death.” I’d heard that people with depression suffer a lot. It’s a mental illness with a very high suicide rate. I comforted him: “I heard that once people have money, they lose their worries. You should be glad you have it all. Don’t be sad, Oliver.” “…Thank you for your ineffective counseling.” Since Oliver had excellent rope-untying skills, I stopped tying him up. It was all based on the honor system. That night, I tossed and turned. Thinking of Leo saying he missed me, I wanted to sprint straight to the hospital to see him. I guess I’ll go back and check on him tomorrow. Thinking this, I gradually drifted off to sleep. But it felt like as soon as I fell asleep, I was woken up by an itch. It was incredibly itchy, like claws scratching at my heart and liver. I tossed and turned, unable to fall back asleep. Why was it so itchy? While scratching, I picked up my phone to Google the symptoms. Hives? Doesn’t seem like it. Psoriasis? No. Kidney failure? Yes, yes, this must be it. These past few days, I’ve been so worried about Oliver running away that I’ve been guarding him 24/7. Sometimes I didn’t even have time to go to the bathroom and just held it in. I felt like I’d been struck by lightning. I instantly felt sick to my stomach, my mind going completely blank. Oliver seemed to have been woken up by me. “What’s wrong? Aren’t you sleeping?” “I feel prickly all over, incredibly uncomfortable. I just Googled my symptoms, and it says it’s kidney failure.” I was so anxious I was almost crying. “What do I do, Oliver? Am I going to die? I don’t want to die yet!” “…How long has it been since you took a shower?” “I haven’t washed since I kidnapped you! I was afraid you’d run away!” “Go take a shower. You won’t itch after you wash.” “Oh.” After I showered, I felt completely refreshed, and my body wasn’t prickly anymore. The next day, I woke up bright and early. But seeing Oliver still sleeping soundly, I didn’t dare brush my tongue when I brushed my teeth, afraid I’d gag and wake him up. I didn’t even dare chew my chips until they were soft and soggy in my mouth. My phone rang. It was my best friend, Harper. As soon as I answered, she politely greeted my entire ancestry: “Maya, you absolute disaster! Where the hell have you been these past few days? Do you have any idea how much Leo misses you?!” “I haven’t… ah, recently, I’ve actually had some things to deal with. I’ll be right back at the hospital.” I hung up the phone right after saying that, grabbed my bag, and rushed to the hospital like my tail was on fire. When I arrived at the hospital, Harper was watching cartoons with Leo. When Leo saw me, he threw his arms around me: “Sister, I missed you so much! Are you really back? I’m not dreaming, am I?” I crouched down to his eye level and pinched his soft little cheek: “You’re not dreaming. Have you been listening to the doctors lately? Are you still scared of getting shots?” “I’m not scared anymore. I’ve grown up. I’m a man now. I can protect you, sister.” While Leo and I were having our touching sibling moment, Harper angrily dragged me out of the room and demanded to know where I had been for the past half month, abandoning my own brother. “I went to get money.” “What kind of money makes you disappear completely?” “I just… lightly tested the penal code…” I lowered my voice. “I kidnapped the CEO of Vance Enterprises’ son.” She was dumbfounded: “How could you even dare?! Holy shit! You… turn back before it’s too late.” At that moment, Leo suddenly ran out and invited me to fold paper boats. So the three of us sat on the hospital bed folding paper boats together. But I was clumsy, so I had to ask Harper: “Is this how you fold this part?” “Fold it over like this… Please, turn back before it’s too late.” “…” A little while later. I asked Harper again: “How do you fold the boat’s canopy in the middle?” “That part should be folded back, then you just pull it and it’s done… Please, turn back before it’s too late.” “…” After folding the paper boats, Leo watched cartoons for a bit, then got tired and fell asleep. It was time for me to head back to the abandoned warehouse. I said goodbye to Harper outside the hospital. Harper was in tears. I just thought she was sad to see me go, but I didn’t expect her to say: “Does this make me an accessory to a crime?” “Don’t worry, I’ll cut ties with you right before I get caught. I won’t drag you down with me.” She looked grave, pointing at an Audi logo, and said: “Don’t those four rings look like two pairs of silver bracelets (handcuffs)? One pair for you, one pair for me… Please, turn back before it’s too late.” “…No, they don’t.” After parting ways with Harper, I headed back to the warehouse. But when I got back, I realized Oliver wasn’t there! I searched the surrounding area several times but still couldn’t find him. He couldn’t have run away, could he?! Was he going to the police?! Just as I was hopping mad and wiping away tears, I saw Oliver dragging a large 24-inch suitcase back from a distance! I was both shocked and delighted: “Where did you go?! I’ve been looking everywhere for you!” “I went home for a bit.” “…” “Grabbed some clean clothes.” “…” I wiped away tears and said: “Then why did you come back?” “We have a kidnapping with integrity going on here. If you don’t let me go, I won’t leave. Stop crying, you’re losing all your kidnapper street cred.” Thank goodness Oliver came back, otherwise I would have been so anxious I would have turned myself in. 3 I felt like Oliver had the aura of a perfect househusband. Ever since he brought that massive suitcase back from home, he went into full warehouse-makeover mode. He cleaned the area where he slept, put up some wallpaper, used discarded wood to make a shoe rack, and even strung up a clothesline outside the warehouse. A little later, he was patching up the broken windows and putting up curtains. I watched his flurry of activity, completely dumbfounded. “Oliver, are you planning on living here long-term?” “I’ll leave once you extort the $500,000.” I felt a bit touched. “Thank you for helping me extort your dad.” After he finished putting up the curtains, he was sweating profusely and grabbed his body wash to go take a shower at the spring. My phone buzzed. A quick glance showed it was a text from the bank. Had the $500,000 arrived?! My heart was racing, my hands trembling! I held my breath, anticipating opening the text… Damn it! It was a notification that my Spotify premium subscription had renewed… Just as I was looking up at the sky and sighing, wanting to cry but having no tears left, another ringtone sounded. It wasn’t mine. I followed the sound in confusion and finally located it in Oliver’s suitcase. My heart leapt into my throat. When did he bring a phone?! Had he secretly called the police?! I picked up his phone. The caller ID was a missed call from someone named “Pain Patch.” A moment later, this “Pain Patch” sent a WeChat message: Why aren’t you answering the phone? Immediately followed by another: I sent the medicine over. Remember to pick it up. What medicine? Curious, I scrolled through their chat history… Oh wow, it turns out Oliver had his phone on him this whole time! My fault! I had no experience; I forgot to check if he had a phone! I was so annoyed I wanted to slap myself. His most recent contact with Pain Patch was yesterday: “Oliver, what’s going on with you? You were already home, why did you go back?” “I felt like it.” “Is that guy a kidnapper? Or a kidnapper with a heart of gold? Whatever, suit yourself. By the way, you forgot your medicine. Send me your location, and I’ll mail it to you tomorrow.” Then Oliver sent a location—the nearest Amazon Locker at the foot of the warehouse’s mountain. “Use this address. It’s close, I can make it quick.” “Why don’t you just use your home address?” “No, my house is too far. If she realizes I’m gone, she’ll think I went to the police. She’ll probably cry her eyes out.” “…ojbk [doge emoji]” Suddenly, the phone rang again. I jumped and accidentally answered the call. On the other end, Pain Patch said: “Hey, Oliver, you finally picked up.” I swallowed hard, not knowing what to do. “Oliver, why aren’t you saying anything? Damn it, did something happen?! I’m calling the police right now!” I hurriedly replied: “Ah no, nothing happened.” “??? Are you the kidnapper with a heart of gold?” “Hello, Mr. Pain.” “…My last name is Zhao. You can just call me Dr. Zhao.” I pleaded: “Dr. Pain, please don’t call the police. Oliver said he’d help me extort his dad, and I promise I won’t hurt him.” “I won’t call the police. Put Oliver on the phone.” “He just finished working up a sweat and went to take a shower.” On the other end, Pain Patch coughed awkwardly. “Then I won’t interrupt. You two have fun.” He hung up the phone after saying that. At that moment, Oliver returned. He was holding a dripping pair of boxers and hung them on the clothesline. I ran out clutching his phone. “Oliver, I’m sorry, I snooped through your phone. But why didn’t you tell me you had it hidden? Didn’t we agree to an honest kidnapping?” “I just didn’t want you to misunderstand and think I was going to call the police.” “Oh, well what if you used the GPS to run away?” “Then why don’t we add each other on WeChat? If I run away, I’ll send you a message.” Hmm, he truly had the qualities of a model hostage. It saved me a lot of worry as a kidnapper. Since he had cleaned his sleeping area that day, when night fell, I shamelessly scooted closer to him. “Oliver, you smell so good.” It was true, a very fresh and clean scent. “Your greasy hair smells very unique too.” Ah, that… I awkwardly got up and moved back to my spot. In the dark, he suddenly grabbed my hand. “Come back. Talk to me for a bit.” So I obediently lay back down. “Why did you want to kidnap me?” he asked. “I really need money.” Whenever money was mentioned, I was wide awake. “Oliver, are you your dad’s biological son? Why hasn’t he sent the money yet?” “Him? He’s… he’s probably running around begging everyone he knows to scrape the money together.” The Vance Enterprise is so huge, $500,000 should be pocket change! “Listen to yourself, do you even believe what you’re saying?” “I do.” I believe you… not! I suddenly thought of a question and asked: “Do you think maybe the ransom note I wrote never even reached your dad?” He was resolute: “Impossible.” “Are you lying to me again?” He laughed: “I’m not lying.” “Then you said students don’t lie to students!” “…I can’t say it.” I was a bit angry, but I was so tired that I eventually fell asleep while fuming. But in the middle of the night, I was woken up by the sound of sobbing. I groggily opened my eyes. By the faint moonlight, I saw Oliver hugging his knees, crying. I sat up facing him. I didn’t understand depression, but I could tell he was in a lot of pain. “Oliver, Oliver.” I called out to him, but he seemed to have lost all interest in life, not even batting an eyelid. I didn’t know what to do, so I just sat with him silently. In a flash of inspiration, I remembered Pain Patch. Based on Oliver’s situation, he was probably Oliver’s doctor. I quietly picked up Oliver’s phone, stepped outside the warehouse, and dialed Pain Patch’s number. It connected quickly. “Finally decided to call me? What, did your kidnapper with a heart of gold untie your ropes? Speak, what’s up?” “Hey, Dr. Pain, Oliver is crying, and I don’t know what to do. Please help him!” The more I spoke, the more I wanted to cry, and by the end, my voice was cracking. He was clearly surprised. “It’s you. Don’t panic. Depression patients %#&%!^#. You need to &#• %^!# watch his mood %#& something might happen.” The signal suddenly got very bad, and his voice was breaking up. This led to a miscommunication between us— “What, something might happen?” My heart skipped a beat. “Is Oliver going to commit suicide? I’ve heard some depression patients commit suicide.” “Suicide?! You said %#&#%^ … he wants to commit suicide!” “No, I mean…” “The signal is bad, you’re saying %#& I can’t hear you clearly. You %^#&*… send me the location, I’m coming over right now!” He hung up after saying that. I hesitated. If he knew where we were, would he call the police to catch me? But if something happened to Oliver, I’d really be a sinner! So I steeled myself and sent him the location. I went back into the warehouse. Oliver had changed positions and was still crying. I sat down next to him and held his hand. “Oliver, don’t be scared. Pain Patch is already on his way.” He finally lifted his eyelids to look at me, calling me with a hoarse voice: “Little Sprout…” I didn’t dare leave his side for a second, terrified his mood would dip too low and he’d do something drastic. I don’t know how much time passed, but Oliver finally stopped crying and fell asleep shortly after. Not long after, I faintly heard noise outside the warehouse. I peeked outside and saw a young man with a flashlight. When he got closer, I finally saw his face. He wore wire-rimmed glasses and looked refined and intellectual, about the same age as me. He was cursing under his breath: “What the hell is this dump? You can’t even drive a car up here!” Turns out intellectual guys curse too. He was probably Dr. Pain. He cut straight to the chase: “Where’s Oliver?” “Asleep.” Afraid of waking Oliver up, he tiptoed into the warehouse. Seeing him sleeping soundly, he let out a sigh of relief. I lowered my voice and asked him: “Doctor, is Oliver’s condition very dangerous?” “Moderate depression, but there’s a very good chance he can overcome it.” I’ve heard that people with depression suffer from long periods of low mood. I remembered that when I’m in a bad mood, I can’t eat, don’t want to do anything, feel annoyed and helpless—it’s agonizing. I can’t imagine how Oliver managed to get through it. “Why did you want to kidnap him?” “For money.” “What do you need so much money for? Are you very poor?” I shook my head: “No, it’s my little brother. He’s sick and needs a kidney transplant.” He fell silent for a moment, expressing sympathy for my situation, and then asked which hospital my brother was in. When I told him the hospital’s name, he was a bit surprised. It turned out he worked in the psychiatric department at that very hospital. He warmly told me to contact him anytime if I ran into difficulties in the future. I was so touched that my eyes instantly welled up with tears. He pulled out his phone and opened his WeChat QR code: “Let’s add each other as friends. Contact me anytime if you have a problem.” I wiped my wet eyes, opened WeChat to scan the code, and then heard a loud DING~ I jolted, quickly turned down the volume, and looked back at the sleeping Oliver. Thank goodness I didn’t wake him up. “My last name is Zhao,” he emphasized, afraid I would save his contact as “Pain Patch.” But right after I added Dr. Zhao, Oliver’s ghostly voice came from behind me: “Why are you two adding each other as friends behind my back?” “…” Listen to what he was saying. He made it sound like we were doing something shady. Oliver was mad that Dr. Zhao and I added each other as friends, and he ignored me all night. The next morning, I woke up early. Pain Patch was still sleeping, but Oliver was nowhere to be seen. My heart instantly jumped into my throat. He had a terrible night last night; did he do something drastic? I didn’t have time to think and ran out immediately to look for him. Thank goodness, he was just sitting on a large rock outside the warehouse. I let out a huge sigh of relief. I walked up behind him and saw him playing on his phone… That was my freaking phone! I saw him open WeChat, pin “Oliver” to the top, then find “Dr. Zhao” and hit delete without hesitation. I swear to God… I clenched my fists. My knuckles were turning white. I was just about to lose it when I saw him pull out another phone—Dr. Zhao’s—and expertly delete me from it. I gritted my teeth: “Oli-ver!” He jumped in shock, then grabbed the phones and started running. His legs were so long, how could I possibly catch him? Just as I was about to give up and head back, I bumped into someone. I looked up and saw a middle-aged man, looking to be in his fifties, with an ordinary face. Seeing this, Oliver quickly ran over and shielded me behind him. At that moment, Dr. Zhao’s voice came from the warehouse: “Well, well. It was too dark to see clearly yesterday, but look at this! Pots, pans, the whole nine yards! You two setting up house here?!” He stretched as he walked out, but froze when he saw the unfamiliar middle-aged man. That was when I noticed, to my shock, that the stranger had a hunting rifle slung over his shoulder! He immediately aimed the gun at us: “Nobody move! No cops!” Oliver pulled me further behind him, and I was so scared I barely dared to breathe. The man forced us into the warehouse with the gun, confiscated our phones, turned them off, and removed the SIM cards to prevent police tracking. Dr. Zhao swallowed hard, mustered up his courage, and said: “Sir, please let us go. Don’t worry, we absolutely won’t call the police. Besides, we don’t even know you, so we couldn’t give the police any leads anyway.” The man snorted: “Funny. The police have a city-wide APB out on me. Everyone knows who I am, and you expect me to believe you don’t?” He was the ruthless, bloodthirsty killer?! I wanted to cry but had no tears left. Unlucky, incredibly unlucky! Dr. Zhao was silent for a long moment: “I’m a bit of a shut-in. I really don’t recognize you.” “Cut the crap!” The man pointed at me, then at the ropes on the floor. “You, tie them up.” I didn’t dare disobey. I picked up the ropes and tied Dr. Zhao and Oliver back-to-back. Then the man picked up another rope and tied me up like a trussed turkey. While tying me up, he felt the unmailed ransom note Oliver had helped me write in my pocket. He stared at me in disbelief: “You’re in the business too?” I nodded. He put the letter away: “I was just worrying about having no money for the getaway. I’ll take this $500,000!” Now I really wanted to cry. I had worked so hard, and now my payday was flying away. “Give me the card.” I stammered: “It’s in the pink backpack in the corner.” He walked over, roughly dumped out the contents of the bag, and found the bank card. “PIN.” I told the truth: “My birthday.” “…How the hell am I supposed to know what day your birthday is!” At that moment, Oliver suddenly spoke up: “There’s no money on the card. Taking it is useless.” The man spat: “No money? Are you little punks messing with me?!” “But I can help you call my dad and extort him.” The man was suspicious: “You’re trying to pull a fast one, aren’t you?” “Aren’t you trying to get money for your getaway? I’m paying for my safety. Once you get the money, you have to let us go.” The man still didn’t believe him. “You took our phones, so we can’t call the police. If we really wanted to call the police, we’d have to go to the station ourselves. By the time we file a report, you’ll be long gone.” The man seemed swayed. He weighed his options and finally said: “Fine. But no phone calls. God knows what tricks you’ll play on the phone. Send a text. I’ll send it from your phone myself.” Oliver agreed without hesitation. After the man sent the text from Oliver’s phone, he immediately turned it off and removed the SIM card.

