เรื่องสั้นแนว Familial Bond Romance และนิยาย Bias ในฉาก Workplace

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.

My mom stole my dad's name and his status as the top-ranked student in the state, then gave them to her childhood sweetheart. From then on, the two thieves soared to the top. One was admitted to Ashford University and went on to become a computer science professor at one of the country's top universities. The other attended Westbridge University and became a nationally recognized expert in education. … Meanwhile, my dad was left without a legal identity, spending his entire life scraping by through odd jobs and backbreaking labor. Years later, I inherited his talent and founded a leading AI technology company, making a name for myself in the industry. Potential partners were constantly coming to me with offers. One company, in particular, approached me several times seeking a partnership. The contract they offered was tempting, with generous terms and impeccable credentials. I casually flipped through their background information. But when I reached the page introducing the founder, my hand stopped. After a long silence, I finally said slowly, “Forget it. I won’t work with you.”

On my way home after a night shift, my wife, Lilian Jones, the associate chief of neurosurgery, suddenly called. "Honey, Garrett Lowe in Room 9 has suffered a ruptured cerebral aneurysm. You're the only surgeon in the hospital who can perform this operation. Come back now!" In my previous life, I did not hesitate. I made a U-turn and sped back to the hospital. However, by the time I burst into the operating room, Garrett was already dead on the table. Right in front of his family and the entire surgical team, Lilian slapped me across the face and insisted that my surgical error had cost Garrett his life. The hospital immediately suspended me from clinical duties, stripped me of my position as an attending neurosurgeon, and suspended my medical license for six months. Three days later, Garrett's family ambushed me outside the emergency department and stabbed me to death in broad daylight. Only after I died did I learn the truth. To give surgical resident Ethan Smith a chance to gain hands-on experience, Lilian violated hospital protocol and allowed him to take the lead in the operation. His inexperience cost Garrett his life, and I was nothing more than the scapegoat they sacrificed to cover it up. Less than a week after my funeral, the two of them moved in together openly. A few years later, they even became the hospital's model couple, admired and envied by everyone. "The patient's already under anesthesia, and the OR is fully prepped. Where are you?" Lilian's voice came through the phone again in this life, her barely concealed panic impossible to miss. I fell silent for a moment before answering in a hoarse voice, "Okay. I'll be right there."

Every year, Callum Walker gave me exactly five hours of his personal time. A meal with me cost forty minutes. A trip to visit my parents together cost two hours. Even sex was on the clock, starting the second he kissed me. Callum was the youngest senior partner at an elite white-shoe law firm, and his private consulting rate was 8,000 dollars an hour. I'd always assumed he was simply meticulous about his time. Then, at the firm's annual gala, Mia Garfield, the young lawyer he'd mentored himself, asked with a laugh, "Callum, how much time does your wife have left this year?" Callum glanced at his phone. "Seventeen minutes." Everyone in the room laughed. Mia tilted her head up at him. "What about me?" Callum ruffled her hair. "You're not on the clock. Dress shopping, late-night snacks, midnight movies... When have I ever kept time with you?" I swallowed the laughter filling the room and held on to those last seventeen minutes. A month later, my father, Russell Merriott, died suddenly of a heart attack. I used my final seventeen minutes to ask Callum to come with me to sign Dad's cremation authorization form. But I broke down afterward, clutched his sleeve, and kept him ten minutes longer. He didn't push me away. I thought that in the face of my father's death, he had finally made an exception for me. The next day, his secretary, Leon Barrymore, sent me a bill for 4,000 dollars. That same day, I pawned my wedding ring for 5,000 dollars. Four thousand went to settling the bill. The remaining thousand covered the first tuition installment at a language school abroad. This time, I wasn't going to waste any more of his time. Or any more of mine.