Emotional

During a kindergarten parent-teacher conference, a rich wife accuses me of stealing her bag. I'm baffled. I bought the bag myself abroad, and it even has my name etched on it. However, when I scrutinize the bag, I discover that my name is missing. I call my husband, and he impatiently says, "I gave your bag to Jen. She's fresh out of college and needs an expensive bag to make herself look good. Even Finn said the bag is too young for you—it suits Jen more. You're too old for these things. You should be glad to even have a fake one." I bark out an exasperated laugh. I can go without having a husband, but the bag has to be returned to me.

I am diagnosed with severe systemic lupus erythematosus, and I only have three days left to live. When my husband rejects my 188th plea for help, I take my test results and enter the hospice care center. "Hello, I'd like to schedule my own cremation process and apply for government aid." Ten minutes later, they arrive. Before I can speak, my lawyer husband, Jasper Horton, coldly slaps me across the face. "You're faking a terminal illness just to steal attention from Janice?" My doctor brother, Casey Carter, snatches the medical report from my hand and scoffs at it. "Lupus? If you're going to fake being sick, at least make it believable. Only one in a million people gets this." I endure the pain in my body, return to the counter, and hand in the application form and my medical records once more. The staff member sees the butterfly-shaped rash on my wrist and sympathizes with me. "I have no family left," I say. "I'm requesting cremation in three days, location doesn't matter. I just don't want my death to burden anyone."

After reuniting with my birth family, my wealthy biological father tossed me a black card and laid down one rule: I could spend as much as I wanted, but I was never to call him Dad—that title belonged only to his adoptive daughter. Clutching the black card, I cautiously bought myself a two-dollar-fifty ice cream cone. Just as I was happily licking the sweet ice cream, the adoptive daughter dropped to her knees before me. "Alice, are you mocking me because I can't even afford something that costs two-fifty in the future?" My brother immediately slapped me twice. "You have money now, but you can't split love. Natalie is my one and only sister!" Then my father splashed boiling water onto my face. "No disgraceful wretch deserves to be a Gervais." To punish me, they sent me off to Rimala, forced to work as a child laborer in the mines. Ten years later, I walked into a grand banquet hall with an ice cream in hand and came face-to-face with my brother, Ansel Gervais, dressed in a hand-tailored suit. "All these years and you're still a disgrace," he sneered, but I couldn't be bothered to argue. "Let go. My dad's waiting for me—and if I'm any later, the ice cream's going to melt." He looked down at me with contempt. "Dad? Who gave you permission to call him that? Natalie will forever be the only Gervais girl—no one can take that away from her!" I rolled my eyes. Who said I was talking about that cheap excuse for a father? I was talking about my adoptive father—the oil tycoon with an incurable sweet tooth. I was in a hurry to let him taste some ice cream.

I was born with a one-track mind—I take everything seriously and do exactly as I'm told. When my adoptive father cursed a rival company, calling them bloodsucking vampires, I immediately went out, bought ten pounds of garlic and a crucifix, and stormed into their CEO's office to perform an exorcism. When my adoptive mother said she was willing to sell a kidney for the sake of the company, I contacted an underground black-market clinic on the spot and asked when they could schedule her surgery. Over time, no one dared joke casually around me anymore. Everyone in the family chose their words with extreme care, terrified I might take them at face value. That is, until the day of the family reunion banquet—when the fake heiress, who refused to leave no matter what, showed up as well. She hooked her arm through my brother's and flashed me a provocative smile. "Arista, Benji dotes on me the most," she said sweetly. "He said if anyone dares to make me unhappy, he'll chop them into pieces and dump them in the river to feed the fish." The banquet hall erupted in laughter. I was the only one whose face went deathly pale. The next second, I kicked my brother, Benji Collins, straight onto the dining table. I grabbed the silver steak knife and pressed it against his throat. "Everyone, stay calm," I announced loudly. "I've already called the police! For publicly advocating premeditated murder, desecration of a corpse, and antisocial personality tendencies… The minimum sentence is the death penalty!"

When my neighbor's daughter-in-law falls pregnant, my neighbor issues a few "decrees" in a group chat for all residents in the area. "Number 1: Anyone whose family has daughters has to avoid leaving the house when my daughter-in-law does. I don't want them to hurt my grandson! "Number 2: Every family has to purchase meat and expensive fruits once a week and present them to my daughter-in-law! "Number 3: After my grandson is born, I will bestow upon everyone the honor to bask in his fortune. Every family has to give us 300 dollars as a gift. I will personally visit each family that doesn't!" She even singles me out with a message. "Unit 401, I want you to immediately stop feeding stray cats. I'll also give you three days to get rid of your cat! My daughter-in-law is scared of cats, and the creatures are covered in germs. What if she catches a virus from your cat when she goes downstairs for a walk? What if you hurt my grandson? "I command you to immediately bring me one thousand dollars as a deposit and guarantee. If I catch you feeding stray cats one more time, I'll confiscate the money!" I transfer 20 thousand dollars to her, yet she grovels at my feet and begs me to take the money back.

