Cerita Pendek Tragic Love Romance & Novel Awakening

While I was with a client looking at watches at a luxury boutique, I spotted a Chanel bag sitting on the authentication counter. "You've got a great eye, sir. This bag retails for eleven thousand dollars, and the young lady who brought it in wants to let it go for under three thousand." As the sales associate opened the inner pocket, a hand-drawn dried-flower card slipped out. "May my girl never have another worry." I wasn't seeing things. It was the seventh-anniversary gift I'd given Veronica Hale, with a note in my own handwriting. The sales associate started chatting idly. "A young woman dropped it off the day before yesterday. It's already been authenticated. She said she needed cash fast to buy her younger boyfriend a car." Younger boyfriend? A car? The color drained from my face. I opened the video account of Dylan Kerr, the college intern at her company. In the video, he was holding a slender hand in the passenger seat, their fingers laced together. On the woman's wrist was a clover bracelet. The one I'd fastened there myself three years ago. Fighting back nausea, I swiped my card and bought the bag. "No need to pack the card. Just throw it out."

I ignored my friends and family’s objections and insisted on pursuing my now-girlfriend, who was disfigured in a car crash when she tried to save her first love. Some laughed at me for being a back-up plan, but I didn’t care. I worked day and night, earning money for her plastic surgery, and stayed by her side as she walked out of depression. But on the eve of our wedding day, as I was doing her laundry, a marriage certificate dropped out of her pants pocket. The groom was her first love. I was about to make things clear with her when I overheard her conversation with her best friend. “I know Steve saved me, but if Yves doesn’t marry me, he’ll be forced into a marriage alliance. I don’t want to see him lose his freedom. “As for Steve, I’ll find someone to forge a certificate for me. Don’t blurt this out, okay…” I felt my blood then grow cold as I quietly changed the groom of our wedding three days later to her first love. By the time she found out about the surprise, I would have left for abroad, never to return.

Nathan Caldwell has a rule: anything he lends out has to be returned personally. So every item his ex-girlfriend left behind when she moved out, he returned himself. An old umbrella meant a three-hour drive. A book meant taking half a day off work. An earring meant a flight out of state. It's been five years. She still hasn't finished collecting what she left at my house. Then my mother is hospitalized after an asthma attack. I'm stuck working late, so I ask Nathan to stay with her overnight and keep an eye on her oxygen monitor. He says yes. At two in the morning, he takes a phone call and leaves. He doesn't come back until the next day. "Camille said she forgot a pair of glasses at our place," he tells me. "I dropped them off." I look at the alarm button on the oxygen monitor that nobody ever pressed. In his rules, whatever someone else leaves behind always comes first. My mother's life doesn't even rate as a stop on the way. Fine. If he can't let her go, I'll let him go back to her.

Nathaniel Cooper spent ten whole years slowly working his way into Audrey Sinclair's life. At last, he went from being a secret admirer no one knew about to the man she openly acknowledged as her fiancé. But just two weeks before their wedding, he decided to call it off. "I'd like to transfer to the research institute's Northwestern Branch. Please add my name to the list." Nathaniel placed the signed application form on the director's desk and spoke in a calm voice. The director, who had been looking at his computer, looked up in shock. "Nathaniel, aren't you and Audrey getting married next month? We all know you joined the institute to follow her. You're so close to finally getting what you want. Why would you choose to leave for the Northwest at such a critical time?" Nathaniel swallowed the bitterness rising in his chest and cut her off. "Just approve the transfer, please."

Every time Millie Johnson, my daughter, returns home from playing with my best friend's dog at his place during summer break, she brings home an expensive doll. I have no choice but to pinch pennies and save up for a gift for my best friend after seeing how much Millie loves the dolls. I return home earlier than usual one day and overhear Millie talking excitedly into her smartwatch from her hiding spot in her room. "Mission accomplished, Mommy! Daddy didn't suspect a thing!" I am momentarily stunned. I am convinced that I have misheard, but then I hear Millie ask for a reward. "You're taking your wedding anniversary photos with Papa today, right? Can I come along, too? I'm so sick of eating plain pasta with Daddy every day, Mommy!" I freeze, my breath catching as I snatch the smartwatch from her. I happen to see the photo that has just been sent over. Sophie Johnson, my wife—who is supposed to be on her janitorial duty this morning—is actually wearing a pure white wedding dress. I stare at the screen, my hands trembling uncontrollably as my heart skips a beat. Millie tosses her doll aside and hurriedly tells me off, "You can't just snoop on me, Daddy! I'll be heading out to play with the doggy later, so don't bother us!" She excitedly peers out the window and waits for her ride after saying that. I stand frozen in place, staring at the apology message Sophie sent just a minute earlier. "I'm so sorry, Steven. It's all my fault for blowing the business and making you and Millie suffer so much all these years. I swear I'll make it up to you, Steven." I feel a sharp pang in my chest, leaving me barely able to breathe. I don't want to confront Sophie yet, so I simply trail the car that has come to pick Millie up instead.

