Melodramatic Short Stories & Male POV Face Slapping Novels

To keep my grandmother's failing organs stable, I simmered a medicinal broth for her every day and strictly controlled her diet. Then the Whitmore family's long-lost real son was brought home. "You're feeding my grandmother something that looks like slop? Julian Whitmore, what kind of heart does a fake son like you have?" The butler wiped sweat from his forehead. "Sir, this is Mr. Whitmore's specially prepared medicinal broth. The old madam's been drinking it for years, and her health has only--" "Shut up!" Tyler Whitmore threw an all-foreign-language menu in my face. "I've consulted top nutritionists overseas. What Grandma needs now is protein!" "I've had the finest bluefin tuna flown in. From now on, I'll handle Grandma's diet myself." My grandma, Irene Whitmore, stayed silent. She merely glanced at me, which counted as approval. I forced out a smile and turned to leave. "Fine. Then take good care of her." They had no idea Grandma had been poisoned with a rare tropical toxin. That bowl of medicine was a suppressant I had prepared specifically for her. Once she stopped taking it and touched seafood or other triggering foods, the poison would backlash instantly.

Right after my exchange program interview, I become the center of a campus scandal. The headline is brutal. "Top Student Caught Getting Into a Rich Woman's Bentley Late At Night. Did He Earn His Exchange Spot or Sleep His Way Into It?" The post includes a 12-second clip of a middle-aged woman stepping out of a Bentley and opening the door for me. Mark Stone, the campus heartthrob, wastes no time spreading rumors that I'm a sugar baby and that I stole his spot in the exchange program by sleeping my way to the top. Bruce Jagger, my academic advisor, pressures me to give up my spot. Hugo Lawson, my roommate, even packs up and moves out overnight. But Mark isn't done. He publicly challenges me to bring the woman to campus and face him head-on. So, I make one phone call and summon the very woman he's accusing me of sleeping with to come to campus. Everyone expects me to get exposed in front of the whole school. Instead, the woman walks up to me and addresses me respectfully in front of the entire crowd. "Mr. Durham, you called for me?"

Before meeting my girlfriend's parents, she promises me up and down, "Don't worry. My dad is super easygoing. Just a little naive, that's all!" I actually buy it and show up at their door with my arms full of gifts. But the second the door swings open, I freeze in my tracks at the entryway. My future father-in-law, Mike Bennett, is standing there dressed head-to-toe as a prince. My jaw drops, but my girlfriend, Alicia Bennett, just flashes a bright smile. "This is my dad's fetish. Don't mind him." I take a deep breath and hold out the gifts with both hands. "Nice to meet you, Mr. Bennett. Here's a little something for—" Before I can even finish speaking, Mike snaps, "Why are you calling me Mr. Bennett? You shall address me as Prince Mike!"

The night before our wedding, word spread like wildfire through high society that my fiancee had thrown herself a bachelorette party with ten virgins. When I storm into the villa, I find her nestled in the arms of my chauffeur's son, her skin blotched with fresh red marks. "It's just a wild night before the wedding. You get that, don't you?" Melissa Young says. She looks up at me with indifference, not bothering to explain herself. I catch the smug challenge in the eyes of the man holding her. My eyes burn red as I hurl the wedding invitations to the floor. "The scandal is everywhere! Have you even thought about what tomorrow's wedding will look like?" I yell. "This isn't just about you and me. It's about the future of both our families' businesses! Call a press conference and explain yourself." She frowns, irritation flickering in her eyes, but gives a grudging nod. Yet the next day, the internet explodes with a new bombshell—the Zucker heir is impotent, leaving his fiancee unsatisfied. When I demand answers, Melissa puts her foot down, her voice dripping with venom as she says, "All I see now is Nicky." She snaps, "No matter how many times you threaten to pull your investments, my mind's made up!" In that moment, the last ember of love I feel for her goes out. I call my dad, my resolve steeled. "Cut off all funding to Young Group, and buy out every one of her partnerships at triple the price!"

