Mind-Bending Short Stories & Hypocrisy Face Slapping Novels

On Valentine's Day, as my girlfriend, Christy Lawrence, and I stroll along a tourist hot spot, a photographer asks me, "Care to take a photo? Oh, you brought someone new again!" I brush it off as a joke, but Christy stops the photographer and says seriously, "He told me I'm his first girlfriend. How can you make up a lie like that?" The photographer snorts. "This young man here brings a different young woman with him to take a photo here every six months. I still have the photos to prove it!" He brings out his phone and shows us a photo of a couple—the man looks exactly like me. All of the surrounding tourists start eyeing me scornfully. I take my phone out and make a call. "Hello, I suspect that someone has stolen my identity. Could you please send a police officer over?"

After my dad has retired, I give him 5,000 dollars for his living expenses every month. Coupled with his monthly pension of 2,000 dollars, I thought Dad would be living a great life back in our hometown. Little do I know that the hospital calls me the next day, telling me that Dad has fainted from low blood sugar due to starvation, which leads to him getting sent to the ER. I'm stunned, to say the least. How can Dad starve to the point of getting hospitalized when he's living off 7,000 dollars per month? So, I rush back to my hometown overnight. In the ward, Dad is all skin and bones. He's lost so much weight that his cheekbones can be seen protruding. The moment he sees me entering the ward, he tries to get out of bed. "I want to get discharged! I'm not staying in the hospital! I don't have any money to get hospitalized!" I quickly stop Dad. "Dad, you get 7,000 dollars per month! Why don't you have any money at all?" He glares at me hatefully. "I don't have 7,000 dollars per month! Every month, you give me 200 dollars! You even stole my pension from me! As if I have any money to get hospitalized right now! "If not for the fact that I got up early just to rummage for junk over the past few years, I'd have died of starvation a long time ago!" Everyone in the ward turns to look at me. Meanwhile, my mind goes blank. The thing is, I do give Dad 5,000 dollars every month. I really want to explain the truth to Dad, but he's already crying about how I've kept his money for myself. He also claims that I don't care about him when he gets sick, and that I'm a total ingrate. Someone has recorded the whole outburst. Naturally, the tagline "Ungrateful Son Keeps Father's Money All to Himself" goes viral the next day. My name, my workplace, and my address are quickly dug up by the angry Internet users. Someone even goes so far to splash red paint onto my front door. Because of that, I get fired from my workplace. My landlord doesn't hesitate to kick me out as well. Feeling very dazed, I walk on the street, only to get hit by an incoming truck. When I open my eyes again, I've returned to the day I transfer the 5,000 dollars to Dad.

My wealthy birth parents, James Lowe and Elise Graner, bring me home. Their adopted daughter, Jennifer Lowe, runs away from home in anger. She gets into a car accident and falls into a coma that very night. Not only do my parents not blame me, but they are also completely unconcerned about Jennifer, who is still in intensive care. Instead, they go ahead with a grand banquet to celebrate my return to the family. My brother, Alex Lowe, spends millions of dollars to have a custom necklace made just for me. For a moment, I believe that I have finally found my family that loves me after being 20 years apart from them. But the instant I take the necklace, a burst of sinister laughter rings in my ears. "Perfect! We only have to put up with this idiot for seven more days before Jennifer gets a healthy body!" I freeze and slowly turn around. Only then do I learn the truth. Jennifer suffers from a congenital heart condition. For 20 years, she has lived like a fragile princess and is unable to engage in any strenuous activity. My parents dote on her so much that the real reason they bring me home is so that she can swap bodies with me. They want her to take over my healthy body. Even after discovering the truth, I still put the necklace around my neck. But after we switch bodies, why do Mom and Dad stop smiling?

I had just finished my check-up and stepped out through the glass doors of the hospital's outpatient building when a sudden, brutal force yanked my arm. I stumbled and crashed onto the cold tiled floor. "You bitch! Have you no shame seducing men right inside a hospital?! I'll beat you to death today!" A woman in a mink coat grabbed my collar and dragged me aside, her nails scraping across my neck and leaving a burning sting. "Since you like acting like a slut so much, why don't we let everyone get a good look at you?" I struggled desperately, raising my voice in protest. "You've got the wrong person. I'm not a mistress!" The woman shoved her phone right in front of my face. "How dare you deny it! Isn't this a photo of you with my husband?" I fell silent as I looked at the man in the picture, for he was the leukemia patient I had just been matched with—the very one I was preparing to donate bone marrow to.

