Feel The Bern

Just a few days before my wedding, I accidentally come across a post while scrolling online. The title reads, "To the guy getting married in this city, your fiancée's already cheated on you." Curious, I click in to see the gossip, only to realize I'm the one being talked about. A deep male voice plays in the video. "I heard you're getting married?" The woman in the frame, bare-backed and trembling, chokes back a sob. "After you left, I realized you're still the one I love most. I'm done with him. Take me away, please!" The moment I hear her voice, it feels like someone punches me straight in the chest. Then I notice something on her wrist—the luxury couple's bracelet I gave her just yesterday. And in that instant, I feel like the biggest joke of all. Turns out the fool was me.

On our wedding anniversary, my husband has his intern put on the custom-made wedding gown he prepared for me. "You wouldn't have looked good in a wedding gown with your baby bump, anyway. She's saving us trouble by wearing the gown for you. Think about how kind she is!" Before I can rebuke him, an earthquake happens. I lose my balance and fall to the floor. Instantly, I feel moisture on my legs. At the same time, my husband received a call from his intern. "There are so many frogs here, Mr. Quinn. I'm so scared…" My husband turns to leave, but I grab his pant leg. "Ethan, I—" "It's just a minor earthquake—the ground barely even shook. Don't make a mountain out of a molehill. Didn't you hear Chloe crying because she was so scared? Can't you be sympathetic?" He ignores the blood pooling around me and hurries off to comfort Chloe Bennett. That night, they share a passionate kiss under a sky full of fireworks. Meanwhile, my child dies in my belly. It's a pretty good way to end things. Someone like Ethan Quinn doesn't deserve to have his own children.

My mom has always been biased toward my younger sister, Nina Henderson. But before she passes away, she leaves the only house she owns to me. Meanwhile, Nina, who has always been the apple of my mom's eye, obtains nothing but a jewelry box. Just as I'm about to feel touched, I see comments springing in front of my eyes. "The truth is, their mom owes someone a huge sum of money. She left Leah her house because she wants Leah to take over the debt. In the end, Leah is forced to jump off a building by the debt collector. What a poor woman." "Nina, on the other hand, is able to marry the richest man's son thanks to the photo hidden inside the jewelry box. She gets to enjoy a lavish and comfortable life." "It's such a shame that Nina begins cursing at her mother the moment she hears the will being uttered. Because of that, her mother dies of anger before she can tell Nina the whole truth." I'm left feeling dumbstruck. That night, I dig up the jewelry box that Nina has thrown away. Then, I'm able to track down the richest man's villa.

The intern secretly submitted a voluntary pay-cut application on my behalf. As a result, my salary dropped from $10,000 to $2,000. When I found out and confronted him, my boss and colleagues all defended him. "The company is not doing great right now. Oscar was just trying to save costs for us. Do you have to nickel-and-dime over this?" With my salary so low, I couldn't afford the special medication for my chronic migraines, and one day I passed out at my desk during an attack. But the intern snuck a video of me unconscious and posted it on the company's website. He even whipped up a detailed 100-page slideshow breaking down how I was slacking off on the clock and dumping all my work on him. Overnight, I was labeled a workplace bully. My boss gave me the cold shoulder, and my colleagues whispered about me. Even worse, some extreme "anti-workplace-bullying" activists tracked me down to my home, showed up with two cans of gasoline, and burned me and my parents alive. When I opened my eyes again, I was back on that very day when the intern had submitted my pay-cut form. In this second chance at life, I would make sure everyone saw the intern for who he truly was.

I accidentally come across a post made by my mom's smurf account on the Internet. "Is it too cheap for me to prepare just a set of gold bars as a coming-of-age gift for my daughter?" My heart skips a beat. My parents are known for being extremely stingy. To think that they are willing to spend this much on me! I'm worried that my parents might overwork themselves just to prepare such a lucrative gift, so I take a screenshot and save the link to a three-year vacation tour that's priced at 999 dollars. Then, I decide to respond to the post as an anonymous user. "Your daughter will feel very happy as long as she receives her parents' love. No materialistic gift can ever outshine that." Five minutes later, Mom responds to me, "Thank you for your suggestion, but I've already taken my darling on a graduation trip in Enora last week. She had so much fun there."