I've just received a text from my CEO wife, Cara Lavigne. Apparently, she's gone on another last-minute business trip again, so she can't accompany me to the funeral home. But soon, I see Cara's silhouette being captured in a photo, where she celebrates her assistant, Warren Stone's birthday with him in a work-related post he has just uploaded. The caption reads, "Thank you for the amazing cake, boss! I feel so happy to be able to celebrate my birthday!" I just smile calmly before leaving a like and a comment. "Happy birthday." My colleagues, on the other hand, start betting pools like mad to see what kind of tricks I'm going to pull this time in order to kick up a ruckus. Cara calls me immediately just to scold me. "Warren is just celebrating his birthday, so what's with the comment? He's a very sensitive person, you know! How is he going to survive in this company now that you've passive-aggressively humiliated him in that public post? "It's been barely two years since Warren joined this company, not to mention he doesn't have any friends! What's wrong with me celebrating his birthday with him, huh? People like you, who are born with silver spoons in their mouths, will never understand Warren's plight! "I want you to delete your comment right now! We'll talk more about this once I'm home! Your dad is already dead anyway, so you can just wait for a few more days before claiming his body!" I can only clench my fists tightly as I listen to Cara's heartless and nonchalant words. "No need for that." Once she is back, the divorce procedures will be done.

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.

My wife, Ruth Quarmby, had a twenty-year-old male apprentice named Craig Smith. He secretly turned off a diver’s scuba tank underwater. This caused an accident. He then posted three posts on his social media feed. The first post said, [I played a little prank underwater by shutting off my instructor’s mother-in-law’s scuba tank. Now, she’s in a coma and heading into surgery. But hey, I’m innocent!] The second post said, [Toast one: from a broke mountain kid to a certified diver. All by myself! Toast two: I confessed my love to someone I shouldn’t have, but I didn’t cross that line. Toast three: here’s to every lonely night I suffered through.] The third post said, [Best instructor ever. Without her, who else would cover for my pranks?] I told my wife to pay for the surgery to save the person quickly. But in front of the operating room door, she told me solemnly to give up on the surgery. “Your mother is old and fragile. Saving her is a waste of resources. Even if she makes it out alive, she’ll be bedridden. She’ll wish she were dead. Just let her go.” She quickly signed the Refusal of Treatment form. Then, she threw the signed form in my face. I kept quiet. The person lying in the operating room was her own mother.

After my beautiful boss, Violet York, starts a new relationship, I somehow end up becoming the other man. Her brand-new boyfriend, Cody Moore, shows up in a sweatshirt and a trendy layered haircut. He kneels in front of me and cries, "You're Vi's secretary, right? Please give her back to me. We're the ones who are destined for each other." I jump back in shock. Yes, I am Violet's secretary. But more importantly, I'm a national award-winning top scholar with both looks and brains. I have the company's core tech in my hands! And most importantly of all, there is absolutely nothing going on between Violet and me. I can swear with my life!

My mother-in-law was rushed to the hospital with sudden chest pain and sent straight into emergency surgery. However, my wife, who was the head of the thoracic department, insisted that her clueless young male apprentice be the lead surgeon instead. The apprentice stood in front of the operating table. He couldn’t even recognize half of the surgical instruments laid out before him. He pouted and fidgeted a little. “I forgot again…” My wife just smiled indulgently at him. Even though the patient’s chest had been opened, she patiently spent ten minutes explaining the instruments to him before the surgery finally began. In the end, the apprentice’s hand trembled, and he accidentally punctured the tumor. Terrified, he let out a sharp scream and threw himself into my wife’s arms. To console him, my mother-in-law’s only chance at survival was gone, and she died right there on the operating table. My wife walked out of the operating room, supporting her badly shaken apprentice, and glanced at me indifferently. “Before you take your mother’s body away, provide an affidavit of non-prosecution to the hospital. Your mom couldn’t have been saved anyway. Anthony is still young. His future can’t be ruined because of your mother.” Only then did I realize that she thought the person lying on that operating table was my mother. I chuckled and said, “I'm afraid I'm not qualified to do that.”

