Mga Maiikling Kuwento at Nobelang Scumbag Melodramatic

The birthday gift I gave my husband was found in a doghouse by the side of the road. I spent the next five years as the butt of all jokes made by Cascade City's high society wives. Every year when Julian Carter's birthday came around, they would bring it up again, teasing that the gift I bought him was surely the most expensive one of all. "That's nouveau riche taste for you. She thinks the more expensive it is, the better." "Yeah, but I wonder where they'll find it this year. Another doghouse, maybe?" The women burst into laughter. Then, they realized something was different. This year, I had not given Julian anything at all. In fact, as his birthday drew to a close, I still had not shown up. "Laura, where's my birthday present? And what kind of behavior is this? You disappeared for the entire day. Do you have any idea how unhappy everyone in the family has been?" Julian's eyes were dark with irritation. I pushed back my sleep-mussed hair, only then remembering that it seemed to be Julian's birthday. "Oh, sorry. I forgot." After a brief pause, I added casually, "I'll have my assistant pick something out tomorrow and send it over." For a moment, he simply stared at me, as if he could not believe what he had just heard. "What did you just say?"

When my mother-in-law was poisoned and clinging to life, my toxicology knowledge was her only hope. I ended the call and grabbed my coat, ready to rush to the hospital. My husband blocked my path. "Hold on! It's the opening of Ella's haunted castle today. You're bailing to play ghost?" I stared at him, telling him about the dire situation. The poison needed to be neutralized within thirty minutes, or it would be fatal. He rolled his eyes. "Your janitor mom can drop dead for all I care. I'll toss some Monopoly money on her grave if it shuts you up. Don't try to cross me here." His best female friend draped herself over him. "In a hurry to chase some side guy? Girl, your face is longer than Herbert's when he is all revved up. Right, buddy?" Their shamelessness was almost laughable. The kicker? Herbert thought it was my mom dying.

After my entire family was executed by slow slicing, I became the sensible, understanding wife Tristan Blackwood had always wanted. I stopped asking where he went. I stopped screaming at him to send his widowed sister-in-law away. When he said he wanted to take her as a second lawful wife to carry on his late brother's line, I calmly agreed. On their wedding day, I accepted the cup of tea Sabine offered me and, with a smile, handed her a marriage blessing. Tristan grabbed me by the throat and roared in fury. "Elowen, you know I earned that blessing for you, kneeling and bowing at every step of the way! Why would you give it to someone else? "Do you still blame me for not saving your father and brothers? "Is this how you're punishing me? How long are you going to keep this up?" His eyes were full of pain, but my smile was calm. He was the one who used my whole family's lives to force me into obedience. I was only giving him what he wanted. What he didn't know was that I was waiting. Right now, the remains of my entire family hung from the city gates for all to see. In three more days, I could finally collect their bodies. And on that same day, I would join my father and brothers, who had died wronged.

On the day of my wedding, I had just discovered I was pregnant when news of Gavin Holt's death reached me. I wept until my eyes were swollen, yet still clung to his portrait and insisted on completing the ceremony. The very next day, his twin brother Sebastian Holt, came with Charlotte Evans, to break off the marriage on behalf of his brother. "My brother said before he died that Charlotte was his one true love. If she cannot enter the Holt family, he'll never rest in peace!" Taking advantage of the fact I had no family to back me up, Sebastian shamelessly brought Charlotte into my bridal chamber and slept with her. Their moans and gasps filled the room. On the very first day of my marriage, I was humiliated by my own brother-in-law and turned into a laughingstock for the entire city. Then, by chance, I overheard their conversation. "Gavin, you lied to Emily, told her you were dead. What if she finds out?" "She's so foolish. Even now, she mourns my 'death' with blind devotion. Once she gives birth to the child, we'll drive her out of the Holt family." Only then did I learn the truth that the one who had died in that car accident wasn't Gavin at all, but his twin brother! Later, I chose to end the pregnancy and leave. Yet he went mad, begging me to return.

