Maiikling Kwento tungkol sa Melodramatic at Romance, at mga Nobela ng Mistress na may Cheating

After three years in a long-distance relationship, I secretly traveled a thousand miles to give my girlfriend a surprise. That afternoon, right outside her apartment building, I caught her playing the claw machine with her first love. The girl I had always considered the perfect, completely devoted girlfriend was gazing at him with a bright, tender smile as he manipulated the joystick. The moment the plushie dropped into the chute, she threw her arms around him, her eyes brimming with delight. I clenched my phone and dialed her number. She answered almost instantly, her voice as soft and caring as ever. "Parker? Why are you calling right now? Did you miss me?" I stared fixedly at her from barely ten feet away, my voice tight. "Where are you? What are you up to?" While cooing into the receiver to reassure me, she attentively reached over and zipped up Benedict Wooten's jacket. Her tone carried just the right mix of fatigue and apology. "I'm still at the office, working late with my team to pull the proposal together. Get some sleep, okay? As soon as this crazy rush is over, I'll fly out to see you." The line went dead. On the street side, an electronic billboard was flashing a breaking news alert. [A major hurricane will make landfall tonight. All residents are urged to seek shelter immediately...] A sudden gale swept through the street, blowing away the last remnants of my wishful thinking. It turned out that her three years of single-minded devotion were nothing more than a masterclass in time management. Candace Richards wasn't loyal. She just wanted to have her cake and eat it too.

On our wedding night, my new wife casually proposed an open marriage. "I'm pregnant. From now on, I'll spend Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays with Finley, and Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays at home." I forced myself to steady my trembling body and looked up at her. "When did this start?" "When you introduced us. We fell in love at first sight." A faint smile played at the corners of her lips. "The moment I met him, I finally understood what real passion felt like. With you, it was just familiarity after all these years. "By then, the news of our families' marriage alliance had already gone public. I figured I'd just settle for you and make the best of it. Then I found out I was pregnant." She rested a hand over her belly, her eyes softening with unmistakable maternal tenderness. "The baby needs a father. If you stay, you'll still be my husband. That won't change. But Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays belong to him. "If you want a divorce, that's fine too. House, cars, or whatever. Name your price. I'll give you whatever compensation you want."

Lynette Kensington's rules took effect on the second day of our marriage. "Your monthly spending is capped at 2,000 dollars. For any single purchase over 100 dollars, photograph the receipt and send it to me for approval. It's not that I'm cheap. I'm helping you learn how to budget. You've never had any discipline with money," she claimed. I thought she had a point. So for three years, buying a single jacket meant budgeting for half the month, and replacing a pair of contact lenses meant waiting for her approval. Then, last month, I found a supplementary card statement tucked inside the pocket of her trench coat. The cardholder was Jayden Scott, her Administrative Director. The transactions from the previous three months: A luxury menswear boutique: 17,400 dollars. A high-end annual golf membership: 6,400 dollars. A Michelin-starred restaurant: 2,800 dollars. The total amounted to more than a year of my living expenses. I carefully refolded the statement exactly as I had found it and slipped it back into the same pocket. That night, Lynette came home and found me sitting with the ledger. "How much did you spend today?" she asked, barely sparing me a glance. I didn't look up. "25 dollars. 13 dollars on groceries, and 12 dollars on utilities." She gave a satisfied hum and walked into the study. But what I wrote on the last page of the ledger wasn't a number. It was my name, my signature on a divorce agreement she hadn't seen yet.

When the bullet train tickets to Kellmore went on sale, Elaine Hartwell did what she always did and booked two, one for herself and one for Bradley Collier. She turned to me once the order went through. "Leo, did you get your ticket yet?" I froze for a moment. On the screen, her seat and Bradley's were right next to each other. By the time I checked, the only seats left on that train were in the next carriage. I stared at the seat number and almost laughed, as something inside me clicked. From weekend trips out of Portmill to college move-in day, it was always the same. The three of us traveled together, but they were always a pair, and I was always the one trailing behind. Not long after, Bradley sent a rental agreement in our group chat. The co-tenants line listed his name and Elaine's. He tagged me with a grin. [Leo, Elaine figured the dorms would make more sense for you. [You can come over to our place for dinner on weekends.] "Our place." The words pricked at my chest like something small and sharp. So even before college had started, I had already been written out of their future. Elaine messaged me privately. [Don't overthink things. [Bradley's living off campus alone and no one's looking after him. I'm just keeping an eye on him for his parents. [Don't throw a tantrum over something this small.] I stared at those last three words, then slowly opened the admissions portal. My acceptance page for Alderton University was still sitting there. I closed it and pulled up the late-enrollment page for Pennington University instead. This time, I did not pursue their train, and I did not pursue Elaine's life anymore, either.

