Cerita Pendek & Novel Healing

I find out I'm about two months pregnant before my wedding. Luke Logan drunkenly caresses my belly and half-jokes, "I'm not ready to be a father, Summer. Can we not keep the baby?" My heart is calm. I say softly, "Sure." In my past life, I insisted on keeping the child. Meanwhile, Riley Richards had an accidental miscarriage, making it difficult for her to conceive again. Luke held a grudge against me for that and treated me coldly after we married. As for the son that I put one foot in the coffin to bring into this world, he, too, cried and fussed. He wanted Riley to be his mother. Later, I got into an accident and suffered from significant blood loss. However, Luke and our son merely hurried past me to be with Riley as she went into labor. I slowly bled to death on the floor above, while Luke and our son celebrated the birth of Riley's child on the floor below. Now that I've been reborn, I won't lose sight of myself and take the wrong path again. I call Eric Nottingham. "I'll join the expedition team to Glacia."

I woke up and found myself transmigrated into my nemesis' doll. At first, I thought he was still a child at heart for keeping this. Then, I realized he was just unhinged. The doll's face looked just like mine. And then the bigger surprise was that he was a beastfolk. Every night, he would torture me with his literal serpent tail. I eventually told him I knew what he was. He imprisoned me on the bed and smiled at me gently. What came next were cruel words. "Since you already know, I'll drop the mask now. Tell me, do you want to use those toys or my tail?"

Our pack has a tradition that goes back 100 years. When a pup turns one month old, her father plants a moonsilk vine with his own hands, and it grows alongside her. When the pup first shifts into wolf form, her mother harvests the ripe silk from the vine. From that moonsilk, she weaves two moon robes by hand. At the bonding, the she-wolf wears the long gown, and her mate wears the matching robe. Fur from both wolves is sewn into the lining of each robe. The robes symbolize one moon, one pack, and two mates with one heart. My twin sister, Lise, and I were both due to have our bonding ceremonies at the next full moon. A week before the ceremony, my mother brought Lise her finished gown. The gown shimmered silver in the moonlight. Lise couldn't stop touching it. My mother watched her fondly. "My little pup is about to be mated. I can hardly bear to let you go." My father tried to sound stern, but he couldn't hide his smile. "If Cecil doesn't treat you right, I'll tear his throat out!" I watched her with envy, hoping I'd get a gown like that too. "Mother, my bonding ceremony is at the next full moon too." My mother waved me off impatiently. "There wasn't enough moonsilk. Yours went to Lise too." I froze where I stood. My father glanced at me and said offhandedly, "Just buy a white dress for your bonding. It's the same thing. And stop sulking and making this hard on everyone." As I looked at the gown, I remembered how carefully my mother had tended the moonsilk vines in the moonlight. She'd once told me, "A bonding decides whether a wolf will be accepted by her mate's pack. It's one of the most important moments of your life." But they didn't care about my bonding ceremony at all. In that case, it was time I left the pack.

To encourage overall development, the kindergarten had asked each student to create a hand-drawn poster. My daughter Holly refused my help and insisted on doing it all on her own. Little did I know, most of the other children had their parents do the artwork for them. In comparison, Holly's delicate strokes were quickly dismissed. Not only was her work discarded into the trash, but her teacher also called her out in the parent group, criticizing her for being careless with the assignment. As I racked my brain trying to figure out how to help Holly regain her confidence in drawing, I was surprised to see Holly's artwork among the winning entries in the state-level children's art competition. But the signature wasn't hers—it belonged to another student from her class.

In my ninth year of being with Tyler Freeman, he flaunts his relationships with other women while I'm only allowed to come and go from his bedroom. He doesn't acknowledge me as his girlfriend, yet he allows his friends to address me as such. I have a name but not an identity. His friends are bored during a private party and want me to perform a strip dance on stage to liven things up. I expect Tyler to at least turn them down on my behalf, but all he does is sip his wine and say, "Go on. You're the owner of this place, aren't you? Aren't clubs supposed to satisfy their patrons' needs? Don't let my friends down!" I look at him emotionlessly. I don't cry or throw a fuss. Instead, I splash a glass of liquor in his face. The following day, I trash the club. Three months later, Tyler finally thinks of calling me. "Where are you? Aren't you gonna get the hell back here? Do you really expect me to beg you to come back? Do you think you're worthy of that?" I pull my newlywed husband to the camera. "Sorry, Mr. Freeman. I'm getting married. You don't need to come, but do get me a wedding gift." Unexpectedly, he threatens to show my husband intimate videos of me when he sees me in a wedding gown.