“Three hundred dollars for rent just went through. Thanks, Claire.” A text popped up on Claire’s phone from a contact saved as “Mark.” I grabbed the phone before she could react and froze. “Rent?” I asked. “You’ve been telling me every month that money was from your side job.” Her face went stiff. She reached for the phone, trying to take it back. “He was my sister Emily’s husband,” Claire said quickly. “After Emily died, he was left with two kids. I was only trying to help.” My hand brushed against the anniversary gift in my pocket, and something inside me went cold. “Which apartment is he paying rent for?” Her lips parted, but it took her a long time to answer. When she finally did, she gave me the name of a neighborhood. My ears rang. It was the downtown apartment my parents had left me. A spacious unit that could rent for ten thousand a month at market rate. And she had leased it to her widowed brother-in-law for the absurdly low price of three hundred dollars.

On the seventh day after my dad's passing, I head over to the funeral home to wrap up the aftermath of the funeral as well as pack up my dad's personal effects. That's when an employee stops me and demands that I cough up an additional 100 thousand dollars for the storage and preservation of my dad's corpse. I'm stunned, to say the least. Dad has already gotten cremated and buried a long time ago. His ashes are already deposited inside the graveyard, as we speak. So, how is his body getting stored and preserved throughout the week? I use facts and logic to argue with the employee. But he has the gall to threaten me with an impatient scowl on his face. "Stop yapping already! The system shows that your father's body is still inside the cold storage! It's been seven days, so you must pay 100 thousand dollars, no matter what! If you refuse to settle the payment, you can forget about taking your father's personal effects with you! "When the time comes, you have to cough up the additional charges as well! If not, I shall see you at court!" As I stare at the hostile employee, I can feel rage simmering in my blood. Still, I call every family member and relative I have to borrow 100 thousand dollars from them just so I can make the payment. With the receipt in hand, I walk into the police station right away. "Officer, my dad was cremated and buried seven days ago. But the funeral home decided to charge me 100 thousand dollars' worth of storage and preservation fees for no reason! I suspect that they didn't send my father off the proper way!" When the police show up at the funeral home, the same employee who threatened me looks alarmed. He quickly gets his manager, Mr. Lawson, to deal with the situation. Impatience is etched all over Mr. Lawson's face as he snaps at me, "Your father has already gone through the cremation process seven days ago. The procedure and all the receipts are intact. Don't you dare kick up a fuss irrationally now!" I let out a cold chuckle in return before showing Mr. Lawson the receipt. "I'm being irrational, you say? I've just paid for the storage fees of my father's corpse, and here's the receipt to prove the validity of the transaction! You must return my father to me today!" I thought the funeral home insisted on charging me earlier. Now, they'd better fulfill their side of the bargain by returning my dad's corpse to me without a single hair out of place!

I am timid by nature but have this strange sleep disorder where I immediately fall asleep when scared. However, what nobody else knows is that after I fall asleep, a split personality will awaken and take over my body. That split personality is also prone to violence. When I was eight, a fierce dog scared me so much that I fell asleep on the spot. When I woke up again, the dog was whimpering in a corner, clearly terrified of me. When I was 17, a robber accosted me. When I opened my eyes next, he was clutching a police officer's legs as he begged to be taken away and thrown into jail. All these years, I have tried my best to remain calm, so no other accidents happen again. That is, until I enter university and am placed into the same dorm room as the campus hunk, Theodore Caldman. During the welcome party, he corners me in the equipment room. With a pair of scissors in hand and a malicious smile, he says, "You always dress so tackily, yet you still dared to hit on my girlfriend? I'm going to ruin that pretty face of yours! Let's see how you'll seduce others again!" My legs turn to jelly, and I stammer out, "I-I'm not the sort who likes to cause trouble, but if you scare me so much, when I fall asleep, things are going to get real ugly…" He punches me in response. "What's with the tough guy act?" With that, my eyes roll back as I fall asleep. Theodore barely gets a smug laugh out when I suddenly spring up from where I was prone on the floor. Even though my eyes are still shut, I seize him by the neck and lift him into the air with one hand. Ten minutes later, the security guard kicks open the door to the equipment room, only to see a beaten and bloodied Theodore, kneeling on the ground and singing nursery rhymes. Meanwhile, I am leaning against the wall off to one corner, snoring softly.