I'm a member of a top-secret research unit. As per my superior's request, I am to deliver a file to Celeste Judd, my older sister. The moment I step into my sister's office, an intern, Ethan Irwin, quickly moves to stand in my way. "Are you the new assistant?" He eyes me up and down, finally noticing the document envelope in my hand. Then, he chortles loudly. "It's your first day on the job, and yet you're already trying to suck up to Ms. Judd! Why don't you take a look in the mirror and see how pathetic you are?" Only then do I realize that Ethan has mistaken me as a love rival. But the thing is, Celeste has never told me that she has a boyfriend. I'm about to explain the truth to Ethan when I feel his fist colliding with my face. "I'm the only assistant Ms. Judd needs! You can forget about being her boyfriend!" Ethan yanks me by the hair as he dumps scalding hot water onto my face. "To think that you're already planning on becoming a sugar baby and seducing rich women at such a young age! I'll teach you a lesson on behalf of your parents!" I can only curl into a small ball on the floor. Stubbornly, I use my body to protect the document envelope. My actions infuriate Ethan to no end. He snatches the file away before ripping it into pieces in front of the entire company. He even says fawningly to Celeste, "Ms. Judd, your new assistant sure is a bold one for trying to seduce you! But don't worry, for I've already taught him a lesson!"

Under my parents' request, I work as the finance officer in my childhood friend, Julius Sanford's company. But the moment he goes on a business trip, the new intern, Lizzie Dalton, rushes into my office and demands that I process her reimbursements. As I stare at the pile of receipts that come from luxury stores, all I feel is shock. "Lizzie, I can only use the company's funds to reimburse business expenses. Why are you asking me for reimbursements when all you did was buy clothes and bags of your own?" But as soon as my words fall, Lizzie splashes a cup of coffee at me instantly. "I'm the lady boss of this company! The company's funds are my funds too! Don't think you can just reject my receipts just because you know my husband!" I do my best to suppress my fury as I dig out the company's policy and reiterate, "No, I seriously cannot do that. The company's cash flow must be reflected in the books." Seeing as I refuse to yield to her no matter what, Lizzie calls Julius on the phone and begins whining to him. "Babe, since when do I need to ask your childhood friend for approval if I want to buy something I like for myself? Or could it be that she's acting so assertively because you two are secretly having an affair?" Julius panics and tells Lizzie that he has nothing to do with me. After that, he quickly releases an announcement on the company group just so he can defend Lizzie. "Lizzie Dalton is my wife! She's the second boss of this company other than me!" After that, Julius tags me in the group. "Hey, finance! You're not my mom here! I don't like you, so please stay out of my private matters! "I'd like nothing more than to let my own wife spend my own money! If you don't like that, you can pack up and leave!" Once Julius makes his stance clear, I change my tune and reimburse Lizzie the expenses she's claimed. But one week later, Julius finds himself staring at the list of debts that's 33 feet long when he returns from his business trip.

After I refused for the eighth time to give my daughter a monthly allowance of $80, she went live online to denounce me. During the broadcast, she shared screenshots of our messages, showing how she had repeatedly and desperately asked me for money after the new school term began. "Mom, I just got my period. I do not have money to buy sanitary pads. Could you send me this month's allowance?" I replied calmly, "No." "Mom, I have not eaten in three days. I am really hungry." I responded with sarcasm. "What does that have to do with me?" The screen quickly filled with comments calling me suffocatingly cruel and heartless. Looking straight into the camera, she sobbed uncontrollably. "Mom, I am not asking for much. I only need $80 a month for living expenses. "Do you really have to push me to death before you feel satisfied?" Within a short time, I became the target of widespread online abuse. A well-known education influencer reached out to me. "It is only $80. It is not something you cannot afford. Why are you treating your own daughter so harshly?" I looked at her calmly. "Try livestreaming seven days of life with me and my daughter. "If you can do that, you'll understand."

In my previous life, everything I do to care for myself somehow ends up benefiting my new housekeeper instead. I apply expensive skincare, yet dark spots and fine lines spread across my face, whereas the 45-year-old housekeeper's face becomes silkier. I jog every morning, yet my body only grows heavier and bulkier, while hers becomes slender and toned. When my husband notices the stretch marks on my abdomen, his face twists with disgust, and he never touches me again. "I genuinely can't bring myself to touch you. How can you look worse than Mirabelle when you take such good care of yourself?" My housekeeper looks at me with a sinister smile. A chill crawls up my spine, and the strange feeling makes me fire her on the spot. Yet, as soon as she leaves, I start aging at lightning speed, entering menopause 20 years early and developing diabetes and high blood pressure. I see every doctor I can, but after hanging on for a week, I die from a stroke. When I open my eyes again, I'm back on the day she first reports to work. This time, I push away the royal jelly she sets in front of me with a pleasant smile. "I've been avoiding certain foods lately. You can have it instead."

My son was caught in a car accident. My husband said that without a cornea donor, he would be trapped in darkness forever. Heartbroken, I let him sweet-talk me into signing away my corneas. Blind, I overheard my son gloating, "Dad, the plan worked. Mom fell for it, and Rachel's got her sight back. She won't be miserable anymore." "Yeah, now we're a real family with her," replied my husband. The truth gutted me. They'd played me like a fool to save my husband's old flame. When I confronted them, Rachel Huffman shoved me down a staircase, and I died in agony. But when I opened my eyes again, I was back on the day of my son's car accident.