After being reborn, I'm taken back to the day I confessed my love for my childhood friend. In my past life, I had to plead and beg before he begrudgingly agreed to marry me. "You look pathetic when you beg me for anything, Annabelle." That was what Hayden Gulman always said to me. He was so cold to me that he even canceled the part where we read our vows to each other during the wedding. When I was eight months pregnant, he took a photo of my belly covered in stretch marks. Then, he complained to his true love about the unhappiness he faced after marrying me. When I went into a difficult labor due to my agitation, he and his true love were on vacation. At that moment, my heart finally died. It turned out my one-woman show couldn't be considered love at all. Now that I've been reborn, I smile when I see the disdainful look in his eyes. I say, "We have nothing to do with each other from this moment on. I only wish to be happy."

When Levi Ezra and I got married, he had solemnly vowed he would love me for a lifetime. Seven years later, he got another woman pregnant — a woman he had so carefully tucked away in a luxurious estate, complete with everything money could buy for a perfect, pampered delivery. By the time I discovered the truth, his mistress's belly was already round and heavy. Her due date was just around the corner. Levi had hesitated — for barely a second — before instinctively shielding her behind him, as though I were some threat. He said, "Nikki, you're terrified of childbirth. Now that this baby is coming, the Ezra family will finally have an heir. You won't have to suffer anymore. We'll still be the same as before. Nothing will change." I clutched the freshly issued pregnancy report in my hand — the one confirming my own child — and let out a laugh so sharp and brittle that it shattered into tears. The day his mistress went into labor, I terminated my pregnancy. I left the divorce papers on his desk, packed my bags, and boarded the first flight to a foreign land.

On the night of the Benedetto family's Harvest Festival, my Mafia husband, Salvatore, told me to bring our son, Giuseppe, to the family gathering. He said his madre had finally accepted us into the Benedetto bloodline. I was trembling with excitement in our little cottage as I dressed Giuseppe in his finest little suit. He had carved a single wooden rose by hand, a project he'd saved for over five years. He said he would present it to his grandmother at the celebration, a plea for her to accept our place in the family. But the moment we stepped into the stone manor, I saw Carmela. Salvatore had her pinned against an oak barrel in a deep, searing kiss. In the moonlight, her hand was undoing his tie. In front of everyone, Salvatore smiled and gently pushed her away. He walked toward the family members gathered in a semicircle and raised a crystal glass. "Tonight, in addition to celebrating the harvest, I have an important announcement." "I would like to introduce you all to the woman I have married in the eyes of God and the Church." "Miss Carmela Torrino." Before I could even process his words, Giuseppe tore his hand from mine and rushed forward. "Papa, what are you saying?" "Isn't my mother your wife?"

Leon Santoro's ex-wife and their daughter pushed me down the stairs. I lost the baby. Leon came to see me in the hospital. He sat beside the bed, his expression as composed as always, and said, "She's a child. She didn't know what she was doing. I'm sorry you had to go through this. I apologize for Rosalie." "That's it?" I asked. "Just an apology?" He turned to look at me. "What else do you want? Money? Stock?" "I can't exactly make Rosalie pay with her life for what happened to your child." Your child. Not our child. So he truly never cared about the baby I was carrying. He'd made a promise to his ex-wife Giselle: Rosalie would be his only child. When I told him I was pregnant, he'd barely reacted. Just a shrug and a flat "I know," like I'd told him the weather. Thinking about it now, I looked at him and asked quietly, "You're relieved, aren't you? Now that the baby's gone."

With the Dragon Trials coming up, I secretly cast a dark spell to take first place. The spell would bind me to a random top-tier powerhouse to coach me in combat magic. It wouldn't break until I moved up in the rankings. The next instant, I was teleported into the [Can't Leave Until You Rank Up] room. The Academy's coldest professor got pulled in with me: Marcel Thorne, an ice dragon. A screen of light flickered on in midair. [Student Cordelia must take first place in the Dragon Trials. Until then, she will be locked in this room every night.] [Failure to rank up will result in the ultimate punishment.] A whip cracked a few times, followed by moans. Then the System displayed a message. [Punishment footage has been censored.] Marcel's usually icy face went bright red. "Don't even think about it! "I'll get you to first place. Whatever it takes."

