Daniel Goleman Emotional Intelligence

My mother-in-law is extremely frugal. She reuses paper others have discarded, carefully saving the unmarked portions. She even takes the black waste oil from the kitchen range hood and uses it to cook our meals. She says, "Frugality is a virtue—it brings blessings!" I try tirelessly to convince her otherwise, throwing out all her filthy items to protect my family's health. But while she praises me to my face, behind my back, she uses my baby's food scissors to clip her grimy toenails. My child eventually dies of a lung infection, leaving me heartbroken. My mother-in-law, however, points her finger at me, saying I'm unlucky and that I've brought misfortune to their family. Even my husband blames me. In the end, they use a knitting needle to pierce my throat and stab me to death. When I open my eyes again, I find myself back on the day I first see her picking up dirty paper. The first thing I do is hide all the high-quality tissue paper I had stocked up on before my pregnancy, pretending I knew nothing. She calls these blessings, right? Fine. The blessings of this miserly frugality—she can reap them all herself!

A while ago, my buddy Aaron Miller took me to a camping site, and that’s when I truly learned what camping was all about. I also discovered why so many men become obsessed with camping and can’t get enough of it. Inside each tent, there were stunning women, each one more beautiful than the last. There were the intellectual and graceful ones, the mature and seductive ones, the petite and delicate ones, and the quirky, fun ones—there was no type you couldn’t find there.

The day before our wedding, my fiancé invites our family onto a cruise ship. He says he wants to test the authenticity of my feelings for him. He shoves my mother off the ship when the waves are at their choppiest. Then, he jumps into the water, too. I'm caught between a rock and a hard place. I panic, not knowing what to do. My mother had already choked on a lot of water, but she pushed me away weakly. She cried, "Save Adrian first! He can't swim!" However, after I drag Adrian Lawson onto land and go back for my mother, I find that she's already stopped breathing. Adrian watches me cry, his expression frosty. "Drop the act. Your mother was a swimmer when she was younger—how can she be dead? I can't believe you didn't save me first. "Vi is right—you don't love me enough. Our wedding is postponed. It'll happen only after you've reflected on your mistakes and I've received an apology from you and your mother." After that, he leaves while holding Vivian Sinclair's hand. He doesn't know that my mother can no longer swim after a major illness a few years back. He's shoved her to her death.

During lunch, an older female colleague asked me, "How old are you? Do you have a boyfriend? When are you planning to get married?" I shook my head. "Twenty-seven, no boyfriend, and no plans to get married." She was momentarily stunned. "What are you talking about? How can a woman not get married?" she asked. I smiled without responding. Realizing I wasn't joking, her expression darkened. "Did you work as a escort and get caught? Is that why no man wants you?"

My brother, Theo Sorento, died in a plane crash on his way back home just to celebrate my birthday. They never found his body—only wreckage. Ever since, my parents forced me to kneel in front of his grave every year on my birthday, demanding that I repent for surviving when he didn’t. Then came my eighteenth birthday. I realized someone was following me. Panicked, I sent a few messages asking for help. Just then, Mom called, not to check on me but to lash out. “I know exactly what you're doing. You’re just making up excuses so you don’t have to kneel in front of your brother’s grave! You’re a liar. Why wasn’t it you who died instead of him? You’re a walking curse!” Before my phone was smashed under a boot, the last thing I heard was the cold click of her hanging up. Then, I was cut up into pieces, and what was left of me was tossed across the city. My father, the lead forensic pathologist on my case, didn’t even recognize me. Later, Theo returned alive with his wife, whom he had eloped with eight years ago. When they found out the pile of rotting flesh was me, they all went insane.

My husband promises to go to my hometown with me for the New Year holidays this year after I go to his. But before the trip to my hometown is due, he suddenly tells me he doesn't want to go anymore. I argue with him about this, and he pummels me with a bat. Meanwhile, his family eggs him on, telling him to kill me. Intense pain shoots through me as the blows land. I try my best to fight back, but I can't win against the majority. As the sky darkens, everyone heads home for dinner after giving me a good beating. When I regain consciousness in a corner of the garden, I see sense.

I was growing up as the much-hated "fake heiress" in a wealthy family, and my life took a devastating turn after my death. My childhood friend who lived next door leaked my nudes online, branding me as manipulative and promiscuous. This ignited public outrage, with strangers celebrating my demise at my family's home. My parents, eager to sever any connection with me, destroyed our mansion that very night, even going so far as to feed my ashes to the dog. Everyone said I deserved it. On the day the true heiress married my childhood friend in a grand, live-streamed wedding, I gave them a unique wedding present from beyond the grave.

Just because my sister, Yvonne Lindell, claims I swapped Grandma's medicine with sugar pellets and caused her death, Mom locks me inside the cremator. I kneel and beg, but Mom spits at me in disgust. "You wretched girl, stay still! You killed your grandma by secretly switching her medicine. Now go repent to her properly!" Dad hesitates, unable to bear it. "Maybe we should let her out. What if—" "What are you afraid of? Don't forget that she killed your mother! If we don't teach her a lesson this time, who knows who she'll kill next!" The voices outside the door gradually fade, and my heart sinks to the bottom. The flames slowly begin to lick at my body. In despair, I clutch Grandma's cold hand beside me. "Grandma, I'm sorry. I should've taken better care of your medicine. But I swear, I didn't replace it with sugar pellets. Maybe only in death, can I truly atone for this sin…"

I have just been discharged after leg surgery when Victor Clark, my wife's former colleague who resents her for taking his position, drags me up to the roof and stabs me repeatedly. My wife, Melissa Lane, is the captain of the rescue unit, yet she is busy mobilizing everyone to stop her depressed first love, Ethan Hayes, from setting his rental apartment on fire. I don't call her to save me. In my previous life, I begged her for help. She abandoned Ethan and rushed to rescue me. In the end, I survived while Ethan died in the blaze. Melissa never blamed me. She said that Ethan got what he deserved and even promised me a surprise for my birthday a week later. But on my birthday, she drugged me, tied me to a hospital bed, and drove a knife into me again and again. "You and Victor set me up that day, didn't you? Those stab wounds aren't even serious! You were never going to die! Since you like getting stabbed so much, I'll make it real for you!" When I open my eyes, I am back to the day Victor took me hostage. This time, I let Melissa go save her first love.

On the day of our tenth wedding anniversary, my wife, Cara Dempsey, jumped from ten thousand feet in the air after hearing that her first love's plane had crashed. It was only then that I finally understood the only man she ever truly loved all these years was Luthen Waltz. When we were both sent back in time to relive our teenage years, she wasted no time making a grand, public confession to Luthen, completely cutting ties with me. I just stood there, watching the two of them kiss like they couldn’t bear to be apart, and in that moment, my heart felt nothing. From that day on, we were over, and we lived our separate lives. Ten years later, we crossed paths again at a five-star hotel in Harbor City. She, who had become a celebrity adored by the world, was wearing a gown, laughing in Luthen’s arms. When she saw me wandering through the hotel, searching for someone, she thought I had come looking for her. “George, stop wasting your time! Even in ten years, I will never choose you!” I didn’t respond. Instead, I looked toward the little girl running toward me, calling me Dad, and gave her the warmest smile. Cara’s expression froze. Tears welled in her eyes as she choked out, “You lied to me, didn’t you? You said you hated kids and that you’d only ever love me.”