There are certain things one should never mess with. Like someone else's final exam revision notes, for example. Or a life-saving online calculus course. And a chicken curry meal ordered by a college student who has been starving for eight whole hours.

The day I receive my acceptance letter from a top-tier university, I'm over the moon. On my first day of school, I pick up some greens and sauteed chicken from the cafeteria and place them on my tray. A single bite of the greens sends a wave of spiciness straight to my head. I scramble for water, desperately trying to cool the burn. My parents, who tagged along to help me settle in, immediately confront the cafeteria manager. "What is wrong with you people? Students come here from all over the country! Why would you make simple greens devilishly spicy?" The manager looks at us in confusion. "It's just seasoned with a couple of dried chili peppers. It's not spicy at all." Refusing to back down, I drag over a few students nearby to taste it, but everyone says it isn't spicy at all. My parents quickly soothe me, saying it's probably just a regional taste difference, and tell me to eat the pickled olives we brought from home instead. I nod through my tears and scoop a generous portion over my pasta, planning to make do with the meal. To my horror, a huge mouthful of olive pasta hits me with that exact same searing heat! The explosive spice makes my throat swell and constrict at an alarming rate. No amount of water helps, and breathing grows harder by the second. In the end, I suffocate to death. Even as I draw my last breath, I can't wrap my head around it. It's just olive pasta without a speck of chili in sight. How could it possibly be that spicy? When I open my eyes again, I'm back to the first time I sat down with my tray in the cafeteria.

Getting into one of the nation's top universities, Newhaven University, is something I achieve after putting in all my effort throughout high school. The orientation bus for freshmen is traveling along the mountain road toward the new campus. Everyone on the bus is filled with anticipation for university life, but I'm curled up in the very last row, drenched in cold sweat. No one here knows that I've already died once. The GPS clearly shows that following this winding mountain road to the summit will lead to Newhaven University's new campus. However, in my previous life, the bus drove through a dense fog for a full three hours before finally plunging into a deserted valley. Yesterday, it was in that valley that I lost my way entirely, plunged off the cliff in sheer panic, and shattered every bone in my body. The roar of the bus engine pulls me back to reality, and I jerk my head up to glance at the time. In ten minutes, that eerie, all-encompassing fog will arrive.

I can hear the voices of every organ in the human body. In my three years of practicing medicine, I've never misdiagnosed a single patient. For instance, a young man with wobbly legs comes in for a consultation, suspecting he has a terminal illness. His kidneys, however, start cursing up a storm. "You're juggling eight girlfriends at the same time. Even a workhorse on a farm doesn't get worked this hard!" I try my best not to laugh, prescribe him some supplements, and casually suggest he learn a little time management. Then, a well-dressed white-collar professional walks in and tells me she's experiencing heart palpitations and dizziness and insists that she must have congenital heart disease. Her heart immediately protests loudly in my ear. "You drink three iced Americanos a day! I'm about to burst out of your ribcage and start doing calisthenics!" I smile and prescribe her some chamomile tea. Less than half a month later, she returns with a healthy, rosy complexion to present me with a banner of appreciation. From that moment on, I earn the nickname "the Human X-Ray". … One afternoon, a woman walks in with a listless-looking boy. Maeve Brown looks sick with worry. "Dr. Young, please take a look at him! Lennon has been suffering from headaches, and he has already taken several days off school due to them." However, his brain is practically throwing a party in my ear. "Hell yeah, I successfully skipped class! I'm going to grind ranked matches all night long!" I smile as I diagnose him with malingering, and Lennon White goes home with a flushed face. Ten days later, Maeve and Hubert White burst into my office. This time, Lennon's complexion is pallid. Bracing himself against the doorframe, his body sways uncontrollably. Initially, I assume he's putting on another performance. However, the moment I hear the voices emanating from within his body, my mind goes blank. I immediately push him out of the room and dial 911. "I'd rather treat a dog with this condition than treat you!"