On the morning we were supposed to leave for our elopement trip to the stunning Calistia Mountains, my girlfriend, Jeanie Portman, was nowhere to be found. Worried something had happened to her, I drove to her family's house to look for her, only to find the whole neighborhood strung with wedding banners and streamers. A big outdoor reception was underway, the tables loaded with food. Jeanie stood there in a white gown, leaning into my foster brother's arms as she poured him a toast. Relatives showered the two of them with compliments, calling them a perfect match, while my father sat at the head table, grinning so wide he could barely close his mouth. I nearly lost it and started toward them, but my mother yanked me into a corner before I could get there. "What's gotten into you, making a scene like this? His birth parents died saving your father and me. Handing Jeanie over to him is the least we can do to pay that debt back." My voice shook as I demanded to know why no one had told me sooner. My mother just gave me a flat, dismissive look. "Because you're a teacher, and you've got too sharp a tongue for your own good. If we'd told you ahead of time, you'd have blabbed it to the whole world, and then how were the two of them supposed to have a proper wedding? "That's enough. Don't make a scene. "You've got a stable job. You won't have any trouble finding someone else. Don't ruin our family peace over some woman." I looked past my mother, toward the red carpet where Jeanie and my foster brother stood glowing with happiness, then at the relatives cheering beside them. Something inside me went hollow.

A day before my wedding, my fiancee, Claudia George, was suddenly required to go on a business trip to North City. “There are some issues with the project. The issue should be settled by tomorrow morning, and I’ll return immediately. I won’t delay the wedding at all.” She was afraid that I would overthink the situation, so she video-called me right after she landed. In the video call, she was wearing the down jacket that I had bought her. Behind her was the white wall of the hotel. It was snowing heavily outside the window. She showed me the entire room. There was one pillow on the bed, and one set of toiletries on the sink. She even opened the closet for me to have a look. I nodded with a smile and urged her to go to sleep early. However, after she hung up, my tears trickled down my cheeks uncontrollably. It was a super El Nino year. No snow was supposed to fall upon North City.

To cure her indecisiveness, my wife Vivian started drawing lots to decide whether she would spend time with me or with Julian, her childhood sweetheart. The short slip had my name. The long slip had his. Every wedding anniversary, every holiday, every birthday that should have belonged to us, she somehow "happened" to draw the long slip. "Can't help it. You're just unlucky. I have to go with Julian." I cried. I argued. I even stood on a rooftop begging her to stay, and all she did was call me crazy. Eventually, she stopped answering my calls and stopped coming home at all. Only after Julian landed an engagement with an old-money heiress and blocked Vivian the night before the engagement did she finally decide to return to our marriage. She threw away the lot-drawing jar herself. She cooked, she did laundry, and she became the perfect wife everyone praised. On my birthday, she made an entire table of food and knelt to help me change my shoes. "I was confused before. From now on, I'll spend every birthday with you." I took out the lot-drawing jar and smiled at her. "This past year, I developed indecisiveness too." Right in front of her, I drew the long slip with Lily's name on it. Lily was waiting outside. I picked up the suitcase I had packed long ago and repeated Vivian's old words back to her. "What a shame. I didn't draw your name. "You're just too unlucky. Nothing I can do."

When my father died, he left me with two prospective husbands. I was supposed to marry one of them, Nolan Mercer. But on our wedding day, he ran off with a housekeeper's daughter. So his younger brother, James Mercer, married me instead. On our wedding night, I slipped out onto the balcony and cried because I missed my father. James kicked the door open, mockery in his eyes and a sneer on his lips. "Are you really that heartbroken just because you had to marry me instead of Nolan?" For the next five years, he brought a different woman home every week. I swallowed the pain and did everything I could to be a good wife. But this time was different. Four months had passed, and the woman by his side was still the same one. My heart sank. She slipped her arm through his and said, "James, looks like the lady of the house is upset." James looked at me, his face unreadable, and let out a mocking laugh. "Lady of the house? She doesn't even want to be. She'd rather be the lady of the house across the street." That night, a gas leak sparked a fire in our home. James scooped the woman into his arms and rushed outside. I'd inhaled so much gas that my limbs had gone weak. I collapsed to the floor and watched him leave without a second thought. Something inside me finally snapped. I'd had enough of this miserable five-year marriage. This time, I was going to end it myself.