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I’ve read countless romance novels about the “regretful ex crawling back,” but I never expected to become a character in one. Except, in my story, there was no “crawling back.” Only the ashes. Because I was truly dead. I became a ghost, tethered to the man who took me for granted. Seven days after my death, it was as if a delayed wave of grief had finally crushed him. In the home I could never return to, he howled, wept, and shattered into pieces. You ask how I felt? I just stood there, blankly, meticulously savoring every inch of agony on his face. I listened earnestly to his desperate, agonizing wails over my departure. Beneath the sorrow and heartbreak, a massive, twisted wave of schadenfreude surged within me. A joyful, ecstatic sense of vindication. It was a sharp, liberating thrill. I covered my mouth and laughed. 1 After I died, I became even more certain that Holden Crawford had never truly loved me. When the police called him to identify my body at the morgue, he thought I had teamed up with my friends to pull a sick prank. He thought it was just my way of forcing him to give me a way to step down from our fight. Because right before I died, we had gotten into a massive argument. I had looked at his phone and seen texts from his ex-girlfriend. In reality, they were just discussing work. There was no explicit flirting. But a woman’s sensitivity and suspicion caused my emotions to spiral out of control. His ex-girlfriend. His “one that got away.” His absolute muse. He had never deleted the photos of them from his camera roll. Yet, in all the years we had been together, we didn’t have a single picture together. The day before, he was running a 102-degree fever. I stayed awake all night by his bed, nursing him. But in his feverish delirium, the name he mumbled was hers. These things piled up, piece by piece, until my emotions erupted like a volcano. Finally, Holden looked at me with exhaustion and said, “Harper, stop causing a scene.” Harper. He was always so cold and distant, calling me by my full name. But in his texts, he called his ex-girlfriend by her sweet nickname, “Ella.” Why didn’t he just call her Stella Montgomery? Holden said I was being unreasonable. He didn’t know that this was just the final straw on a mountain of suppressed feelings. I didn’t want the argument to escalate into something uglier, so I slammed the door and left. 2 But I never expected to be so unlucky. After fighting with Holden, I originally planned to go to the mall to do some retail therapy and clear my head. Instead, I ran into a psychopath. Life is unpredictable like that. I was murdered. The police called Holden to the morgue. Holden frowned, answering the phone with intense impatience: “Harper, are you done? Can you stop being so childish?” After he hung up, the police called him a second time. “Hello, please don’t hang up. This is the Central Precinct. This is not a prank. Am I speaking to Mr. Holden Crawford? Do you know a Harper Quinn? She was murdered at the downtown mall. Please come to the precinct immediately to identify the body.” In the suffocating, oppressive morgue. My body was covered tightly by a white sheet. Only one arm hung out, smeared with dried, dark blood. The detective said, “Take a look. Is the victim your girlfriend, Harper Quinn?” He reached out to pull back the white sheet covering my head. But Holden grabbed the detective’s wrist in a death grip. He stared fixedly at the arm hanging out—at the tattoo of a wild rose intertwined with the letters “HC”. Even beneath the mottled bloodstains, it was strikingly visible. I remembered when I first got that tattoo. I excitedly held it up to show Holden. He was furious. He thought that permanently marking his initials on my body was incredibly irresponsible. Actually, his grandmother had just passed away around that time. He had said, in total despair, that from then on, he was an orphan, utterly alone in the world. So I went and got that tattoo. I just wanted to make him a little happier. I pointed to the tattoo and solemnly promised him, “The wild rose symbolizes eternal companionship. Holden, I will always be with you.” So you will never be an orphan, and you will never be alone. I’ve forgotten his exact reaction, but I remember moving myself to tears. Thinking back on it now, his anger was probably just a feeling of being burdened. The person he wanted by his side forever… was always someone else. 3 Holden stared dead at my tattoo. He said, “There’s no need. It’s her.” He looked so calm, just incredibly pale. I heard the detective tell him, “The killer was a sociopath, stabbing people at random in the mall. Your girlfriend was trying to pull a pregnant woman to safety but got tripped and fell. She died a hero.” No, I didn’t. I was trying to help the pregnant woman run, but when the killer was right behind us, she shoved me backward to save herself and ran away. I was stabbed over twenty times by that psychopath. I bled to death. Just my rotten luck. I stood in front of Holden and cried. It hurts so much, Holden. I hurt so, so much. But thankfully, he didn’t let the detective lift the sheet. My body was definitely too mangled to look at. When Holden walked out of the morgue, he stumbled slightly. Then he leaned silently against the wall in the hallway. After a long time, he called my parents, probably to inform them of my death. No one answered. This wasn’t surprising. My parents divorced when I was very young and had no affection for me. They were probably afraid I was calling to ask for money, so they had cut ties with me years ago. The police were efficient. An older officer patted Holden’s shoulder, handed him a business card, and said, “This is the contact for the crematorium. Have them come pick her up as soon as possible. It’s hot out; you can’t keep her here for days, and you can’t take her home.” From the moment I was murdered to the moment I became a handful of ashes in Holden’s hands. Not even twelve hours had passed. And Holden handled my post-mortem affairs with chilling calmness. Signing papers at the station, going through the motions, everything perfectly organized. I opened my ghostly eyes wide, trying to find a single trace of grief on his handsome, pale face. Just a little bit. Couldn’t he shed just one tear for me? Even if he had kept a dog for this many years, he should have at least faked some sadness, right? But sadly, I found nothing. 4 I floated home with Holden. He sat on the couch, staring blankly, as if the sudden reality hadn’t registered. I couldn’t blame him; even I felt like I was in a dream. One second I was perfectly alive, arguing with him about his ex-girlfriend. The next, I was murdered, reduced to a wandering spirit in the mortal realm. I could never go back. I was dead. My body had been hacked over twenty times. Every minute leading up to my death was agonizing. My physical form was now just a pile of ashes, and here I was, a pathetic ghost, greedily searching my boyfriend’s demeanor for any tiny clue that he might have actually loved me. What a pitiful, tragic existence. Maybe before the sun rises tomorrow, I’ll fade away completely. I suddenly felt a little scared. Holden stared blankly at the ceiling, lost in thought. I gently drifted over and rested my head against his shoulder. Trying to draw some warmth from his body. Surprisingly, when the sun rose the next day, I hadn’t vanished. I turned to look for Holden. He was on the phone with Stella Montgomery. They were going on a business trip together to handle a client’s case in Boston. Oh, right. He and Stella were both lawyers. Last year, Stella jumped ship and joined his top-tier Big Law firm. Holden was a senior partner there. That was when our frequent, explosive arguments began. I remember one time I was so furious I lost my filter. I asked, “Holden, do you want to rekindle things with your ex? If you want to break up, just say it.” He stood in the living room, backlit by the window, his handsome face devoid of emotion. He just stared at me coldly and didn’t say a word. Later, I regretted the fight and gave myself a way out. I stood in the kitchen, wiping my tears, and asked, “Holden, do you want beef stew or chicken parm for dinner?” He said beef stew. And just like that, we made up, both pretending the fight had never happened. 5 Holden hung up the phone and started packing his suitcase. I thought my death would at least make him depressed for a little while, but clearly, I was wrong. My death hadn’t caused even a ripple in his emotional state. He didn’t even delay his business trip. I never expected him to be like this after I died. He kept to his routine, going to work, coming home, sleeping late, waking up early. His life ran like clockwork. Aside from occasionally zoning out for long periods, he acted as if I had never existed in his world. I was like a sea foam bubble, vanishing completely from his life without leaving a single trace. How heartless. Who knows, maybe on this trip, fighting side-by-side with Stella, staying in the same hotel, the old flames might reignite. Whatever. I was already dead. Right, I’m dead. I suddenly felt an overwhelming sense of exhaustion and a chill in my heart. It’s strange. You still have a heart after you die. The pain branched out from my chest, creeping along my stagnant veins until it was unbearable. I felt my entire body become weightless, floating gently in mid-air. I heard the sound of the front door closing. I had originally wanted to follow Holden on his trip. But I thought, what was the point? Even if they kissed right in front of me, there was nothing I could do. I stared at the ceiling in the dead-silent house and started reminiscing about my history with Holden. I always knew he didn’t love me. But I never expected that, after staying by his side for so many years, he wouldn’t have even a sliver of affection for me. 6 Holden and I went to the same university. He was pre-law; I was a struggling art major barely scraping by. During my freshman year, the university hosted a seminar on student rights and fraud prevention. We had just finished an exhausting week of campus orientation. We had been standing in the blistering sun all day and just wanted to go back to the dorms and sleep. Being forced to attend some boring seminar led to widespread complaints, and everyone was drowsy. Until Holden stepped up to the podium. The professor running the seminar had a last-minute emergency and sent his star student to fill in. The moment Holden stood there, I was wide awake. I couldn’t help it. I was a sucker for a pretty face. He was tall, lean, and incredibly pleasant to look at. His expression was cool, his eyes deep. When he spoke, his pacing was perfect, his voice captivating. He made a dry, boring seminar on student rights sound fascinating. Looking at him shining on that stage, my naive, young heart fluttered wildly, and I fell head over heels for him. The result was predictable. I chased him for six months, and he avoided me like the plague for six months. I was young, passionate, and reckless for love. I had this stubborn courage that refused to give up until I hit a brick wall. But I never considered that my “courage” was actually a nuisance to him. Once, when I blocked his path again, smiling and offering him some pastries I had baked myself, he stared at me with those dark eyes and asked: “You spend every day chasing after someone who doesn’t like you, wasting your time and mine. Don’t you have your own life to live?” I didn’t catch his underlying meaning back then. I just foolishly said, “My life right now is trying to win you over.” Then I held up my finger, showing him a blister I got from baking. Pouting a little, I said, “Look, it hurts.” His gaze swept coldly over my finger and landed on my face. He frowned slightly, let out a detached sigh, and said with obvious frustration, “The things you do don’t move me, Harper. You’re just moving yourself. And this self-sacrificing act of yours is putting a huge burden on me.” He looked at the tears welling up in my eyes, hesitated for a second to choose his words, but still said it, “And I really don’t like you.” “You’re a nice person, but I will never, ever be attracted to a girl with your personality. Do you understand?” A girl with my personality. I sat on the planter box by the sidewalk, resting my chin in my hands. I knew what Holden meant. I was painfully average. I wasn’t an overachiever. I blended into the crowd. I lacked discipline, loved to eat and sleep, and had no goals or plans for the future. The person he liked had always been Stella Montgomery. They were the shining stars of the pre-law program, perfectly matching each other’s brilliance. She was exceptional, independent, and had her own strong opinions. She would certainly never act like me—pathetically chasing after a man who didn’t love her. After that, I disappeared from Holden’s world. You have to know when you’re not wanted. 7 Later, my friends asked me, What exactly do you like about Holden Crawford? Is it just his face? He treats you like that, why are you so obsessed? Why? Maybe it was because of that time I was walking back to my dorm from off-campus, and I saw him in the woods near the North Gate, feeding a stray cat. It was pouring rain. He held an umbrella with one hand, squatting on the muddy ground with meticulous patience, coaxing the filthy, shivering kitten out from under a bush. Then, he gently hid the dirty kitten inside his jacket to keep it dry and took it back to his dorm. His profile in that moment was so incredibly gentle. I stared at him in a daze. Even though I was holding an umbrella, I felt like a torrential downpour had just flooded my heart. I wanted to tell him that I was a stray cat, too. I was abandoned by my parents when I was little, and I grew up wandering just like that. If he could be so gentle to a filthy stray kitten, would he ever look at me with that same tender expression? But thinking about it now… he gave all his tenderness to everyone except me. 8 Holden came back a week later. I had been lying on the living room couch for a week. But it was strange. He obviously had his keys, yet he stood at the door, knocking persistently. As if someone was going to jump out and open it for him. When I was alive, every time he came back from a business trip, I would time it perfectly and wait by the door. Sometimes his flight would be delayed, so I’d sit on the stairs. The moment his silhouette appeared, I’d practically tackle him, wrapping my arms around his neck in sheer joy. Because every day we were apart, I missed him terribly. He would pry my hands off his neck and say coldly, “Stop messing around.” I would always prepare a lavish dinner. I knew he didn’t eat well during his business dinners, and his stomach was ruined from his younger days. So, my specialty was making soothing, easy-to-digest comfort food. He must have been knocking for a while because Mrs. Higgins, our next-door neighbor, opened her door and said, “Holden, you’re back from your trip?” “Stop knocking. Harper isn’t home. I haven’t seen her in almost a week.” “Did you forget your keys? Harper left a spare with me just in case you ever forgot yours and she wasn’t home. Do you need it?” After a moment, I heard Holden’s voice. It sounded like it was being squeezed from the very depths of his throat—hoarse and low. He said, “No need.” He used his own key to open the door. Then he stood frozen in the entryway. He had left in a hurry the day of his trip. The balcony curtains were drawn, making the apartment look dark and gloomy. The spray roses on the coffee table had completely withered and died. The house was a mess: a half-empty teapot, molding fruit in a bowl, a half-eaten bag of chips, and fine dust floating in the stagnant air. Oh, and my ashes. Placed in the complimentary small box from the crematorium, sitting right next to the dead spray roses. When I was alive, the house had never been this messy. Because this was our home. We were both people without families. When we finally built this little nest, I cherished it deeply. I always kept it comfortable and spotless. God knows how badly we both wanted a home. He stood there for a very long time before finally stepping inside. He pulled back the curtains. My clothes were still hanging on the drying rack on the balcony. He froze for a second. Just when I thought he was going to throw my clothes into the trash, he took them down, folded them on the couch, and started mopping the floor and cleaning the apartment. I never knew the house could be this quiet. It felt like, aside from the sound of breathing, there was absolutely nothing else. After finishing all those chores, he sat exhaustedly on the couch alone. I studied him closely. He had lost a lot of weight on this trip. His eyes were bloodshot, and his stubble was unkempt. He was a high-powered, immaculate lawyer. Had his case with Stella Montgomery not gone well? Just as I was thinking that, he pulled out a cigarette and lit it. He had actually quit smoking a long time ago. I don’t know why he started again. He leaned his head back, staring at the ceiling. His eyes were wide open—hollow, cold, devoid of emotion. He smoked one cigarette after another. Then, for some reason, he spaced out again, until the ash from the cigarette fell onto his palm, startling him back to reality. After a long time, I saw his lips move. I drifted closer and heard him whisper, so softly: “Harper.” That name… it was spoken so faintly, it felt like a hallucination.