The day before our wedding, my fiancé Cyrus eloped with his long-lost love. I chased after him, but he shoved me away viciously, causing me to lose consciousness. When the doctor called him as my life was on the brink, all he did was scoff and say, “She’s just pretending again. In a coma? Hah, she’s still alive, isn’t she?” That moment, my heart shattered. After I was discharged from the hospital, I cancelled the wedding, just as he wanted. But then he began to regret it…

On the day of our fifth anniversary, I got into a fight with my boyfriend, Tyrus Aberg. My best friend, Claire Dawson, sent me a screenshot. [Proxy Girlfriend: Thirty Days] Below it was Tyrus' reply. [Approved.] Every time we fought, Tyrus would deliberately have Claire act as his proxy girlfriend. He said I only dared to pick fights with him because I felt too secure in the relationship. He figured that as long as Claire got close to him and made me feel threatened, I would get jealous and tearfully beg him to reconcile. Three years ago, after one argument, he and Claire changed to matching couple profile pictures. "You've got one day to think it over. She'll be my proxy girlfriend for now. I'll only reconcile with you when you apologize." One day turned into three days. What started as switching profile pictures escalated into dates, hand-holding, and hugging. The last time I refused to cave for a whole week, he moved in with Claire. Claire spent the night wearing his shirt and showed up to parties with him as his girlfriend. He said, "You'll only feel jealous when Claire becomes my proxy girlfriend. "She's your best friend. No matter how close she and I get, it doesn't count as cheating." After this fight, he extended Claire's stint as his proxy girlfriend to a full month. A video call came in right after. "Lay-lay, it's your fifth anniversary today. "If you don't apologize soon, I'll be the one going home with Tyrus to meet his parents this Thanksgiving." On the other end, friends started laughing and counting down. They were all waiting for me to get jealous, cry, and beg Tyrus to reconcile, just like always. But I just left the three-person "Proxy Girlfriend" group chat. [A month is too short.] [Make it permanent this time.]

When the Carter family went bankrupt, Zoe Carter sold herself to the Tanners to save her mother. She became the bride of Yale Tanner, the man everyone in Gerton feared and avoided like the devil himself. Their marriage was supposed to bring him good fortune and save his life. Three days after the wedding, Yale, who had been on the brink of death from a gunshot wound, made a miraculous recovery. From then on, he treated Zoe like the most precious thing in his world. Now, however, Zoe sat bound at the wrists and ankles with coarse hemp rope, less than two feet from the open door of a helicopter. Freezing water jolted her awake. At thirty-three thousand feet, the icy wind rushing through the open doorway chilled her to the bone. She struggled instinctively, but the ropes only tightened, digging into her flesh until blood began to seep from her wrists and ankles. "Don't be scared, Zoe. Look at your mother! She's putting on quite the kite show!" Yale seized her trembling head and forced her to look at the screen beside her. There, suspended from a rope outside the helicopter, her mother dangled helplessly in the wind, her eyes vacant as she swayed like a kite. "Mom! Mom!" Her fear for her mother overwhelmed her own terror. Frantically, Zoe tried to crawl toward the screen, struggling forward on her bound hands and feet. Yale caught her by the back of her neck and held her firmly in place. His warm breath brushed her ear as he spoke, his voice cold and menacing. "Have you learned to behave yourself yet, Zoe? Now tell me, who do the data and research papers on precision-targeted therapies and antibody-drug conjugates really belong to?"

Someone uses AI to put my face in a pornographic video, and it gets over 20 million views. The day I decide to take legal action, everyone close to me tries to stop me. My childhood friend, Vivian Clark, corners me at the door, warning that suing will only make people believe the video is real. My best friend, Mike Crain, snatches the evidence out of my hands and throws it in the trash, insisting the people behind it are overseas, and the police will never track them down. Even my older brother, Graham Campbell, calls, telling me to think about our parents' health and stop disgracing the family. I take a deep breath. I finally manage to get away and head straight to my girlfriend Wanda Beckham's apartment. She's a lawyer. If anyone will help me clear my name, it's her. But when I walk in, I find her curled up on the couch in the arms of her childhood friend, Everett Patterson. He's casually admitting that he's the one who made the video, brushing it off as a mistake with the AI software. Wanda just laughs and hands him a beer. Vivian and Mike are there too, sipping their drinks as they joke about how Everett should have been the one dating Wanda all along. They say I've been standing in his way for years and had it coming. I freeze in the doorway. The people who ruined my life were right there beside me all along—and I was blind to it.

