Melodramatic Short Stories & Independence Marriage Novels

In the fifth year of my marriage to Raymond Lowe, Lilian Smith, the woman he had never been able to forget, returned. From that moment on, cracks began to form in our marriage. Raymond started breaking his promises. The first time was the day I won a major design award. He had promised to take me out and celebrate. Instead, a single phone call from Lilian was enough to make him leave. The second time was on my birthday. The candles had been lit, and I had not even made a wish yet when Lilian called. Once again, he walked out without hesitation. The third time was Valentine's Day. I sat alone in the private dining room I had reserved, waiting for Raymond for four hours. He never showed up. Later that night, I saw Lilian's post on social media. Raymond was with her, standing on a bridge beneath the stars. The fourth time was our wedding anniversary. That was the night I became the laughingstock of Liberty City. The humiliation was so public that there was not a single person in the city who did not know about it. I sat alone in a nursing home that evening when a message from Lilian appeared on my phone. After reading it, I walked into the operating room without looking back and terminated the pregnancy. In that moment, I also took back the love I had once given Raymond. Raymond, it was only because I loved you that you were able to hurt me again and again. However, the moment I stopped loving you, you became nothing to me.

The day I broke up with my boyfriend, I was sitting in my husband’s car when I watched him buy a box of bandages for his mistress. Gavin Hart had always said he didn’t believe in love. What he wanted was novelty. The rush of something new. I laughed when I heard that. Funny. I didn’t want love either. I wanted his money. His power. And the life that came with his name. Marriage is never just about two people. I thought my affair was the betrayal that would destroy everything. Later, I realized it was the least important secret in our marriage.

My wife, Elena Shaw, brought home a baby girl and told me she was the orphaned daughter of a distant cousin. She asked me to raise her as my own. However, I knew the truth — the girl’s biological father was the man who killed my father. I wanted to throw her out. Then, Elena showed me a single photograph. The moment I saw it, I accepted the child without another word. For twelve years, I washed her clothes, cooked her meals and sent her to an elite private school. I never scolded her, even when she pointed at me and called me a pathetic coward. Our relatives all said that I had lost my mind. Then, on her thirteenth birthday, Elena asked me to sign over my shares of the company. My mother fell to her knees and begged me not to sign, but I simply smiled and took out that same photograph. She looked at it only once before pressing her thumbprint onto the document herself. The entire room erupted into chaos.

Five years after having a son with a feared mob boss, she wept until her eyes turned red by my hospital bed. Taking advantage of her business trip, I went to see my personal doctor to beg him to keep my terminal illness a secret. Instead, I overheard a conversation outside the door between her, our son, and her right-hand man: "You don't get it. He's just like Oscar when he was younger. Being with him feels like falling in love with Oscar all over again." "Yeah! He's way gentler than Dad. I like Daddy Theo way better!" It turned out that her "business trip" was straight into my personal doctor's bed. If that's the life she wants, she can keep it. I don't want this mother and son anymore.

After his eighteenth failed attempt to divorce me, Jesse Pellam suddenly stopped bringing it up. Before that, every single attempt had ended in complete humiliation and chaos. I had harmed myself, threatened to jump from a building, and plastered the company lobby with intimate photos of him and his female assistant, Gianna Seyfert. At a press conference, I had even publicly stripped Gianna, leaving her with PTSD. Jesse had every reason to despise me; however, he never mentioned divorcing me again. He came home on time every day and gave me full access to his phone. He checked in with me every hour to update me on his whereabouts. Even during his business trips, we stayed connected through video calls around the clock. But I still could not shake the feeling that something was wrong. Every day, I pressed him for an answer, asking why he no longer wanted a divorce. “Haven’t I done enough?” he asked. Yes, he was better than ever, almost too good to be true. It was not until he caught me following him again that he finally admitted the truth. With exhaustion evident in his eyes, he said, “I received a phone call from my future self, ten years from now. He told me that if I divorced you, I would regret it.”

I'm a family law attorney. My specialty is winning divorce cases for other people. I never imagined that one day, I'd be drafting my own divorce papers. For six years of marriage, Adrian read to me for ten minutes every night. He said it was our little marriage ritual. That was until I came home early from a business trip and heard his voice coming from my female neighbor’s apartment next door. "Vivi, which chapter do you want to hear tonight?" I stood outside her door, still holding the birthday cake I'd bought for him. I turned around, went home, opened my laptop, and went through our marital asset inventory from top to bottom. Later, Adrian knelt outside my law firm, his voice so hoarse it was barely recognizable. He said, "Serena, I was just helping her fall asleep. I never touched her." I set the voice recorder in front of him, and out came words he'd said himself. "She'll never leave me. She's too rational, which actually makes her the easiest to manipulate." I smiled. "Adrian, do you think the judge will find me easy to manipulate too?"