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On the anniversary of my father’s death, Mom and I went to pay our respects. Mom suddenly wanted to place something inside Dad’s urn. But when the staff member brought out the urn, Mom and I froze instantly. Because the photo on the urn in front of us wasn’t my dad at all—it was some stranger. I demanded an explanation from the staff member, my voice shaking. “What’s going on? Why is there someone else’s ashes in my father’s plot?” Mom clutched her chest beside me, her heart condition nearly flaring up from the shock. “We’ve been paying our respects to the wrong ashes for twelve years? Then where are my husband’s ashes?” The staff member had never encountered this situation before. He quickly checked the system, then looked at us with confusion. “Are you sure you came to the right cemetery? I just checked—we don’t have any deceased person with the surname Thompson in our records.” “Impossible!” My tone was firm. “When my father died, I personally placed his urn in this plot. I couldn’t have made a mistake!” Mom chimed in to support me. “That’s right. We still have the purchase contract for this plot at home. How could your cemetery not have any records of a Thompson?” Seeing how certain we were, the staff member logged into the system again to check. But the result was the same as before. No records of anyone named Thompson. At that moment, the manager rushed over after hearing about the commotion. He bowed repeatedly to Mom and me in apology. “I’m so sorry, this is all a misunderstanding. Last year we expanded the cemetery, and to avoid disturbing the deceased, we temporarily moved all the urns to the funeral home. The staff must have been careless and mixed up the ashes. We’ll fix this immediately. Please, come wait in our office.” “Mixed up?” My eyes widened, anger creeping into my voice. “Why didn’t you notify the families before moving the ashes during your expansion? If Mom hadn’t wanted to see Dad today, would we have ever found out?” “This is entirely our mistake, entirely our mistake!” The manager wiped the cold sweat from his forehead. “I completely understand your feelings, but right now the priority is finding your father’s ashes. Please just wait a moment.” I wanted to argue with him further, but Mom, still clutching her chest, stopped me. “Forget it, Evelyn. Take me somewhere to sit down and let them find your father’s ashes first. We can’t miss the time to leave flowers for him.” Looking at Mom’s haggard face, I could only swallow my anger for now. “Fine. Find my father’s ashes first. After we’ve paid our respects, we’ll discuss how to handle this.” With that, I led Mom to their office. The manager nodded vigorously behind us. “Yes, Ms. Thompson, don’t worry. We’ll notify you the moment we find them.” In the office, I poured Mom a glass of water to help calm her down. Ever since Dad’s company went bankrupt twelve years ago and he jumped to his death, Mom had developed a heart condition. Over these years, she’d had to care for Grandpa and Grandma while supporting me through high school, with no time to see a doctor. On top of that, she’d been paying off the debts Dad left behind from the bankruptcy. Life had been incredibly hard. Fortunately, I’d succeeded in starting my own business. Not only had I paid off all of Dad’s debts, but I’d also saved quite a bit of money. I’d originally planned to take Mom to get proper treatment for her heart after paying our respects to Dad. I never expected something like this to happen. Thinking of this, I asked Mom. “Mom, what were you planning to put in Dad’s urn?”

Mom’s expression softened a bit as she pulled a bead from her bag. ” A couple days ago I went to the chapel and got this blessed rosary bead for your father. The priest said if I put it in the urn, it would help him have a better time in heaven ” Mom’s superstition made me want to laugh and cry at the same time, and my tense mood relaxed slightly. Just then, a staff member came to get us. “Ms. Thompson, we’ve found your father’s ashes.” Mom and I exchanged glances and immediately got up to return to the plot. The manager handed me Dad’s urn with an apologetic expression. “Ms. Thompson, you were right—it was mixed up. It was mistakenly placed in the plot next to yours. Now that we’ve found it, please confirm it’s correct and we’ll put it back right away.” I took the urn and glanced at it. The photo on top was indeed my father. Seeing Dad’s portrait again, I couldn’t help but tear up. Mom quietly wiped away tears beside me. “If everything’s correct, I’ll put it back now. The urn shouldn’t be exposed to sunlight—it’s bad luck.” I quickly handed the urn back to the manager. “It’s fine. Go ahead and put it back.” “Wait.” Mom suddenly spoke up, pulling the bead from her bag. “Let me put this inside first.” Before the manager could respond, Mom opened the lid of the urn, preparing to place the bead inside. But the moment she opened the lid, her expression darkened. “You’re saying these are my husband’s ashes?” “Yes, isn’t that Mr. Thompson’s photo on the urn?” Mom put the bead back in her bag and stepped backward. “These aren’t my husband’s ashes at all! When he was cremated, I placed our wedding rings in his urn. There’s nothing like that in here! Where did you hide my husband’s ashes?” I stepped forward and looked into the urn. There were indeed no rings inside! “Where are my father’s ashes? What kind of cemetery is this? Did you lose my father’s ashes and just randomly grab someone else’s to cover it up?” The manager’s face had already gone pale when he heard Mom’s words. Now he stammered, unable to get a word out. Other people who’d come to visit their loved ones noticed the commotion and gathered around us. “Your cemetery can’t even protect the deceased’s ashes properly? How can we trust leaving our loved ones here?” “What if something happened to our relatives’ ashes too? I demand to inspect mine!” “Exactly! You need to give us an explanation. Paying respects to a complete stranger—that’s disgusting!” Seeing him remain silent, I’d had enough. I pulled out my phone. “Since you can’t give me a reasonable explanation, you can explain it to the police instead!” I was about to call the police. Seeing me reach for my phone, the manager finally broke his silence and pressed down on my hand. “Don’t call the police. Let’s talk this through.” “Talk it through?” I glared at him. “My father’s ashes are still missing and you won’t explain what happened. What is there to talk about?” Mom joined in loudly. “Exactly! You’re running a shady cemetery! My husband has been buried here for twelve years—who knows when you switched him out for someone else! We have to call the police!” The crowd’s emotions were equally heated. “That’s right! Call the police! You have to call the police!” Under the enormous pressure, the manager finally cracked. He raised his hand and shouted. “Your loved ones’ ashes are all fine!” Then he turned to look at me, forcing out a sentence with difficulty. “Your father’s ashes aren’t missing because we lost them. Someone else claimed them!”

As his words fell, the surroundings instantly went quiet. The onlookers who’d been making a fuss all turned to stare at me in unison. I froze, instinctively asking. “What do you mean? What do you mean someone else claimed them? Besides us, who else would my father give his ashes to?” Mom became agitated too. “What’s going on? How could you hand over my husband’s ashes to just anyone?” After revealing this truth, the manager explained what had really happened back then. Apparently, before my father’s company went bankrupt and before he jumped to his death, he’d left behind a suicide note. In the note, he’d left all his remaining assets to a woman named Madison. He’d specifically instructed the manager to give his ashes to that woman as well, and to make absolutely sure we never found out. So at the time, the manager found an unclaimed body and pretended those were Dad’s cremated ashes. For twelve years, we’d been paying our respects to a complete stranger’s ashes. Dad’s real ashes had been taken out shortly after we placed them in the plot, and handed over to that woman. During last year’s cemetery expansion, a staff member noticed the photo on the urn was wrong and switched it back. And because of that, we discovered today the truth that had been hidden for twelve years. “I only got paid twenty thousand dollars for this. That amount of money isn’t worth going to jail for! I’ve told you the truth now—please don’t keep threatening to call the police.” After hearing the manager’s explanation, I clenched my fists and asked through gritted teeth. “So where are my father’s ashes now?” The manager gave me an address. “Last time I mailed her your father’s suicide note, I used this address. You can try looking there.” On the way to that address, Mom sat in the passenger seat with an unusually calm expression. “Evelyn, why do you think your father left his ashes to that woman?” I already had an unpleasant suspicion forming, but I tried to comfort Mom gently. “Mom, don’t overthink it. Maybe Dad had some reason he couldn’t explain. We’ll know when we get there.” Mom didn’t respond to me. She just stared out the window in silence. I drove quietly too, flooring the gas pedal, wanting to reach our destination as quickly as possible. When we arrived at the address, we found ourselves in front of a lakeside villa. It looked quite expensive. I walked to Mom’s side, supporting her slightly trembling hand. After exchanging a glance with her, I rang the doorbell. The person who opened the door was a young woman. The moment she saw Mom, she froze. Then, coming to her senses, she turned to close the door. I quickly blocked the door with my hand and stepped forward, forcing the woman back into the house. Seeing my aggressive stance, the woman spoke guiltily. “Who are you? Why are you barging into my house? I’ll call the police if you keep this up.” “You must be Madison, right?” I cut straight to the point. “You claimed my father’s ashes? Where are they now?” The woman’s eyes instantly filled with panic, but she kept deflecting. “What ashes? I don’t know what you’re talking about. You’ve got the wrong person.” “Whether we have the wrong person or not, you know best.” Mom suddenly spoke up from behind me. “I’ve seen you before. You were a new intern at Thompson Industries. Your name is Madison Clarke, isn’t it?” Seeing that Mom had recognized her, Madison stopped pretending and admitted her identity directly. “Yes, I’m Madison Clarke. Your husband’s ashes are with me, but this was his own dying wish. He wanted to leave his ashes with me. You have no right to take them.” “We have no right?” Mom let out a bitter laugh. “I’m his wife. This is his only daughter. How do we not have the right to claim his ashes?” “But I’m the one he loved!”

Madison raised her voice and shouted. “He stopped loving you, you old hag, a long time ago! He didn’t want you paying respects to his ashes at all!” As her words fell, the smile froze on Mom’s face. In that moment, something shattered in her eyes. Madison grew more confident as she continued. “You don’t even know, do you? We were together for a long time. He wanted to divorce you. If his parents hadn’t absolutely refused, I would be his wife right now, not you.” “Shut your mouth!” I cut her off sharply. “What you’re saying has no evidence! Who knows if you’re just making things up?” “You want evidence? Fine, I’ll show you!” Madison went to a drawer, pulled out an envelope, and slammed it down in front of me. “This is a suicide note your father wrote himself. See for yourself!” I was about to reach for it, but Mom stopped me. She extended her own hands—rough and worn from years of hard work—trembling as she picked up the envelope and slowly opened it. Inside was Dad’s familiar handwriting. The contents were simple, just a few short sentences, but they instantly brought tears to Mom’s eyes. Because everything written there expressed Dad’s feelings for Madison and their time together. At the end, he’d left all his remaining assets to Madison. Even this villa had been specifically set aside for her. As for Mom and me, he’d left us nothing. Nothing except a mountain of debt we could never fully repay. You have to understand—this villa alone was worth enough to pay off all of Dad’s debts. But he’d given it to Madison without hesitation, leaving Mom to work herself to the bone for over a decade, slowly paying back those debts bit by bit. In that instant, all the blood in my body rushed to my head. Right now, I wanted nothing more than to scatter my father’s ashes to the wind. Mom’s hands trembled as she finished reading the letter, tears finally breaking free and streaming down her face. Seeing this, Madison lifted her chin smugly. “Do you believe me now? Just leave. With this suicide note, there’s no way you can take your husband’s ashes.” I couldn’t control my emotions anymore either. After helping Mom sit down on the couch, I strode toward Madison. “Where are his ashes? Hand them over now!” “I’m not giving them to you—” *Slap!* I raised my hand and struck her hard across the face. Madison’s face whipped to the side. She stared at me in disbelief. “You hit me?” I flexed my wrist and threatened her coldly. “I’m not asking you. I’m telling you. If you don’t hand them over right now, I’ll beat you until your own mother wouldn’t recognize you. After all, that suicide note can’t prove one hundred percent that my father wrote it. I could easily say you stole my father’s ashes. I just lost control for a moment out of anger.” With that, I grabbed a fistful of her hair and, ignoring her screams of pain, yanked her toward me. “Talk! Where are my father’s ashes?” At that moment, a familiar voice suddenly came from the doorway behind me. “Evelyn Thompson, what do you think you’re doing? Let go of Madison right now!” In an instant, every hair on my body stood on end. Because that voice belonged to my father—my father who had been “dead” for twelve years. I stiffly turned my neck and looked back. Standing in the doorway was a man. It was my father. He was alive. He hadn’t died.

