Tragic Synonym

In the seventh year of my marriage to Simon Heath, I finally walk away from him after his 32nd mistress shows up at my door. I join a classified government program and disappear from his world. Now he's falling apart and calling me non-stop. "Lily, I was wrong. Please come back." In the past, a single word of apology from him would have been enough to make me stay. But not this time. This time, he's bound to be disappointed.

My partner, Derek Crawford, calls himself a traditional man. On our tenth anniversary, I bought him a pair of his favorite AJ sneakers. Instead, he gifted me a bag of pastries. "Your cake is extremely tiny, and yet it costs you a few dozen dollars! Look at the pastries I got you—not only are they cheap, but they are also huge in quantity! Now this is what I call worth it!" After that, Derek tells me that he'll make it up to me by throwing an engagement party. He has also invited my parents and my relatives to the party. With anticipation brimming in our eyes, we arrive at the restaurant, only to see Derek serving us with store-bought pickles and dinner rolls. "I'm a traditional man, you see. I'm not used to fancy food and foreign cuisines. This, right here, is the basics of a traditional dinner. You don't see patriotic men like me nowadays!" My relatives' expressions change drastically on the spot. Meanwhile, my parents look very mortified. I can only smile awkwardly at them while doing everything I can to stop them from leaving. But as soon as I leave the hotel, I receive a notification from the bank that 200 thousand dollars have been deducted from my account via a supplementary card linked to it. At the same time, Derek's childhood sweetheart, Renee Young, posts a photo of her 12-layered luxurious cake on her social media account. "When I told Derek that I wanted to celebrate my birthday, not only did he buy me the most expensive strawberry cake, but he also reserved a dozen or so tables that are served with the grandest feast! "If your man loves you that much, he won't need any lessons in pampering you! Traditional men definitely know how to love and pamper their queens!" I tighten my grip on my phone. As I look back at Derek, who keeps claiming that he's a traditional man stuck to his traditional ways, I suddenly find it exhausting to continue being in a relationship with him.

I fell in love with the nanny's son. After boldly pursuing him, he reluctantly agreed to marry me. But I never expected his young lover to storm into my home like a madwoman, prying my mouth open to pour scalding water down my throat, pressing me into a sink full of dirty water, and finally pushing me down the stairs. My husband stood by my hospital bed, looking at my broken body with disdain. "Irene, every moment with you makes me sick," he spat, barely able to hide his impatience for my death. Yet, when I finally died, he sobbed uncontrollably in public, playing the role of the devoted, heartbroken husband. "Irene, don't leave me! You have no idea how much I wanted to die with you!" At that, I spoke softly from behind him. "Is that so?"

When the lights came on at the end of the graduation party, the spotlight suddenly shifted and froze on a young couple kissing passionately at the back of the auditorium. The young man held up a bouquet of roses and shouted to the crowd, “Sophie, be my girlfriend!” The moment the girl covered her face and nodded, the cheers in the hall nearly lifted the roof. Amid the thunderous applause, my hand trembled around my phone. The screen still showed the message he had sent half an hour earlier. Rowan: [Wait for me. I’ll come to you right away.] After the party, I took off the couple’s bracelet from my wrist and threw it into the gutter, along with four years of love.

What was even more humiliating than discovering her fiancé’s affair was hearing him claim he’d lost interest in her, and that he had gotten another woman pregnant. In the world of adults, it’s never about right or wrong—only about leverage. Heather Jenner couldn’t afford to lose the status she was so close to achieving as a wealthy wife. Let him have his fun, she thought. If he could stray, why shouldn’t she find another man to father her child? And so, she set her sights on his younger brother—the one who outshone him in every way.

Everyone said I was too possessive when it came to my girlfriend, Amanda Crane. When Amanda first started taking photos of her childhood friend, Ian Lewis, I ripped apart all the rolls of film. When she helped him fix his computer, I called her 100 times in an hour. And when he called her from the airport, asking her to pick her up because the rain made it impossible to get a cab, I held a knife to my throat. I told her I'd take my own life if she went to him. Fed up, Amanda shipped me off to a psychiatric hospital that same night. When I got out, I vanished. Amanda was certain I was hiding somewhere, spying on her and Ian, but I never showed up—until the celebration party for a business project three years later. Ian puts his arm around Amanda and swirls the wine glass he's holding. He shoots me a taunting look, remarking, "You used to get so jealous, Steven. I'm sure you no longer mind if Mandy and I drink from the same glass now, right?" He waits for me to go berserk the way I used to three years before, but I simply move the bottle of wine closer to them. "I don't mind at all, of course. Have as many glasses as you want. It's great to see that your relationship has been progressing so well." Amanda pauses. Her eyes start to redden. She stares fixedly at me and questions, "Why don't you feel jealous anymore, Steven?"

For five years I had been the lover of my best friend’s little brother… and I found out that he was only using me for practice!

After being secretly married to me for five years, my husband, a famous actor, suddenly reveals his relationship on his Twitter account. Promotional accounts find out who I am and make me out to be a woman who refuses to let the relationship die. My husband's fans criticize and mock me all over the Internet, but I'm unfazed. My husband's the one who cheated on me, yet he's acting like he's deeply in love with another woman. Does he think I'm nothing but a regular businesswoman? Sometimes, some people get ahead of themselves because they forget their roots. I bet he's forgotten who funded his success!

I'm staring at this man who looks exactly like my husband, overwhelmed by fear, as I received a message that read, "He's not your husband!"What's even more bizarre is that the name displayed as the sender of the text on my phone is "My Dear Husband"!Who on earth should I believe?

My boyfriend is a forensic doctor. I've been abducted and tied to a bomb—there's only ten minutes to detonation. The abductors force me to call my boyfriend, but all I get is a scolding. "What the hell do you want, Michelle? What are you playing at, using your life as an excuse just because you're jealous? "Vi's cat has already been stuck in a tree for three days. She loves it like it's her life! If you delay me from saving it, you'll be a murderer!" I hear a coquettish voice ring out on the other end of the line. "Thank you for this, Kev. You're amazing!" I recognize that voice—it belongs to my boyfriend's childhood friend. I text my boyfriend when the bomb is about to explode. "Farewell forever. I pray we won't meet each other again in another life."