"Sir, the divorce agreement from the safe." On their fifth wedding anniversary, in a dimly-lit restaurant, Xavier Hampton's secretary placed the divorce papers in front of him. Five years ago, on the day Elizabeth Eaton and he registered their marriage— She had loved him deeply. So deeply that she had prepared the divorce agreement in advance, signed her name, and locked it away in the safe. If she ever betrayed him, all he had to do was sign. Xavier picked up the pen and swiftly signed his name. Across from him, the empty seat seemed heavier than any presence. His gaze dimmed. "Send the divorce papers to Attorney Harvey," he said, his voice calm, almost detached. "Then book a hotel and have the wedding venue set up in advance." The secretary hesitated for a moment before carefully asking, "Whose names should I write as the bride and groom?" "Elizabeth Eaton and Connor Walker."

When I hear that our family's long-lost heir has finally been found, I fly home overnight. As soon as I step inside, a young man in a faded shirt reaches out and snatches my pendant. "Ten years ago, you stole my pendant and took my place in the Jackman family, didn't you?" he asks, his voice caught with emotion. I'm stunned. I haven't even answered when his voice rises, full of hurt and resentment. "Back then, I saw you begging by the roadside and kindly gave you money. I never thought that would give you a glimpse of the Jackman family's wealth and feed your greed. You actually arranged to have me sold to a family in the mountains and took my place. "While you were off studying at Stormford, I was sold to a family to be raised as their daughter's future husband. "Now that you know I'm back, you've flown home overnight on a private jet to fight me for my place. Elijah, don't you have a conscience?" My fiancée, Rachel Quinlan, steps in front of him and shields him from me. "Elijah, what you did was child trafficking," she says, her gaze cold. "You can expect to go to prison. As for our engagement, I should be marrying Keith instead. He's the Jackman family's real heir, after all." I fall silent. "He isn't," I say firmly. It's true that our family had lost its real heir years ago. But our real heir was the Labrador my mother had raised for three years, calling him her precious boy and doting on him until he weighed over a hundred pounds. And the supposed fake heir Keith Seinfeld was talking about was the Pomeranian at his feet, panting with its tongue out and trying to look cute.

My fiancee, Josephine Carter, tells me she is too busy with work to go home with me for Christmas just yesterday. But today, I find out that she has secretly booked a flight ticket to my hometown. I am delighted. Josephine has always been good at creating surprises during our relationship. I do not expect her to still be doing this now that we have practically been dating for years already. Just as I am about to tell my mom the good news, my stepbrother, Daniel Reed, suddenly announces in the family group chat that he is bringing his girlfriend home for Christmas as well. My relatives immediately start teasing him in the group chat, asking to see the beautiful lady. In the next second, photos of Josephine and him embracing like a couple appear in the chat. Daniel texts, "See? I told you she is gorgeous. Not only that, she's rich too." "Wow. You won the heart of such an amazing woman. That's impressive, Daniel." Daniel replies smugly, "Of course! She is totally in love with me." My breath catches in my throat, and the veins on the back of my hand bulge as I grip my phone. No wonder Josephine says she cannot come home with me after learning I am spending the New Year at my mother's place. She doesn't expect that we will run into each other. I close my eyes for a moment and send her one last message, "I have transferred back the 500 thousand dollars you asked me to manage for our wedding. It's over between us."

Back when Elaine and I are most in love, I'm a renowned financial reporter, while Elaine Crowley is a rising star in capital circles. However, on the day I'm supposed to interview her, she stands me up once again. My boss, Lisa Donica, waves a limp finger at me and sneers. "You've been sleeping together for eight years, and you still can't land an interview with her? Has she already gotten bored of you? But I guess that makes sense. Some men don't respect themselves—they throw themselves at women and expect to be worth something!" I ignore her and step outside to call Elaine. But the moment I turn around, I find her Cullinan parked right outside. A surge of joy rushes through me. I'm just about to call out to her when the car door opens. Elaine, with her head bowed, carefully steps out with my coworker, their bodies far too close for comfort. Lisa shoots me a sideways glance. "Your woman is letting your biggest rival put his arm around her waist? Luke Tilghman, you've been cheated on!" My eyes fall on the Cullinan. I press my lips together and make a call. "Send a crew over. It's time to take out the trash!"