After I get detained in the police station, my husband, Gavin Pratt, specifically comes over to bail me out. But I grip a policeman's arm without letting go. "I'm the one who did it! Hurry up and arrest me!" In my previous life, I was surrounded by the family members of a car crash victim. A bar owner and a saleswoman who sold cosmetics were there as well. They claimed that I had gone into a drunken frenzy and stole perfume from the store. On top of that, I even ran a red light and hit someone with my car. I kept explaining the truth to everyone, yet no one believed me. Instead, they all had me surrounded and beat me up till I died. When I wake up again, I've returned to the day I'm detained inside the police station.

My boyfriend of six years, Liam Sherman, proposes to his long-time crush, Vivi Johansen, on my birthday. With that, the passionate love between us is a thing of the past. I come to my senses and distance myself from him, choosing to put our relationship behind us. As such, I decided to go along with the arranged marriage my family has planned.

My husband, Samuel Sullivan, has listed his home appliance repair services on a secondhand marketplace for five years. He charges one cent per job, and his service range is strictly limited to a single city, a single residential complex, and one specific address. His only customer is his ex-girlfriend, Willow Emerson. When her air conditioner filter needs replacing, he travels across half the city to disassemble and install it. When her bathroom lightbulb burns out, he heads out late at night, claiming he's going to buy cigarettes. I asked him about it once. He tells me a man must keep his word. He promised to look after her, and just because they broke up doesn't mean he can go back on his word. I hold my tongue, thinking I should be the bigger person. That is until Mom's heart bypass surgery, when I wait outside the ICU for nine hours. He tells me he has to go on a last-minute business trip and can't make it back in time. I reassure him that it's fine. However, moments later, I chance upon a short video on the local trending list with over 200 thousand views. Samuel crouches on Willow's balcony in the video, assembling the swing chair she has wanted for a long time. The comments section is flooded with people calling him the "perfect ex-boyfriend". The location tag shows he's only two miles from the hospital. I take all the times I've bitten my tongue and said "It's fine" in the last five years and write them into the divorce agreement.

One day, after getting rear-ended outside my office, I, Maeve Dahlman, call out for help, but Austin Cooper, who is simply passing by with Carmen Holt, merely glances at me impatiently, annoyed that I've disrupted their lunch plans. Instead of helping, he has his assistant take me to his private club and lock me in a room, accusing me of being paranoid and dramatic. "I'll give you three days to calm down," he says before walking away and leaving me in isolation. Eventually, I escape and call the police. An ambulance rushes me to the hospital, where doctors diagnose me with a brain injury that requires immediate surgery. I keep calling Austin, only to realize that he has blocked my number. Then, I see Carmen's latest post online, gushing about a romantic luxurious dinner with him. After I'm discharged, I cancel the wedding, destroy all the invitations, and finally call my mother. "Mom," I say, "I've made up my mind. I'm ready to meet him."

My body matured faster than most girls my age. When I turned 18, my overprotective brother worried I’d be taken advantage of, so he asked his best friend to look after me. But the first time we met, that man's eyes never left my body. After I graduated from college, he kept crossing the line, again and again. By day, he was my boss, and by night, I was his "personal assistant." For four years, we kept our affair a secret. He molded me into exactly what he liked, and the worst part? I let him. One day, his ex-fiancée came back from overseas. He slipped out of my bed in the middle of the night and rushed to the airport to pick her up. Humiliated but unwilling to let go, I followed him there, only to watch him gently stroke another woman’s hair right in front of me. He turned to me and said, "Jennifer Huckabee, four years ago, you were the one who crawled into my bed while I was drunk. The way you're behaving now… it’s really pathetic." The way he looked at her was soft, and the way he mocked me was sharp and deliberate. I suddenly realized he was right. This was meaningless. So I lowered my head, texted my brother to tell him I’d accept the Sinclair family marriage proposal, then looked up at that man and smiled. "Alright then. Goodbye."