The night my boyfriend and I celebrate our first anniversary, we get into an accident. My soul travels through time and ends up ten years in the future. Here, I see that my boyfriend and I have married and started a family. It's the future I've dreamed of. However, it seems that I'm out of a job, and I've given up on my dream. I struggle to make it through endless days of my boyfriend's ice-cold treatment. Ultimately, I see myself sitting on the edge of a building's roof after falling deep into postpartum depression. When I open my eyes again, I see my boyfriend's panicked face…

It was common knowledge that the Marsh family was the family with the strictest household rules in upper-class society. They adhered to the rules unyieldingly, and there were so many of them that the rulebook was thicker than ten legal codices. One of the rules was: If any woman wanted a divorce, she had to roll on a bed of nails for half an hour before she was allowed to leave. In the past, Violet Stane insisted on marrying River Marsh and never thought about getting a divorce. After all, she had spent ten years pursuing this aloof ice prince. Once she married him, she gave up on her flourishing career, stopped being so aggressive, obeyed the ridiculous number of house rules, and became the perfect wife for River. But she no longer wanted to do that.

After being Nelson Jackson’s devoted simp for five years, Sarah Paterson became pregnant. Just as she was excitedly waiting for him to propose, Nelson had a change of heart when his high school sweetheart returned from studying abroad. Sarah didn't fight to keep the relationship. Instead, she went straight to the hospital, had an abortion, and immediately agreed to the arranged marriage her family had set up with a business partner's son. But Nelson came to regret his decision. He begged Sarah to keep his child, but she only gave him two words in response. "Too late."

The clock was ticking with twelve minutes left before the ceremony was supposed to begin. The wedding car that my bride, Teagan, and I sat in stopped at the curb. The church doors stood open a hundred yards away, ready for our arrival. My parents and relatives were gathered outside with the officiant, photographer, wedding coordinator, and the rest of the bridal party. The wedding coordinator’s voice came through my earpiece. “Parker, you’re clear to head in. We’re starting at 9 sharp.” I was about to tell the driver to go when the door of the groomsmen’s SUV behind us swung open. “Hold up. I forgot my tie.” That was enough to halt the entire procession. Teagan unbuckled her seat belt and stepped out. “Oh, no! It won’t look good in the picture if a groomsman is missing a tie.” Standing by the SUV, Luke looked at me with a smile. “Parker, have the driver wait a minute. I can’t show up at your wedding in a white and collar sticking out. I will make you look bad.” He then turned to Teagan. “Don’t I have a spare tie kept with you? Can you help me find it?” Teagan nodded and dumped her bouquet on me, just to dig through the bags at the back of the car. Silence gripped the air. My mother’s face went white. I held the bouquet, my eyes fixating on Teagan. “We’re going to be late for our wedding, Teagan. We can still make it if we go now.” Teagan frowned. “I’m already here anyway. What’s a few minutes?” As Teagan went on a mission to get Luke a tie, I broke into a smile. Turning around, I held my phone and texted a number I had almost forgotten. “Don’t you want to marry me? Be at the church at 9. I’ll be waiting for you.”

The royal family once helped the Foxkin of Moonveil. For generations, the Foxkin had sent their youngest daughters to the royal palace to repay that debt. Each prince had a Foxkin companion who looked after him and kept him safe. My elder brother, Alaric Ashbourne, had a Foxkin who fought fiercely by his side on the frontier for years. In the end, they fell in love and married. My Foxkin was named Evelina Wrenwood. I felt sorry for her. She had left her home and would never be able to return to her clan, so I never restricted her freedom. I always gave her the finest things first, never expecting anything in return. People said I spoiled her rotten, but I pretended not to hear them. Yet Evelina ignored all I did for her and kept urging me to put brotherly love first and entrust Alaric with greater authority. That day, I personally brought her a basket of summer peaches from the southern duchies. But when I stepped out of her room, I saw a swarm of tiny words floating in midair. [That's what you get for chasing a woman who doesn't want you. You end up with nothing!] [Why force Evelina to be yours? Her heart belongs to Prince Alaric. Doesn't he get it?] [She's doing everything she can to put Prince Alaric on the throne. Cassian, the crown prince, is just a fool!]

After six years together, Isabella McCarthy proposed to Gabriel Hart six times. He accepted all six. But when she proposed for the seventh time, he didn't immediately offer his hand. She looked up at him with sincere eyes, wisps of black hair falling across her forehead as the lights gilded the fine contours of her face. Gabriel looked at her and suddenly gave a sardonic smile. "Does this proposal actually count?"