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My husband, Ethan Pierce, wants me to sign an infidelity agreement. Article Three of the agreement: twelve opportunities to cheat per year, unused chances can be converted to cash. I smiled and signed it. From then on, I purchased various contraceptives and sex toys for him. I took excellent care of my husband and his lovers. Those lovers humiliated me: “That old hag is so pathetic. Does she really think she can keep Ethan’s heart by acting like a dog?” I still didn’t cry, didn’t make a scene, and didn’t file for divorce. Instead, every year, I collected a payout of thirty-six million dollars. Every second, I waited for that bastard husband to die. After all, Ethan Pierce had no idea. His HIV test had already come back positive long ago. The sixty-eighth time. When the nauseating moans from the master bedroom finally stopped, I swallowed the PEP pill in my mouth and put on protective gloves before daring to push the door open. Bit by bit, I cleaned up the disheveled, obscene mess of the room. The next second, the frosted bathroom door was yanked open. Ethan Pierce walked out bare-chested, supporting a young woman who could barely stand. “Ouch, I told you it was my first time. Did you have to be so rough?” It was Sophie West, the new intern at the company — fresh, beautiful, like a rose with thorns. The two of them flirted and laughed, but when they saw me, the warmth in Ethan’s eyes plummeted. “Fast work.” He pulled out a black card and casually tossed it onto the messy sheets stained with spots of blood. “Get the most expensive bedding set. Keep whatever’s left and buy yourself some handbags.” His voice sounded like he was dismissing a beggar. I numbly walked over, bent down, and picked up the card. I didn’t cry. I didn’t make a scene. Because Ethan Pierce had no idea. Six months ago, I’d found the medical report of his previous lover. Positive. And not only had I quietly concealed it, I’d also prayed to every god I could think of — and received confirmation that Ethan Pierce had tested positive too. Childhood sweethearts. A power couple. Seven years of marriage. I never imagined that one day, I’d be hoping for Ethan Pierce to die. Seven years ago, when Ethan used half of the Lynn family assets as startup capital and became the leading business tycoon in Crestwood, he knelt before me and said I was the only true love of his life. When he knew I was overseas on a business trip missing home-style cooking, he’d fly over ten hours just to cook me a table full of dishes himself. But after my family went bankrupt and Ethan handed me an agreement allowing him to “cheat twelve times a year,” I went from being the pampered elite wife he held in the palm of his hand to the maid who cleaned up after his hookups. If love could be performed, then I’d perform until he lost everything… After all, with one month left until his onset period, I was only one step away from completely destroying Ethan Pierce. “You clean up. I need to take this call.” The ringtone interrupted my thoughts. Ethan kissed Sophie for a few seconds, answered the phone, then turned and headed to the study. In the enormous bedroom, only Sophie and I remained. I watched Sophie — who had just kissed Ethan and been infected again — sit brazenly at my vanity without the slightest hesitation, picking up my bottles and jars and smearing them recklessly on her neck. I smiled. “If you like them, I’ll give them all to you later.” Through the mirror, Sophie looked at me with contempt, a provocative smile curling at the corner of her mouth. “Smart of you to know your place. So what if you’re childhood sweethearts? You’re still just a washed-up old woman.” “Ethan said that because I gave him my first time, I’m his only true love. And without me, he’d rather die.” “So, Lydia Lynn, do you really think a marriage certificate can hold onto Ethan?” True love… I laughed. Didn’t she know? She was already Ethan Pierce’s sixty-eighth true love. Looking at Sophie’s young, ignorant face, remembering how she’d just bragged about her first time, out of what little pity I had left, I looked at her with a hoarse voice. “Ethan Pierce has too many women around him. He’s not clean. If you’re smart, you should leave him as soon as possible.” But that sentence seemed to step on her tail. Sophie shot up, her pretty face instantly twisting. She raised her hand and slapped me. The crisp sound echoed in the empty bedroom. My cheek burned with pain, and the metallic taste of blood exploded in my mouth. “Leave? You bitch! You’re just jealous of me! You just can’t stand seeing Ethan treat me well!” She screamed, her eyes reddening, then turned and ran toward the study, crying and shouting as she ran: “Ethan! Your wife is bullying me! She said I’m dirty! She’s forcing me to leave you!” The study door burst open. Ethan Pierce strode out, his face showing the impatience and fury of being disturbed. Without asking any questions, seeing Sophie crying like a pear blossom in the rain, then seeing me covering my face, he delivered another slap, viciously striking my other cheek. “Lydia Lynn, no matter how jealous you are, you’d better fulfill the agreement! I give you money, you do your job as the maid!” I fell to the ground, my ears ringing. Through blurred vision, I watched Sophie coyly throw herself into Ethan Pierce’s arms, wrapping her arms around his neck, her face full of smug satisfaction. “Ethan, don’t be angry. Let’s do it again, okay? I really want to give you a baby.” “Okay, whatever you want.” Ethan Pierce lowered his head and kissed Sophie’s forehead. Before entering the room, he glanced at me like I was trash and coldly ordered: “When we’re done, wash those sheets clean.” “Okay.” I nodded silently, watching their backs disappear. Since Sophie wouldn’t listen to my warning, getting infected was no one’s fault but her own. That evening, after professional disinfection personnel finished sanitizing the villa, I had just changed into my pajamas when the villa’s door lock suddenly turned. Ethan Pierce had come back. He carried a strong scent of perfume and alcohol, his steps unsteady. I instinctively tried to dodge, but he suddenly grabbed me from behind, his scorching breath spraying on the back of my ear, his voice hoarse and suggestive. “Seeing me with others, you must be missing me too, right? Tonight, I’ll pamper you, okay?” With that, his kiss came crashing down.

In that instant, my stomach churned. I was not only disgusted by his touch, but terrified of infection. “My period… just started.” I firmly held back his chest. Ethan’s movements froze. I took the opportunity to turn aside, my voice extremely low: “Don’t touch me.” The man released his grip, stepped back, and the lust on his face was quickly replaced by disgust. “Playing high and mighty? Your period isn’t today.” He tugged at his shirt collar, his gaze sweeping over me from top to bottom, as if examining an expired product. “You won’t let me touch you, right? There are countless women outside waiting in line for me. Lydia Lynn, you’ll regret this someday.” He sneered, grabbed his car keys, and slammed the door without looking back. As the engine roared, I made one phone call, and a complete disinfection and cleaning crew rushed in. Smelling the gradually spreading scent of disinfectant, I clutched the folded blank equity transfer agreement in my pocket. Tomorrow, as long as he signed this document, his three most core holding companies would be transferred, without his knowledge, to the shell companies I’d set up in advance. This was the entire meaning of my endurance through sixty-eight times. The next morning, at Pierce Group headquarters. As the CFO, I had just exited the elevator when I saw the CEO’s office door standing open. Sophie West was wearing a barely-there camisole dress, half-sitting on Ethan Pierce’s desk, legs crossed, bossing around the head of administration. “This month’s team-building budget is too low. Ethan said to let me choose the restaurant. The one I picked averages three hundred eighty dollars per person. Go change it.” The admin manager looked troubled, glancing at me as if seeking help. Sophie noticed me too, and smiled. That kind of smile, like a cat catching a mouse. She hopped down from the desk, waving a stack of receipts as she walked up to me. “Ms. Lynn, help me sign off on this reimbursement, will you? Last month’s personal expenses — Ethan said to expense them through the company.” I took it and scanned it… eighty-six thousand dollars. Luxury goods receipts, medical aesthetics treatments, an invoice for a couples’ hot spring hotel. “Exceeds approval authority. Against regulations. Can’t sign it.” I handed the documents back. Sophie’s smile froze for a second, then she turned and ran into the inner office. Less than ten seconds later, Ethan Pierce stormed out with a livid face. Three executives who’d just finished a meeting were still standing in the hallway. In front of everyone, he threw the stack of reimbursement forms viciously in my face. Papers scattered across the floor, one slicing past my eye, bringing a faint sting. “Lydia Lynn, is your brain rusted?” “Sophie is my woman. Over a little money, you’re pulling the legitimate wife act?” The hallway was so quiet you could hear the air conditioning hum. The three executives kept their heads down; no one dared look at me. Seven years ago, I had injected all of the Lynn family assets into this company. This building, this floor of offices, even the land beneath our feet — all of it was bought with my dowry. And now, in front of the executive team I’d built with my own hands, he was making me reimburse expenses for his mistress. I bent down and picked up the receipts one by one. “Fine. I’ll sign.” After all, once you’re dead, I can take it all back. After everyone dispersed, Sophie slowly sauntered over to my side. She deliberately circled behind me, leaning close to my ear, her voice as light as a honey-coated needle. “Ms. Lynn, last night when you wouldn’t let Mr. Pierce touch you, he came to me again.” She stroked her lower abdomen, her eyes full of smugness. “Mr. Pierce is really something. What if I get pregnant… shouldn’t the position of Mrs. Pierce be handed over?” Pregnant? Perfect. Looking at her young, arrogant face, endless excitement surged in my heart. I didn’t speak, only showed a submissive, almost humble bitter smile. “Ms. West is right. Mr. Pierce… really does love you most.” With that, I pulled out the blank agreement from my bag, along with the reimbursement forms that had just been thrown in my face, and respectfully handed them to Sophie. “Ms. West, please also have Mr. Pierce sign these financial reports.” Sophie paused, then quickly took them, her face filled with satisfaction. “Should’ve been this sensible from the start. I’ll be the boss’s wife of this company sooner or later anyway.” Perhaps my submissiveness pleased Sophie greatly. Before long, Ethan Pierce, with one arm around Sophie, tossed the stack of documents mixed with the contract onto the desk in front of me. On top were three characters… Ethan Pierce. Written with flourishing strokes. Signed right on the agreement worth thirty-four percent equity. Got it. “Oh, by the way…” Ethan Pierce finally looked up, as if remembering something, and said casually: “The company scheduled annual executive physicals tomorrow. Family members included. I registered Sophie too.” He turned to look at Sophie, gently pinching her chin with affection: “Maybe you’re already pregnant, babe. Might as well get checked.”

Physical examination. Full panel. My mind buzzed instantly. If Ethan Pierce had blood drawn tomorrow, the positive results would come back within forty-eight hours at the earliest. Given his personality, his first reaction wouldn’t be fear — it would be rage. A full investigation. Investigate the source of infection, investigate everyone around him, investigate finances, investigate the company… Then the last equity swap funds I hadn’t finished transferring would be frozen overnight. Sixty-eight times of endurance, five years of planning — all reduced to zero. I couldn’t let him get blood drawn tomorrow. Absolutely not. At six o’clock the next morning, I stood in the kitchen, a packet of brown powder in my palm. prune juice concentrate — colorless, tasteless. Mixed into warm milk, it would only cause several hours of severe diarrhea. Completely untraceable. I placed the milk on Ethan Pierce’s designated black coaster. Seven years. I knew his habits better than he knew them himself. At exactly seven o’clock, Ethan Pierce came downstairs in his crisp suit and sat down punctually. But just as his hand touched the cup… “Ethan!” Sophie came running in fuzzy slippers, plopping herself into Ethan Pierce’s lap, coquettishly snatching the glass of milk. “I want some too. I’m the lady of this house — everything should go to me first.” She deliberately glanced at me, then tilted her head back and drained the entire glass in one go. My hand holding the fruit plate froze in mid-air. Sure enough, by the time they left, Sophie’s face had turned pale. And just as the car got onto the elevated highway, she suddenly clutched her stomach, instantly breaking into a cold sweat. “Ethan… my stomach hurts so much…” Ethan Pierce’s expression changed immediately. He grabbed her and shouted at the driver: “Turn around! To the nearest hospital!” Sophie vomited three times. The last time, she was practically semi-conscious, collapsing in Ethan Pierce’s arms. When he carried her rushing into the emergency room, his eyes were red. And I was summoned by his furious phone call. “Lydia Lynn, you can’t even make a fucking breakfast right? Did you deliberately give her diarrhea!” The roar on the other end was so loud even the taxi driver glanced over. When I arrived at the VIP hospital room, I saw Ethan Pierce crouching by Sophie’s bedside, carefully tucking in her blanket, his gaze as tender as a different person. He heard footsteps and shot to his feet. A glass of cold water came crashing down. I was knocked to the ground in an instant. Ice-cold water ran down my hair, face, and neck, soaking the collar of my blouse. A cut opened on my forehead, blood seeping out. In front of three nurses and an attending physician, he pointed his finger almost at my forehead: “If it weren’t for your dead father’s sake, I would’ve kicked you out long ago!” My dead father. He had the nerve to mention my dad? He’d had the chance to save my father with just three million dollars, but didn’t my dad still jump to his death? I lowered my eyes. Water droplets slid from my lashes, like tears, but they weren’t. “If anything happens to Sophie…” Ethan Pierce gripped my jaw, the force nearly dislocating it: “I’ll make you pay with your life.” “I’m sorry… it was my fault. But the medical center… are we still going?” Wiping the water from my face, I asked timidly. “Go? Go where!” He waved his hand irritably. “We’ll go after Sophie recovers. Reschedule for next week!” Ethan Pierce turned away from me and sat back on the edge of the bed, intertwining his fingers to hold Sophie’s hand again. That image was so tender, it reminded me of three years ago. I’d hemorrhaged from a miscarriage in the ER, called him seventeen times, and every single call went unanswered. I found out later that he’d been celebrating girlfriend number thirty-four’s birthday that night. I was lost in thought when… Buzz. Ethan Pierce’s phone suddenly exploded with sound. He frowned and answered, but less than five seconds in, his face turned from iron-blue to deathly pale. “What did you say?!” On the other end, I heard it — the finance department’s voice trembling: “Mr. Pierce, there’s an abnormal flow of three hundred million dollars from the company accounts!” “The system shows the approver is… Mrs. Pierce.” The air in the hospital room instantly froze. Ethan Pierce slowly turned his head, those bloodshot eyes nailing themselves onto me.

“Lydia Lynn, give me an explanation.” Ethan Pierce’s Adam’s apple rolled. The room was so quiet you could hear the monitor beeping. I panicked. After all, panic was exactly the reaction I should have. Lowering my head, I clumsily pulled a document from my bag, hands trembling slightly as I handed it over. “This… I discovered it last week. I checked — someone hacked my authorization in the approval system. The funds flowed to… the account for that villa in Heron Bay.” Ethan Pierce’s pupils shrank violently. That was the residence of his sixty-seventh mistress, Yvonne Zoe, whom he’d dumped just a month ago. The breakup had been ugly. Yvonne had even threatened to expose him, but Ethan had silenced her with a lawyer’s letter. Ethan Pierce snatched the report, his eyes flying over every line of data. Then, gritting his teeth, he threw the report down. “That bitch!” After cursing, he didn’t look at me again. After all, in Ethan Pierce’s world, Lydia Lynn was just a dog. Would a dog bite? No. That night, I sat in the darkness of the study, the blue screen light reflecting on my face. When I pressed Enter for the last time, my finger was steady. Over the past thirty days, the old Lynn family guard had completed the final round of capital swaps. The core assets and underlying equity structure of Pierce Group had been hollowed out by me, thread by thread, over seven years. From the outside, Pierce Group still looked glamorous. But the bones were gone. I closed the laptop, walked to the window, and looked out at the city’s night view. A month later, at Pierce Group’s year-end gala. Under crystal chandeliers, Ethan Pierce appeared on the red carpet with Sophie on his arm, camera flashes crackling. I was seated at the most remote table in the corner, without even a nameplate, sitting with three drivers from supplier companies. Ethan Pierce stood on stage holding a wine glass, confidently describing his business empire. He looked much worse than a month ago. Sunken eyes, night sweats, and then swollen lymph nodes appearing on the side of his neck. Ethan Pierce thought it was just too much socializing and not enough rest. A few days ago, he’d gone for a checkup, gotten an IV drip at a private hospital, and taken a few fever reducers. This time I didn’t stop the checkup. I didn’t need to anymore. After all, what’s coming will come. At the gala’s climax, Ethan Pierce suddenly called my name. The entire ballroom went silent. He threw a document in front of me, his tone like ordering a servant to pour water: “Sign it. Just a formality. Sophie likes the garden at the old Lynn estate. I’ve already transferred the deed to her name. You don’t mind, do you?” I looked down and made out the line: Lynn Family estate Property Transfer Agreement. That was my father’s last possession before he jumped. That was the courtyard where my mother had grown magnolia flowers for twenty years. That was the only place I could still call home in these seven years of hellish existence. One mistake in a hundred calculations. My hands began to tremble. This time, they were really shaking. I finally looked up at him with reddened eyes: “Ethan Pierce, do you have to be this ruthless?” He looked down at me like an ant blocking his path. “Lydia Lynn, don’t be ungrateful. Without me, you wouldn’t even have the right to stand here. Sign it, and you’re still Mrs. Pierce.” “If you don’t sign…” He didn’t finish, but of course he didn’t need to. Sophie walked over with a wine glass and high heels, deliberately thrusting out her waist, smiling broadly: “Ms. Lynn, Mr. Pierce dotes on me now. If you still want to be Mrs. Pierce, be smart about it, won’t you?” I bit my lip, my hand holding the pen still trembling. Over three hundred pairs of eyes in the room watched me — some sympathetic, some indifferent, most just watching the show. And just as I was about to sign… Bang! The side door of the ballroom was violently pushed open. The private doctor I’d bribed, pale-faced and sweating, clutching an urgent report in trembling hands, stumbled in. His voice exploded across the entire hall, uncontrollably shaking: “Mr. Pierce! Something terrible has happened… Your physical examination report…”

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My boyfriend’s birthday—my first time staying over at his place. In the middle of the night, while he was sound asleep, I got up for a drink and accidentally bumped his computer. The screen lit up, showing an Instagram post visible only to friends. The bold title read: [The Billionaire’s True Love Game] Eight months ago, this billionaire had started publicly documenting his operation to hunt down a Cinderella. The post had plenty of followers. I scrolled to the latest comments. “What’s up with Ethan lately? No updates? Isn’t the new target supposed to be dumb and clueless—difficulty level zero?” I refreshed. A new reply appeared: “Ethan already said he’s taking this girl’s virginity tonight. He’s busy with that right now!” I looked at the blogger’s profile picture—unmistakably Ethan’s profile. That side view I could never mistake. A bone-deep chill washed over me. What I thought was true love was just a con. He’d pretended to be a poor, hardworking, innocent boy—just bait tossed out by a wealthy playboy in his game. I forced down my explosive emotions and posted from my Instagram burner account to ask strangers for advice. Half an hour later, I’d made my decision. I grabbed some chicken blood from the fridge and climbed back into bed.