I'm severely allergic to pollen. If I come into contact with even a speck, I'll suffer from difficulty in breathing. Alas, my boyfriend, Glenn Winchester, is a famous luxury floral designer. On Valentine's Day every month, he'll bring back a bunch of stems that only come with leaves. For the past three years, I have been keeping them alive in a glass vase filled with water. For so long, I've been thinking that this is Glenn's way of protecting me by specifically choosing flowerless plants for me. That is, until his floral design studio accepts a commission to design a grand wedding. I stand far away from the venue and watch as the entire hall is decorated by tens of thousands of roses of the highest quality. The bride, Adeline Shoeman, is Glenn's childhood sweetheart. She flaunts the most flawless and beautiful bridal bouquet on her social media feed. "He told me that my skin is delicate. That's why he has personally trimmed every thorn off the stems of all ten thousand roses, leaving me with the softest petals ever." I tap on the photo and zoom in, soon noticing that the roses are trimmed so short to the point that they only have the shortest, barest stems left. That's when I suddenly recall the bare stems Glenn has given me over the past months. All of those stems are covered with uneven nicks where the thorns have been snipped off. It turns out that the exclusive love I think I have is nothing but a pile of waste from Glenn's trimming sessions just so he can prevent the roses from pricking his beloved Adeline's hands. After I return home, I pull the stems from the vase, break them in half, and toss them into the trash can. Glenn, you've cultivated wonderful roses. But I will not be receiving anything from you from now on.

Adam Locke made it his mission to control our marital finances. Every time I needed money, he subjected me to an interrogation. All I was allowed was 300 dollars a month, no more, no less. "Asking for money again?" Adam asked, shoving his ledger in my face. "You've already reached your withdrawal limit for this month!" I stared at the ledger. That 300-dollar budget was supposed to cover our children's medical bills, our daily household expenses, and even the money Adam owed restaurants or colleagues whenever he got drunk at one of his "business events." Not a single one of those expenses had been for me. Suddenly, his phone rang. He picked it up from the table, and his tone softened almost instantly. "Oh no. Did Zack get into another fight? How much do you need to settle it? I'll send you the money right away." "They said 15,000 dollars, or Zack's getting locked up at the station," replied his secretary, Yolanda Sharpe. Adam did not need to be asked twice. He hung up and immediately wired Yolanda the full amount so her little brother could stay out of trouble. It was as if Zack mattered more to him than his own wife did. I waited until he finished, then calmly said, "Mom was in a car accident. I need money for her medical bills. Please, anything would help." He tossed the ledger in front of me. "I told you, you've reached your withdrawal limit for this month!" he grumbled. "Can't she wait until next month to take care of whatever business she needs to handle?" This time, I did not argue or insist that he give me the money. I simply nodded and said, "Sure." Then I turned away from him and called my mother-in-law, who was lying on an operating table in the ER. "Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but it seems your son has refused to pay to save your life."

I spent seven years drafting divorce papers for other people. I never expected that the ninety-ninth agreement would be my own. That night, my husband, Carter, lost a tabletop game during a live stream with his childhood sweetheart, Chloe. The penalty was to give up the thing he treasured most. Chloe smiled at the camera, tapping his wedding ring. "Lend me your marriage for a day." The comment section blew up. Carter looked at me like he was giving orders to an assistant. "Evelyn, you know the drill. "Sign a temporary divorce agreement. I’ll cancel it with you tomorrow morning." Chloe lowered her eyes, her voice trembling. "Forget it. She won't let you. You always choose her over me anyway." I reached into my bag and touched the positive IVF result. Seven years of hormone shots. Four miscarriages. I didn't even have the energy to tell him anymore. As the camera zoomed in on my face, I pushed the papers back across the table. "Carter, this time, I’m putting down a bet, too. “I bet the thing you lose tonight isn't just me.”

I had fallen in love with my father’s friend—the man I was supposed to call “uncle,” Kael Viremont. For a while, I thought he loved me too. We even had this silly little promise—that if I turned twenty-seven and still want to be with him, then we could be together, publicly. Five days before my twenty-seventh birthday, I overheard him saying he’d never liked me. That he was going to marry his childhood sweetheart. And as if that wasn’t cruel enough, he was planning to use the wedding to cut me off for good. So I did the one thing I should’ve done a long time ago—accepted that he and I would never belong to the same world… and disappeared from his life for good.

