Cerita Pendek Feel-Good Story Romance & Novel Bias

On the day my family went bankrupt, my older sister fled the country overnight to escape her wedding. When I returned home after selling off every luxury item I owned, my alcoholic father drugged me and sent me to the bed of Tristan Chevalier, a man with intermittent explosive disorder. Once the effects of the drug wore off, he realized something was wrong. His eyes bloodshot with rage, he wrecked Chevalier Manor. He was even willing to sever ties with his family just to go abroad and explain everything to my sister. In the end, however, Tristan's grandmother, Donna, threatened to take her own life, forcing him to marry me and register our marriage. Whenever Donna pressured him to have a child with me, he would deliberately wait until his intermittent explosive disorder was acting up before taking me with brutal force. Afterward, even when I lay on the bed covered in blood, he would not spare me a second glance. "Sylvia Jefferson, consider this my reward to you this time. If you can't get pregnant, you'd better be prepared to spend the rest of your life as a widow!" After that, I tried everything I could think of to seduce him, but he refused to touch me, not even with a finger. Instead, he tormented me even more cruelly. In public, I was the once-down-and-out heiress who had married into a wealthy family, living the life of a pampered society wife. Behind closed doors, however, he gave me only twenty dollars a day to keep myself fed. Then, one night, I took advantage of his drunken state and climbed into his bed, hoping to sleep with him. But he called the police on me and accused me of sexual coercion, turning me into the laughingstock of our entire social circle. Eventually, I stopped longing for a child. I even personally brought my sister back to him and handed him the divorce papers. Yet this time, Tristan refused to let me go.

At the coming-of-age ceremony my sister and I shared at twenty-one, our father produced two marriage contracts. One came from the ducal House of Beaumont. A century-old line with power beyond measure, whose heir Alexander was composed, wealthy, and the dream of every unmarried girl in Saint-Vérain. The other came from the bankrupt Moreau family. Their estate mortgaged, creditors at the door, their heir Elias had nothing but a handsome face. In my last life, my sister Vivienne chose Alexander first and left Elias to me. Later, she was caught in an affair, and the Beaumont family confined her for life under the name of "psychiatric rest." Elias, with my help, climbed from ruined nobility into City Hall and became the youngest chief secretary to the mayor. Vivienne didn't hate the in-laws who destroyed her, or the husband who was cold to her. She hated only that I lived better than she did. The day I visited her, she smashed my skull with a silver candlestick. When I opened my eyes again, we were back at the moment of choosing. Vivienne snatched the Moreau letter and said smugly, "Little sister, this time it's my turn to be the wife of the rising star of politics." I looked at her and smiled. She didn't know that in the last life, the one who had truly raised Elias to high office was never fate. And that Alexander, who had never touched her, had never been cold by nature. He had simply married the wrong woman.

I'm the neglected real son of the Duncans, Austin Duncan. By the time my family finally brings me home, the fake heir, Edward Duncan, has already been carefully groomed into the perfect successor. I'm nothing more than a country bumpkin. Edward goes through with a prestigious arranged marriage and becomes the son-in-law of the powerful Cooper family. As for me, I'm unceremoniously married off to Clara Prescott, the illegitimate daughter of the Prescott family, whom no one acknowledges. Everyone looks at me with contempt. I assume Clara is no different. But she smiles at me and says, "Austin, we aren't free to choose for the first half of our lives. But I'll protect you from now on." I truly believe she's different. But when she emerges victorious in the Prescott family's power struggle and becomes the CEO of Prescott Group, the very first thing she does after taking control is force the Cooper family into bankruptcy and bring Edward back to her side. Only then do I finally realize that Clara is no different. The one she loves has always been Edward.

Euri Scott had always shared a body with her sister, Kiara Scott, and they each spent six months taking control of the body. When Euri fell for Edwin, the heir of the Langs, she decided to marry him. Edwin did not mind that there were two spirits in her body, and he bought presents only for Euri and planted flowers Euri loved. When he looked into her eyes, he said, "Even though you share your body with your sister’s spirit, you are the only one I love." They were supposed to get married within six months, but Euri met with eighteen accidents that forced her to postpone the wedding. She either ended up in an accident or fell into the sea. This time, the wedding was postponed because Euri suffered fractures all over her body, and she had to be pulled back from the brink of death three times. When she was discharged, Euri wanted to talk to Edwin about postponing the wedding, but when she reached the door, she heard Edwin’s conversation with her father. "You have gone too far with the accident this time, Edwin. What would we do if you accidentally hurt Kiara instead?"