I didn’t sleep well. When I woke up, my eyelids felt heavy. Ethan sat at the small table typing on his laptop, his white dress shirt glowing faintly in the morning light. Campus heartthrob looks—truly captivating. Hearing me stir, he brought over a glass of warm milk. He affectionately pinched my cheek, his voice doting and magnetic: “Baby, drink your milk.” Then he pulled out a paper jewelry box and opened it. Inside was a tarnished silver ring that looked dirty and old. He knelt on one knee, held the ring up in front of me, and said: “Baby, this is the silver ring my mom took off her own finger and gave to me. It was also a gift from my grandmother to her.” “It’s not expensive, but to my family, it means everything.” “We’ve only been dating for five months, but from the moment we met eight months ago, I fell deeply in love with you.” “Please don’t refuse me, okay?” I silently sneered to myself. Wasn’t this the exact suggestion from the comment section when he posted pictures last month? A cheap alloy ring bought online for a dollar, free shipping during promotions. And they’d written so confidently: Game props don’t deserve expensive investments. Their disgusting game involved deliberately pretending to be poor, deceiving girls who struggled to make ends meet, scamming them for money and sex. And they justified it shamelessly: This is the only way to find girls who aren’t materialistic. Ha! Screw their “good girls!” I stayed silent, lowering my eyes. Ethan maintained his kneeling posture, his expression gradually tensing. He was worried I’d reject this piece of trash. I hid my left hand under the covers and viciously pinched my thigh. Tears immediately sprang to my eyes. Then, overcome with joy, I extended my right hand and slipped my ring finger into the silver band. I quickly pulled it back, as if afraid he’d change his mind. “It’s too precious. Are you sure you want to give this to me now?” Ethan blinked, caught off guard. He set down the paper box, using that movement to compose his expression. He gave me a sincere smile: “Of course. I’m sorry, baby. This is all I can give you right now.” What award-winning acting. I wiped away my tears and clasped my hands tightly together. “Ethan, don’t you dare look down on yourself!” I pressed the ring against my chest and solemnly declared: “I swear, it’s more important to me than my own heart.” His expression froze slightly, the mockery hidden in his eyes quietly dissipating. I shyly pulled him close, wrapping my arms around his waist and burying my face in his white shirt. I mentally reviewed all the netizen comments from last night. Ethan stroked my hair and murmured: “I’m sorry. Last night… I couldn’t hold back.” Fighting the urge to jump up and slap him, I gently pushed him away and turned to pull at the bedsheets. Against the large expanse of sky blue, a spot of oxidized rusty red stood out prominently. From where Ethan stood looking down, he could definitely see it. I quickly bundled the sheet into a ball. When I turned around, his face indeed showed poorly concealed smugness. “Last night was worth commemorating. Baby, don’t bother cooking. I’ll treat you to pizza.” I stuffed the sheet into the secondhand washing machine, poured in detergent, and replied casually: “Forget it. Takeout is expensive and dirty. I’ll cook instead. We need to save money if we’re going to buy a house someday.” Ethan looked deeply moved and tender. “You’re right, baby, but today’s an exception.” Without waiting for my answer, he placed the order. Then he walked over and held me tight. “Don’t worry. I’ll definitely make you happy. I’m going to work and earn money now. You eat first, okay?” The door closed. As I listened to the washing machine rumbling, memories flooded back.

Eight months ago, I was running a street stall on Central Street. Ethan worked at the boutique shop next door. That night, a woman with a nose ring and tattoos all over her body walked past my stall and kicked over my most expensive crystal ball. It shattered completely. I immediately stopped her and demanded compensation. The woman shoved me hard, climbed on top of me, and started hitting and cursing me. Ethan, from the boutique a few meters away, stepped forward and pulled her off me. The woman pointed at his nose and cursed him out, then stormed into the shop threatening to cause trouble. The shop owner wanted to keep the peace and told Ethan to apologize. I grabbed him and refused to let him. In the end, Ethan and I packed up my little stall and left together. We were both ordinary people who’d come from far away to make a living. No special skills, no connections—just warming each other through hardship. Half a month later, he handed me discounted red roses. Blushing, I kissed the corner of his mouth. That’s how our relationship began. Ethan was wonderful—handsome and gentle. Worried about my safety, he accompanied me to my stall whenever possible. When I caught a cold and felt chilly, he held me through the night. Last month, he proactively suggested I move in with him. Living together would save more money than living separately. Once we’d saved enough, we could get married. I was overjoyed and nodded eagerly. I looked forward to our future. But “the future” was just a joke. Now, I opened his profile page. Sure enough, there was a new post. “Easy as pie. She’s even dumber than I thought.” In the comments, his buddies posted a string of emoji. “That’s our Ethan!” “Ethan’s the best! Destroy her!” I smiled mockingly. Ethan put serious effort into pretending to be poor. He worked overtime every day, but in reality, his private blog posts showed yachts, mansions, and seafood feasts. Naturally, I couldn’t fall behind. I turned around and increased my workload, getting up early and staying out late, running all over the south and north sides of the city. Every night in the latter half of the night, I’d return to this cheapest basement apartment with my voice hoarse. But I never complained. I took care of him a hundred times more attentively. I’d rather eat rock-hard bread myself than skip making him chicken soup. Watching me grow increasingly pale, the mockery in Ethan’s eyes gradually disappeared. Instead, he occasionally seemed lost in thought. One morning, I knelt on the floor polishing his leather shoes. He seemed to choke up. After a long pause, he said: “Baby, they’re not worn out. I can still wear them.” I carefully wiped them, saying: “Clothes make the man. You can’t wear shoes with peeling polish—people will laugh at you.” “I don’t have money to buy you new ones right now, so I’ll just touch up the polish for you. Look! All done! Come try them on!” Ethan hesitated for a long time before walking over and stepping into them. His smile looked very unnatural. This weekend, Ethan said he had time off and took me to the night market. He bought me a grilled sausage, half-jokingly apologizing that this was all he could afford. I ate it with a blissful expression, as if it were a delicacy. Just then, the woman with the nose ring walked toward us from across the way. She was fawning all over a bald man’s arm. What rotten luck. The bald man had a face full of flab. He listened to the woman whisper in his ear, then sneered at us: “So you two are the ones who offended my woman?” This nouveau riche posture—in the past, Ethan wouldn’t have been worthy of pouring him water. Ethan’s fists clenched tight. If he threw that punch, the so-called game would end early. My eyes swept the area. I grabbed nearby pasta and hurled it at them. The bald man and nose-ring woman both shrieked, utterly embarrassed, then cursed and charged at us. I shielded Ethan behind me, waving the bamboo stick from my sausage while shouting tremblingly: “You bastard! Don’t think having money means you can bully people!” The bald man’s eyes widened as he tried to kick me. “Bitch, who are you trying to scare?” But he didn’t succeed. Ethan stepped forward quickly, kicked his foot away with one leg, then kicked him to the ground. His hand gripped the bald man’s throat, his expression murderous. “You want to die?” The bald man’s face turned completely red. A few seconds later, Ethan released him. The bald man didn’t even bother with nose-ring woman and fled directly. Ethan grabbed my hand and threw away the bamboo stick. “Do you know you could go to jail if you hurt someone? Just because of me… you fool.” His words were tender, but his eyes held scrutiny. I squeezed out tears and smiled at him. “You’re my man. I protect my boyfriend. Do I need a reason?” “Ethan, I’d do anything for you.” For an instant, something seemed to crack in his eyes. Ethan, who played with people’s hearts, claimed not to believe in genuine feelings—but what he wanted most was exactly that: genuine feelings.

That day when we got home, Ethan proactively put his arm around me for a selfie and posted this couple photo to social media for the first time. I understood—my progress bar had advanced another notch. Late that night, I opened his private profile page in the bathroom. Sure enough, there was a new blog post. He’d written about today’s events. The comments were full of mockery: “This chick’s got some fire in her.” “Ethan, are you catching feelings?” “Tsk tsk tsk, is Ethan going serious? You’ll lose the game if you do.” Ethan hadn’t replied to a single comment. The next night at midnight, he came home reeking of alcohol, looking at me with both despair and pain. “I’m sorry. Baby, let’s break up.” He pulled out a diagnostic report. “I’ve been feeling unwell these past few days—dizzy, headaches. I went to the hospital today for a checkup. Turns out I have a brain tumor.” “Surgery would cost at least two hundred thousand dollars. Where would I get that kind of money?” Did he steal this from a soap opera? I resisted rolling my eyes. Ethan half-reclined on the sofa, tears streaming down his face. “Lily, I can’t ruin your entire life.” I clasped my hands together, my nails digging into my palms, my lips biting until they bled. Between my part-time jobs and street stall, I’d only managed to save fifty thousand dollars so far. Two hundred thousand could crush me. Ethan cried while sneaking glances at me. He was waiting to see how I’d agree to break up, dump this terminally ill boyfriend, and restart my life. But I said nothing and turned to leave. The door clicked shut. His mouth opened—he hadn’t expected me to leave without a single word. After turning two streets, I opened his profile page. Ethan’s tone was agitated. “She ran off over two hundred thousand. Really poor, cheap, and worthless.” The comment section echoed in agreement: “Normal. For poor people, two hundred thousand is worth more than life itself.” “Ethan, you’ve played with this one for most of a year. Getting bored? Let’s find someone new!” Ethan didn’t reply, but he didn’t leave either. He stayed in the basement apartment, continuing to smoke and drink. Staring fixedly at the door.

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When I got home from work, I noticed one of the spare keys on the table was missing. I asked my husband Ethan about it. He said he’d lost it. In the shower, I spotted a strand of hair stuck to the drain. Long, curly, wine-red. My hair was short. Soon after, I received a message on my phone. It was from Vivian, Ethan’s newly hired assistant. “Aria, Ethan gave me a spare key the other day. He said it was for convenience.” I didn’t respond. The next day, I changed the locks. Then I posted a message in the company’s group chat. “Locks have been changed. If Vivian wants a new key, she can come find me.” The moment Ethan got home, his face darkened. “Aria Summers, have you lost your mind? What nonsense are you spouting in the company group? Do you know what people are saying about her?” I set down the soup. Looking straight at him, I asked, “Then why did you lie about losing the key?” He froze. After a long pause, he sighed, his voice softening slightly. “Vivian is my assistant. Giving her a key was just for convenience. I lied because I was worried you’d overthink things. Did you really need to react like this?” I was silent for a few seconds, my voice hoarse. “Should I just give her all the keys then?” “Aria Summers!” Ethan raised his voice impatiently. “Vivian left crying this afternoon. She and I are just normal colleagues. Can you stop being so paranoid?” “Then how do you explain the overlapping handprints on the shower wall?” “What handprints?” I grabbed his arm and pulled him into the bathroom, pointing at the wall where the handprints should be. But there was nothing there. Ethan immediately shook me off and snorted coldly. “I don’t want to fight with you, but this better not happen again! Go reflect on yourself.” Then he kicked me out of the group chat. A new notification popped up on my screen, showing that I, the administrative assistant, had been terminated. The grayed-out group number and the termination notice. Like two heavy slaps across my face, leaving it burning. The fragrance of soup drifted from the kitchen into my nostrils. Suddenly, it didn’t smell good anymore.

Seven years. I hadn’t waited for his proposal yet, but I’d waited for him to publicly defend someone else. It reminded me of the year my father jumped off a building and my mother left. He had held me then, his eyes red, voice low and fierce. “Aria, listen to me. Even if the whole world abandons you, you still have me. If I can’t do surgery, I can still be a pharmaceutical rep. I can give you a home, a balcony for growing flowers. You plant azaleas, I’ll grow succulents, and we’ll have lots and lots of children…” My heart had ached with tenderness then. I couldn’t refuse Ethan, who had ruined his hands saving me in a car accident, losing his ability to hold a scalpel, yet still making me promises. I stayed. From a tenth-level pianist to a nanny who racked her brains to take care of him. Massages, cooking soup, arranging daily life—my entire existence revolved around Ethan. My mom couldn’t understand. “Is it worth giving up your life’s dream for him?” I had answered with certainty. But now, looking at Ethan’s still-handsome face under the warm lights, growing increasingly cold and distant, I realized I’d been wrong. Ethan and I fell into a cold war. He stopped coming home, and I had the housekeeper continue delivering his meals as usual. Vivian’s social media posts became increasingly frequent. Like the Pikachu slippers that appeared outside Ethan’s usual break room. Not my size. Not his style either. Like the new soup bowl Ethan was using, in a pink he would never choose. In the photo, they shared one bowl of soup, smiling at each other. Vivian’s caption read, “Drinking love soup with the one I love. Some old things are destined to exit the stage.” But I’d spent four hours making that soup. The discarded bowl was from the matching couple’s set I’d given him seven years ago. In the comments, someone teased, “Did Ethan switch girlfriends? Better than the previous one, they look more compatible.” Ethan didn’t deny it. Instead, he liked the comment. The lighting was warm and yellow. The heating was on full blast. Yet I felt bone-chillingly cold. Because of Ethan’s casual like, my seven years of giving everything were just “old things” in others’ eyes and “the previous one” in his. With a ding, Vivian tagged me in a post. “Sorry, Aria. Last time I accidentally got my clothes dirty and borrowed your bathroom. I apologize. Please don’t make things difficult for Ethan because of this.” “Ethan said he’s already added my fingerprint to the system, so I don’t need to get keys from you anymore…” Followed by a smug emoji. She had every reason to be smug. Apologizing on the surface while secretly telling everyone that Ethan was on her side. An acquaintance defended me. “Is this an apology or marking territory? Ethan, aren’t you going to do something about this?” “Do what? Can’t you see Mrs. Blake is about to be replaced?” The comment section erupted. Ethan said nothing, but under the “Mrs. Blake is being replaced” comment, he posted a smiley face. I stared at the screen. My eyes stung with pain. I exited the app and opened the fingerprint settings. Deleted my newly added fingerprint, leaving only his two. Ethan wanted a replacement. And I was tired of being his nanny.

