Melodramatic

After our eighty-eighth canceled wedding, I called my business partner. "I'm taking the Haviana market project." There was a beat of stunned silence. "Seriously? That's ten years overseas. You just got married—well, weren't you? Does your husband even know? What about your parents? You always said staying close to them was everything." I glanced around the empty church and let out a sharp laugh. "There was no wedding. No husband. And my parents? They've got Cindy. That's all they need." Another pause. "Alright. Pack your bags. You leave tomorrow." After the call, I ran a hand down my wedding dress. One last tear slipped out, quiet and pointless. Cindy had another "episode" today. Claimed she'd off herself. Andrew canceled—again. I'd looked at him, drained. "It's the eighty-eighth time." He dropped his head, guilt all over him. "Just a little more time, Viv. She's been off since the accident. I'm scared she'll actually do it. I swear, I'll talk to her. For real this time. Then we'll get married. Promise." My parents didn't hesitate. "Vivian, let Andrew go. If Cindy hadn't gotten kidnapped trying to save you, she wouldn't have these breakdowns. Are you really putting a wedding over your sister's life?" "How could you be so selfish?" I'd heard it all before. Used to fight it. Not this time. If neither my fiancé nor my parents wanted me around, then fine. I'd leave.

After the most wanted bachelor in Renowoods, Marvin Chambers, lost his memory, he began to pursue me relentlessly. I dated Marvin for three years and fell hopelessly in love with him. Just when I was about to tell him I was pregnant, I overheard a girl who used to bully me say to him, "Thanks for pretending to lose your memory and pulling 99 pranks on Serena just to avenge me. "Once you hit 100, I'll be your girlfriend." That was when I finally understood—Shirley Hunt was the one Marvin had always loved. And I was just the fool he used to make her laugh. Later, I died in a plane crash. Marvin lost his mind searching through the wreckage, only to find a single ring. Inside, it was engraved: [Hope You'll Love Me After 100 Pranks]. They say he collapsed crying in the debris and had to be rushed to the hospital after passing out. When he woke up, he turned against everyone who had helped him prank me. Meanwhile, I stood smiling in the snowstorm of Frontania, watching as my medical records went up in flames. He had faked amnesia to win my heart, so I faked my death to teach him a lesson.

The girl my family sponsored was a manipulative opportunist. She had my childhood friends wrapped around her finger. I helped her out of pity for her poor background, but she climbed her way up, slowly taking my place. She faked innocence in front of the brothers while sabotaging me behind my back. When they found out, they called me petty rather than blame her. I got fed up, married my college crush, and moved on. But they flew in overnight, begging for forgiveness.

Everyone in Sparrowville said that Margaret Chapman was the happiest woman in town. Gavin Hartley showered her with gifts—a sapphire ring, an asteroid after her name—treating her like she was the center of his universe. Margaret had always believed it, too. Until the day she accidentally discovered the woman he had been hiding in his villa. For ten years, he had kept her there—his childhood sweetheart. After she lost herself to schizophrenia, she had said, "Margaret is me." And so, for nearly seven years, Gavin had courted Margaret and cherished her, playing out a love story that had never truly been hers. Margaret's heart crumbled to ash after she found out the truth. She left without looking back, moving to a country thousands of miles away. But she never imagined that Gavin would lose himself to rage, his eyes burning red as he nearly tore Sparrowville apart. "Where the hell is Margaret?!"

The day Alpha Marcus and I marked each other, his first love, Cecilia, threw herself off a cliff into a ravine overgrown with wolfsbane. The pack searched for three full days and nights before they found her, barely clinging to life. She was once the most spirited she-wolf in our pack, but the fall cost her a leg and the ability to bear pups. I grieved for the beautiful life that had been ruined, and I blamed myself for not seeing how fragile she'd become. Marcus comforted me gently. "Elena, this wasn't your fault. Cecilia made her own choice. You did everything you could. Don't beat yourself up." Later, not long after our pup, Rylan, turned five, a sudden illness tore through him, and he died in my arms. Night after night, Marcus held me, wiping away my tears. "Don't be sad, Elena," he would murmur. "We'll have other children." I had always believed my mate was the most considerate, most protective Alpha in the entire world. Until the day I overheard him speaking with his Beta, Adrin. "Alpha, the dosage of wolfsbane we gave Rylan was perfect—just as you ordered. It looked like a genetic defect. No one will ever suspect." "It's been so long. Don't you think it's time to forgive the Luna?" "What's one pup compared to what Cecilia lost? She lost a leg, her future as a mother. Everything."

