The Price of a Like

I glanced down at my hands and legs, eyes widening in disbelief.

"Lucy," Vanessa Parker's voice chimed in, sending a shiver down my spine. "Graduation's around the corner. I need to find a place for my internship, and this real estate agency is offering a 150-dollar discount if I get enough likes on their post. I'm just one short—help me out, will you?"

Her tone was polite, almost pleading, but the sound of it made my skin crawl. I turned to face her, her smile seemingly sincere, but a flicker of hatred crossed my mind.

In my past life, Vanessa, who had clawed her way out of the countryside, was always trying to save money. She had a habit of sharing posts on her social media to collect likes for rewards.

"Fifty-two likes and you can get a free face mask!" she'd exclaim excitedly.

"Lucy, why don't you try it too?" she'd suggest, her gaze holding an odd glimmer of anticipation.

I had dismissed it as harmless—a marketing gimmick from businesses trying to drum up engagement.

"Come on, Lucy, it doesn't cost a thing," she'd urge, beaming as she encouraged me to repost her promotional posts.

I'd politely decline, shaking my head. These promotional freebies were often about-to-expire items or tiny samples, and with my sensitive skin, I wasn't willing to take the risk.

She never insisted, but when she thought I wasn't looking, her eyes would flash with a hint of jealousy.

"Great, I've got all the likes I needed for the face mask!" she'd announce one day, her voice laced with excitement.

"The company says it'll ship soon," she added, her laughter carrying a sharp, grating edge of satisfaction.

Her glee unsettled me, but I had little time to dwell on it. Just then, my advisor called.

"Lucy, Penelope Reese from the drama department got into a car accident. I'm overwhelmed here. You're the student council president, could you handle the hospital paperwork and visit her on behalf of the school?"

I hung up, feeling uneasy as I caught Vanessa's overly bright smile fixed on me.

"Lucy, what's wrong?"

"Penelope's been in an accident. I need to go help with some paperwork," I said as I hurried to gather my things.

"What a… shame," Vanessa replied, her voice dripping with regret, though the eerie smile creeping onto her lips betrayed her true feelings.

I pushed the thought aside and rushed out the door.

At the hospital, I gasped, covering my mouth at the sight before me. Penelope's face was burned beyond recognition, her body swathed in bandages like a mummy.

For a student in the drama department, such an injury was catastrophic.

But the tragedies didn't stop there. After I had finished coordinating with Penelope's family, another call came from my advisor, asking me to look into some issues on the school forum.

Curious, I opened the forum, only to be met with an avalanche of accusations. Nathan Orhen, the Chemistry department's star student, was being accused of academic fraud. His postgraduate research placement had been revoked amidst claims of plagiarism.

The forum was in an uproar, with post after post condemning him. Though Nathan tried to clear his name, every paper or piece of data he presented seemed to have already been published online by someone else.

It didn't add up.

I had known Nathan—worked alongside him. He was brilliant, meticulous, and dedicated, earning the school numerous accolades. Polite and humble, he spent nearly all his free time in the lab. Even on nights when I returned late from student council duties, I'd see him in the Chemistry building, working tirelessly.

He wasn't the kind of man who'd resort to plagiarism.

Yet before I could defend him, a new piece of shocking news exploded onto the forum: Nathan had jumped into a river and taken his life.

People speculated that he couldn't bear the shame of his tarnished reputation, choosing death over disgrace.

But something about the timing of all this felt deeply wrong.

Later that afternoon, Vanessa tugged at my sleeve again. "Help me with another like, Lucy," she pleaded.

Glancing at her post—a tutoring ad this time—I quickly gave it a like and moved on to handle the forum chaos.

But as I clicked "like," I caught a fleeting glimpse of triumph flicker across her face, her smile curling into something almost predatory.

Days later, my once-loving father and brother gazed at me with cold disdain.

"You wretched child! How dare you steal my daughter's life for so many years?"

Two paternity test results were slammed onto the table before me. I watched, stunned, as they embraced another girl—a girl whose face made my blood run cold.

"Lucy, I'm your parents' real daughter," Vanessa declared, her smile dripping with malice. "You've enjoyed my life long enough. Now, it's time we each returned to where we belong."

What followed was a nightmare. A couple claiming to be my biological parents whisked me away to the countryside, where I was forcibly married to an old bachelor. My life spiraled into a cycle of torment, ending in an untimely and tragic death.

Meanwhile, Vanessa basked in the life I had lost. She rose to fame, replacing Penelope as the lead in a drama series and becoming a sensation in the entertainment world. In academia, her star shone brighter still. The obscure papers Nathan was accused of plagiarizing? She claimed them as her own, receiving accolades and cementing her reputation as a prodigy.

My father and brother adored her, doting on her every whim. She became the darling of high society, and soon, got engaged to a wealthy heir. She seemed unstoppable.

As I lay dying, broken and betrayed, one chilling thought resurfaced: Vanessa's social media posts. Those "like-for-rewards" ads…

The only link between us—me, Penelope, and Nathan—was that we had all liked her posts.