The day I became the state's SATs valedictorian, my father, with his dyed blond hair, got so excited he put his food delivery helmet on crooked. He threw his arms around my mother, tears streaming down his face. "Honey! See that? I told you our genes were anything but ordinary! The curse's been lifted! Our son's gone and become the greatest of all time!" My mother, who had just dyed her hair purple, smacked her thigh as she shed tears of joy. "Bull! This is all because I quit the club scene for good and started selling grilled cheese sandwiches at the night market! God has seen my sincerity and rewarded us for it!" As I watched them celebrate like a pair of overgrown teenagers, I read the floating comments across my vision and had to blink away my tears. "You dummies, this has nothing to do with luck!" "You two swallowed so much bitterness just so your son could stand tall in public! Frankie over here got beaten and didn't dare fight back while Tanya pricked her fingers raw just to support his studies. You two sacrificed everything you had just so he could live well."

The rich scion, Hayden Jensen, who shares an apartment with me, has a split personality. Sometimes, he's a cheerful and optimistic bright soul who keeps introducing amazing hot guys to me. Thanks to him, I've gotten to know Brock Hayes, a varsity jock, Julian Reed, the gentle campus heartthrob, and Noah Bennett, the sweet underclassman. When the four of us are playing poker happily at home, we hear a furious voice being gritted out from behind. "So, you're saying that I was the one who told them to hang out with you?" I inhale sharply at his words. Oh, no! Hayden's dark side has emerged!

When I learned that the villain was a merman who dropped pearls whenever he cried, I took out the discarded pregnancy test stick from the trash can and headed toward the rooftop. "Well, how many babies do you merfolk have in one pregnancy? Do they eat fish food or baby formula?" Theo Atwater, who was attempting suicide, slipped and almost fell from the 18th floor. I shook my head with a sigh. "Forget it. I'll just throw the baby into the sea after giving birth." Later, when the baby was born, Theo was too scared to sleep, fearing that I would release the baby into the sea. When the female lead, Melody Carlisle, and the male lead, Reagan York, were arguing and came to see us, he was looking at our baby’s swimming results and roaring, "You're one of us merfolk. How could you be afraid of water?"

My husband is from a wolf pack with a throne to inherit, but despite all my efforts, I can never give him a son. He finds it shameful that I only give birth to daughters, forgetting how I risked my life to save him. So, he begins an affair with my sister. Later, for the sake of the male offspring in my sister's belly, he brutally throws my daughter to her death and made me cough up blood until I die. Now that I am reborn, I no longer want any connection with him and avoid the path where I save him. But I never expected that my reborn sister would rescue him instead. They smugly mock me for being unable to bear male heirs. But she doesn't know that the ten-thousand-year-old Creator Goddess bloodline flowing through my veins has already been quietly awakened. My daughter will inherit the power of the goddess and become the ruler of the new world.

Maya Beckham was Oscar Francis's first love. After four long years abroad, she had assumed any feelings he once held for her had turned to dust. Yet when she returned to Elminas, he proposed. Everyone swore Maya was the love of his life—his one true love, his everything. Touched beyond words, she finally gathered the courage to say yes. …Until the day she discovered Oscar secretly marrying her half-sister, Diana Beckham. She stormed toward him like a woman possessed, her voice trembling with rage. "Explain." Oscar met her fury with infuriating calm. "You vanished without a word four years ago. Diana stayed. Now she's dying—this is her last wish. How could I refuse?" Maya's lips curled into a faint, unreadable smile. What Oscar didn't know? She was the one diagnosed with a difficult illness back then. Later, Maya got into an accident and forgot Oscar entirely. Oscar broke down. Day after day, he pounded on her door like a madman, begging her to remember.

On New Year's Eve, Facebook blew up. The reason was that Bennett Miles, the golden boy of Crestmoor’s elite, posted an update. In the photo, a shy young woman hid her face as she leaned against his shoulder while he grinned. His eyes were full of affection and mischief. His caption read, "What do I do? Looks like I'm officially taken." Friends in his circle flooded the comment section with congratulations. The real frenzy began when Bennett announced that the first 10,000 followers to like, share, and comment on the post would each receive a gold bar. The internet went wild with envy and curiosity. Everyone scrambled to find out more about the woman in the picture. Then, someone claiming to have inside information started a livestream. "Stop guessing. Her name is Kara Sierra. You know Sierra Hall at Crestmoor College? That building was named after her! "Two years ago, she had kidney failure. Bennett personally donated one of his own kidneys to save her!"