After I fail my mission, the system grants me three days to say goodbye. For the first time, I become the perfect husband in Kristen Snowe's eyes. I stop waiting up for her when she doesn't come home. I stop fighting with her over the money she keeps giving to her childhood friend, Jake Leigh. On the first day, she scoffs at me. "If you'd acted like this from the beginning, I wouldn't feel so sick and tired of you!" On the second day, she starts to get suspicious. "That's it? You're not mad? You're not up to something, are you?" By the third day, she's the one falling apart. "Honey… Why aren't you jealous anymore?" I smile. "Isn't this exactly what you wanted?"

On our third Valentine's Day since marrying the Don Arthur, he set the three places at the dining table. With the same hands he used to wield a gun, he carefully peeled shrimp. Shrimp was Lora's favorite, the first love he'd never gotten over. I was allergic to shellfish. He dismissed every hurt he'd caused me and sided with Lora every time. He was certain I loved him so deeply that I would swallow every insult and step aside forever. Everything changed when I discovered Lora's role in my father's murder and learned how completely Arthur's blind trust in her had buried the truth. That was when I finally saw him clearly. I was done with Arthur and the love he claimed to have for me.

I was always a step behind, while Ryan Walker, my childhood friend, and Claire Morgan, my best friend, were always in a rush. Whenever we ate together, they would finish before I was even halfway through. Then they would start talking about heading to the gaming lounge next door and leave me sitting alone in the restaurant. Once, while we were swimming, my leg cramped halfway across the pool. I called out for help, only to realize they had already gotten out and left. When it was time to submit our college applications, I had not even logged in when they submitted theirs and got up to leave. "Wendy, you take forever. I need to help Claire snag concert tickets, so we're leaving without you. "Claire and I both applied to Eastbridge University. Make sure you apply there too." As soon as Ryan finished speaking, Claire grabbed his arm and pulled him toward the door. They left in such a hurry that he never heard me say, "I'm not applying to Eastbridge University. "You won't ever have to wait for me again."

My wife, Eira Primrose, has forgotten to disconnect the car's Bluetooth from her phone when she gets out to answer a call. A man's explicit, suggestive words echo through the vehicle. "Didn't you say you were coming over tonight? I bought some new toys. Are you sure you don't want to come over and try them with me?" I pause for a moment before reaching out and turning it off. The instant silence falls over the car, Eira teases the man on the phone without the slightest change in her expression. Yet, her gaze lingers on my face for a brief moment through the window. After hopping back into the car, she casually reaches over and straightens my collar. "I was actually planning to stay with you tonight. After all, you were just discharged from the hospital. Yet, you heard him too. He has many tricks up his sleeve, and he's super clingy, so do me a favor and drive yourself home, okay?" I nod. "Do you need me to drop you at his place?" Eira freezes for a moment. "Look at you, making progress. You're not causing a scene and giving me headaches like you did the previous eight times. However, you're my husband. Why would I make you do a driver's job?" Then, she leans in and pecks my cheek. The love bites just beneath her collarbone are faintly visible. "Forget it, babe. We're not heading in the same direction." I plaster a smile on my face. That's right. In the 30 seconds she spends answering that phone call, I accept a job offer overseas. For the rest of our lives, we won't be heading in the same direction.

