قصص وروايات قصيرة من فئة Romance وتضم Scumbag وتدور في Regret

When I was nine, I was caught in the blast while trying to save Joel Yorks, and the loud wave took away my hearing. Since then, I have had to wear hearing aids. Joel felt guilty. He insisted on having my hand in marriage. With his eyes welling up in tears, he swore, “Helen, I’ll take care of you for the rest of your life.” However, when I turned eighteen… Everything changed because he wanted to please the prettiest girl in the school. He ripped off my hearing aid in front of her and our classmates and said in disdain, “I’ve had enough of you being a burden. I really wish you hadn’t survived that day when you were nine. It would have been better if you were dead.” I clutched my audiology report and stayed silent. When I got home, I quietly revised my college applications and formally broke the engagement along with my parents. Joel and I would go our separate ways after that. We would not need to meet again.

My name is Nina Brown. I've been married to Julian Hayes for seven years, ever since I left Sorrin for Capin. We can never eat the same meal. I love spicy food, but the second he smells spice, he slams his fork down. I made a spicy fish stew at home once. He smashed his plate and fork and gave me the cold shoulder for a month. After that, I quit making spicy food and learn to live on thin soup and bland food. Every day, for seven years, until my birthday. That day, I finish buying groceries and head home. Suddenly, the smell from a spicy stew shop stops me in my tracks. That is when I see Julian sitting beside a young woman. A pot of bright red chili stew sits in front of them. He's sweating from the heat, swallowing the food she feeds him like he's done it a hundred times. His lips are already swollen, but he still looks like he's enjoying it. I stand outside the glass window and breathe in the chili in the air. For the first time, it makes my stomach turn. It's not that he can't handle spicy food. He just won't eat it for me.

"If you could start over, who would you date?" That night, one of my fiancé's friends threw a party. We were playing truth or dare when the spinner landed on Julian Hale. All eyes in the room turned to Julian, who sat beside me. Then everyone turned to me with knowing, slightly envious smiles, ready to tease. Just yesterday, Julian had proposed to me with a three-million-dollar drone light show and a nine-million-dollar diamond ring. Glass in hand, my smile froze before it could fully form. Julian toyed with a metal lighter between his fingers. His gaze passed right over me and settled on the girl in white sitting in the far corner of the room. "Summer Lowe." His voice was flat. He didn't hesitate for even a second. The teasing in the room died instantly. A few of the guys across from us exchanged awkward looks. Someone coughed, then quickly tried to smooth things over. "Julian's joking. Everybody knows he's marrying Nora next month." Summer's head snapped up. Her eyes immediately welled with tears, and she twisted her fingers together nervously. "Julian, stop joking around. Nora's going to be upset." Sitting beside Julian, I felt my blood run cold.

Three years into our secret marriage, the shoe rack at home still held only three pairs of slippers. Kevin Russell's, his student's, and his friend's. The only pair missing was mine. When he handed me a new pair of disposable slippers, my voice was so flat it gave nothing away. "Where are the fleece slippers I bought?" He didn't even glance at me. "I threw them out before they came over." "Oh," I said. Swallowing the sourness in my chest, I asked as if it were an afterthought, "Did Monica come this time too?" "No." He was lying. Monica Lawrence had just sent me a message to gloat. Monica: [Honestly, you're kind of pathetic. Every time we come over, you have to pretend to be the cleaning lady and carry the trash downstairs.] Monica: [Have you ever thought that maybe it's not that he can't go public? Maybe he just doesn't want to.] I switched off my phone screen and went to the bathroom. The mirror over the sink was covered in dense handprints, like some kind of declaration of war. When I walked past Kevin, I didn't ask him why he'd lied to me. Or why the contact pinned to the top of his phone was a little m, and not me. I watched a game with him and gazed at the moon for a while. Then, with a smile, I pushed the slippers I'd found hidden in the safe across to him. "If you treasure her this much, stop hiding her away like some dirty little secret."

