Emotional

I went to exactly one party in my new, wealthy neighborhood. Then my neighbor Brenda sued me. In court, she held her bruised and battered daughter, Tiffany. She accused my son of rape. Mid-hearing, Tiffany tugged her collar down. Red marks circled her neck. "He tried to rip my pants off," she sobbed. "He tried to force himself on me. I fought back. So he beat me. He ruined my face!" Outside the courthouse, protesters held up signs, calling my son a piece of trash, a spoiled rich kid. Online, a photoshopped memorial of me went viral. The caption read: The unfit mother should die with her son. My company’s stock plummeted. But I just sat there. Stone-faced. I asked for my son, Cooper, to be brought in. The courtroom doors opened. Cooper walked in. Everyone froze.

My stepsister falsely accuses me of causing her allergies to act up. My three brothers stuff me into the cramped cellar and chain the door shut. I pound on the door and beg them to let me out. My eldest brother, an outstanding businessman, snaps, "It's bad enough that you keep bullying Lori. How could you make her eat seafood when you know she's allergic to it? Isn't that just murder? Stay in there and reflect on your mistakes!" My second brother, an award-winning singer, and my third brother, a genius painter, scoff contemptuously. "It's unbelievable that someone as evil as you is making excuses to garner pity. You can stay in there and repent for your sins!" After that, they take our shuddering stepsister to the hospital. The oxygen in the cellar soon runs out, and it gets difficult to breathe. Ultimately, I die in there. My brothers only remember me three days later when they bring our stepsister back from the hospital. Unbeknownst to them, I've already died of asphyxiation.

After Mom passed, it was just me and Dad, depending on each other. I’ve always had poor health, and people used to taunt me, calling me a “sickly, doomed child.” He kneeled by my bedside, making a promise. “I swear, I’ll get you the best treatment, no matter what. You’ll never suffer again!” Eventually, he became a powerful CEO, going so far as to buy an entire private villa just so I could recover in peace. However, his assistant assumed I was his mistress.  She came in with a group of security guards and surrounded me. “So, you’re the cripple who’s been seducing Mr. Johnson?” “Let’s see if you can still act high and mighty after I’m done with you!” She kicked over my wheelchair, yanked me by the hair, scratched up my face, and finally cut off my hand. Barely clinging to life, I lay there until Dad came back. She held up my severed hand, presenting it to him. “Mr. Johnson, this was a spy sent by a rival company. I took care of her for you.”

Late one night, as I scrolled through social media, I came across a relationship influencer with over a hundred thousand followers, teaching men how to "control" their wives. "She actually tried to talk to me about privacy?" he scoffed. "I ignored her for three days, and she handed over all her passwords, crying and begging me not to leave her." The comments exploded almost instantly. The chat went wild. [Take me under your wing, man!] I felt sick to my stomach. Then, without warning, he lifted his phone and pressed a kiss to the screen. A face appeared in the reflection. Mine. Smiling, he turned back to his audience of thousands. "See this? This is the perfect wife I spent three years training." A chill ran through me. I clicked into his profile and scrolled all the way back to his first post. The upload date was the same day we got married. He claimed he was filming prank videos and that it was all just for the livestream—no wonder he got increasingly out of hand. That was when it hit me: he had been lying to me all along. From the moment I stepped into that marriage, I had been nothing more than his experiment, his content, his source of money. Fine. If that was the case, then I would turn his livestream into his worst nightmare. I picked up my phone and sat directly beneath the camera he had installed, then sent a deliberately suggestive message to another man. Three seconds later, the bedroom door burst open. Matthias stormed in and snatched my phone. After reading the message, his lips pressed into a tight line. However, he did not explode. He did not even look at me. Instead, he turned, opened his livestream, and faced the camera. "Send something through, and I'll show you exactly how to put a cheating woman in her place."

Thanks to a car accident, I've suffered from a severe injury in my head, leaving me with one foot in my grave. My husband, Andrew Rollins who's known for being an extremely talented doctor, serves as my primary surgeon. He conducts a surgery on me that lasts for 18 hours straight just so he can wrench my life from Death's cold fingers. But the first thing I do after I wake up is tell him, "Let's get divorced, Andrew." His eyes become bloodshot immediately. "Tess, I just saved your life, and yet the first thing you want is a divorce? Is it because I've been too busy with my work at the hospital that it cuts down on the time I get to spend with you?" I frown deeply. "It's precisely due to the fact that you've saved me that I must file for a divorce. That's the only way I can help you uphold your title as an extremely talented doctor." My older family members are quick to advise me. "Andrew is such an amazing husband. Not only is he a family man, but he also loves you with all his heart. Why must you insist on getting a divorce? Are you tired of living a great life with Andrew?" Whoever has the gall to advise me will receive a rebuttal from me, no questions asked. "If you think he's such a prized man, you can have him after the divorce." Because of that, everyone is pissed at me. "Go ahead with the divorce, then! You'd better not regret your decision in the future!" I mumble under my breath, "Oh, I regret it alright… I regret not divorcing him sooner."

