Hypocrisy

I was attacked at the same time as my childhood friend, and when we finally woke up, he had lost his memory. I didn't have a single scratch, but my long-gone grandmother's spirit somehow ended up inside my body. "This wimp is still pretending he lost his memory just to trick my sweetheart. If I were still alive, I'd beat him so bad he wouldn't know which way was up!" I stared in shock, my mouth wide open. My grandmother's angry voice kept ringing in my head. "In Sonia's last life, she got killed because of that useless Fabian. She lived such an unhappy life because of him! "When her grandpa asks who she wants to marry this time, I hope she won't choose Fabian. She should pick Chandler instead. That boy is quite responsible!" A moment later, my grandfather and a few elders really did walk into my room. They laid out portraits of the four princes in front of me and told me to choose one as my future husband. I didn't hesitate at all. I picked my long-time rival, Chandler Clarke. If my grandmother said Fabian Clarke never loved me, then I didn't want him anymore.

After I got a second chance at life, I stopped bringing lunch to my wife, who had become the factory manager. She would leave for meetings through the south gate, so I would sneak around through the north. In my previous life, I knew she only married me with an ulterior motive, but I still fell for her. I thought I could warm her heart over time. However, Shirley Scott was always just polite to me, nothing more. When I tried to get close, she would hand me a book and say, "Read more so people won't look down on you." Once, with a bit of liquid courage, I hugged her. Yet, she just stood there, stiff as a board, and said, "It's what married folks do." Years later, as I was dying, I read her memoir and learned about how she felt trapped in our marriage, like being stuck in the mud. She hoped she would never have to be with me again in another life. That hurt more than anything. However, then, I woke up and discovered that I was back to when there were whispers about her and the factory's technician. This time, I did not make a scene. I just asked for a divorce.

I had once been the woman Theo Bennett would have risked his life to marry. For six years after our wedding, he treated me like his entire world. He even had a matching tattoo carved into his lower abdomen, identical to mine, as proof of his devotion. But in the seventh year, he coldly demanded that I make a full-body model for his kept woman. "Catherine," he said, his voice sharp with contempt, "this is the price you pay for lying to me about being my savior. You know my tastes better than anyone. Make sure you replicate Hannah's body temperature. She's pregnant. I don't want to hurt her." Hannah Moore lay limp in Theo's arms, laughing so hard her shoulders shook. "How pathetic, Catherine," she mocked. "I'm pregnant, so I can't be with Theo. And yet he'd rather order a model of me than lay a finger on you. Once this one wears out, I guess I'll have to trouble you to make a few more copies of me." Only then did I understand. Theo had mistaken Hannah for the woman who once saved his life. I didn't scream. I didn't cry. I didn't argue. I simply turned around and dialed Sebastian's number. "Sebastian," I said calmly, "Theo is having an affair. I want a divorce."

Every anniversary, Mark had some twisted surprise for me. Our tenth? He strutted into the ballroom holding hands with an escort wearing straight up lingerie. "Jenna, she's cold. Hand over your dress." Then, like that wasn't sick enough: "And the lingerie. She likes your vibe." I clutched my collar, trying to keep it together. He didn't care—just yanked it open. "Cut the act. Your dad sold you to me, remember? That slutty look you used to give me—I still see it." Everyone stared, waiting for me to break. So I did the one thing I could. "I want a divorce." Again. Mark just laughed and chucked a stack of photos on the table—me, covered in marks, curled in bed, a total mess. "You say that every year. And every year, you're back in my bed. Think your mom keeps that hospital spot if these get out?"

In the third year of my marriage, I endure a full day of painful labor to give birth to my first child. However, my husband steals the baby to give to his true love. I try my damnedest to stop him, but all I get is a barrage of insults. "It's just a baby! I'm the one who planted the seed, so I get to decide who gets the fruit!" I'm overwhelmed by grief as I watch my husband leave. However, he shares a happy post on his social media. "Mother and daughter are safe." His true love comments, "Thank you for giving me a child, Jaspie. I'll be the happiest woman in the world with you two by my side." Clueless friends bless them and wish them well. I silently comment, "Give me back my child." All I get is another round of insults. Then, I'm blocked. I don't want to endure this anymore. I hire a lawyer to draft divorce papers before making a police report. "Officer, I want to report my husband for child trafficking."