Vincenzo Moretti was Stonehaven’s youngest financial titan— a tech mogul commanding a multibillion-dollar empire, gracing the covers of business magazines as a modern legend. But only a select few knew the truth: he was also the ruthless Don controlling the East Coast mafia. To him, wealth and power were mere chips in a game. And I? I was just another pawn used to stabilize a fragile family alliance. In our ten-year marriage, he slept with my friends, my coworkers… every single person I once trusted. Then one morning, as I took our one-month-old baby for a routine checkup, Sienna Newton, his latest mistress, ran me down with her car. The baby screamed endlessly. I begged her to take us to the hospital, and when Vincenzo arrived, he looked at me with cold disdain. “Isabella,” he sneered, “when did you learn to stage accidents? “Even if you died here, I wouldn’t bat an eye.” Then he took Sienna’s hand and walked away without a backward glance. By the time I was rushed to the hospital, the child in my arms had suffocated. Upon hearing the news, my mother suffered a heart attack. She didn’t survive. I slipped into a coma for two days. When I finally woke up, I found out that Vincenzo never visited. Instead, his father, Renato Moretti, the true king of the Moretti empire, stood by my bedside. I looked at him calmly and said, “Let me go. Whatever I owed your family, I’ve repaid in full with two lives.” Later, that same Don who had once looked down on me knelt before me, begging me to come home. But I was no longer the woman who waited, silent and broken, for his change of heart. I was the Don’s wife who turned away and never looked back.

My husband, Francis Zouche, thought we weren't well-off and could not afford to raise a child. So, he forcibly took me to the hospital to get an abortion. Right after the surgery, I discovered that he had transfered 200 thousand dollars to his first love, Heidi Colman, for her birthday. Out of pure rage, I got into a huge fight with him in the car, which led to an accident that killed us both. When I opened my eyes, we had returned to the day before our wedding. In our previous life, we were married for ten years. We weathered storms and supported each other, but Francis never wanted us to have a child of our own. On the day I died, I finally understood that the one he loved was Heidi. After getting a second shot at life, I decided to fulfill his wish. We canceled the wedding, blocked each other's phone numbers, and never contacted each other again. Eight years later, Francis became a top lawyer in Alvren and publicly proposed to Heidi at a law forum. Seeing that I was still single, he mocked me with a sneer, "Yvette, I know you loved me for two lifetimes. But I am getting married now. Don't keep waiting for me to come back to you." I glanced at him wordlessly and bent down to pick up my daughter before walking away. As a shocking realization hit him, his eyes reddened. He questioned furiously, "Didn't you promise to love me forever and to only give birth to my children?"

"Mom, Dad. I've changed my mind. I'm willing to go back to Bimern and marry Mr. Coleman, even if he's in a coma." I keep it a secret from Frederick Kirby, my boyfriend of seven years. I'm going ahead and arranging a wedding with someone else. Lennon Downey, Frederick and I grew up together. I had fallen in love with Frederick when I was a teenager, while Lennon was always like an older brother to me. We are close, and we've always been that way. That is, until the three of us went on a trip and got caught in a flash flood. Florence Cooper, the fake heiress, stole the credit for saving their lives and even lied that I left them behind to save myself. Since then, they've taken her side in everything. They've even hurt me for her. I cried, fought, and tried to explain over and over again. I thought that they would see her for who she really is one day. However, they never did. All I got in return was betrayal, again and again. I'm done. I just want to leave. I want to disappear from their lives and never, ever see them again.

To temper my attitude, Frederick Burke throws me into the mountains. What he doesn't know is that this mountain lies deep within a high-radiation zone. Five months later, he finally shows up with a group of people to bring me back. However, my body is already starting to rot from the radiation. "Anastasia, if you hadn't pushed Colette down the stairs, I wouldn't have punished you like this. I wouldn't have left you to rot on this godforsaken mountain. Do you admit your mistake now?" I kneel on the ground and prostrate myself before Colette Reeves. Frederick freezes and instinctively reaches out to help me up. "Alright, there's no need for this…" I say nothing. I just quietly watch as he grabs my arm. Unbeknownst to him, my body is already soaked in radiation after months in this mountain. Anyone who touches me will slowly begin to rot, too...

I had moved out of our house, but my boyfriend—the one I had given up everything to run away with—had no idea. Neither did his possessive younger brother, the one who used to knock on my door calling for me. My boyfriend's first love had taken up all their attention. They no longer listened when I played the piano. They even forgot about my cat fur allergy and brought that woman's cat home. My boyfriend, Ian Blake, had snapped, "If anyone's leaving, it's you. There's no way Eva's cat is going anywhere." His brother, Sebastian, had said, "Sienna, Eva is my girlfriend. How could I give up her cat for you?" When I woke up in the hospital after going into anaphylactic shock from my allergy, I decided to leave them. Back home, I made my first call to my mother. "Mom, I'm ready to accept the arranged marriage."