Five years after their breakup, Lauren Scott signed a master-servant contract with Yale Sutton, the ex-boyfriend who had been penniless when they were together. Yale would pay off her debts, and in return, Lauren had to fulfill his every demand. "Lauren, take off one piece of clothing, and I'll knock a million off your debt." Yale spoke slowly, his voice dripping with mockery. Around the private room, the men hooted and cheered while the women laughed and made teasing remarks. Lauren gritted her teeth. "Fine. Just don't go back on your word, Mr. Sutton." Without a moment's hesitation, she unbuttoned her blouse and let it fall to the floor, baring her porcelain-white skin and most of her full, rounded breasts. The room fell silent for a moment before whistles erupted from every direction.

The day Adrian Knight clinched a contract with our biggest client, I "accidentally" tipped a bottle of ink across the paperwork, voiding it on the spot. Because of that single blot, the project landed in Alex Lewis’s lap, and he won Chairman Henry Carter’s favor almost overnight, moving into the Carter mansion as their future son-in-law and watching his net worth rocket into eight figures. Adrian never blamed me. He just laughed that he’d never been executive material anyway and happily brought me home as his bride. Everyone whispered that, if not for my meddling, Adrian would already be sitting in the Carter family’s executive suite instead of scraping by in an ordinary life with me. Only I knew the truth: stopping him from signing that contract had saved his life. When Adrian learned I was pregnant, he locked me in the basement, fingers digging into my throat. "If it hadn’t been for you," he snarled, "I’d be Henry Carter’s son-in-law by now. You’re the reason I lost Rachel, the princess of the Carter family." That’s when I realized he’d been nursing this grudge for years. After he killed me, I woke up, reborn on the very day Adrian first reached for that fatal contract. This time, I’ll make sure Adrian Knight gets exactly what he wants.

My boyfriend of nine years suddenly changed his WhatsApp name to "Peanut Love." When I asked why, he wouldn't say. Then his secretary, going by the name "Peanut," sent me their intimate photos. I understood everything. I calmly saved the photos and opened my mom's chat. I sent a single message: [Mom, I've decided to come home for the arranged marriage.] Mom immediately video-called me. "Sweetheart, we'll set the wedding for the end of this month." Fifteen days. That's all that's left between Jason and me.

Remi Sloan had been married to the top scion of the elite circle for five years. To outsiders, their marriage looked like a fairy tale. Everyone said he adored her—that he would even give his life for her if she asked. However, because she could not get pregnant, a few hints from her in-laws became outright demands. The man who had held her hands and promised to protect her for the rest of her life on their wedding day cried in front of her. “Be good… I can’t hold on anymore.” So this was how short a man’s promise could be, because less than two months later, she saw him supporting a pregnant woman in the hospital's obstetrics department, his movements gentle.

When Lily Rosenfelt is eight months pregnant, Zeke Connolly brings home the woman he truly loves—Sophie Cruz, who's also eight months along. To give Sophie and the baby the recognition they deserve, he goes public with a statement saying that he and Lily are already divorced and that he'll be marrying Sophie soon. Thinking Lily is still blind, Zeke tricks her into signing the divorce papers. He even sleeps with Sophie in his own villa. What he doesn't know is that Lily has long regained her sight. When she and Sophie fall down the stairs together and Zeke, without a moment's hesitation, chooses Sophie, something in Lily breaks. She buries her love for him along with their child. It's not until she's truly gone that Zeke starts to panic.