That evening, Ethan came home. His face was expressionless, but his eyes gleamed brightly. Then he shoved a music score into my arms. “I promised to give you this before. Here.” He pushed me down onto the sofa and sat at the piano himself. With his back to me, hunched over, he clumsily searched for each key. If this were before, I would have, like Vivian, taken a photo and posted it with the caption, “My boyfriend is trying so hard to make me smile!” But now, I just asked calmly, “When did it start?” The piano stopped. Ethan turned around, his brows furrowed tightly. “I’ve explained. I’ve apologized. Aria Summers, what more do you want?” I looked up at him directly. “There’s an extra pair of slippers at home, a new perfume, and a Pikachu plush. The bedside drawer also has several boxes of ultra-thin condoms, the strawberry-flavored kind we never bought. Your closet—” “Enough!” The living room fell into dead silence. Only our amplified breathing could be heard. Ethan stood still for a few seconds before getting up. The music score crumpled in his grip, his knuckles white with tension. He looked at me with disappointed, cold eyes. “Aria Summers, I’m starting to wonder if your father’s mental illness was hereditary. Are you planning to jump off a building to force me next?” “Just like how your mother cheated and your father used death to force her?” A roaring sound filled my ears. My heart felt like it had exploded. I’d thought he might argue or deny. I never expected him to tear open my old wounds this way. “Some things are better left unsaid—that’s adult maturity! No matter what I do outside, you’re still the future Mrs. Blake. I ruined my hands for you, gave up my dream of being a doctor. What more do you have to be suspicious about?” “Vivian shouldn’t have showered in your bathroom, but she apologized. Don’t blow other things out of proportion and target her!” His voice grew louder with each word. Combined with those cold eyes, every word cut like a sharp blade. As if the one being unclear with a subordinate, maintaining an ambiguous relationship, wasn’t him, but me. I looked at him, finding the certainty in his eyes painfully glaring. Not the guilt of being caught, but the confidence that I had no way out, that I wouldn’t dare break things off with him. My throat felt blocked. I didn’t say another word. He only remembered ruining his hands, giving up his dream of being a doctor. But he’d forgotten that I’d also ruined my hands, spending every day in the kitchen for him. After he went to the bedroom, I numbly pressed piano key after piano key. The music played on. But it no longer had the sweetness of the past. Neither of us spoke again that night. Around midnight, Ethan quietly left. When the door closed, I opened my eyes. Soon after, Vivian posted again. Five photos. Each one showed brilliant fireworks exploding in the night sky, forming words. Together, they read, “Ethan Loves Vivian.” I’d received the same confession three years ago. Back then, Ethan’s company had just gone public. On the same day, he gave me a villa key and a huge flower-growing balcony. It had roses, peonies, orchids, and succulents. Lively like a warm little home. That night, countless fireworks exploded in the night sky as he shouted with a smile, “I did what I promised Aria. I’ll love Aria forever.” Same person. But the object of his love had changed. My phone vibrated. It was a reply from my mom. I turned off my phone, opened my suitcase, and began packing my clothes. Everything else went into the trash. When Ethan returned, what he saw was that suitcase.

He instinctively frowned. “Where are you going?” “On a trip.” “A trip?” He loosened his tie, as if he’d heard a joke. “You’ve taken care of me for seven whole years without leaving home for a single day. You think you can actually leave?” “Aria, if you think you can force me to give in this way, it won’t work.” “I don’t think I’m wrong, and I don’t think Vivian and I did anything wrong. I’ve supported you for seven years. You should be more understanding by now.” I didn’t speak or argue. I just stuffed the 20-inch suitcase back into the closet. The suitcase was light. Just like this home I’d stayed in for seven years, this marriage I’d anticipated for seven years. I’d thought it was full of blooming flowers. But it was riddled with holes. Only then did Ethan nod with satisfaction, a laugh escaping from his nose. “Good that you understand.” “In this world, besides me, no one else can give you a home, a balcony for growing flowers. You should cherish your blessings.” These words were certain yet cold. Mixed with an unfamiliar strawberry-milk scent on his collar, my heart throbbed with delayed pain. “Remember, you’re no longer the Aria Summers who shone on stage. You’re just my nanny now, a woman I’ve taken care of who’s become useless. Stop with these pointless acts. Behave, and I’ll treat you well…” The man’s slightly cold words drifted through the sound of running water. I couldn’t hear clearly. But it was enough. He didn’t know. The suitcase I’d put back contained my travel documents and clothes. I didn’t leave, not because I couldn’t bear to, but because I’d booked a flight for the day after tomorrow. The next day, Ethan unexpectedly called me. His tone was soft. “Company gala. The business partners all want to meet you.” A laugh came through the phone. “Come. I’ll use this opportunity to propose.” My heart raced for a few seconds, then calmed down. Not much excitement. But I still agreed. Not because I had any expectations, but for these seven years of wholehearted devotion, I wanted an answer. That evening, he had someone deliver a pair of sapphire earrings to me. And a black off-shoulder dress. My favorite color. My exact size. My heart warmed slightly. When the grand doors of the venue slowly opened for me and I walked step by step to the center of the crowd, I froze. On the stage paved with flowers, Vivian stood at the center in a black diamond-studded off-shoulder dress. Around her neck was an even larger sapphire necklace. And Ethan was holding a ring, down on one knee. Brilliant lights cast halos around them. The clicking of cameras mixed with congratulations loud enough to shatter the ceiling. Like a tsunami drowning me. I should have felt sad. But I didn’t. Only a sense of relief, as if things had turned out exactly as expected.

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Every time my mother packed a bag to run away from home, she’d make it exactly halfway before finding an excuse to turn back. The first time, she couldn’t bear the thought of leaving behind half a watermelon that was about to go bad in the fridge. The second time, we actually made it onto the Greyhound bus before she gasped and said we had to go back to move the laundry from the washer to the dryer. The third time, I saw that familiar, sickeningly anxious look wash over her face again. Looking back at those first two attempts, I would have had to be completely blind not to figure it out. She never really wanted to leave the man who beat her. She was just using my heartbreak and panic to satisfy her own desperate need to feel like a martyr. 1 I stood outside the sliding glass doors of the regional bus depot, watching my mother’s hands tremble as she clutched the ticket to my grandmother’s town. She looked back over her shoulder. One. Two. Three times. “Heather, I forgot to turn off the stove.” Her voice was frail, laced with that precise pitch of hesitation I had grown so accustomed to that it made my stomach turn. I didn’t say a word. My phone screen was still glowing in my palm with a text from Nana: Come on down, baby. Got the spare room all made up for you and your mama. Nana was seventy-three. Her knees were shot. But she had made my Uncle Dave spend his whole afternoon clearing out the dusty guest room just for us. And my mother was standing here saying she forgot to turn off the stove. Last month, Rick—I had stopped calling him Dad a long time ago—threw her down a flight of stairs. Her elbow had been swollen to the size of a grapefruit for a week. When I was rubbing arnica cream into the bruised skin, she had forced a smile and told me she just tripped over her own two feet. I was seventeen. Not seven. “Are you coming or not?” I asked her. My mother looked down at the crumpled ticket, then back up at me. Her lips parted, pressing together again before she spoke. “Heather, honey, maybe… maybe we should just go tomorrow?” I laughed. It wasn’t a happy sound. It was just a rush of air forced out of a chest so tight I felt like my ribs were cracking. “Joanne, you do this every single time.” I used her first name. She froze. For the first time in seventeen years, I didn’t call her Mom. “The first time you took me away, we made it three blocks before you said you couldn’t stand wasting half a rotten watermelon in the fridge. Did you really think I bought that?” “The second time, you were literally sitting on the bus. You said the wet clothes were sitting in the washing machine. I moved them to the dryer for you, did you know that? I did it before we walked out the door. You didn’t even listen to me.” “And the third time, right now. The stove? I stood in the kitchen and watched you turn the dials to off before we walked out.” A flush of red crept up her neck. It wasn’t the blush of a modest woman; it was the hot, humiliating flush of being entirely seen through. She stopped talking. The paper ticket was practically disintegrating in her sweaty grip. Over the intercom, a garbled voice announced the final boarding for the bus heading downstate to Oakhaven. Nana’s town. I gripped the plastic handle of my rolling suitcase and gave her one last look. “If you’re not going, I am.” As I turned my back on her, I heard her voice crack behind me. “Heather! Heather, wait for me!” I didn’t stop. Because I knew, deep in my bones, that even if I stopped, she would never actually step foot on that bus. Three steps. Five steps. Ten steps. Just as I suspected, I didn’t hear her footsteps following me. When I finally glanced back, she was standing frozen on the concrete, the evening sun casting a long, hollow shadow behind her. She looked impossibly fragile, her shoulders caved in, still clutching that ruined ticket. For a split second, my heart genuinely ached for her. But when the ache passed, I was left with a clarity sharper than glass. It wasn’t that she couldn’t leave. It was that she didn’t want to. I got on the bus alone, making my way to the very back row and pressing myself against the window. As the bus rumbled to life, I sent a text to Nana. It’s just me coming. She replied instantly. Where’s your mother? I turned my phone off. The city skyline blurred into suburbs, the suburbs melting into vast stretches of dark, empty fields. I rested my forehead against the cool glass and thought about the first time I ever saw a bruise on my mother’s face. I was eight. She told me she walked into a doorframe. I believed her for nine years. Until last winter, when I walked into the hallway and saw Rick gripping her by the hair, slamming her skull against the drywall. Nine years. She had lied to me for nine years. And it took three failed escapes for me to finally understand that she didn’t want to be saved. 2 The bus ride took two and a half hours. By the time we pulled into Oakhaven, the sky was pitch black. Uncle Dave was waiting for me in his beat-up Ford pickup. When he saw me step off the curb alone, the hopeful expectation on his face melted into a heavy, tired pity. “She didn’t come again?” “Yeah.” He didn’t push it. He just grabbed my suitcase, tossed it into the truck bed, and we started the drive out to the county line. There were no streetlights out here, just the yellow sweep of the truck’s headlights cutting through the dark. The wind whipping through the cracked window was biting and cold. “Your Nana made a chicken pot pie,” Dave said quietly, keeping his eyes on the road. “The kind with the biscuit crust. Your favorite when you were a kid.” “Mhm,” I murmured. When we pulled into the gravel driveway, the old woman was standing on the porch, leaning heavily on her cane. The second she saw I was alone, her eyes welled up with tears. “Heather, baby, your mama…” “Nana, I’m starving.” I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t have this conversation tonight. Nana quickly wiped her eyes with the back of her hand and hobbled into the kitchen to pull the pie from the oven. The steaming food was set on the worn wooden table. I kept my head down, eating mechanically, while Nana sat across from me, just watching. “Heather, your mother… she’s always been like this.” I took another bite. I didn’t say a word. “When your grandpa was alive, he had a temper on him too. He’d throw plates. Smash things. Sometimes, he used his hands. And back then, I…” Her voice trailed off, swallowed by the quiet ticking of the kitchen clock. I looked up at her. The harsh overhead light threw the deep lines of her face into sharp relief. “I never left either,” she whispered. I put my fork down. The metallic clink was loud in the silent room. “So what are you saying, Nana? It’s genetic?” “It’s not genetics.” She shook her head slowly. “It’s a habit. Your mother grew up watching me swallow my pride and take it. She learned that enduring it was just what you did. It’s not that she doesn’t want to leave. It’s that she can’t comprehend where she would even go.” “She could come here.” “Here?” Nana let out a dry, bitter laugh. “What’s here? A crumbling house on an acre of dirt. Your uncle Dave works at the lumber yard making barely enough to keep the lights on for his own kids. We scrape by.” I fell silent. “Your mother… she always thought leaving just meant becoming someone else’s burden. She’d rather suffer it herself.” “What about me?” My voice cracked like a whip in the quiet kitchen. “She suffers it, but what about me? Did she ever stop to think about me?” Nana opened her mouth, but nothing came out. “Since I was eight years old, I’ve watched the bruises on her face turn black and purple, getting worse every single year. I put the ice packs on her. I helped her lie to the school guidance counselor. I swept up the shattered dinner plates after Rick lost his mind.” “I said, Mom, let’s go. And she said, Okay, let’s go.” “And then what? Three times. Three times she abandoned me and ran right back to him.” “Every time she said we were leaving, I felt like I could finally breathe. I folded all my clothes perfectly. I packed my textbooks. I took every dollar I’d saved from my weekend job and shoved it in my pockets.” “And every single time, she left me standing there.” By the time I finished, my voice was shaking violently. But I didn’t cry. I was way past the age where crying fixed anything. Nana sat in silence for a very long time. “Heather, you just stay here for a few days. Let me try calling her again. Maybe I can talk some sense into her.” “Don’t bother.” I pushed my chair back and stood up. “You can’t talk her out of it. She likes how it feels.” “Likes how what feels?” “The sacrifice. She likes feeling like she’s throwing herself on the sword for our family. She likes being the tragic victim who takes all the hits so she can sit around waiting for everyone to feel sorry for her.” Nana didn’t have a response to that. I walked down the hall to the guest room she had prepared and shut the door behind me. The bed was made with freshly washed sheets that smelled like laundry detergent and sunshine. My phone buzzed against my thigh. A text from my mother. Heather, I’m back home. Your dad didn’t even drink tonight, he’s being so good. Be safe at Nana’s. I stared at the glowing letters in the dark for a long time. And then, I turned the screen off without replying a single word. 3 On my third day at Nana’s, my mother finally called me. “Heather, come home. Your dad promised he’s never going to lay a hand on me again.” It was the exact same script. Every single time. “He said that last time,” I replied, my voice flat. “This time is different. He wrote it down. A whole letter of apology.” “He wrote one last year too. He even signed it.” The line went dead silent for a few seconds. “Heather, if you don’t come back, your dad said…” Her voice dropped to a frantic, hushed whisper. “Said what?” “He said he’s going to go down to your high school and make a scene.” My breath hitched. Rick always knew exactly how to play my mother. He’d beat her bloody, then hand her a bouquet of flowers. But with me, he used a different currency: terror. He knew I was a senior. He knew I was in the top ten percent of my class, applying to colleges. And he knew that if he showed up drunk and screaming in the middle of the school day, I would never be able to look my classmates in the eye again. “Let him come.” I didn’t even know I was going to say it until the words were out of my mouth. “I’m not scared of him.” My mother panicked. “Heather, please, stop being so stubborn! Just come home, I’m begging you.” “You’re begging me?” My grip on the phone tightened until my knuckles turned white. “I am the last person you should be begging. You should be begging the police. You should be at the courthouse. You should be begging the people whose actual job it is to save you.” “What the hell am I supposed to do? I’m seventeen. You want me to come home and act as your human shield?” “Heather—” “Don’t. If you want to stay in that house, then stay. But don’t you dare drag me down to drown with you.” I hung up. My hands were shaking so hard I almost dropped the phone. I turned around to find Nana standing in the doorway. She was leaning against the frame, a paring knife in one hand and a half-peeled apple in the other. “That was your mother?” “Yeah.” “That bastard feeding her sweet talk again?” “He said he’s going to show up at my school and ruin my life.” The knife in Nana’s hand stopped moving. The blood drained from her face, replaced by a fierce, terrifying anger. “He wouldn’t dare.” “Of course he would,” I said hollowly. “Is there a line he hasn’t crossed?” Nana set the apple down on the dresser. She turned around and marched into the hallway. A moment later, I heard her shouting into the landline. “Listen to me, Rick. If you so much as step foot near Heather’s school, I swear to God I will drag my dying bones to the police station and have you locked in a cage!” I could faintly hear Rick’s voice barking back through the receiver, slurred and muffled, but I caught the gist: Mind your own damn business, you old bitch. Nana’s lips were trembling with sheer rage. Uncle Dave came rushing in from the porch, wiping grease off his hands, and snatched the receiver from her. “Rick. You listen to me. If you touch my sister or my niece again, I will put you in the ground myself.” Click. The line went dead. Dave’s face was a violent shade of crimson. “Mom, we can’t just let this keep happening.” Nana collapsed into the armchair, burying her face in her hands, completely silent. I stood in the doorway of the bedroom, looking out the window at the dilapidated little backyard. There was a stack of chopped firewood against the fence, clothes flapping in the breeze on a rusted line. This was the furthest I could run. Two and a half hours away. A distance my mother couldn’t even manage to cross. The next morning at sunrise, Uncle Dave drove me back into town. “You sure you wanna go back, kid?” “I’m not going back to that apartment,” I said. “I’m going to the school.” “The school? Classes don’t start for another week.” “I need to talk to my homeroom teacher.” Dave shot me a look, but he didn’t argue. The bus station in town looked exactly the same as it had yesterday. Run-down and miserable. I bought a one-way ticket back to the city. Right before I stepped onto the bus, I sent my mother a text. I’m going back to school. I’m not coming home. She replied instantly. Okay. Just one word. No punctuation. No emojis. I didn’t know if she was relieved that she didn’t have to protect me, or disappointed that she’d lost her buffer. It was probably both. 4 It was 2:00 PM when I dragged my suitcase onto the campus. The security guard at the front gate knew me from the honor roll assemblies. He buzzed me in. “Heather? What are you doing here so early? The dorms aren’t even open yet.” “I need to see Mrs. Gallagher.” Mrs. Gallagher, my AP English teacher and homeroom advisor, lived in the faculty apartments right across the street. When I knocked on her door, she answered with a red pen in her hand, looking utterly baffled. “Heather? Honey, what’s wrong?” I stood on her welcome mat, suddenly entirely unsure of how to form the words. What was I supposed to say? Hey, my mom is a battered wife. I ran away from home. And my abusive father is threatening to terrorize the campus. Every single variation of the truth tasted like ash and humiliation. But I had burned all my bridges. I was standing at the edge of the cliff. “Mrs. Gallagher, I need to tell you something.” She ushered me inside immediately and poured me a glass of water. I sat down at her small dining table and pulled my phone from my pocket. I opened the hidden album in my camera roll. A close-up of the horrific, mottled purple bruising on my mother’s elbow. A shattered ceramic vase strewn across the living room rug. A fist-sized crater punched straight through the hallway drywall. And then, the worst one. The one of my mother’s face. I took it last winter, after Rick came home drunk from a sports bar and decided his dinner was too cold. One backhand had sent her flying. Her head clipped the sharp corner of the glass coffee table. Her temple had split open, bleeding freely. I had been hiding in the dark of my bedroom, capturing the photo through the crack in the door hinges. Mrs. Gallagher flipped through the photos. With every swipe, the color drained from her face until she looked physically ill. “Is… is this your mother?” “Yes.” “How long?” “At least nine years. Probably longer.” “Has she ever called the police?” “No.” “Why on earth not?” I let the silence hang in the air for a moment. “Because she doesn’t want to.” Mrs. Gallagher looked at me, her eyes brimming with a total, absolute lack of comprehension. I couldn’t blame her. How do you explain the psychology of that? A woman beaten like a dog for a decade, who will violently defend the man holding the leash. Who would believe it if they didn’t live it? “Mrs. Gallagher, I’m not here to ask you to help my mom.” She blinked, startled. “Then why are you…” “I need you to help me.” I told her exactly what Rick had threatened to do. The shock on her face hardened instantly into cold, righteous fury. “He thinks he can come onto this campus? I’ll have the squad cars waiting for him before he even steps out of his vehicle.” “It’s not him coming here that scares me, Mrs. Gallagher. It’s…” I swallowed hard. “What is it?” “I’m terrified that my mom will use his threats as an excuse to force me to go back.” Mrs. Gallagher went very quiet. She was in her late forties. Divorced. Raising a teenage daughter entirely on her own. I think she understood the dark, unspoken subtext of what I couldn’t say out loud. “Heather, you’re going to stay in the dorms. I’ll go speak with administration right now and get your room unlocked early.” “Thank you, Mrs. Gallagher.” “And those photos on your phone? Text every single one of them to me right now.” “Why?” “So I have a paper trail. If that man shows his face anywhere near these gates, I am handing my phone straight to the precinct captain.” I AirDropped the files to her. That night, I slept in a desolate, echoing dormitory. A room meant for two girls, entirely empty except for me. It was so quiet I could hear the blood pumping through the veins in my ears. My phone vibrated on the mattress. It wasn’t my mother. It was Rick. Heather, get your ass home right now. I didn’t answer. He called seven times in a row. On the eighth ring, I picked up. “If you call this number one more time, I’m dialing 911.” The line went dead quiet for two seconds. Then, a low, cruel chuckle crackled through the speaker. “Call the cops? Go ahead. Let’s see who looks like the white trash family on the evening news.” “You think I’m the one who should be embarrassed?” “You think you’re pretty tough, huh, little girl? You keep pushing, and I swear to God I will beat your mother so bad you won’t even recognize her face.” The blood rushed to my head so fast I felt dizzy. My palms were slick with cold sweat. But when I spoke, my voice was dead calm. “You touch her, I call the cops. Every time you lay a finger on her, I make a report. I have the photos. I have audio recordings. I have a video of you taking a baseball bat to the television. You want to test me? Let’s see whose life gets ruined first.” Silence on the other end. Heavy, breathing silence. Then he muttered a vile string of curses and slammed the phone down. I dropped my phone onto the thin mattress. My hands were shaking violently. My heart was beating out of my chest. But I knew, sitting there in the dark… this was only the beginning.