Cole Sullivan's intermittent amnesia has lasted for three years. Every so often, he'll forget me and fall hopelessly in love with my younger sister, Roselle White. The night before our wedding, he loses his memory again. I sit right beside his hospital bed, yet his eyes pass over me as if I weren't there and land once again on Roselle. Mom and Dad have long since gotten used to smoothing things over. "Rach, you know about Cole's condition. Don't take it personally." I make an excuse to leave. Halfway down the hall, I realize I've forgotten my phone. I've just reached the door when I hear my family laughing and talking inside the room. "So, Cole, how do you plan to tell Rachel about your wedding with Roselle?" Mom asks. "I'll book her a trip around Eurora. By the time she gets back, everything will be settled," Cole answers. "And when you do 'marry' Rachel, we can give her a fake marriage certificate to fool her for a while," Dad adds with a laugh. Roselle sounds hesitant. "What if Rach finds out?" "Then, she finds out," Cole says indifferently. "Saves us the trouble of coming up with more lies, anyway." I stand outside the door, my fingertips turning cold. It turns out his so-called intermittent amnesia in the last three years has been a mere performance, written and directed for me alone to watch. I sink to the floor and slowly pull off the glaring engagement ring I've been wearing, then toss it into the trash can in the hallway. Since no one here truly cares about me, I'll give them exactly what they want and disappear from their lives for good.

After I've completed 98 tasks for my fiancee, Cheryl Landeau, she finally agrees to marry me once I've completed the 99th task for her. For that task, I'm required to pick her up outside her company. On the day I stand outside Cheryl's company with a huge flower bouquet in my arms, I don't see her at all despite having waited till late night. Soon after, I get hospitalized due to a high fever. When I tap on my phone, the first thing I see is a photo of the marriage certificate belonging to Cheryl and her assistant, Jason York. Jason even includes a caption with the photo. "My mom is very satisfied with her daughter-in-law. Please take good care of me from now on, my dear wife." The next day, I hang a banner outside the company. "May Ms. Landeau and Mr. York grow old in harmony and be blessed with children." All of my colleagues are stunned, to say the least. At that moment, Cheryl quickly pulls me into her office. She then explains, "Jason's mom is severely ill. Her death wish is watch him get married. What's wrong with me fulfilling her wish? Can't you show more kindness toward Jason? "Now, stop throwing that tantrum of yours and get rid of the banner. Once Jason's mom passes away, I'll file for a divorce from him." I just smile as I set off more fireworks at the doorway. "Oh, you don't have to bother with a divorce. I'm worried that his mom might come back to life soon. Let's just end things here."

"Hello, I want a divorce." In the third year of her marriage, Roxanne Levine decided to file for divorce. But she did so without telling her husband. Across the desk, the lawyer, Nathaniel Shepherd, responded in a formulaic tone after hearing her intent. "If you wish to proceed with a divorce, both parties need to sign the divorce agreement. After that, there will be a one-month cooling-off period before the divorce is finalized. Did your husband not come with you today?" Roxanne paused for a few seconds. "I'll make sure he signs it." "Very well. I'll draft a divorce agreement for you."

