Chapter 1

"The patient's hemorrhaging. Get Dr. Cooper in here now!" a nurse shouted.

She then stepped up to me. "Are you the patient's family? We're short on Type B blood. Can you donate?"

I blinked in a daze. When I looked up, I saw the words "In Operation" overhead.

I instinctively clenched my sleeve, and my breathing turned sharp and fast. My best friend, Helen Doyle, was in surgery.

Had I been reborn?

Noticing no response from me, the nurse nudged me. "Hurry up. She's not going to hold on much longer."

I shook my head to clear my thoughts, then replied calmly, "No, I'm not her family. Find someone else."

The nurse stared in surprise for a second, then rushed back into the operating room.

I let out a sneer. In my last life, I had followed her without hesitation to donate blood.

Yet, the nurse didn't bother with so much as a basic check and directly took almost one pint of my blood. It was clearly premeditated.

After losing that much blood, I had nearly passed out. I was dizzy and weak, in no state to think clearly.

By the time someone helped me into the delivery ward, Helen begged me to raise her child. I had agreed without even realizing what I was doing.

While I was lost in thought, the operating room light suddenly went out. A doctor stepped out with a grave expression.

"We did everything we could. She's still conscious for now. You can go say goodbye."

I walked in slowly. Just like in my last life, Helen lay weak and pale on the hospital bed.

She looked at me with a hint of hurt in her eyes and said, "Melanie, why didn't you donate blood to me? If you had, maybe I could have made it."

The nurse chimed in from the side, "Exactly. She treated you like her best friend, and you wouldn't even give a little blood? That's a human life. Don't you feel guilty at all?"

Helen pretended to wipe the tears from the corner of her eye. "It's already come to this, so I won't blame you. My parents and boyfriend both abandoned me. There's nothing left for me to hold on to in this world anyway.

"But my newborn son is so small. I'm terrified for him. Melanie, you're the only one I can trust. Can you help me raise him?"

The nurse began to sniffle while casting an accusing look at me. "It's so tragic. She's dying because of you. You're not going to be heartless and abandon her baby, are you?"

Watching the two of them play their parts, I felt nothing but disgust.

In my last life, I was already weak from blood loss, yet Helen bribed the nurse to guilt-trip me.

At that time, I truly thought of Helen as my best friend. Seeing her on the verge of death, I agreed out of deep sorrow.

And what did I get in return?

My boyfriend, Joe Shepherd, suspected the child was mine from another man and dumped me without a second thought.

I couldn't afford to hire help, and juggling school with raising a child became impossible. In the end, I had to leave the top university in town, going from a top student to someone with only a high school diploma.

With no degree, I couldn't find a decent job and could only do manual labor.

When the child, Aidan Sutton—named after my surname—was eight, he came down with a high fever and was rushed to the ICU. The medical bills were more than I could handle. With no other choice, I took out online loans.

By the time Aidan recovered, I couldn't repay the debt. The creditors tracked me down and began threatening me.

Aidan cried in terror day after day. The neighbors grew tired of the constant noise and reported me to the landlord together.

I was thrown out of the apartment and wandered the streets with Aidan like a beggar.

Over those 18 years, I had worked as a restaurant waitress and even a janitor.

When I finally met a boss who cared about ability instead of education, my life slowly stabilized. I began to pay attention to the people around me and hoped to find someone to lean on.

The first time I brought Zac Bennett—a man I was seeing—back home, the neighbor lady went on a rant about me while I wasn't around.

"Young man, you've made a wrong choice. Don't you know she has a kid? With your conditions, marrying her would be a waste."

Zac hesitated. "But Melanie said the boy is her best friend's son."

The woman smacked her lips. "And you believed that? She must have fooled around when she was young and gotten pregnant out of wedlock. She's afraid no one would marry her, so she made up that story. I've seen plenty like her. Listen to me. You should find a more innocent lady."

He hesitated for a long time. In the end, he turned and left without even saying goodbye.

Hidden behind the door, I crouched down and sobbed into my hands.

For 18 years, I endured endless mockery and cold stares. I raised Aidan alone with everything I had.

And in the end, at his award ceremony, I was told it had all been a test.

I wasn't even that desperate to be Helen's friend. That was 18 whole years of my life!

My youth, future, and marriage were all destroyed. Yet in the end, they told me it was all fake.

Even the child I raised with my own hands chose to stand against me without hesitation at that moment.

Hatred surged in my chest, almost spilling out of me.

I took several deep breaths before I barely managed to steady myself. "I'm not obliged to raise your child. If you can't raise him, send him to an orphanage."