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In my past life, my piano teacher clawed her way into our family by playing the part of the doting caregiver, eventually becoming my stepmother. I never saw it coming. Once she married my father and fell pregnant, her true colors bled through. To ensure her unborn child would be the sole heir to the Whitman fortune, she orchestrated a nightmare. She conspired with kidnappers to have me poisoned, and then she watched as they dumped my body in the wilderness like trash. But then, I opened my eyes. I’ve been reborn. This time, I won’t be the stepping stone she uses to reach the top. I’m going to make her wish she had stayed in the gutter where she belongs. … My mother died bringing me into this world, but my father, Arthur, never entertained the idea of remarrying. It wasn’t out of some grand, eternal devotion. Theirs had been a strategic merger—a business arrangement between two powerful dynasties. There was no passion, and certainly no reason for him to remain a monk in her memory. He simply felt that since he already had an heir—me—a wife was an unnecessary complication. At my christening, in front of the crème de la crème of Manhattan high society, my father declared me the sole successor to the Whitman empire. He doted on me, giving me the world on a silver platter; my grandmother, the formidable Diana Whitman, treated me like the crown jewel of the family. But even a child who has everything still craves a mother’s touch. When I was five, they hired a piano teacher named Lydia. She was soft-spoken, attentive, and always seemed to know exactly when I needed a hug or a kind word. To my five-year-old self, she felt like the warmth I’d been missing. I didn’t realize it was a performance. She was using me as a Trojan horse to get to my father, desperate to trade her sheet music for the title of Mrs. Whitman. She eventually escalated her game, drugging my father’s drink one night and orchestrating a “scandalous” encounter. She thought a night in his bed would force his hand. She was wrong. My father was a man of the world. He’d seen every trick, every social climber, and every honey trap in the book. He saw through Lydia’s clumsy power play immediately. He didn’t even get angry; he just intended to write her a severance check and show her the door. But Lydia wasn’t going to let the golden goose go that easily. She came to me, weeping, telling me she was being forced to leave. By then, she had woven herself into the fabric of my daily life. I was addicted to her “love.” I refused to let her go. She seized the moment, whispering in my ear that if I begged my father to marry her, she could stay with me forever. My five-year-old brain, fueled by a desperate need for a mother, fell for it. I staged a hunger strike, screaming that I wanted her to be my new mom. My father had no desire to marry her, but he couldn’t stand to see me suffer. He relented. Lydia got her ring, though it was a quiet, private affair with no public announcement. For ten years, she played the part of the perfect wife. She was diligent, kind, and unfailingly “loving.” I truly looked at her as my mother. Then, she got pregnant. To clear the path for her own child, she “accidentally” fed me something laced with almonds. My anaphylactic shock was violent. While I was gasping for air, she coordinated with outsiders to kidnap me, intending to leave my corpse in the woods. As they threw me into the trunk of a car, I drifted back into a moment of agonizing clarity. I heard her hushed voice, cold and sharp, conspiring with the men. That was the moment the mask fell. But it was too late. Without an EpiPen, I was a dead girl walking. Even knowing my father would eventually avenge me, the unfairness of it burned. Fortunately, the universe decided to give me a second chance. Just before the darkness took me, a blinding white light swallowed the world. I woke to a voice—deep, cold, and achingly familiar. I opened my eyes to find myself curled in my father’s lap. He was idly playing with my small, chubby hand, his gaze icy as he looked down at Lydia, who was kneeling on the floor, trembling. “I don’t know what kind of spell you’ve cast on Celine to make her insist on having you as a mother,” my father said, his voice dripping with boredom. “But since my daughter has asked, I will grant her wish.” Lydia’s face was a mask of flustered humility. “Mr. Whitman, you’re joking. I truly love Celine, and I… I have feelings for you, too. It’s not a spell; it’s genuine.” My father’s patience snapped. “I don’t care about your ‘genuine’ feelings. If you want to be Mrs. Whitman so badly, fine. But remember this: your only currency in this house is Celine. You say you love her? Then you will spend every waking breath pleasing her.” “If you fail,” he added, his voice dropping an octave, “I will personally drop you back into the dirt you crawled out of.” Lydia went pale and whispered her assent. I chose that moment to rub my eyes and let out a soft, sleepy mumble. “Daddy?” The second he saw I was awake, the predatory hardness in his eyes vanished. He turned into the doting father I knew. “I’m here, sweetie. You’re awake. Are you hungry?” I nodded slowly. He patted my back, stood up, and began carrying me toward the dining room. Lydia scrambled to her feet, trying to follow. “Celine, are you hungry? Do you want me to feed you, sweetie?” she called out, her voice pitching up in that fake, sugary tone. Before she could take three steps, Barnaby, the butler, stepped in her path. I didn’t look at her. I just buried my face in my father’s shoulder, clinging to him. He paused, glancing back at the butler with a silent, sharp look. Barnaby understood immediately. He signaled to the nearby security staff. They stepped forward, clamped their hands over Lydia’s mouth, and dragged her toward the foyer. Lydia’s eyes went wide with terror, her muffled screams echoing as she struggled against them. It was useless. Our staff were professionals—they knew exactly how to handle a nuisance. Soon, the faint, rhythmic sound of slaps and Lydia’s stifled cries drifted through the hall. Barnaby’s voice followed, cold and instructional. “You common little thing,” he hissed. “You think because you crawled into a bed you can speak without permission? Today, we’re going to teach you the rules of this house. Again. Harder!” My father had agreed to let her stay, but she was a “Mrs. Whitman” in name only. In reality, she was a glorified, live-in nanny. My father knew she had manipulated me, and he was going to make her pay for that audacity while using the punishment to establish my absolute authority over her. In my last life, Lydia had also been “disciplined” by the staff early on. That brutality had kept her in line for a decade—until her pregnancy gave her the delusion of leverage. I sat in my high chair, slowly sipping my organic oatmeal while my father cut up fresh fruit for me. I looked up at him and gave him a bright, innocent smile. “Thank you, Daddy!” He beamed, ruffling my hair. Lydia, I thought, watching the door. Let’s see if you can survive this life without me protecting you. The next morning, I woke up in my sprawling bedroom—a sanctuary of blush silks, designer plushies, and custom-built dollhouses. I stood in front of the full-length mirror. The girl looking back was porcelain-perfect, but her eyes held a depth of cold calculation that no five-year-old should possess. Lydia wanted the life of a socialite. I was going to let her see the gold, let her smell the luxury, but I would make sure she could never truly touch it. She would be a ghost in a silk cage. Voices drifted up from downstairs. “Where is she?” It was Grandmother. Diana was here. “She’s still sleeping, ma’am,” Barnaby replied respectfully. “Let her sleep. Children need their rest. Now, bring that little social climber to me. I want to see exactly what kind of trash my son has let into this house.” To my grandmother, I was the perfect angel—the “Good Whitman.” I was the child who always asked for her advice, who never threw tantrums in public, and who was the envy of every other matriarch in the Hamptons. My grandmother lived for that prestige. My mother’s death had been a blow to her, especially since the Whitman-Price prenuptial agreement stated there would be only one heir, regardless of gender. My grandmother might have preferred a grandson, but since I was her only link to the future and brought her nothing but social credit, she adored me. Lydia, however, was about to become her favorite punching bag. I crept to the top of the stairs to watch. Lydia was standing in the center of the marble foyer, wearing a simple white sundress. Her face was haggard, her eyes bloodshot, and her cheeks were still swollen from the “lesson” she’d received the day before. Grandmother sat on the Louis XIV sofa, took a slow sip of her Earl Grey, and set the porcelain cup down with a deliberate clink. Only then did she look up. “So, you’re the girl? Lydia?” Grandmother’s voice was like a razor. “You’ve got that desperate, hungry look. You thought you could fly high, didn’t you? But you didn’t check if you had the wings for it.” She stood up and walked over to Lydia, plucking at the hem of her white dress. She spotted the designer tag and scoffed. “Wearing labels you couldn’t afford in three lifetimes. You must be feeling very smug right now, thinking you’ve made it.” Lydia shook her head frantically, eyes glued to the floor. “Celine is a Whitman,” Grandmother continued, her voice dropping. “To use a child’s innocence to secure your position… you have more nerve than I gave you credit for. You’ll stay in this house, but you won’t be enjoying any of its comforts. You will be paying for them in sweat.” She turned back to the sofa. “Martha, come in.” A sturdy, middle-aged woman walked in. Martha had been my grandmother’s personal maid for thirty years. She was as loyal as a wolf and twice as sharp. “Lydia, you said you love Celine, right? You wanted to be her ‘mother’? Fine. From now on, you are responsible for her every need. Martha will be your shadow, teaching you how to serve properly. If you so much as look at my granddaughter the wrong way, you’re out.” Lydia looked up, her bruised face twisted in shock. “But… there are housekeepers. Why do I have to do it? I’m Arthur’s wife now. We’ve signed the papers.” Grandmother let out a short, bark-like laugh. “Wife? You’re a legal technicality, darling. You aren’t a member of this family. You’re a domestic worker with a ring. If you want to stay, you serve. If not, I’ll throw you out and let Celine cry for a few days. She’ll forget you by next Christmas.” Lydia collapsed inward, her spirit breaking. She whispered her agreement. Grandmother then picked up a phone from the side table—it was Lydia’s. She scrolled through a social media page where Lydia had already begun posting coy, subtle hints about her “new life in luxury.” “Is this yours?” Grandmother asked, her brow furrowing. “This house is not a backdrop for your vanity. If you show this much lack of discretion again, I’ll have Barnaby remind you of the rules. I’m sure he’d love to leave a few more marks on that pretty face.” Lydia flinched, backing away and nodding frantically. Grandmother huffed and turned toward the stairs. I scrambled back to my room and dove under the covers, pretending to be fast asleep. Downstairs, the silence was broken only by Lydia’s quiet, pathetic sobbing.