On my wedding day, the video montage I'd spent seven years putting together - a record of our entire relationship - was replaced with photos of me looking cozy with an older man. My fiancé's assistant, Chloe Reed, stepped onto the stage and declared self-righteously, "Mr. Carter may not be able to tell a decent woman from a slut, but as his assistant, it's my job to protect him. "So I made a voting app just for this. "Let's all decide whether Cecilia Bennett deserves to be Mrs. Carter. "Press 1 for yes and 0 for no. Voting starts now." I instinctively opened my mouth to explain. The "older man" in those photos was my father, Richard Bennett, head of Bennett Industries, the company that was Carter Group's largest investor. But before I could get a word out, my fiancé, Frank Carter, pressed 0. "Chloe's just kidding around. Think of it as a way to liven things up. "Besides, if you've got nothing to hide, why are you so worried about everyone voting no?" I stared at the giant screen, filled with nothing but 0s. Then I caught the knowing look Frank and Chloe exchanged. Suddenly, I remembered the last time Frank had gone along with one of Chloe's so-called jokes. He'd made me stand on the street in nothing but lingerie to drum up business. And just last month, the two of them had spread cooking oil across the floor of the restaurant where Frank and I had gone for a date, making me slip and fall. All because they wanted to see how ridiculous a pregnant woman would look after taking a fall. Whether I wanted to believe it or not, I finally had to face the truth. The wedding I'd dreamed about for seven years was nothing more than another cruel joke at my expense, all to entertain another woman. I slipped off my engagement ring and placed it in his palm. "No need to vote. "You want to be my husband, Frank? You're the one who isn't good enough."

The day my son is born, my husband holds him tightly, looking overjoyed. However, while I'm asleep, he secretly swaps my son with the child next door—his first love's baby. I act like I know nothing and arrange for someone to switch the babies back. My husband wants me to raise someone else's child as my own but has no idea he's not even the father of my son. Ten years later, I transfer all my assets to my son's name as a birthday gift. That's when my husband's first love, Amanda Larkin, crashes the birthday party. She looks at me smugly and says, "The son you've treasured for the past decade is actually mine!"

The villagers raised me as a child. So, when I became successful, I initiated a development plan for the village to repay their kindness. However, because of forced evictions, the village chief’s family, who were the kindest to me, four villagers, and two youngsters died miserably under the excavator’s shovel. I gave away every penny I had, knelt in the rubble to beg forgiveness, and was beaten bloody by the enraged villagers. I was left disfigured, crippled, and eventually thrown in prison for ten years. After I came out of prison, I went to a faraway place, changed my name, and worked on a construction site. I planned to just drift through the rest of my miserable life in obscurity. However, my ex-wife and daughter tracked me down. “Max, why didn’t you tell me when you got out? That whole thing has passed now. Weylon has built a great career. He can get you a decent job. “Come home. Our daughter and I miss you.” Our daughter, Josie, glared at me with grievance. “Who misses this murderer? He’s the reason I can’t hold my head up. Everywhere I go, people curse me. I don’t want a beast like him for a father. “Mom, you and Uncle Weylon are all the family I need…” I caressed the scar on my face, looked at my crippled right leg, and felt my numb heart ache once more. Back then, the person who skimmed the compensation money, forced the evictions, and caused those deaths was Weylon, my ex-wife’s foster brother. To protect him, she had threatened me with our daughter’s life and made me take the fall. At that moment, she was standing before me, offering charity from on high.

Because of her first love's piano competition, my fiancee, Ashley Blake, postpones our wedding for the 17th time seven years into our relationship. On the eve of the competition, she chops off my ring finger just because Marc Tyson claims I injured his hand and ruined his ability to compete. The pain of losing my finger leaves me crying in agony, but she simply holds him in her arms and stares me down with indifferent eyes. She says, "Stop pretending, Troy Clinton. You're a grown man. What's all this fuss over losing a finger? Besides, you merely lost one finger. Marc has lost the dream he spent his whole life chasing! This is what you owe him." Her cruel words shatter my heart into tiny pieces. She has forgotten that my fingers are also meant to dance across piano keys. "The wedding next week is postponed," she says dismissively while covering Marc's reddened fingers. She adds, "This has nothing to do with Marc. It's simply because you can't wear a wedding ring with a missing finger anyway." Clutching my bleeding hand, I finally wake up to reality. From this moment onwards, we owe each other nothing.

It was my parents' twenty-fifth wedding anniversary. The whole family kept it from me and took my adopted sister Evelyn to the most expensive Italian restaurant in New York. My older brother Luca raised his glass. "Evelyn wants to study business management. I'll introduce her to the right people." My younger brother Noah handed her a gift. "This bracelet suits you, sis." My mother put the sapphire earrings my grandmother had left me in her ears, smiling. "Evelyn, with us here, you'll never have to be afraid of anything again." My father nodded. "You need these more than Leah does. She's had it good her whole life. It's only right that she gives way to you." I stood in the cold wind outside the restaurant, looking down at the family photo on my phone. In it, all five of them were beaming. No one noticed that one person was missing. Me. Suddenly I understood. They hadn't forgotten me. They had simply never seen me as someone who needed to be chosen. In that case, I didn't want them either. I applied to the school farthest from home. From now on, they were them. And I was me. Later, when I'd made a name, made money, and found my footing on my own, they came looking for me with their bills.