My sister Sofia and I married into the Moretti family, New York's most feared dynasty, and got pregnant less than a month apart. I married Dante Moretti, the eldest son and youngest trauma surgery chief St. Vincent's had ever appointed. Sofia married his younger brother Luca, a Major Crimes detective with a badge and a Moretti army at his back. One carried a scalpel. The other carried a gun. Behind them stood a family that owned docks, unions, private clubs, and half the secrets in Manhattan. Everyone said we'd won a life women would kill for. On my first anniversary, I left a maternity clinic with our daughter's fetal heart scans. Sofia hopped out at a bakery for a cinnamon-apple tart. That craving saved her life. The black Cadillac carrying me cut through an intersection and drove straight into an armored truck. Metal folded around me. Glass filled my mouth. Beneath the screaming brakes, I felt my baby stop moving. I called Dante with a bloodied hand. He rejected me three times before answering the fourth. "Enough with the loyalty tests, Elena. Valentina's old gunshot wound triggered an arrhythmia, and I'm treating her. You and Sofia don't get to invent emergencies every time we help her." Sofia called Luca in tears. He was at Valentina's townhouse investigating a triggered alarm. "A false report leaves a record," he said. "Stop helping your sister put on a show." In the end, my eight-month-pregnant sister smashed open the warped car door and dragged me through broken glass and leaking gasoline. She commandeered a hotel SUV and drove me to the ER herself. I survived. She went into premature labor and lost her son the same night I lost my daughter. After surgery, we lay in neighboring beds while dawn bled through the windows. "Elena," Sofia whispered, "I'm done with my marriage." I reached across and took her ice-cold hand. "So am I."

After her miscarriage, Elise Emery became exactly the wife Colsen Locke had always wanted. She quit telling him about her day. Quit calling when he stayed out all night. Even when an old man falsely accused her of hitting him with her car, she didn't call anyone. Didn't ask for bail. She just spent seven days in custody. At dusk on the seventh day, the precinct's iron gate clanged open. Elise had barely made it down the steps when a black Maybach screeched to a stop in front of her. The door swung open. Colsen stepped out in a custom suit, tall and lean, all broad shoulders and cold control. Same polished look. Same unreadable face.

During a summer road trip, a sudden car crash occurred on the highway. My boyfriend and my sister lunged forward without hesitation, sheltering me behind their bodies. My body emerged uninjured, but shattered glass pierced through my eyes, leaving me permanently blind. Overwhelmed with guilt, they cared for my every need, vowing to serve as my eyes for the rest of their lives. Though I lost my sight, I still felt deeply blessed. As our wedding day drew near, I was unexpectedly bound with a vision restoration system. "Host's vision has been restored. If no one detects your recovery within three days, your eyesight will be restored. If anyone finds out, you will die instantly." Overjoyed, I accepted the terms. But right after I finished trying on my wedding gown, as my boyfriend was driving me home and stopped at a red light, he suddenly leaned back. My sister leaned forward naturally from the back seat, and the two of them locked lips.

Elle's toxic first love had only one birthday wish: for us to get a divorce. The first time I refused, she aborted our three-month-old baby. The second time I wouldn't budge, she pressed a box cutter to her wrist and asked me to choose: divorce, or widowhood. And today was the third time. Even the clerk at the courthouse knew me by now. When she handed over the divorce certificate, she teased me with a smile, "Remarrying again in a month, same as always?" Elle expected me to fall apart the way I always did, to beg her to stay. She'd already started frowning, bracing herself to explain. I just took the divorce certificate from her hand and said, calmly, "We're not remarrying." Elle froze where she stood, staring at me without moving.

My wife, Florence Jipson, told me that our son, Bart Lyons, had been in a severe car accident. His eyes were crushed in the crash, and he had completely lost his vision. I rushed from my company to the hospital. I begged the doctors to use my eye for Bart’s transplant. After the surgery was completed, I was wheeled out of the operating room. Then, I heard the sound of everyone bursting into loud laughter. “God, Benedict is such an idiot. He falls for the same nonsense every single time and never learns.” “Flo, if you told him to go kill himself next time, he’d probably do it too, wouldn’t he? He’s such a well-trained little puppy.” Florence stood in the crowd, holding hands with her assistant, Solomon Sowden. She was laughing just as wildly. “What can I say? Sol loves this kind of drama. So, I had to play along and tell him Bart got hurt. “I really thought Ben would be smart enough to catch on this time. I never expected him to actually be willing to donate his own eye.” Even the eight-year-old Bart nodded in agreement. “Having such a silly dad is so embarrassing.” I was utterly disheartened when I heard Florence and Bart’s mocking remarks. It turned out that even family members who had lived together for more than ten years could become strangers in an instant. I finally chose to let go.