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The new estate manager claimed he was a “Narrative Hijacker.” To max out Madeline’s love meter and steal the heroine’s affection, he saved her life eight times. And eight times, he died right in front of her. On his ninth resurrection, the manager collapsed at Madeline’s feet, his voice raw and desperate. “Please, ma’am. Just love me this once. If I fail again, the System will erase me completely.” Madeline kicked him out without a second of hesitation. She threw herself into my arms, her eyes wide and earnest. “Cole, I swear to you,” she whispered against my chest. “You are the only man I will ever love in this lifetime. It’s just you and me.” Then, the earthquake hit. It was a sudden, localized anomaly. I was buried under the rubble of our collapsing sunroom. Madeline fell to her knees, digging through the jagged concrete until her fingers were shredded and bloody. Her screams echoed through the dust. “If Cole dies, I don’t want to live!” Everyone who witnessed it wept. They thought her love for me was etched into her very bones. But when I was finally pulled from the wreckage, barely clinging to life, I accidentally overheard Madeline talking to the manager in the shadows of the hospital corridor. “Maddie, you and Cole are the protagonists of a strict, monogamous romance algorithm,” he said. “The narrative rules dictate you can only love him. Every time you sleep with another man, the universe registers a glitch. It retaliates with catastrophic accidents.” “I know,” Madeline replied, her voice eerily calm. “But I used the System to transfer the physical punishment entirely onto him. Tell me… seeing him crushed like that, did it make your heart ache for me?” His answer was the wet, desperate sound of lips crashing together. I listened to the sickening rhythm of their bodies pressing against the wall. “You died eight times to save me,” Madeline murmured, her voice laced with a dark, intoxicating sweetness. “He’s just absorbing the narrative punishment for a year. You said it yourself—he’s the male lead. The plot won’t let him die. When your mission ends in a year, I’ll go right back to being the Madeline who only loves Cole.” The truth was a cold knife to the gut. She had already given him her heart. I felt the ground tremble beneath me once more. Another anomaly. I looked up at the sterile ceiling, staring into the invisible void of the narrative matrix. Good, I thought. I can finally go home. 1 The Price of Betrayal When the room began to shake violently again, I knew instantly. Madeline was in another man’s bed. The muffled sounds of heavy breathing and moans drifted through the thin hospital walls, drilling directly into my skull. My head throbbed. The next second, the heavy steel frame of my hospital bed snapped. The mattress buckled. My half-healed wounds tore open in a spectacular rip of agony, hot blood instantly soaking the back of my gown. The IV needle violently jerked out of my vein, leaving a massive, angry purple welt on my hand. The deafening crash brought the nurses running. They found me crumpled on the linoleum, pale and gasping for air. Panic set in as they scrambled to lift me. “What the hell happened? How did the bed just collapse?” “I checked this room top to bottom before he was admitted! This bed is brand new. There is zero mechanical reason for this!” “Oh my god, if Madeline finds out, we are all getting fired. You know how protective she is of her husband.” The youngest nurse was on the verge of tears. I looked at her terrified face and opened my mouth to offer a hollow reassurance. But before I could speak, the heavy metal IV pole tipped over, the steel base slamming directly into my forehead. The world went black. When I blinked my eyes open again, Madeline was sitting at my bedside. Her back was to me. Both of her thumbs were flying across her phone screen, and even from this angle, I could see the soft, unmistakable curve of a smile on her lips. “Water…” I rasped, my throat feeling like sandpaper. Madeline jumped. She hastily shoved her phone into her purse and poured a glass of steaming hot water from the thermos. Then, she immediately called the doctors in to check my vitals. As I looked at the unfamiliar faces of the medical staff, she sighed, brushing a hand through her hair. “The last shift was incredibly negligent. I can’t believe they let you get hurt. I’ve already had the hospital administration terminate all of them.” I managed a weak, bitter smile. My eyes drifted to the pristine white collar of her blouse. Just above the fabric, blooming against the delicate skin of her neck, were fresh, unmistakable red marks. She was completely oblivious to them. “Your neck…” I started to say. Before the words fully left my mouth, a ringtone shattered the tension. Madeline glanced at the caller ID and quickly hit decline. A second later, a text chimed. She opened it, her bright eyes widening for a fraction of a second before a deep, undeniable flush crept up her cheeks. She pocketed the phone and leaned over to tuck the blankets around my chest. “There’s an emergency at the company,” she said smoothly. “I’ll come back to see you tomorrow.” “Can’t you handle it from the hospital?” I asked quietly. She paused. “It’s highly time-sensitive. Don’t worry, Cole. Tomorrow, I’ll clear my entire schedule and stay with you all day.” She turned to leave. As she did, her elbow caught the edge of the tray table. The glass of scalding hot water she had poured for me tipped over, splashing directly onto my bruised, swollen hand where the IV had been ripped out. The skin instantly turned a furious, blistering red. My entire body violently spasmed from the pain. “Maddie. It burns. God, it hurts.” She stopped in the doorway. “I’ll go get the doctor.” She didn’t come back with them. I knew she wouldn’t. I watched as the new doctor frantically applied burn ointment and wrapped my hand. Once he thoroughly inspected the room to ensure nothing else could possibly malfunction, he let out a long sigh of relief. The moment the breath left his lungs, the fluorescent light fixture above my bed exploded. Sparks showered down. The electrical surge blew the outlet next to the bedside table, causing the heavy glass water boiler to shatter. Boiling water and jagged shards of glass rained down onto my broken body. 2 The Truth in the Wounds I was a mess of blood and ruin. Crimson soaked deep into the white hospital sheets. The boiling water had fused the fabric to my scalded skin. When they tried to move me, a massive layer of tissue peeled away with the blanket. The attending physician frantically dialed Madeline’s number to report the critical complication. When she answered, she only asked one question: “Is it life-threatening?” The doctor looked at my mangled body, his face pale. “No, not life-threatening, but…” Madeline cut him off, her tone sharp and impatient. “I pay your hospital a premium to fix problems. If you can handle it, don’t interrupt me.” “But—” “If you let my husband suffer permanent damage, you can all pack your bags. Do your jobs.” The line went dead. I drifted in and out of consciousness, listening to the dial tone echo in the room. I closed my eyes, a mocking laugh dying in my throat. The nurses whispered above me, their voices filled with confusion. “I thought she was obsessed with him? A year ago, he got a tiny paper cut and she practically shut down the boardroom.” “I know. Remember when he burned his finger on the stove? She took a red-eye flight back from Europe just to be the one to change his Band-Aid. Why is she…” A younger nurse leaned in, her voice dropping to a hush. “When she answered the phone just now… I swear I heard another man’s voice in the background.” No one said another word, but the heavy silence confirmed what they were all thinking. Dozens of tiny glass shards were embedded deep into my boiled, blistered flesh. Because of my erratic vitals, they couldn’t risk putting me under general anesthesia. The doctor had to use surgical tweezers to extract the glass, piece by agonizing piece. I was entirely, brutally awake. I felt every jagged edge dragging against my raw nerves as the glass pulled free from my muscle. I clamped my jaw shut, trembling violently as cold sweat poured from my face. The white pillow beneath my head was thoroughly soaked. I couldn’t tell if it was sweat, or tears. When the grueling procedure finally ended, the doctor wiped his brow and gestured for the nurses to prep a new room. “Don’t bother,” I rasped, my voice barely a whisper. “I’m going home.” 3 The Breaking Point I called Madeline three times. It went straight to voicemail. I arranged for private medical transport to take me back to our house. Miraculously, the narrative algorithm spared me any accidents on the drive. When I finally wheeled myself through the front door, the scene was exactly what I expected. Clothes strewn across the hardwood floor. Unidentifiable wet spots on the rug. The heavy, unmistakable scent of musk, sweat, and sex hung thick in the air, suffocating the beautiful home we had built together. From the master bathroom, the slick sounds of skin slapping against skin sent a fresh spike of agony through my skull. “Maddie, your love meter for me is already at ninety percent,” a male voice purred. “That means Cole’s narrative punishment is going to double. Don’t you want to swing by the hospital and check on him?” “The male lead can’t die,” came Madeline’s breathless reply, punctuated by soft moans. “But physical pain can break a man’s mind.” “He’s just taking a few cuts and bruises. You died eight times for me, Gavin. You bled out right in front of my eyes. Compared to the trauma you went through, his little injuries are nothing.” “Then you better make it up to me,” Gavin groaned. “Push that meter to a hundred.” “I will. For this entire year, you are the only man I touch.” The second the promise left her lips, the massive, twenty-pound crystal chandelier suspended above the living room ceiling gave a violent groan. The reinforced chain snapped. Trapped in my wheelchair, I had nowhere to run. I could only watch the mountain of glass and brass plummet directly toward me. The impact was deafening. I heard my own bones splintering. The wheelchair collapsed under the weight, sending me crashing to the floor in a grotesque, unnatural angle. Countless shards of crystal pierced my skin, embedding themselves into every inch of my body. The pain was so absolute, so blinding, I couldn’t even push the scream out of my lungs. The thunderous crash startled the two in the bathroom. Madeline burst into the living room, clutching a towel to her chest. She froze. She saw the devastation. She saw me pinned beneath the ruined chandelier, a pool of dark red expanding rapidly across our imported rug. Her pupils dilated in sheer horror. I reached a trembling, blood-soaked hand toward her. “Maddie… help me.” But before she could move, a loud thud came from the bathroom. Madeline didn’t hesitate. She ripped her eyes away from my mangled body, turned her back, and sprinted toward the bathroom. I watched her retreating silhouette. A moment later, Gavin emerged, leaning heavily on her shoulder. He was completely naked, wearing a flawlessly executed expression of distress, while Madeline looked at him with frantic, obsessive concern. In that moment, the final piece clicked into place. Madeline didn’t love me anymore. Gavin looked over her shoulder, meeting my eyes. He shot me a wicked, triumphant smirk, and pressed his bare chest closer to my wife. The pain finally dragged me under, and the world went beautifully, mercifully dark. 4 Prelude to an Exit While I was unconscious, a mechanical voice looped endlessly in my head. [Plot trajectory deviating. Plot trajectory deviating. Commencing repairs. Commencing repairs…] I forced my eyes open. I was floating in a stark, blindingly white void. A metallic, humanoid entity—an Administrator—was frantically smashing its hands against a floating holographic keyboard, trying to patch the broken code of this universe. “I have a solution,” I told it. The Administrator paused, turning its blank face toward me. I laid out my plan. It processed the data, then gave a slow, mechanical nod. “But once the bugs are fixed,” I said firmly, “I want to be extracted. I want to go back to my original world.” Madeline didn’t know this, but I wasn’t from this universe. I had accidentally transmigrated into this romance novel years ago. Over time, living in Cole’s skin, breathing his air, and experiencing Madeline’s overwhelming affection, I had truly fallen in love with her. I embraced my role. But I never expected her to betray the very foundation of this world. Even though the narrative was hard-coded to make her strictly monogamous, she couldn’t resist the allure of a new player dropping into her life. She compromised her soul. She weaponized the universe to torture me. I saw reality for what it was. I wasn’t going to cling to the rotting scraps of her affection, begging for her to turn back. With the deal struck, I woke up. This time, Madeline wasn’t by my bed. Instead, the living room was alive with conversation. “The doctor said the impact from the chandelier practically shattered his spine,” Gavin was saying. “He’s likely going to be paralyzed, Maddie. Are you really going to spend the rest of your life tied to a cripple?” “Then you stay,” Madeline replied softly. “If he’s paralyzed, he can’t interfere with us anymore.” “Maddie…” “Don’t leave me, Gavin. A year isn’t enough. I want you by my side forever.” Her confession hit me like a phantom limb. A dull, aching echo of something that used to be whole. I remembered the early days of our marriage. We were curled up on the sofa, her head resting on my chest as she aimlessly scrolled on her phone. I had kissed the top of her head and asked, “Hey, what if I just vanished one day? Would you come looking for me?” She had dropped her phone instantly, her arms locking around my neck in a panicked grip. “Don’t ever say things like that. I can’t even process the thought of you gone. I would lose my mind, Cole.” She had looked up at me, her eyes shining. “We are going to be together forever. One lifetime isn’t enough. I’m going to find you in the next one, too.” Oh, Maddie. The version of you in this lifetime doesn’t love me anymore. It was time for me to go. 5 The Wedding Trap In the days that followed, they stopped hiding. Perhaps because I was entirely bedridden, functioning as little more than a breathing corpse, Madeline and Gavin threw caution to the wind. They practically lived on top of each other, constantly tangled together like teenagers in the throes of first love. And for me, the universe’s wrath became a daily occurrence. If a wardrobe wasn’t collapsing on me, a freak electrical fire was breaking out in my room. A gas leak nearly suffocated me. Even when I was simply wheeled onto the patio to feel the sun, a stray hunting knife from the neighbor’s yard inexplicably launched over the fence and embedded itself in my chest. A month blurred by. I was wrapped in thick, blood-stained gauze from head to toe. Not a single hospital in the city would admit me. The whispers said I was cursed, a magnet for death, and they were terrified I would die on their watch and ruin their statistics. I didn’t care about the rumors. I was just waiting. Counting the seconds until my extraction. Until Gavin came into my room alone. He leaned over the bed, tracing a heavy gold band on his middle finger. His eyes gleamed with malice. “You know, Cole, Madeline’s love meter for me has hit ninety-nine percent. For that final one percent, she told me she wants to give me a wedding. She wants to be my wife.” He chuckled, a dark, venomous sound. “You really failed, didn’t you? Even with the Author’s algorithm hard-coding her to be obsessed with you, she’s willing to break reality just to walk down the aisle for me. To make sure I leave with no regrets.” I stared up at him from my fortress of bandages. My voice was raspy, hollow. “Gavin… is your mission really just about making her love you?” His smug expression faltered for a fraction of a second. Then, he leaned in so close I could smell the mint on his breath. “Does it matter? Once her love meter hits one hundred, I get everything I came for.” “Then I wish you a beautiful marriage,” I whispered. “May you two be deeply, madly in love for the rest of your lives. Forever tied together. Never to be parted.” My blessing wiped the smile off his face. He grabbed my throat, his grip tight enough to cut off my oxygen. “What the fuck are you talking about? Who wants to be stuck in this simulated hellscape tied down to one woman for a whole lifetime? Only a pathetic idiot like you actually believes a woman’s promises mean forever.”

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