I was an employee of Starmax Group, the country’s business giant, and the husband of its president, Willow Lawrence. To keep our love untainted, I refused every shortcut she offered me and stubbornly chose to work my way up from the bottom, determined to prove through my own abilities that I was worthy of her. Until Jasper White came along. He was more handsome than I was and had a more tragic past. The way he pretended to be strong easily brought out Willow’s instinct to protect him. Thus, Willow personally gave him the promotion meant for me at the most pivotal moment in my career. Afterward, she offered me hefty ‘compensation’. I did not argue or make a scene. I accepted it all with a smile, completely at peace with the outcome. Because from that moment on, Willow was no longer my lover. She was simply my ‘top-tier investor’ and a reliable ‘human ATM’.

My husband, Benji Morrison, is a system guide from another world. His mission is to get me pregnant so that I can give birth to his successor. However, although I've already gotten pregnant seven times, I suffer a miscarriage each and every time. "Your uterus has been severely damaged due to the amount of times you've suffered a miscarriage," the doctor explains. I'm racked with guilt. I resign from my job and stay at home to focus on getting pregnant again. When I get pregnant for the eighth time, a comment appears before my eyes just as I'm about to share the good news with Benji. "She's so pitiful. She's nothing but a tool that the male lead is using to get together with his first love." "The vitamins are actually drugs that will trigger a miscarriage, but the female lead keeps thinking that she's the problem every time." "It's already the eighth time. If the male lead still doesn't return, he'll be stuck there forever." I freeze in place. Benji walks in while holding a glass of milk. He smiles at me warmly and says, "I've added some vitamins into the milk, Harper. Drink it while it's warm. It'll help you conceive." I reach out and take the glass of milk from him. My fingers are trembling slightly when I drain the entire glass in one breath. If Benji doesn't want to leave, he can stay here forever! My stomach begins to ache. I call one of the directors of my company, saying, "I want to take back Weller Group, Richard."

I traveled over a thousand eight hundred miles to find my wife. She was a professor at Harbor University. As soon as I arrived, I received a call. “Hi, Mr. Jaques. We’re just following up on the stroller your wife custom-ordered from us. Have you been happy with it? If so, would you mind leaving us a quick positive review?” I was stunned. We had lived apart for years and did not have a child together. Still, I remained calm and double-checked. “Are you sure I’m the one who ordered that stroller?” “Yes, sir, I can confirm that. Our system requires ID verification from both parents for all custom stroller orders. The mother on file is Shiloh Zoeller. Mr. Jaques, you are listed as the child’s father.” The customer service agent sent me a screenshot of the child’s information as proof. It indeed showed that I had a child around one month old. The more I thought about it, the more confused I became. I went to the address listed on the order. Downstairs, a young man was chatting with a group of people. “As of today, I’m no longer your classmate. I’m now the professor’s husband!” A male classmate laughed and teased him. “What a show off. But come on, the kid’s already a month old. When are you and Ms. Zoeller finally tying the knot? We’re still waiting to toast you!” Just then, a very familiar female voice spoke. “What’s taking you so long? Get up here. Our little boy is getting impatient.” I followed the sound of the voice and saw Shiloh holding a swaddled baby. She leaned against that man’s chest as if she had done it countless times.