In the second year after we decided on a destination wedding, my fiance, Nicholas Shipley, still had not finalized our travel plans. Unable to wait any longer, I confronted him once more. He finally took out his tablet to show me the travel itinerary he had prepared. “Honey, I just want the trip to be as perfect as possible.” Two years of frustration had been building up, and I could feel it boiling over. Just then, his phone buzzed with a notification. He stood up and walked away. He had forgotten to sign out of WhatsApp on his tablet. A pinned conversation with the young assistant intern, who worked for the manager, Annie Croce, popped up. He had marked it as urgent. [Nick, you’re amazing! You put together the whole itinerary in just two months. As a thank-you, I went ahead and bought us both tickets!] [This is a singles’ trip. So, no bringing your wife, okay?] The chat showed Nicholas’ elaborate travel plans in full detail. The itinerary he showed me had all been made for Jocelyn over the past two months. In contrast, I had waited for two whole years. Then, I heard his voice from behind. “Honey, the views aren’t great this month. How about we push it to next month instead?” “Don’t bother.” I was calm, but my body was as tense as a rock. “Nicholas, let’s break up.”

My husband, Nathan Ford, was grounded for two years after a plane crash left him badly traumatized. To get him through treatment, I sold the house my mother left me. I paid the compensation he owed after the crash and sat up with him every night he was too scared to close his eyes. The day he got back in the cockpit, he held me for a long time. "I owe you a honeymoon. I swear I'll make it up to you under the northern lights." After that, he picked up more and more flights. Every anniversary, every birthday, he had a reason: a delay, a diversion, a last-minute schedule change. I knew how hard he worked, so I never brought up the northern lights again. Then the airline I worked for sent me on a business trip, and I made a point of booking one of his flights. Before boarding, I overheard Lana Pierce, the young purser, asking him something outside the crew lounge. "You keep swapping shifts just to take me to see the northern lights. Is it worth it?" He was scrolling through photos of the two of them on his phone, his voice soft. "If you like it, it's worth it." So it wasn't that he couldn't find the time. He'd already taken someone else to see the northern lights he'd promised me. Before takeoff, I signed the divorce papers and accepted a two-year posting overseas. This time, I was going to see my own northern lights.

The night before the Global Finals, my boyfriend, our team captain, handed my starting spot to an academy trainee just to indulge her. Every question I got wrong, I had to hand over a piece of gear that had carried me through championships. But every answer had been rigged from the start. In the end, he pulled my account key and gave my Finals seat to the trainee. "Just let her play one match. You're twenty-six, stop being so petty." I snapped my account card in half on the spot and signed the termination papers they'd drawn up. The whole team expected me to crawl back to base. But when the Finals lineups took the stage, I was wearing our rivals' starting jersey, standing on the other side. They still had no idea who had really been carrying whom to those three straight championships.

My husband claimed my pregnant belly disgusted him. So on New Year's Eve, he left me behind and took his secretary out instead. When I finally breached his private suite, she was moaning from his lap and reeking of my wedding perfume. At seven months pregnant, the shock and fury ruptured my amniotic sac. But the secretary told him I had simply lost control of my bladder to cause a scene. Believing I was just being overly emotional, my husband locked me in the closet. For the next few hours, he rang in the new year with his secretary before finally ending my punishment. Unfortunately, when he finally opened our nursery door, his face turned pale at the sight of her tiny white urn.

My husband, Brandon Robinson, threw me a rehearsal funeral for the sake of his first love, Aylin Blessen. He said Aylin had witnessed her family burn to death and had been terrified of death ever since. The cure was to pick someone close to her, put that person through a full funeral process, and then have them reappear on the seventh day. Only then would she be healed. So, Brandon revoked my keycard access to our house, announced my death to everyone we knew, and sent me to a death simulation facility. I was not allowed to contact anyone for seven days. Aylin sobbed as she personally picked out my burial clothes. "Leanna, you only have to be dead for seven days. But this funeral could save my life." Brandon put my phone in a drawer. "You'll be alive and well through the whole process. What's the harm in doing this for Aylin's sake?" On the day of the rehearsal, Aylin shoved me into the facility's old cold storage unit. Then, she went back to the funeral hall and told Brandon I had run away. His expression darkened as he burned my portrait. "Since Leanna won't play along, then for these seven days, she's dead to me." My soul sat in the corner of the funeral hall and watched them hold each other as they "mourned." Brandon did not know it yet, but this rehearsal funeral was no longer just a rehearsal.