After fifteen years away, I was finally brought back to the DeLuca family. I thought I was returning to my real home. Instead, I walked into a house where the adopted daughter wanted me dead, my father treated me like a burden, and my brothers would rather watch me bleed than make her cry. On my first day back, she set dogs on me. That night, I was dragged to the top of the observatory and forced to apologize to her. When I fell from the tower covered in blood, they still called me a liar. Because in the DeLuca family, I may have been the real daughter by blood— but she was the daughter they loved. She thought she could bully me, poison me, and freeze me to death without consequence. She was wrong. Because the night I nearly died, my mother finally chose me—and turned a gun on the whole DeLuca family.

On my twenty-third birthday, my brother, Zackary Dixon, became the wealthiest man in the country. He threw a grand birthday party for the nanny's daughter, saying that she would be the Dixon family's favorite. At the same time, something went wrong with my artificial heart. I couldn't find a suitable one, only one month left in my life. Due to the torture of illness and great pressure, I had no choice but to call him. Hearing my cough, he coldly said, "At that time, you were afraid to get involved, and now you regret it?" My throat was sore. I stared at his expressionless face through the phone and laughed bitterly. "Zackary, three hundred thousand dollars is no big deal to you. Help me, OK?" Zackary sneered. I could hear his warm voice comforting Lillianna, "Voice phishing. It's fine." Of course, he was fine, because his sound beating heart was mine.

On yearbook photo day, I went over and stood next to my boyfriend, Blake Whitmore. Madison Vance, the cheer captain and sorority president, showed up late, and the crowd parted for her without being asked. A path opened straight to Blake, who stood dead center. "What took you so long? You just turned every head in the place." Blake smiled softly and pulled her into the spot beside him. I was pushed out of the frame. Tyler Brooks, my friend since childhood, caught my arm. "Claire, don't fight Madison for the spot. She's the main character today." Then he traded places with me and took the spot next to her. The crowd started whooping. The fraternity president stood on one side and the vice president on the other, with Madison safely between them. When the group shot was done, the whooping started up again. Blake and Madison had won Cutest Couple in this year's yearbook by a landslide. A hairline crack opened inside my chest, and the cold seeped through it. I was the one dating Blake. Everyone had voted for them anyway. Out on the lawn, the photographer guided the two of them through one close pose after another. Then he called out to us. "Mr. President, where's your fraternity pin? Put it on your queen!" My hand went to the Greek-letter pin over my heart. Blake looked over at me and jogged toward me. "Babe, let me borrow it. Don't be stingy." He took my wrist and moved my hand aside, then removed the pin he'd fastened there himself three years ago. People around us started murmuring. "Oh, that's her. Claire. Blake's girlfriend." "I never even noticed her... She really doesn't stand out." Something in me went hollow, and my hands closed into fists. Your moment of glory has nothing to do with me. So from now on, my life has nothing to do with you.

My wife, Ivy Hart, is about to give birth to the baby she conceived with Toby Clayton, her first love. Her parents hire ten bodyguards to stand guard outside the delivery room. Cora Norris, Ivy's mother, takes Ivy's hand and remarks, "Don't worry, Ivy. We'll make sure he can't get within two feet of you! Your dad is standing guard outside with the bodyguards. If he dares to stop you from having the baby, we'll report him to the police!" Ivy nods, her complexion pale, but she instinctively looks toward the door anyway. She doesn't see why I can't be more understanding of her. All she wants to do is help Toby have a child to carry on his family name. The birth proceeds without me showing up to cause a scene. She smiles gladly when she sees the crying baby in the nurse's arms. She thinks to herself that if I visit her tomorrow, she is willing to forget all about our previous fights. She is even willing to let me be the baby's father. What she doesn't know is that I've already submitted my application to the Alliance of Nations. In seven days, I will be leaving the country to become a field doctor for the Frontline Medical Corp, a humanitarian organization. I won't be coming back ever again.