At a party hosted at our house, my husband sang a soul-stirring rendition of “Missing You Tonight". He poured his heart into it, his eyes misty and his voice raspy with emotion. I secretly recorded a video and posted it online. To my surprise, the video blew up. Hundreds of thousands of likes poured in, with the comment section overflowing with sympathy. Laughing, I handed my phone to my husband. “Jacob, you went viral.” The top-voted comment read: [Girl, I’m not one to stir up drama, but your husband looks like he’s nursing a broken heart.] I thought he’d just laugh it off with a half-hearted smile. Instead, he took the phone and looked me straight in the eye with dead seriousness. “You’re right, I am heartbroken. I fell for a younger girl, but she refuses to be my lover and is trying to break up with me.” The room fell silent. I didn’t cry or make a scene. I just took my phone back and spoke in a flat, even tone. “That works out then. Let’s get a divorce. The young guy I’ve been seeing on the side has been throwing a fit, too, demanding I make things official with him.”

When I find out my husband is cheating on me, I don't cry. My pride won't let me waste a single tear on a man who isn't worth it. Instead, I crash a stranger's funeral so I can cry my eyes out over someone else's memorial photo. I'm sobbing so hard I'm shaking when the widow suddenly shoves a million-dollar check into my hand. "Take the money and get lost. Don't think you can worm your way into my family just because he's dead." I stare down at the check. Suddenly, being the other woman doesn't seem so bad. At least she gets paid. Meanwhile, I'm the wife who gets cheated on and humiliated, and somehow I'm still the one expected to step aside for the other woman. I'm about to leave when an arm suddenly blocks my way. The dead man's son is a tall, handsome college student. He leans down, looks me straight in the eye, and sneers, "You fraud. You're crying your eyes out over my dad, but you can't even get his name right." Caught, I take a step back. He plucks the check from my hand and leans close to my ear. "You want the million dollars? Fine. Then play along with me and help me piss off my mom. She's the one who actually cheated on my dad."

After my family went bankrupt, I begged my fiancé Ryan to pump cash into our business. He didn't just refuse. He turned around and got engaged to someone else. When I was at the end of my rope, Ethan Brooks stepped up, tossing all his savings into my family's mess. Sadly, we missed our shot, and our company crashed. My parents couldn't handle it. They jumped off a building. Even so, I was thankful to Ethan and married him to pay him back. Three years later, at Lily Carter's birthday party, I overheard her talking to him. "You tanked the Harper family so I could win that bid. Won't Kelly blame you?" "For you, I'd give up everything. I'll just make it up to her." My blood ran cold as I realized our marriage was all a lie. The one he loved was Lily all along. I turned and left. If he was that hooked, I'd set him free.

I'm the most famous marriage-desperate woman in Merrowfield. But every time my fiancé, Gavin Northwood, and I try to hold a wedding, disaster strikes. The first time, his mother fell down a staircase and broke her leg. The second time, Scout, the dog Gavin had raised for eight years, died of poisoning. The third time, my mother was struck by a falling sign and critically injured. The fourth time, the fifth time... every attempt after that ended with someone close to us getting hurt. I hated that curse, and on my thirtieth birthday I dragged Gavin out to see a spiritual adviser and have it stripped off us for good. Before we left, I happened to see a group chat on his phone called "Operation: Protect Gavin and Serena." One name came straight into my head. Serena Colebrook. Gavin's first love, and my stepsister. I stared for a long time before I opened the chat with shaking hands. The pinned announcement at the top read: "Twenty-ninth successful operation preventing Gavin Northwood from marrying Maris Ellington." The members were my mother, Gavin's mother, my stepsister, Gavin himself, and my best friend, Paige Merrick. Everything came clear in an instant. My heart clenched hard, but I only opened my own phone, my face perfectly blank. It doesn't matter. Who says the man I'm desperate to marry has to be Gavin Northwood? I looked at the message that other man had sent me. "Didn't we agree that if you still weren't married at thirty, you'd marry me?" I answered calmly. "Yes. I'll be there."

Just a few days before my wedding, I accidentally come across a post while scrolling online. The title reads, "To the guy getting married in this city, your fiancée's already cheated on you." Curious, I click in to see the gossip, only to realize I'm the one being talked about. A deep male voice plays in the video. "I heard you're getting married?" The woman in the frame, bare-backed and trembling, chokes back a sob. "After you left, I realized you're still the one I love most. I'm done with him. Take me away, please!" The moment I hear her voice, it feels like someone punches me straight in the chest. Then I notice something on her wrist—the luxury couple's bracelet I gave her just yesterday. And in that instant, I feel like the biggest joke of all. Turns out the fool was me.