My fiancé, Jim Smith, had always been the kind of older brother who spoiled his younger sister. Harriet Smith, his adopted sister, was the first person he thought of whenever anything happened. When the craze for seasonal drinks swept through town, he was quick to buy Harriet the first one of the season. When he bought his first car outright, he saved the passenger seat for her to try first. Even when a fire broke out in our house in the middle of the night, his first instinct was to rush into Harriet's room and carry her downstairs. Only after he knew she was safe did he call to wake me. After I was injured in that fire, I finally lost my temper and demanded that he choose between Harriet and me. He looked genuinely confused. "Cecilia, Harriet and I have been through everything together since we were kids. She's just a kid. Why are you comparing yourself to her?" Then, as if he were offering me some perfectly reasonable solution, he added, "How about this? From now on, I promise I will treat you both equally. Okay?" I hesitated for a long time before finally agreeing. I had no idea that, later, the first wedding ring Jim had custom-made would go to Harriet. Even the wedding dress was no exception. Today was the day we had agreed to go to the county clerk's office and make our marriage official. Harriet came with us. The moment we arrived, she looked at Jim and said, "Jim, it's your first time doing this, so I wanna do it too."

Graduation season arrived, and my boyfriend's childhood friend, an influencer, posted a video titled "The Four of Us Through the Years." It went viral overnight. Viewers envied the friendship the four of them had maintained for ten years, and many began shipping her with my boyfriend as childhood sweethearts. What no one knew was that I had filmed every piece of footage and written every word. The video was twenty minutes long, yet my name never appeared, and neither did my face. When I asked my boyfriend why, he replied flatly, "You didn't come along until college. You weren't part of those years." Later, I found a folder on his childhood friend's computer. Every clip that included me had been cut out and placed inside. The folder was labeled: [Outsider in Frame.] My boyfriend had even reminded them in their private group chat: [Make sure you get every last bit. Don't spoil the whole 'four of us' thing.] I didn't argue. I simply revoked their permission to use any of my footage. If there was no room for me in their memories, then they could stop using my footage to relive them.

My cheating husband, Steve Manson, gets hit by a car and suffers brain damage. After the accident, he can only say two words—"Yes" and "No". He can't say anything else. And somehow, every answer he gives has to be the truth. For once, it feels like heaven is finally on my side. I ask, "Is the woman you're having an affair with my best friend?" His face turns pale, but his mouth moves against his will. "Yes." "Did you transfer assets behind my back?" "Yes." "Is your bank account password your first love's birthday?" "Yes." Thanks to this bizarre ability of his, I successfully send the mistress to prison and walk away with all of his assets. Yet, he can't even curse me out no matter how much he wants it. Then one day, a handsome food delivery guy flirts with me. I turn to look at Steve, who stands there with the same dull expression as always. "Are you really my husband? Why aren't you even jealous?" Without hesitation, he blurts out, "No." I freeze instantly and stare into his eyes. After a long silence, I finally ask, "Then is my husband... dead?" He answers, "Yes and no."

This was the hundredth time Mom caught Dad throwing thousands of dollars at social media influencers. She didn't scream or make a scene for the entire construction crew to laugh at anymore, nor did she pause her work. Dad thought she had finally learned her place and grown sensible. The very next month, he invited every single worker on the job site to attend his wedding. However, he kept Mom and me out of it. When the workers returned, they were all gossiping about how Mom, the worn-out house-cat, had been replaced by a beauty. The bride was a meticulously dolled-up young woman. I had seen her on his phone many times. Every time, she would be wearing next to nothing, dancing on camera while calling my dad her "Big Spender", right before Dad transferred amounts of money to her with many zeros at the end. Mom looked calmly at them. Unfastening her apron, she thrust the spatula into the woman's hands. "The workers' massive daily meals will be on you from now on." Dad's expression hardened instantly, and he slapped Mom's hand away. "Are you out of your mind?! There are over a hundred people on this site. How could you possibly make Abigail cook for them? It would wear her out! She married me to live in luxury!" "And living in a shack on a construction site isn't too much for our daughter?" The young woman stepped forward to play the peacemaker. "Oh, I heard you and my husband started working on construction sites together ten years ago. The kid must be totally used to it by now. "You can just stay on as the housekeeper. I won't kick you guys out." As if granting charity, Dad commanded Mom, "Hurry up and thank Abigail for her generosity. She's the new matriarch around here. We're all one family now." Mom didn't say another word, simply closing the drafty corrugated tin door. "Bailey, I saved up a bit of money. How about I take you somewhere else to go to school?"