My mom ran a clinic her whole life, charging just five dollars for cold medicine. After I took over the clinic, I followed her teachings closely, doing my best to care for the folks in our community. However, after I charged an influencer 30 dollars for medication, I got blasted online as a scam clinic that was out to rob people blind. The entire town showed up at my door, young and old alike, demanding I return the 'overcharged' fees. I gave them exactly what they wanted and refunded every penny before shutting down the clinic for good. "There you go, just like you wanted. The clinic's closed. From now on, if you've got health concerns, feel free to drive 30 miles to the county hospital for consultation. I wish you all good health." The very next day, they were back at my door again. Only this time, they were begging me to reopen.

During the two months that I was away for a competition, my neighbors insulted me in the neighborhood’s common group chat. [The girl living on the ninth floor, you look like a decent girl. Why are you bringing so many men back home every day?] [Can you moan a little softer? I don’t care if you’re a sex worker, but if you keep making loud noises until midnight, don’t blame me for calling the police!] [Don’t call the police yet. I haven’t had my turn. How much are you charging, Charlene?] My heart sank. Before I left for my competition, I had asked my boyfriend, Jacob Smith, to take care of my luxury river-view apartment. That way, he could keep an eye on my expensive paintings. What was happening? I rushed home in confusion, but when I opened the door, I was further dumbfounded. My 3,000-square-foot apartment had been partitioned into 30 rooms. Meanwhile, Jacob’s childhood friend, Prissy Black, was holding a string of keys as she collected rent money. When they saw me, everyone started laughing. “What? Are you here to rent from Prissy after learning that she’s providing cheap rooms in such a pristine location? “Too bad everyone knows that you’re eyeing her boyfriend. You won’t be able to benefit from doing such a thing!” I was extremely furious as I approached Jacob to talk about it. However, he told me that it was Prissy’s dream to be a landlady. He asked me not to pay it any mind and to treat it as doing a good deed. “You’re rich anyway. Don’t be so calculative. Everyone’s happy now, so what’s wrong with that?” The keys tinkled in Prissy’s hand as if they were taunting me. “This house doesn’t welcome stray animals like you. You have yourself to blame for not having such a nice boyfriend.” The two of them acted all lovey-dovey in front of me, and I immediately called the police. “Someone’s trespassing on my property, and my painting that’s worth 15 million dollars has gone missing. What type of punishment would this entail?”

During a critical heart transplant, my doctor husband insisted his intern assist despite her garish nail art compromising the sterile field. When I called her out, he abandoned the patient mid-surgery to comfort her. I begged him to return, but he snapped, "Giselle is upset. Can't you wait? This is nothing compared to her feelings." 40 minutes later, the patient bled out and died. Later, they discovered that he was our highly respected mayor and placed the blame on me. "If it weren't for you causing a scene and kicking us out of the operating room, the mayor wouldn't have bled to death. This is all your fault!" Defenseless, I was sentenced to life in prison, tortured, and died in agony. My husband and his intern walked down the aisle, enjoying their happy life. When I opened my eyes again, I was back on the day of that fateful surgery.

Mom was a top student at a prestigious school and had always been determined to be the best at everything. She demanded that I learn to walk by seven months, speak fluently by eighteen months, and master all addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division by the age of three. I did all of it. Yet Mom still felt it wasn’t enough. However, when my younger brother, Liam, didn’t speak until he was five, Mom clapped and cheered when he finally did, celebrating his “late-blooming brilliance”. I didn’t think anything of it. Until one day, I was wearing headphones, memorizing Spanish words, and accidentally let the sound leak out, scaring Liam. He clutched his chest and cried, saying his heart hurt. Mom’s eyes turned red as she stormed over and slapped me. Then she grabbed my ear, twisting it a full 360 degrees with all her strength. The pain in my ear was so intense that I lost all feeling, and the fear made me nauseous to the point of vomiting. Still, Mom forced the headphones back on, cranked the volume to the maximum, and locked me in the storage room to reflect. “How could I give birth to such a terrible child? You’re just jealous of Liam. No matter how much I do for you, you’ll never appreciate it! “Love listening to words, huh? Then listen all you want.” But seven days later, when she opened the door, she completely lost it.

My mother hated me, to the point that she wished I were dead. I knew I deserved to die. Sixteen years ago, if I hadn’t insisted on going out, my brother wouldn’t have died while trying to save me. Eventually, both of us got what we wished for. I got brain cancer. She had become a stranger to me as I forgot everything and went to die in blissful ignorance. Then, she went mad.