In the three years since my wife, Ariel Meyers, and I are married, I've been beaten up 38 times by her deranged ex-husband, Isaac Thornton. The last time, he doused me from head to toe in vinegar, thinking it was sulfuric acid. I want to call the police, but Ariel stops me and says, "He's just having an episode. He thinks that he and I haven't divorced yet. "It's not like it's real sulfuric acid anyway, Matt. Just let it go. A shower will fix everything. "Oh, and by the way, Isaac's condition has worsened, and he needs a kidney transplant. Can you go to the hospital and get tested for a match? "My daughter also hasn't accepted you yet. How about I move back in with Isaac and her first, just for a while? Just bear with it a while longer, alright?" I look at her and feel my heart sink to my stomach. So, she still hasn't completely let go of Isaac yet. And I will forever be treated as an outsider as long as she thinks that. I buy a ticket back to my hometown without any hesitation. "Let's get a divorce. I won't stand in the way of you remarrying your ex again, Ariel."

The day I catch my fiancée, Autumn Freeman, in bed with another man, the guy on top of her deliberately slashes his own face. Autumn throws herself in front of him, refusing to budge. Even as I fall apart right there, she refuses to let me get a clear look at his face. She turns to me, her voice breaking as she pleads through her tears. "This is all my fault. I'll spend the rest of my life making it up to you. I only ask that you leave him alone, Clark Ballard." After that day, Autumn gives up her privacy. She hands me her phone every day and installs hidden cameras in her car herself. Even when patients text her, I grill her about it. She accepts everything without complaint, doing whatever it takes just to win me back. But when I go to pick up my suit three days before our wedding, the clerk gives me a puzzled look. "Mr. Ballard, you already picked up your suit this morning. I just came across a video of your wedding online." In the video she pulls up, Autumn's close friends, who were calling me Autumn's husband just yesterday, are handing rings to the newlyweds. Our mutual friends are standing right there, too, and Autumn looks absolutely radiant with happiness. Blushing, she gazes at the groom and softly calls out to him. "Kev." Hearing the groom's name, along with seeing a face that looks exactly like mine, leaves me rooted to the spot.

My wife, Sarah, was the executive chef at a renowned Michelin-starred restaurant in town. Her culinary creations were famous across the city, making a reservation nearly impossible to secure. Yet in our ten years of marriage, she had never cooked me a single meal at home. She always claimed that cooking was just her job, and when she came home, she didn’t want to set foot in the kitchen. Naturally, I wanted to visit her restaurant and taste her food. However, every time I brought it up, she insisted that all the tables were fully booked and told me not to make a scene. Everything changed when my mother’s seventieth birthday approached. Half a month in advance, I asked Sarah if she could reserve a table at her restaurant for a family celebration. To my surprise, she readily agreed. On the day of the dinner, I walked arm-in-arm with my mother, followed by around thirty of our relatives. Yet, when we arrived, the receptionist informed us there was no reservation under our name at all. Panicked, I called Sarah more than a dozen times, and she didn’t answer a single call. With no other choice, I swallowed my pride and rushed in, hoping to find her so she could let us in. The moment I pushed the doors open, I froze. Sarah stood there in a spotless white apron, meticulously placing a tiny chocolate car onto a five-tiered birthday cake, and standing right beside her was Mark, her high school sweetheart. As it turned out, today was his son's first birthday party. So it was never that she didn’t know how to care for her family; it was simply that I was never the family she cared about. I quietly backed out of the room, turned around, and reserved a table at another restaurant instead. If she didn’t want to cook for me, then from this day on, I would never ask for her cooking again.

At the company's tenth-anniversary celebration, my wife's male secretary was in charge of the raffle. When it was time for the grand prize, he somehow drew his own name. My wife asked him what he wanted, and he pointed at the watch on my wrist. I flatly refused. How could a personal belonging be used as a prize? But the male secretary turned to my wife and whined, "That watch is a limited edition. There's only one in the world." My wife signaled for me to give the watch to him. I argued my case, but my wife slapped me across the face instead. "It's just a watch. Don't ruin the mood of the anniversary celebration." I smiled, took off the watch, and handed it to her secretary. It was a wedding gift from her that I had treasured for years, but now, I had decided to throw away both the watch and her.

