Sweethearts Theme

Thirty days into our argument, my girlfriend kissed her first love passionately right in front of me. I quietly asked my boss for a transfer to the Northern City branch, which was thousands of miles away. Her friends clapped and teased me. “Ivan, your girlfriend’s getting a new boyfriend. Aren’t you going to win her back?” I held her hand and sincerely said, “I’m sorry.” She looked down at me with a proud smile. “Okay, I forgive you. Tomorrow, pack your things. We’re going to see my parents.” I smiled and agreed. But she did not know I was leaving for Northern City that night.

I'd been "married" to Zachary for two years—until I tried applying for a loan and the bank's system flagged someone else as his legal wife. Our wedding? Just a private show. The real marriage license had his name next to hers. So yeah. I wasn't the wife. I was the other woman. Crushed, I went home—only to hear Zachary talking to his friend, Ethan, by the door. "Man, watching you stress is exhausting," Ethan said. "You clearly love Sierra. So why marry Cathryn?" Zachary looked torn. "At first, she was just a stand-in. But when she left, I couldn't stop thinking about her. So I brought her back—as my assistant." He paused, then muttered, "I can't live without Sierra. But I can't let go of Cathryn either. So I gave Sierra my love in public and kept Cathryn hidden with the title. That's fair, right?" I stood frozen, heart splitting open. He loved us both. Me—his childhood sweetheart. Her—the hidden wife. I thought I was the one. Turns out, I was just the game. He didn't break my heart. He shattered my whole world. But I didn't cry. I didn't scream. I walked away. And started planning two things.

The day my husband, Lucas Maxwell, helps his childhood sweetheart—Cecilia Brown, who has cancer—lose her virginity, I leave behind a divorce agreement and walk away. Before I leave, I drop a comment beneath a photo of them on his social media. Their fingers are tightly interlocked in the photo. "Let's get divorced. I wish you both a lifetime of happiness." A minute later, he calls me. "How did I end up marrying someone as selfish as you, Fiona Sinclair? Do you really have the heart to let her die without leaving anything behind?" I sneer, "You're no longer my husband. How is that my problem?" That's when he panics.

In her past life, Dylan Xander was forced to marry Zoe Stone. On their wedding day, his first love died in a plane crash. After the wedding, Dylan fell into a deep depression and grew to despise Zoe. For seven long years, she humbled herself just to win a sliver of his affection. But all she ever got in return was the same cruel question, over and over again: “Why wasn’t it you who died instead?” And yet, when the tsunami struck, Dylan gave up his only chance of survival to save her. On the lifeboat, she desperately reached out to grab his hand but he pulled away with all his strength. As he sank into the dark depths of the sea, he smiled in relief. “I’m finally free. I can be with her now.” After his death, the entire Xander family turned their hatred toward Zoe. Consumed by grief and guilt, she took her own life by jumping into the ocean. But when she opened her eyes again, she had returned to seven years ago. This time, she would cut the toxic bond between them and let him be with his true love.

My boyfriend, Karl Boone, was one of the adopted sons my father took in. Before he left, he vowed solemnly, "If I lose this battle, I'm not worthy of marrying you. And if I win, I'll rent out Disneyland and throw a grand wedding for you." I tore up all the marriage contracts from the local noble heirs and waited for him for two full years. But when he returned, he knelt before my father, with a pregnant woman hiding behind him. "I'll sacrifice everything I gained overseas to marry Karen," he said, shielding the woman. "She's innocent and fragile, having suffered through hardships in the slums. She's not like Tabitha, who has had everything from birth." My father's gaze swept over me, and the entire room fell silent. Everyone knew that when I lost my temper, I could tear down the house and make them pay dearly. But instead, I greeted the woman with a sweet smile. "Hi there." That night, I closed my eyes and picked one of the blind boxes containing names of potential suitors. As luck would have it, I picked Karl's arch-enemy. On our wedding day, Karl barged in wearing a bomb strapped to his body. "Tabitha, if you dare marry him, we'll die together!"

Everyone is envious of me for having someone like Dominic Cruz, who's love-brained, as a husband-to-be. He's rich, handsome, and highly educated. I smile without saying anything, but I nod happily. However, on the day I'm misdiagnosed, he goes missing. He's so engrossed in his secret lover that he forgets all about me. So, I jilt him before he can do it to me. I turn him into the city's laughingstock. Later, I hear that he drinks the bar dry every night. He scours Marina City but fails to find his missing bride.

After being reborn, I decide to return my fiancé to his true love. When he holds a singles party for her and doesn't want me to disturb him, I go to Faldora alone. He says I'm an annoyance, so I quit my job without hesitation. He doesn't feel good being in the same country as me, so I immediately migrate abroad. In the end, he tells me he wants to make his true love feel secure. I nod and accept someone else's proposal. Why am I so obedient and compliant? It's because of my past life. In my past life, his true love ended her life after I married him. He blamed me for separating them and subjected me to inhumane torture. This time, I just want to live my life. Later, when I'm taking a stroll with my family, he kneels before me and sobs in earnest. "I promise I'll be with you as long as you leave them, Audrey."

I agreed to transfer schools with my childhood friend who was constantly being bullied, but she backed out on the last day. Her friend teased, "I can't believe you pretended to be bullied all this time just to get rid of Harry. He's your childhood friend. Are you really willing to let him go to another school all by himself?" Lena said indifferently, "It's just another school in this city. How far could it be? I've had enough of him always being around me. Getting some distance between us is just what I wanted." I stood outside the door for a long time that day before deciding to turn and leave. However, on the transfer application, instead of writing Haleswood High School, I wrote the high school that my parents wanted me to go to, which was abroad. Everyone seemed to have forgotten that Lena and I had been worlds apart from the very start.

I was reborn. The universe spat me back to the year of my SATs, eighteen again, right when Noah Ritchie confessed his love for me. Turned out, it was the last year he'd ever love me. That was the year he met her… the one who'd actually own his heart. For Carla Davidson, he didn't hesitate to confess his love to me, not out of sincerity, but to distract me from my studies. Because of him, I missed my shot at a top university and barely got into a second-tier one. He even staged a car accident to keep me from attending an academic competition, just so Carla could win first place. When Carla suffered from severe blood loss in an accident, he convinced me to donate so much blood that it permanently damaged my health and left me unable to bear children. Later, Noah was forced to marry me, but he spent every day brooding over a photo of Carla. And when he learned she was getting married, he abandoned me without a second thought, choosing to die for love. But in this lifetime, I'm wide awake. I won't love him again. I'll be selfish. I'll live for myself and no one else. So when Noah looked at me with his usual arrogance and asked, "Tiffany, will you be my girlfriend?" I met his gaze calmly and shook my head. "No."

My girlfriend keeps saying that she comes from a poor family, but she gives her childhood sweetheart a yacht on our anniversary. I text her to ask about this, but all she does is berate me. "Who do you think you are? How dare you stick your nose into my business! I'll give anyone whatever I want. My money, my call. Get lost!" Unbeknownst to her, I'm covered in blood on the other end of the line.