A typhoon warning had been issued. I drove out to pick up my mother, who lived by the coast. My car broke down halfway there. I called my boyfriend fifty-eight times, and every single one was declined. The rain kept getting heavier. No rescue services were available, and the water was rising. My hands were shaking so badly that all I could do was get Mom to a nearby bus shelter. That was when I scrolled past a Facebook post from my boyfriend's assistant, Megan. "Derek is such a sweetheart. Spent two hours searching, and the little stray finally has a home." In the photo, Derek was at Megan's place, giving a stray cat a bath. I looked at my mother, soaked to the bone, and a wave of hurt washed over me. By the time evening fell, my boyfriend finally called back, but the wind was so strong that the signal kept cutting in and out. I was about to ask him to come get us when his voice crackled through the receiver, broken up by static. "Don't let your mom... the seafood... mess up the car." Before I could say a word, he hung up. The rescue team arrived. As we climbed in, Mom was still shivering, fretting over the seafood that had spoiled during the delay. I picked up the bag and tossed it into the trash. If it's spoiled, there's no point keeping it. Same goes for people.

On the day of our graduation photo, the class started sorting everyone into groups. I'd barely taken my place beside my boyfriend, Evan Brooks, when someone started shouting. "Put Claire next to Evan!" "Right? Claire's the prettiest girl on campus. She belongs beside the campus heartthrob!" Before I could react, my childhood friend Liam took my arm and gently traded our positions. "Nina, switch with Claire. "It's only a graduation photo. Don't be petty." Evan smiled and didn't refuse. He only stepped half a step aside, opening a space for Claire. I froze where I stood and touched the barrette in my hair without thinking. It was the first gift he'd ever given me. I'd stood in front of the mirror for ages getting it right, because I wanted one proper photograph with him. Right before the shutter, Evan called to me. "Nina." My heart lurched. The next second, he reached up and took the barrette out of my hair. "Claire's hair is a mess. Let her borrow this." The teasing started up again. Claire lowered her head and smiled. Evan didn't explain. The photographer called out. "All right—happy graduation!" When everyone shouted it together, I was standing at the very edge. At that moment, I finally understood that I had never belonged there. Since I had no place in your graduation photograph, you would have no place in my future.

On our third wedding anniversary, my husband, Ethan Hale, took his childhood sweetheart Sienna Clarke and me to a gourmet market. The clerk smiled when she saw the two of them and asked, "The usual? One Musang King durian and a pound of Kobe wagyu?" Ethan nodded, then added without missing a beat, "Cut the wagyu thick. And make sure the durian is fully ripe. She hates it underripe." But I was allergic to durian, and I'd never liked beef. At checkout, the clerk handed over a gold cooler box with tuna, salmon, and a photo inside. "You two have been coming here for eight years now. This is your couples membership gift." In the photo, Sienna was leaning on Ethan's shoulder while he bent down to wipe a dab of whipped cream off her lip. The picture had been taken last year, on our wedding anniversary. That night he'd told me something had come up at work, and I'd waited alone until midnight. Sienna hugged the cooler box and asked, half joking, "Nora won't mind, will she?" Ethan put the wagyu she loved into the cart and said casually, "She's already married to me. She's not going to make a fuss over something this small." I didn't say a word. I just put my shopping bag back. When I got home, I canceled the custom anniversary gift I'd ordered for him and took out the divorce papers I'd already had drawn up. They could have another eight years together, and eight more after that. But our third anniversary would be our last.