After saving up for five years with Cindy Labelle, we finally go house hunting. My best friend, Caleb Jarding, comes along too. He points to the floor plan I've been studying for the past six months and asks Cindy, "The second bedroom needs to be turned into a gaming room. Can we knock down the wall?" Cindy replies, "Let's get a designer to take a look tomorrow. You can change it however you want." The two of them talk about everything from the orientation to the tiles, and then from the floor-to-ceiling windows to the bathtub. I stand in the corner, unable to get a word in. Only when it's time to sign the contract does Cindy suddenly remember my existence. She says, "Let's put Cal's name on the deed for now. He's been working hard here on his own, so consider it a company perk. And since the company is a little tight on cash lately, you can keep renting for another two years, Zachary." But five years ago, I, too, traveled thousands of miles to be with her as she chased her dreams. We squeezed into a cramped partitioned room without air conditioning. Back then, Cindy was deeply moved and promised, "Once the company takes off, the first thing we'll do is get a home of our own." Now that the company is doing well, she gives someone else a home first. I stare at the two signatures side by side on the contract. There is no place for mine. Since she has already planned a future without me, I won't wait for her anymore. I open the webpage to terminate my lease and press confirm.

Someone introduces me to Ivy Bennett, my secret girlfriend of five years, at a college reunion. "Hey, Dr. Bennett, Eli is a researcher in your department, too. Why don't you two give it a try?" I walk toward Ivy, hoping to take this opportunity to finally make our relationship public. But Ivy takes a step back and points toward her childhood sweetheart, Matthew Reed, who has just returned from abroad. "That's alright. I already have someone I like." To avoid suspicion, Ivy adopts a distant, detached expression and says, "If you have marriage in mind, there's someone I can introduce you to. I think you'd make a good match." I look at the ten feet of distance she keeps between us and laugh dryly. For five years, Ivy has always appeared to be single, and she has always kept her distance from me. I've waited five years for her to acknowledge our relationship publicly. This time, I'm done waiting. "Oh yeah? Well, introduce me to her, then."

A month before my wedding, I happen to find a shared wedding planning folder on my fiance Tyler Bilson's computer. I just wanted to check if I've missed anything, but instead I find countless comments he and my sister, Winona Shaw, left on it together. Under the champagne roses I picked, Winona leaves a smiling emoji and writes, "Tanya really has great taste." Tyler replies, "But I think red roses would look better. They'd complement your bridesmaid dress." Winona leaves another comment under the scented gift boxes I specifically prepared for the guests. "Tanya really lives up to her reputation as a perfumer. This gift set will definitely make your wedding unforgettable." Tyler replies, "Actually, I think the towel bear you suggested is better. I've already had someone replace all the gift boxes." Then I see Winona's name under the wedding invitation I've revised with the designer five times before approving it. She says, "If only my name were on this wedding invitation as the bride." I stop reading and close the folder. Since you've already planned the wedding for me, I might as well let you have it.

On the day my overseas assignment ended, my boyfriend, Victor Walter, posted something on social media and quickly deleted it. The room was filled with familiar friends. The caption read, [Waiting for tonight's guest of honor.] I thought he had found out that I had changed my flight to come back early and wanted to surprise me. When I arrived at the location and entered the room, everyone fell silent. My best friend, Cynthia Haight, was the first to recover from the shock and said, "Welcome home! We've been waiting for you." Everyone ushered me into a seat and took turns toasting to my return. After several rounds, I leaned drowsily into Victor's arms and closed my eyes to fake being drunk. He pinched my cheek the way he always did and tested me, "Clementine?" When I did not respond, he draped his jacket over me. I smiled a little. Just as I was about to tease him, I heard Cynthia's voice, saying, "Victor, what are we going to do about our wedding on Saturday?" Victor let go of me and turned to pull her into his arms. "Don't worry. The wedding's still on." Their friends chimed in and reassured her softly, "Clementine won't find out. We're all covering for you. There's nothing to worry about." My body turned rigid. I only dared to open my eyes a tiny bit. Under the couch, I noticed something that had been shoved out of sight. [Victor Walter & Cynthia Haight—One-Year Anniversary.]