The night before our wedding anniversary party, my husband—Harvey Clarke—receives constant calls from his first love, Cassie Moss. He responds by holding me closer, and I ask, "Aren't you going to pick up? What if it's urgent?" He firmly shakes his head and says he has already moved on. But when he receives news of her at the party, he breaks down right there and then, oblivious to the room of staring guests. When he tries to leave, I stop him in a panic, but he turns to me with a pure look of disgust. "Cassie's dead. Happy now?" The words hit me like a lightning bolt.

My roommate is the kind of person who has to get to the bottom of everything and doesn't stop asking questions until she's satisfied. One night, while I'm sound asleep, she suddenly stands by my bed and calls my name, "Melissa, are you asleep?" Having been awakened by her, I shoot her an annoyed glare, but she just says, "See? You weren't really asleep. Otherwise, how could you have answered me?" One day, she decides to skip class. Thinking that I could help by signing her in on my phone, I do just that. However, near the end of the lecture, she suddenly bursts into the room and asks the professor, "I wasn't here today, so why does it show I was marked present? Is the system down?" The professor traces it back to me, fails me on the spot, and makes me retake the class. Later on, I join a speech contest. My roommate stands up in front of everyone and asks why my speech sounded exactly like her ideas. I get disqualified, lose my scholarship, and am labeled a plagiarist. Devastated, I climb onto the rooftop late at night. When I open my eyes again, I'm back to the night when my roommate first asked if I was asleep.

"I don't want to go with you on this business trip," Lucy Landon said at the dinner table. Her voice was calm, so calm that no one could sense anything unusual. Steven Cooper's trip was set for June 1st. It wasn't their wedding anniversary, nor was it anyone's birthday. Just an ordinary Children's Day. Three days ago, she had stumbled upon a voice message on Steven's phone. A child's soft and childish voice had said, "Daddy, for Children's Day, I want to go to Maldove to see the fishes!"

Imagine my shock when I found out that my husband, a professor who had proudly embraced a childless life for half of his years, had an affair with one of his own students. She even had his six-year-old son. The day I planned to report him to the university, Zia Thompson came to my door with the child and knelt in front of me. "Maybe you and Zeke were in love once," she said. "But he's over forty now. Who doesn't want to have a child? A legacy?" "I don't need a title," she went on. "I can give up the child too. I just beg you, don't tear our family apart." I looked at my husband, who stood protectively in front of them. I felt terrifyingly calm. "Cut ties with them," I said, my voice flat, "or prepare to be reported to the university. You choose." Without a moment's hesitation, he tore the report letter into shreds. I thought that was his answer. But on the fifty-second night of a bed grown cold and a home echoing with silence, he still hadn't returned. Instead, I received news that Zia was pregnant again. She had graduated by then. The report I never sent no longer posed any threat to them. Zeke didn't bother to hide his fatigue and irritation anymore. "Treat Zia and the kids well," he said, "or keep living alone in that empty house. It's your choice." My heart was already a wasteland. "I have one more option," I said. "I choose divorce."

When my family went bankrupt, I was drugged and sent to the bed of my childhood sweetheart, Craig Kennedy. From that night, he brought women home every evening, tossing a divorce agreement in my face. "Beg me, and I won't leave you." He stood above me, watching as I humbled myself to dust, pleading to preserve our marriage. He even ordered me to kneel in his office and massage the feet of his secretary, Lucia Langston. On the day the Moore Group needed ten million to survive, she blocked all my desperate calls for help. I waited 24 hours, watching my family's legacy collapse and my parents take their lives. Craig, with Lucia at his side, entered the house and threw the signed divorce agreement at me again. "You wanted money to save your family, didn't you? Beg me, and as long as I don't divorce you, no one will touch them." But I signed it with calm despair. "Don't bother. We no longer need your help."