The ambulance that's carting a pregnant woman is currently racing down the highway. The pregnant woman's water has already broken, which means she's in a dire situation right now. As I clutch the steering wheel tightly, I make sure to press the gas pedal all the way to the maximum. But the hospital director, Corey Johnston, who has tagged along for the ride, suddenly issues an order. "Pull up at the rest stop ahead." I'm momentarily stunned by the order. But I soon protest anxiously, "The patient can't afford to wait at all! She and her baby might die anytime soon!" Corey merely waves a hand impatiently. "Who's the one calling the shots here—me or you? I've been dabbling in the medical world for 30 years! As if a driver like you know better than me!" Thinking that Corey needs to go to the bathroom urgently, I soon park at the rest stop. But I witness him strolling into a supermarket leisurely, only to come out with two huge bags of snacks a long time later. "I bought my daughter the local specialities. She loves snacks like these the most." As Corey speaks, he tosses the snacks and his phone onto the front passenger seat. His phone screen flickers to life due to an accidental contact, which reveals the wallpaper of the lock screen. It's a photo of Corey and his daughter. I frown at the sight as my breath hitches in my throat. Why do I have a feeling that Corey's daughter looks quite similar to the pregnant woman in the ambulance right now?

My CEO wife, Bianca Bennett, who used to love me to the point of obsession, blew out the candles on her birthday cake, opened her eyes, and looked at me like I was a stranger. "Who the hell are you?" she asked. "Where’s Connor? Even if I have to get married, he’s the only one I’ll ever marry." She screamed and bolted out the door. As I stood there, utterly paralyzed, a stream of floating text suddenly flashed across my vision. [Looks like the side character is totally clueless. The female lead swapped souls with her eighteen-year-old self! She’s heading out to find her true love now.] [Honestly, he should just be grateful. If his face didn't look so much like the male lead's, he never would've married into a rich family in the first place.] [Too bad the soul swap only lasts for thirty days. Go get him, teen female lead! Win back your first love, so when your older self comes back, you’ll get a nice little surprise!] My blood ran cold. Two weeks later, Bianca walked back through the front door, dragging a guy who was a dead ringer for me right behind her. She slammed a set of divorce papers onto the table in front of me. "The house is mine, and the money is mine," she sneered, "You’ve been living off Connor's likeness for years. Sign the papers and get out."

I was a top ER nurse at the city hospital. Over the years, I helped save thousands of lives. During my day off, I received an urgent call from my department chief. “Zayn, there’s a child at a daycare near your neighborhood suffering from a severe allergic reaction. The ambulance is stuck in traffic. Please get over there immediately and administer first aid.” I grabbed my emergency kit and rushed to the daycare. When I arrived, one of the teachers falsely accused me of being a child trafficker. He shoved me aside and shouted, “He’s a trafficker. Do not let him touch the child.” Furious and desperate, I pulled up my digital nursing license. “I am an ER nurse. If you keep stopping me, this child could die.” He insisted my credentials were fake, and I had no choice but to wait for the ambulance. When the ambulance finally arrived to take the child to the hospital, the teacher jumped in again. He claimed we were working together and refused to let us leave. Everything changed when the child’s mother arrived with a DNA test report in her hand. His entire world collapsed in an instant.

The night before our engagement, my best man Reese suggested we play Never Have I Ever — our version, where you name something you have that you think no one else does, and anyone who doesn't have it puts a finger down. "Sitting in this room is someone I can't have," he said. Everyone else's fingers went down, except Reese's and my fiancée Molly's. The others erupted in whistles and teasing, not caring that I was right there. "I have the most loyal fiancé," Molly said. "Boring and dull." Everyone glanced at me, and the private room fell into an awkward silence. I was suddenly exhausted. Molly and I had been together for two years. Tomorrow was our engagement party, yet she'd just publicly admitted there was someone she wanted but couldn't have. And in her eyes, the only redeeming quality her fiancé had was loyalty. When my turn came, I said calmly, "I have a grand wedding of the century." I turned to Molly beside me. "But as of now, it's canceled."