In my past life, my boyfriend's childhood sweetheart, Kimberly Thatcher, claimed to be Lady Luck. She insisted on handing out sachets to keep our team safe for a hike. I, Priscilla Jensen, caught the scent and realized the sachets were stuffed with herbs that would attract wolves. So, I stepped in to stop her, saving everyone from an attack. But Kimberly thought I was looking down on her sachets, and that I was targeting her on purpose. Though she was the leader, she stormed off from the group in anger. We searched the forest under the raging storm. In the end, someone broke a leg, someone else was strangled by poisonous vines, and my shoulder was torn open. By dawn, we found Kimberly's corpse at the bottom of a valley. … On the seventh day after her death, her memorial service became an ambush. While everyone mourned for her, their eyes were fixed on me. My boyfriend, Fabian Lowell, was the first to lash out. He ripped off his bandage, revealing his wound. "If you hadn't stopped Kimberly from giving us those sachets, none of this would have happened! How dare you show up to her memorial service?" he yelled. Everyone turned to glare daggers at me. Suddenly, someone shouted, "It's all your fault! You're the reason we ended up like this! Go to hell!" In the next second, they hurled a pot of boiling stew at me. Then they set the private room ablaze and burned me alive. … When I open my eyes again, I'm back on the day of the hike.

While we were scuba diving, my boyfriend, Raphael Carlisle, ripped off my oxygen mask and put it on his childhood friend, Lucia Fairchild, whose mask had started leaking. I was left thrashing helplessly in the freezing water. Just as I thought it was over, Raphael's younger brother, Gabriel Carlisle, swam over, breathed life into me, and brought me back to the surface. After he saved me, he presented me with the purple diamond ring he designed himself and proposed, "For as long as I live, I'll never let you face danger again." I believed that he was my one true love, so I married him, leaving my job behind to focus on starting a family. On the day Lucia was given a critical condition notice, I ended up in a car accident. As I lay half-conscious on the hospital bed, I overheard Gabriel talking with Raphael. "Get a doctor to induce labor right away! Lucia's illness can only be treated with a stem cell transplant from umbilical cord blood. The only reason I got Phoebe pregnant was for this very day." "But she's carrying our bloodline! How could you have someone hit her with a car?" Raphael yelled. Gabriel replied, "Lucy matters more to me! As for Phoebe, I can spoil her rotten once she wakes up." At that moment, I realized the love I held on to was nothing but a lie. If that was the case, I'd just leave.

To win Samuel Zane’s heart, I lost everything. My family was ruined, and I was forced onto an operating table so he could take my heart and save his adopted sister, Xenia Zane, whose organs were failing. At the critical moment, William Zane disguised himself as a doctor and rescued me. We left the country and started a new life overseas. I used all my points to change my target from Samuel to William. “Host, I need to remind you that if you fail again after changing your target, you will be reincarnated as an animal and never become human again.” I looked at William as he knelt before me with a ring in his hand. I said firmly, “I do.” But when I gave birth to our daughter, I saw two figures standing outside my hospital room. William handed our daughter to Samuel and said, “Samuel, you’re rushing this. We need to wait until her organs are fully developed before we can take them.” Samuel’s expression remained cold. “Thanks to your plan, we were able to grow a healthy, young heart for Xenia. Don’t worry. We can just use an organ maturation agent.” “But…” “William, don’t tell me you’ve fallen for that woman.” “Of course not!” I heard him deny it immediately. “I endured everything for Xenia.” The moment he finished speaking, the system’s robotic voice rang in my mind. “Host, your mission has failed. In one month, you will be reincarnated as an animal.”