The doctor adjusted his glasses before handing her a stack of forms. "Ms. Simon, are you sure you want to schedule the love-eradication procedure? Please verify your personal information and sign at the bottom." Selma Simon lowered her eyes to the form, where her details were listed in black and white. Applicant: Selma Simon. Age: 25. Procedure: Eradication of all romantic feelings for Valerio Gould. She stared at the words, her fingertips trembling slightly, before finally answering, "I'm sure." Picking up the pen, she slowly signed her name on the designated line, each stroke bringing her one step closer to ending a love that had consumed most of her life. "Your procedure is scheduled for seven days from now." The doctor put away the paperwork, then added a word of caution. "I must remind you that this technology was only recently introduced in this country and is still in its early stages. "Once your romantic feelings are erased, they can never be recovered. For the rest of your life, you'll automatically block out any romantic attachment to him. Are you certain you won't regret this?" Selma looked up and nodded. "I won't."

The day I began working, I found out that the boyfriend I’d picked up off the street was actually a rich young man from the capital’s elite circle. His fiancée sneered at me, “You’re nothing but a bit of fun for us when we’re bored.” “You didn’t really think you were some kind of heroine here to save him, did you?” I was humiliated, my lips trembling. I couldn’t forgive myself—how could I have spent half of my father’s lifesaving money to help him? I even dropped out of school, working three jobs every day, foolishly treating him as the second most important person in my life. Later, my father passed away, leaving me all alone, so I left that city. But who would have thought that the young rich man who had toyed with me would go mad, searching for me all over the world for the next five years?

On my wedding day, my boyfriend, Theodore Gunther, suddenly stops the wedding ceremony—all because Gwen Lithgow has updated her social media to say she's back. Theodore throws away the wedding ring he designed. He leaves me at the altar without another look back. I'm dumbfounded as I stand there in my wedding dress. My brother, Alvin Chilton, who's supporting me, lets go. "You've always been strong, Joycelyn. I know you can handle this alone. Gwen needs me more now." With that, he also leaves. He and Theodore have both left me for the same woman. They abandon me alone. That night, after dealing with the fallout of the failed wedding, Gwen sends me a photo. In it, Theodore and Alvin are standing by her bedside. She wears the necklace Theodore made himself and the wedding dress Alvin designed. Those were supposed to be mine. The image makes me lose hope in them. Tears stream down my face as I make a call. "Mom, Dad, I've changed my mind. I want to go home."

Dorian Keller hated hassle more than anything—so much that he kept a "standard schedule." Every gift was bought in bulk and shipped to arrive on the birthday itself. We always went to the same date spot. Trying a new restaurant took a written request a month in advance. Even intimacy had an alarm set for it. "Life's about keeping things simple. Let's not make trouble for each other." For seven years, I thought he was like that with everyone. Then, at a get-together with friends, the server brought out a plate of pomegranate. He took it and peeled it seed by seed into a glass bowl, picking away every bit of white pith. I was sitting right next to him. I reached for it. He paused and looked at me. Then he set the bowl in front of Arabella Crane. The girl who used to bully me. In high school, she tore up my homework, poured glue on my chair, and locked me in a bathroom through an entire class. Back then, Dorian pointed in her face and told her she'd die a miserable death. Now he sat beside me, slid the only bowl of pomegranate over to her, and said softly, "Slow down." I pulled my hand back. In that moment, I didn't want to stay there a second longer. And I didn't want him anymore either.

When Harry Carson is reborn, he finds himself back at 27 years old, married to the richest woman in the world, Laura Jensen, with a son and a daughter. Laura holds the top spot on the Global Wealth Index year after year. The Pinnacle Magazine names her the world's most desirable woman to marry, and even the royal family of Eldoria hopes to arrange a marriage between her and their prince. Everyone says Harry is the luckiest man alive, but the first thing he does is take the divorce agreement straight to Thomas Bright, the man Laura has always loved. He slides the papers across the table and says calmly, "I want a divorce. Laura's yours, and so are the kids." Thomas stares at him in disbelief. He can't believe that Harry, who has been Laura's husband for six years, is suddenly willing to step aside. Harry simply adds, "Since they all prefer you anyway, I'm giving you what you want. Just get Laura to sign the papers. Once the divorce procedures are over, I'll walk away." This time, Harry refuses to repeat the mistakes of his previous life. He's done being "Laura's husband", whom everyone treats as though he doesn't exist. Thomas unconsciously runs his fingers along the rim of his cup, his brows furrowing. "Harry, what the hell are you playing at?" Harry watches the expressions flicker across Thomas' face before calmly repeating himself, "I'm not playing games. I've just had enough." "Harry, do you have any idea how many men out there would kill to be in your position?" "I do." Harry looks him straight in the eye. "That's why I'm giving it to you."