My wife, Lily Tanner, is a mortician. She's trying to avoid getting fired during her pregnancy, so she keeps locking herself in the morgue. I may be her husband and colleague, but even I am not allowed inside. I don't want her to work too hard, so in the middle of the night, I sneak into the morgue to do her checks for her. However, she reacts by going berserk and sounding the alarm. Ever since then, I've been very careful around her, fearing that it may affect her pregnancy. Later on, with Lily repeatedly receiving praise from the deceased's family, our department decides to hold a commendation ceremony for her. The whole family seems relieved. However, as soon as Lily receives her award, I ask her for a divorce. The room instantly falls silent. Tearing off the medal on her chest, she complains in a wounded tone, "I'm working myself to the bone even when I'm pregnant, and I'm doing all this to give our child a better life. You're worried that I'll outperform you and overtake you as the top mortician in the industry, aren't you?" I look away from her, a cold smile forming on my lips. "Spend the rest of your life with those bodies, then. I don't want the child anymore, and I'm definitely divorcing you."

My husband Marcus Ashford has severe social anxiety. In three years of marriage, he refused to meet a single one of my friends or family. Even our wedding was just the two of us, because he said a crowd would trigger a panic attack. Because it hurt me to see him like that, I put up with my parents' disappointment and my friends' confusion, made every excuse for him, and guarded his fragile little world with both hands. That changed tonight, when I stumbled onto the social media page of his first love, newly returned from overseas. In the photos, Marcus moved through the room with Chloe, working the toasts with total ease, laughing wide and unguarded. I opened the next live photo, and a snatch of conversation came out of it. "Marcus, isn't today your father-in-law's birthday too? You're not going to swing by?" Marcus answered as though it were nothing, "Going would just be pointless socializing. A waste of time. I'd rather stay here with Chloe." I went through those few photos over and over, more times than I could count, until my eyes were dry and stinging, and then I shut off the screen without a word. Then I called a lawyer and had the divorce papers drawn up. So his world was full of voices and noise after all. It simply refused to open for me, and for me alone. Fine. If the party wasn't mine, I wasn't going to keep forcing my way in.

Ophelia Hart had been married to Rowan Cabell for five years. He had been cheating on her for four and a half of those years. His list of mistresses could probably stretch all the way from Merion to Freeka, and the condoms he had gone through could practically wrap around the entire globe. However, Ophelia never made a scene. Whenever Rowan brought another woman to bed, she would quietly prepare a cup of warm water and a box of his favourite lemon-flavored condoms. When they were done, she would calmly arrange for the maid to clean the room. It was all because of the first rule in the Hart family’s code for women—'A husband’s infidelity is never an excuse for anger or confrontation. Never make a scene. Never raise your voice. His comfort must always come first. Violate this rule, and you will pay the price yourself.’ Ophelia had once paid that price for six months. Those six months were more than enough to make the lesson unforgettable. Hence, when Rowan wrapped his arms around Lydia Beaumont and passionately kissed her in front of everyone, then loudly announced that he was going to marry her, Ophelia merely reached into her bag. She pulled out a pack of strawberry chewing gum, offered it to them with both hands, and said sweetly, “Kissing feels better when you’re chewing gum.” Everyone burst into laughter and started cheering. They thought she had finally learned her lesson. However, they had it all wrong, because she was about to leave…

Two years into my marriage with Luca Mancini, I'd gotten used to waiting. Wait until the accounts were settled—then he'd take me on our honeymoon. Wait until the family meeting was over—then he'd celebrate our anniversary with me. Wait until his men were taken care of—then he'd call the private doctor to see me. I knew how hard it was to sit in the Don's seat, so I never cried or made a scene about it. I even took half the work off his shoulders without being asked. Because of my patience and all the times I stepped back, things between us finally softened. When he was exhausted, he'd lean his head on my shoulder, kiss my forehead, and say: "My Donna, once this busy season is over, I promise I'll make it all up to you." Today was my birthday. He'd promised me half a month ago that he'd spend it with me. I'd booked out an entire restaurant. The cake was cut. I was waiting. But from six to ten, he never showed. Then a photo popped up in my inbox: In the pouring rain, Luca was holding an umbrella, shielding his childhood sweetheart, Anna, tight against his side. The timestamp on the photo read 9:40. Twenty minutes ago. He'd tilted the umbrella over Anna's head, letting the rain soak him through. Then his text came through: "I've got an important meeting. I'll be home late." Looking at that message, I didn't reply "Got it" like the good, understanding wife I always was. I thought I'd gotten used to waiting. I thought if I just cleared every obstacle out of his way, I'd finally get the man who kept his promises. But staring at that photo, my heart sank all the way to the bottom. It was never the waiting I was afraid of. It's just—last month, I was diagnosed with terminal leukemia. This was the last birthday I'd ever have. I stood up, hollow, and walked home alone through the endless sound of rain. The man I'd been waiting for—I couldn't wait for him anymore.