เรื่องสั้นแนว After Death และนิยาย Male POV Awakening

It had been three years since my ex-girlfriend and I broke up, and each of us was keeping a secret from the other. She never told me that she had ended things to atone for something she'd done to someone else. And I never told her that when I agreed to the breakup and said I didn't love her anymore, I had my own reasons. Then we ran into each other again at our university alumni reunion. She was a respected professor and scholar now. She stood in the crowd with her arm around her fiancé, smiling as people congratulated them on their upcoming wedding. When she saw me, her smile deepened. "Dominic, aren't you going to congratulate me?" The word "congratulations" lodged in my tongue like a pair of thorns, and for a long time I couldn't get it out. The person standing beside her should have been me. In the end, I gave her what she wanted and said the words. Because I only had three days left to live.

My CEO fiancee, Lexi Wyndham, had no patience for incompetence, yet she repeatedly made excuses for her incompetent assistant, Lachlan Hayes. During the hiring process, she noticed that his profile looked remarkably similar to mine. Worried that our rivals might target me, she kept him on as my double, someone who could take my place whenever I was in danger. She bought him designer clothes, took him to exclusive events, and even put my projects under his name to build up his reputation. As time went on, she grew increasingly protective of him, insisting it was all so he would be willing to take my place when the time came. Then tensions with our rival company escalated. Lexi would rather send the bodyguards assigned to protect her to me than let Lachlan stand in for me. In the end, our rivals kidnapped me and locked me in a basement, where they tortured me for ten straight days. By the time I was rescued, there was not a part of me that was not badly injured. I had nearly died down there. The next day, Lachlan was diagnosed with liver disease. Lexi drugged me and forced me into the operating room to donate my liver to him. Her voice was gentle. "Lachlan has to be saved for the moment we truly need him to stand in for you. We can't use him too soon, or they'll get suspicious and everything we've done will be for nothing. "He has to stay alive until the day we need him. I'm making you donate your liver for your own good. Don't overthink it. Once you're discharged, I'll marry you." But she did not know how badly I had been injured. The liver donation only made my condition worse, and I was already dying. I would not live long enough to see the wedding she had promised me.

I was reunited with my parents at the police station as the last of the rescued trafficking victims. My mother, Serena Hadley, clung to me, sobbing uncontrollably. My father, Vincent Kingsley, kept bowing to the officers. He was so grateful that he even tried to get on his knees just to thank them. My fiancée, Alina Prescott, gave me all the gifts she had saved for me over the years, telling me she had never forgotten me for a single day. At that very moment, everything I'd endured for 12 years just to find my way home all felt worth it. However, Cameron Kingsley, the orphan of my father's old friend whom he'd adopted, stood by the door with tears in his eyes just as we were about to depart. Serena immediately let go of me. Alina's gaze instinctively drifted toward Cameron, while Vincent hurried over to reassure him that they loved him more. I made an excuse to use the restroom, unable to bear the sudden change. Then, I overheard my parents talking. "Jasper is actually back. What are we going to do about his engagement to Alina? Cameron loves her so much. I can't stand the thought of seeing him hurt." "Then, Cameron can get engaged instead. Who knows what Jasper went through during all those years he was trafficked? After everything he's been through, he's no longer worthy of marrying Alina. Besides, we'll have plenty of time to make it up to Jasper later." I leaned against the wall, drained of all strength, and texted the friend who had been rescued with me. "I don't think I should've come back. Come get me. I want to leave." "Did you tell them you're dying of late-stage cancer?"

My parents always said the world had no sympathy for the weak. So from the moment my younger brother and I could walk, they put us through what they called the 'Strong Child Program.' At five years old, we had to run five kilometers every day. If we could not finish, we were not allowed to eat. At seven, my brother broke his arm. My parents refused to let the doctors use anesthesia, saying enduring pain was a lesson every strong person had to learn. At nine, I burned with a 104℉ fever. Instead of taking me to the hospital, they wiped my body with ice water and forced me to endure it because 'sick children grow stronger immunity.' Then, on the first day of summer vacation, my father announced this year's special training: We were going to learn to swim in the Roaring Spine River. No life jackets. No safety gear. "You only learn after choking on water a few times," my father said. But my brother choked over a hundred times and still could not swim. I desperately swam toward him, trying to pull him back to shore, but somehow the distance between us only kept growing. I called my father, screaming for help, begging him to call emergency services. But after listening to me, he only snorted coldly. "Who learns swimming without swallowing some water? "Your brother isn't made of paper. "Stop yelling and focus on learning to swim." But by then, my brother had already been swept away by the current…