Neville had set up a special wish jar just for me. Every month, I was allowed only three draws to claim his time and attention as my husband. If I drew Dinner, he'd grace me with his presence for a brief meal, as though he were doing me some enormous favor. If I drew a blank, I wasn't even allowed to see his face. I used to tell myself that this was simply his cold, overly analytical, STEM-brained way of expressing love. That was, until Thanksgiving night, when our three-year-old daughter suffered a sudden, severe asthma attack. It left her gasping for air, her lips turning purple. I grabbed Neville by the sleeve and begged him to let me use all my remaining draws if he'd just drive us to the ER. He frowned and violently shook off my hand. "Rules are rules. Stop using our kid to guilt-trip me." Terrified and desperate, I reached into the jar for my final slip. It read: "Don't disturb each other today." Relief washed visibly over his face. Without even glancing at our daughter, he grabbed his car keys and walked out. When our daughter's condition had stabilized, I stood alone at the hospital billing desk with her in my arms. That was when I spotted Neville in a VIP treatment suite in the ER. He was gently pressing an ice pack against his assistant's knee, which had barely a scrape on it. The girl blushed and cooed, "Mr. Murphy, I didn't even have to draw a slip. Why would you take time off work just to stay with me?" Neville's expression softened with a rare tenderness. "The wish jar is meant to keep ordinary people in line. You have unrestricted VIP access." I held our trembling daughter and struggled to keep my tears from falling. It turned out that only the unloved had to leave their happiness to chance. I turned around, tossed the wish jar straight into the trash, and called my lawyer to draw up a divorce agreement.

I came home late one night to find another woman in the apartment I shared with my boyfriend, Alistair Westwood. She was wearing my silk slip, which barely covered her thighs. Barefoot, she pressed herself against him. His hand was wrapped around her bare waist. "Nika isn't feeling well, so I told her she could stay here for now." Nika peeked out from behind him. "I'm sorry. I didn't know this was your place." "Where is she going to sleep?" I demanded. "And why is she wearing my clothes?" Alistair frowned. "Nika is sick. Obviously, she'll sleep with me so I can look after her. Can't you just let this go for once?" "It's fine. I can sleep on the couch," Nika offered. Alistair cut her off at once. "No. You're too sick to sleep there." I stared at the two of them for a moment. Then I grabbed a pillow and a blanket. "I'll take the couch." As soon as the bedroom door closed, I opened my laptop and reached for an invitation on the table. Half an hour later, I typed my answer. By the next day, Alistair's company had lost one of its biggest partnerships.

Evan Shaw was famous for sticking to his principles. He was punctual, followed every rule, and never made exceptions. Yet when it came to going to City Hall to get married to Roxie Foster, he had stood her up eight times. The first time, his former underclassman, Sylvia Young, was returning after eight years abroad, and he had to pick her up from the airport. The second time, Sylvia accidentally burned her finger while cooking. The third time, Sylvia's son got sick. ... This was the eighth time. Once again, Evan didn't show up. He only called in a hurry and said, "Something came up. I'll be there." Roxie watched their number get skipped again and again until the clerk behind the window tapped on the glass. "Miss, is your boyfriend not coming again? We're about to close." Roxie was about to call him when a message from Evan came through first. "I'm still tied up. We'll get married another day." A bitter ache spread through her chest as she stared at the message. She was about to put away her phone and leave when a new post on Sylvia's social media feed caught her eye. Roxie froze. In the photo, Sylvia was smiling brightly. Beside her, Evan held Sylvia's son, Severin "Seven" Young, in his arms while gazing at her with unmistakable fondness. The caption read: "Seven wanted to go to the amusement park today. Thanks to my favorite senior for spending the whole day with us!" Looking at that picture, Roxie's throat tightened, heavy and raw. So this was the important matter that had kept him away. He had skipped their marriage registration to take Sylvia's son to an amusement park. Pain twisted through Roxie's chest. Hurt and anger burned through her so fiercely that her entire body began to tremble. She was about to call Evan and demand an explanation when she noticed the comments underneath the post. Several mutual friends had already started teasing them. "All these years later, Dr. Shaw still has the same soft spot for his favorite girl."