My billionaire dad chooses a husband for me. People claim that Sebastian Lambert is a fine gentleman who's absolutely in awe of me. He seems easy enough to deal with, so I agree to the marriage. The wedding is held at the biggest hotel my family owns. On the big day, as I push open the doors in my wedding dress, a bucket of foul-smelling blood comes crashing down on me. The scene inside is even more horrifying. What was supposed to be a pure and romantic ceremony is now decorated with giant spiders and cockroaches. Grotesque clown faces grin at me from the walls. At the altar, there's a black coffin. Sebastian's adoptive sister, Ruth Lambert, strolls over with a group of people. She covers her mouth in fake surprise as she remarks, "Oh my, Claudia, you look like a pathetic mutt right now!" Laughter erupts around me. Holding my anger back, I coldly reply, "All of you, get out." She crosses her arms, arrogantly looking down at me as if she's on some pedestal. "Come on, Claudia. Seb personally asked me to surprise you. I put in a lot of effort to decorate your little wedding. You're telling me to get out? I don't even get a 'thank you'? Do you need me to teach you some manners?" She signals to the people next to her, and two of them step forward, trying to force me to my knees. Stunned for a few seconds, I pull out my phone and call Sebastian. "Is this the so-called surprise you had your sister prepare for me? Forcing me to kneel before her?"

My sister and I got into a car crash. My heart was ruptured, and I needed immediate surgery if I were to live. My mother, being the director of her hospital, sent all the doctors to my sister instead, all just to check on her. She barely got hurt. I pleaded and begged for my mother to save me, but impatience got the better of her. She roared, "This isn't the time to take any attention away from your sister! She almost had a bone fracture!" And I died. I remember where it was. It was a freezing operating theater.

I had been managing the company’s warehouse software for five years. Then the new manager came to me out of the blue, saying I didn’t understand frontline operations and that I was being fired. Looking at the five-thousand-dollar severance, I just nodded. “Fine.” He patted my shoulder after seeing me so compliant and started lecturing. “Young people should be out on the line, moving boxes! What’s the use of sitting in the office staring at data every day? “We’re a logistics company. Strength is what matters, not a tech geek like you!” I glanced at the high-end gaming computer in his office and obediently replied, “Yes, Mr. Fuller. Lesson received.” Maybe I had been too comfortable these past few years, and he thought I was dispensable. So, I handed over my ID badge and casually deleted all my personal login keys from my computer. Little did he know that the entire warehouse logistics, inventory management, and route planning software had been coded by me. I had let the company use it for free simply because the place was close to home and the work was easy. Now that I was gone, the system running on my personal cloud server was naturally inaccessible. Tens of thousands of items in the warehouse ground to a halt. As for any commercial software that could replace my system, a year’s subscription would cost exactly one thousand times my severance.

The hospital's latest intern, Lindsey Clark, is very pretty, but she's a total idiot as well. When my mom came to the hospital for a prescription, she swapped the vitamin C for potassium supplements, which were known to be very poisonous if misused. Mom, who was fresh out of surgery, suffered from heavy bleeding right after taking the medication. She died on the same night. Before I could hold Lindsey responsible for Mom's death, the latter quickly piped up with teary eyes, "I'm so sorry, Dr. Monroe! I just thought that potassium supplements can help your mother heal faster…" Even Michael Jones, my husband, who was the hospital director, took her side. "Your mom only had her idiocy to blame! She died because she took the wrong medication! How dare you drag Lindsey into this!" I was so furious that my cardiac arrest was triggered on the spot. Soon, I was sent into the operating room. Lindsey said she wanted to redeem herself by taking on the post as Michael's assistant in the surgery. But her hands kept trembling even when she tried to thread the suture needle. In the end, she took off her mask and picked up the suture with her teeth. Just like that, she used her saliva to wet the suture end. One day later, I died in the ICU due to a case of severe infection. When my spirit was about to fade away, I heard Lindsey crying sadly. "If it wasn't for my idiocy, Dr. Monroe wouldn't have died!" Michael just patted her dotingly on the head in return. "Having medical risks in a surgical operation is completely normal. You're still young, so stop blaming yourself already." Mom and I were cremated instantly, seeing as Michael intended to cover up our deaths. When I open my eyes again, I've returned to the day Lindsey has just gotten recruited by the hospital.

My father-in-law said he wanted to experience "how the young folks have fun these days," so I took him to my wife's newly opened upscale cocktail bar for a quiet drink. I’d just finished ordering him a custom cocktail when a man from a booth across the room swaggered over, glass in hand. His eyes scanned the drink menu on our table, and a condescending smirk twisted his lips. "Only ordering the cheapest well drinks?" he sneered. "Brought the old man here to enjoy the free air conditioning? Trash like you belongs in a dive bar. Who even let you in here?" Anger burned in my chest. I stood up, my jaw clenched. "We're paying customers. What's it to you?" But before I could say another word, his face darkened with pure rage. He snatched the half-finished beer bottle from our table and smashed it on my head. "My girl owns this place!" he snarled. "Even if I crack your skull open, I can afford the payout! You filthy pauper—either get on your knees and lick my shoes dry, or get the hell out of my sight. You're an eyesore." The beer dripped down my face. My hands trembled with fury as I wiped it away. Then, a cold calm settled over me. I opened my phone, switched to the camera, and went live. "Alright, everyone," I said into the screen. "You won't want to miss this. We're going live to catch my cheating wife and see the double life she's been leading."