Novels

After I made another kid at the group home cry, the director, Mrs. Gable, sighed and led me to a young couple. “If you’re looking for a companion for your nonverbal son,” she said, her voice heavy with exhaustion, “this one’s your best bet. She’s the most… spirited child in the entire facility.” She leaned in and whispered, “My only request is that once you take her, you don’t bring her back. Please.” The young couple didn’t seem to hear that last part. Their eyes lit up. “She’s exactly what we’re looking for!” I didn’t know what “nonverbal” meant, but my new mom explained it to me on the car ride home. “It just means you can talk to him as much as you want,” she said with a warm smile, “and he’ll never, ever tell you to be quiet.” My own eyes lit up. He sounded like the perfect friend for me.

When I came back to life, the first thing I did was order fifty pounds of ground meat and gather my family to make ravioli. I did this because, in my last life, my stepmother, Brenda, had an affair and got pregnant by another man. To hide her betrayal from my father, she orchestrated a public spectacle. She went to a chaotic Black Friday sale, intentionally got into the scrum for a discounted coffee machine, and let herself be knocked to the ground, inducing a miscarriage. When she came home, she collapsed into my father’s arms, sobbing. “It was Mia,” she cried. “She’s so cheap, she insisted we go fight for that stupid sale. If she hadn’t dragged me there, I wouldn’t have fallen. I wouldn’t have lost our son…” I tried to explain, but my own fiancé, Caleb, stepped forward to drive the nail into my coffin. “Mia, I am so disappointed in you,” he said, his face a mask of disgust. “I’ve tolerated your cheapness—scamming free meals, shoplifting snacks from the bulk bins—but this? Forcing your stepmother into a dangerous crowd just to save a few bucks, causing her to lose a child? I can’t do this anymore. The engagement is off.” My father exploded. He chased me through the house, his rage a storm of slaps and curses. Afterward, he had me committed to a corrupt psychiatric facility upstate. I was locked away, mistreated, and left to die from a septic infection after a botched medical procedure. It was only after I died that I learned the truth. Caleb had been sleeping with my stepmother all along. Our engagement was just a convenient cover for their affair. When I opened my eyes again, I was back. Back on the morning of the day Brenda went to the Black Friday sale.

After seven years of dating, Bradley Kane, who had never given me flowers before, sent me 9,999 roses and a set of lingerie for my birthday. I happily posted about it on social media, only for his 'ideal woman' to comment underneath: [Some people can only pick up the trash I don't want.] That's when I learned that he had bought a house for her, right below our marital home. The gifts he gave me were actually meant for her. I personally delivered the flowers to them and caught them having a candlelit dinner together. Bradley, without any hesitation, cursed at me, "Can you stop being so dirty-minded? Veronica and I are just discussing business. Besides, if there really was something between us, would you have even had the chance to marry me?" In the past, I would have argued with him endlessly to get to the truth. But this time, I just casually tossed the flowers and my engagement ring at him and said calmly, "I wish you both happiness."

I had an online 'puppy' boyfriend, the sweetest guy. He was always showering me with sweet talk and pet names, spoiling me with gifts and cash daily.

I became the villain's stepmother. I didn't really care. I just took the villain with me whenever I went out.

My girlfriend’s childhood best friend heard about my severe arrhythmia and decided to spike my water with a high-caffeine energy drink. The moment I drank it, my heart exploded into a frantic, hammering rhythm. A cold, sharp pain clenched around my ribs. I fumbled for the single packet of emergency powder I carried, tearing it open, only to find the hot water from the kettle had been replaced with black coffee. After one desperate gulp, my vision went gray. A chilling numbness spread through my limbs, and I collapsed, unable to move. Leo threw his head back and laughed until tears streamed down his face. "You've gotta hand it to you, for an actor, that's convincing," he said, wiping his eyes. "I've been a doctor for a long time. Never seen anyone get this worked up over a Red Bull." I crawled toward my girlfriend, Chloe, the taste of blood in my mouth from clenching my jaw. "Chloe, call 911. I'm not kidding. I'm not okay." She waved a dismissive hand. "Oh, stop. You're taking this too far. It's not funny anymore. Nobody dies from an energy drink." She gestured toward Leo. "He's a doctor. What could possibly happen with him right here?" I stopped begging her and sent a single, pre-written emergency text.

After failing to win over my first three targets, I made a final, desperate play: I got engaged to the paralyzed heiress of the Beaumont family. I spent every last point I had with the System to grant her the ability to walk again. The very first thing she did with her newfound strength was to publicly annul our engagement and throw a spectacular wedding at sea for a man named Adrian Thorne. From the deck of a nearby boat, I watched as all four of my targets gazed at Adrian, their faces soft with a tenderness they had never once shown me. A sudden, overwhelming wave of homesickness washed over me. I wanted to go home. So I turned my back on it all and threw myself into the ocean. But as my body hit the cold water, four figures dove in after me, their expressions twisted in masks of terror and regret. ...

After my period went MIA for two solid months, my mom got it in her head that I was pregnant. So, she dragged me to the doctor. And who was sitting in the exam room? My ex-boyfriend, the one I’d dumped two months ago. His face was a blank mask, his voice colder than a morgue. "Get on the bed. Top up, pants down." When I didn't comply fast enough for his liking, he took matters into his own hands and started pulling my pants down himself. But the second the privacy curtain was drawn, he took off his glasses, leaned over me, and whispered, "We never went all the way. So why haven't you had your period in two months?"

To save a buck, I rented a notoriously haunted apartment. The first night, the faucet turned on by itself. I yelled into the empty air, "You're paying the water bill!" The water shut off instantly. I thought that was just the beginning… I just never expected that the next day, I’d find a three-course meal waiting for me on the dining table.