I Was Always Second Until I Left Novels & Stories

Not because I was happy. But because I finally had something left to hit. ** follow me on i,n,s,t,a,g,r,a,m: authormiragreen

My heart raced the entire time. Not from fear. From focus. Every click of a device felt like planting a flag. This is my territory too. You don’t get to rewrite my father’s legacy. You don’t get to play queen in his house. When I finished, I activated the system. Audio on. Video on. Cloud backup. Redundancy. If she destroyed one, the rest would still feed. I checked my phone. Live feed. Perfect. I exhaled. Time to leave. I turned toward the door—

“You can go back to the world that fits you, Reagan. I’ll stay in mine. The one you called weird.” I walked away. Past him. Without looking back.

“You’ll probably tell your friends that I’ve gone rogue or lost my mind. But you know what? I don’t care. I’m done being part of your show.” And with that, I left. Upstairs, I packed quickly — clothes, a few books, my hockey gear. Every item I stuffed into the duffel felt like a weight lifting off my chest. The mansion was quiet except for the sound of my footsteps on marble. When I stepped outside again, the air felt cleaner, sharper. I loaded my bag into the car and stood there for a moment, staring up at the house that had never really felt like home. “I’m done,” I whispered to no one. And I meant it. As I drove away, I didn’t look back. I didn’t need to.

No clean metric for success. Just the knowledge that I’d stood in front of Tiffany and made an ending sound… responsible. Yeah. That was one word for it. Cowardly was a close second. Not that the distinction changed anything. The party continued around me as if nothing important had happened… glassware touching, low music threading through conversation, people already reshaping their orbits around the news that I was leaving. I'd done what I came to do. Announce. Transfer. Cut the cord cleanly enough that no one could accuse me of disappearing without ceremony.

Alexander Li Chen I didn’t leave because I wanted to. I left because the line I’d sworn never to cross was behind me now, and I couldn’t let myself linger on the wrong side of it. The air outside the gym felt colder, harsher, like the city itself had been waiting for me to slip. Everything I thought I had under control… a careful plan, a rigid code, even my goddamn pulse, was suddenly up for grabs.

“Of course.” The drive home was quiet. Too quiet. The city lights passed by in streaks as my thoughts replayed her words over and over again like a broken record. ~Stay away from me. My happiness doesn’t lie with you. Leave us alone~. Us. That word was the worst part. There was no us anymore—not the one I knew. Now there was them. Lena and Lucian. L & L. I scoffed softly, leaning my head back against the seat. My chest tightened again.

"That's not true... I was just used to it. Used to you handling everything on your own. Used to you never making a scene. Used to you forgiving me. I really thought you'd never leave." I smiled faintly. "See? Even the obedient ones walk away eventually."

In Mom's heart, I was still number one, and in Caleb's, I was first too. But this time, I only smiled—because I knew that even if I wasn't anyone else's first, I had long since become my own.

I've never regretted it for a second. After that, I changed all my contact information, cutting him off completely. From that moment on, I walked my own bright path. As for the Carter family, they were nothing more than a brief, insignificant episode in my life, not even worth a second thought. —The End—