Ten years ago, a fire broke out at my school. I saved four friends, but the flames left me an idiot. The four of them stood beside my hospital bed and cried, swearing they would spend the rest of their lives making it up to me. They were afraid I would get bullied, so they gave up their spots at two of the country's top universities and went to community college with me instead. They were afraid someone would trick me into leaving them, so the other three pushed Joshua Summers to confess his feelings for me. I had once said I envied people who lived in houses that didn't leak, so all four of them saved every cent they had and bought me a house for Joshua and me to live in after we married. Then came the party the night before my wedding to Joshua. When I returned from the bathroom, I heard everyone inside playing a round of Truth. The topic was "Secrets Loretta Doesn't Know." Curious, I pressed my ear to the crack in the door. Calvin Dawson's drunken laughter drifted through. "That little idiot has no idea tomorrow's wedding is actually for Nisha." I froze. After a moment of silence, my sister picked up where he had left off. "Loretta doesn't know that when Josh confessed to her, he only did it to spite Nisha. Who would've guessed she'd say yes? This wedding was supposed to be Nisha's from the start." My best friend's eyes reddened. "If my family hadn't forced me into marriage, I never would've taken Lori's wedding from her. I only want the ceremony. She can keep the title. As long as she's happy, my own happiness can wait until the next life." Joshua's eyes flickered. With a resigned expression, he revealed the final secret. "This morning, I got worked up enough to consider sending Loretta to her death, but I gave up on it in the end. We owe her a life anyway. Let's call this one paid off." I didn't know how long I stood there before I finally stumbled back to my room in a daze. I opened Joshua's bag, and there it was: an opened bottle of pills. My heart shuddered. The happiness I had cherished for ten years had never been anything more than repayment for a debt. Through my tears, I put the pills into my mouth one by one. There was no need to wait for the next life. In this one, I would give them the happiness they wanted.

11:59 p.m. "Happy 10th anniversary, my girlfriend!" With Blake West's handsome face before me and our friends watching expectantly, I closed my eyes and made a wish over the candles. 12:00 a.m. Blake immediately reached over and carefully removed the tiara tangled in my hair without pulling a single strand. His charming eyes curved into a teasing smile. "Happy breakup, ex-girlfriend." The private room erupted in cheers. "It's that time of year again! Congrats, Blake. You're a free man!" "Bets are open! If you think they'll get back together, place your bets with me. If you think they won't, go see Brooks!" Amid the flashing lights and pounding music, I remained quietly in my seat as though none of it had anything to do with me. As Blake walked past with an arm around Corrine Duffy's slender waist, he reminded me, "Same rules as always. One month." I pressed a hand against my aching lower abdomen without letting anything show. 'Blake, this time, it's for a lifetime. I'm getting married. I don't care who it is, as long as it isn't you.'

On our fifth anniversary, Jerome Walsh's childhood friend, Nora Blunt, comes back from overseas. "I'm back! Happy anniversary!" she laughs. Jerome's face lights up. He slips an arm around her waist and fusses over her, taking her coat, fetching her slippers, and pouring her a glass of juice. Meanwhile, the candles sit forgotten beside our fifth anniversary cake. After dinner, Jerome hands Nora a gift. It's a giant stuffed toy with "Happy Ten Years, Nora and Jerome" stitched across the front. That's when it hits me that the anniversary he's celebrating isn't ours. It's theirs. Nora teases him with a smile. "I can't believe you still remember. I thought you'd forgotten all about us now that you have a girlfriend." Jerome wipes some icing from her cheek and glances at me. "Of course I remember. Cece and I have been together for five years. You and I have known each other for ten. I know who matters more." Later that night, he lets Nora stay in the guest room, which is decorated exactly to her taste. I look around the room, then at our cake, with the number five sitting lonely on top. Suddenly, I feel drained. I lower my head and type out a message. "I've decided to accept your job offer. Please send me the address and onboarding details. I can start within two days."

I've been with Sebastian Radford for five years, and I assume there are no secrets between us. Then, the night before our engagement party, Sebastian says, "Cece, check the group chat." I open the four-person group text, confused. "Nobody sent anything." Sebastian goes, "Oh. I misread it." When he heads into the bathroom, the tablet on the coffee table lights up with two new messages. My friend, Noelle Frasier, texts, "You scared me to death. You almost gave away our trip plans." My childhood friend, Wade Kirby, writes, "I really don't want Cece to tag along. I can't even cut loose with her around." Sebastian replies, "I'll be more careful next time." I glance at the group name. "No Cecilia Ward Today!" I scroll up. There are over 2,000 messages, documenting an entire life I know nothing about. Just last week, on the night of my promotion dinner, they're all texting about that barbecue joint on the west side. I ask Sebastian why everyone seems so unenthusiastic, and he tells me, "Everyone's got their own stuff going on." It turns out "their own stuff" is figuring out how to do everything without me. I don't make a scene. I quietly set the tablet down, pick up my phone, and call to cancel the engagement banquet. Then I walk into the bedroom and start packing.