Family Saga

The night I found out I was pregnant, my seven-year-old son pointed at a little girl in a mommy vlogger's video on his iPad and said, softly:
"That's my sister."
I laughed and flicked his forehead.
The vlogger lived all the way down in New Orleans. He'd never even met them.
"She has a million followers, sweetie. Don't make stuff up."
"If you want a sister that badly, how about Mommy gives you one?...

My family used me as bait to destroy my sister's happiness.

The plan was simple: fake being poor, watch my sister's construction worker boyfriend run when times got tough, then reveal the truth and break her heart. I was supposed to be the convincing proof of our "poverty."

But I didn't know I was acting. For ten years, I lived their lie for real. Starved while they feasted in hiding. Worked mys...

My husband doesn't love me, and he certainly doesn't love our son.
On the day Toby was born, Graham didn't even look at him before tossing him into my arms.
For seven years, he kept our marriage a secret and strictly forbade our boy from calling him "Dad."
Then, his first love returned.
The usually cold and distant billionaire came to our rundown cabin dead drunk, a rare, tender smile on his face...

My godfather father fell gravely ill and passed the position of Don ahead of time to my fiancé Chris, whom I had not seen for two years.
But he did not fulfill his promise to marry me once I returned home, claiming instead that he would marry my half-sister Lily.
“Sophie has lost sight in her right eye. She is no longer fit to be the Don’s wife.”
“With Sophie’s dull temperament, what does she have...

Dad brought his old friend's daughter home. I was the outsider.

Dad Brought His Old Friend's Daughter Home. I Was the Outsider.

An old friend of my father's had entrusted his daughter to our family.

She was outgoing and full of life. I was the quiet one, always studying for another exam.

Dad doted on her as though she were his own daughter. My two older brothers drove her to all the places tre...

When my husband's eight-year-old "nephew" Noah was diagnosed with acute leukemia, the whole family begged for my help.

They needed my six-year-old daughter, Molly—the only perfect match.

Against my instincts as a head nurse, I agreed.

But the second Molly's stem cells were harvested, their gratitude vanished.

To avoid paying for my daughter’s mandatory sterile recovery room, Noah's mother l...

"Sandra, we're a modern couple. Keeping our finances separate is the greatest respect I can show you."
Seven years into our marriage, my husband Howard Mercer had taken "fifty-fifty" to its absolute extreme.
The mortgage was split down the middle. Utility bills were calculated to the penny.
Even for our six-year-old daughter Anna's birthday cake, he'd remind me to Venmo him forty dollars right aft...

Hearing my sister Vanessa’s tearful pleas over the phone, a chill ran down my spine.
In my past life, my soft heart led me to take in my niece, Skylar. I gave her everything, only to have my family destroyed—my daughter died of anaphylactic shock, my in-laws perished, and I was killed in a car crash.
Reborn, I refused to make the same mistakes. I immediately moved my kind-hearted in-laws into my h...

Knowing I had severe claustrophobia, my stepfamily locked me in the basement just to make my stepsister smile.
"Evan, please! I can't breathe!" I pounded on the door until my nails bled.
But instead of saving me, my boyfriend of five years simply scoffed from the other side. "Aurora, drop the act. Daphne just wanted your room."
For fifteen years, I gave them everything, only to be treated like ...

On Christmas night, he didn’t come home until after midnight, reeking of weed and the perfume of his “sister,” Betty.

The next day, the Miller family summoned me and my son back to the estate and announced in front of everyone: Betty was pregnant. She would be the new Donna. And I -- a “blind woman” -- was only fit to be a maid.

As if that wasn’t enough, they demanded I hand over the bracelet Ha...

I was breathtakingly beautiful.

When I turned eighteen, I became linked to a system that let me share my beauty.

My younger sister, Chloe Bennett, spent an entire night crying under her covers because everyone in her class had a cruel nickname for her. Without telling her, I gave her seventy percent.

By the end of summer, she was the prettiest girl at school. I was someone nobody noticed.

Mom ...

My daughter was choked until her face turned purple by the mistress's son, then nearly died after my ex-husband forced her to give blood.
She was beaten, cursed at, and abandoned on a bench outside the hospital.
And I could do nothing to help her.
Because I had already died eight years ago.
It wasn't until my daughter collapsed crying at my grave—and the story made the news—that my ex-husband fina...

My brother's first day on the job, and the new intern, Ashley Pratt, accuses him of trying something with her in the break room.

In my last life, I panicked under all those judging stares and my father screaming at me over the phone. I grabbed my brother by the shoulder and forced him to bow and apologize to her, tried to pay her off to make it go away.

She turned around and leaked the wire tran...

One month before the SATs, I saw my predicted score floating right above my head.
But every time I finished a practice test, the score automatically dropped by 20 points.
And if I skipped class to party for a day, it went up by 20 points.
In my past life, I partied for a whole month, and the score above my head reached a perfect 1600.
But when the results finally came out, I only scored a 400.
And...

After my twin sister and I were accepted into the same elite university, our parents fully sponsored the freshman welcome banquet.

They told the university president, "This way, even at school, they can feel that parents will always be their unconditional support."

On the night of the banquet, my mother pressed a piece of paper into my hand.

"Elara, go to the podium. Read the address, and...

On the morning of the entrance exams, my parents locked me inside the family freezer to keep me from outshining Ethan.
They thought they were saving him from a prophecy.
By the time they realized the prophecy was a lie, I had already frozen to death with my hand still raised against the door.

For six years, I had worked as a contract killer to pay for my brother's leukemia treatment.
Today, I had finally saved enough money to cover his surgery.
But he casually rejected the operation.
"Actually, I'm not sick. And Mom and Dad aren't dead, either. I planned that car accident six years ago."
My husband, Damian Blackwood, followed his confession with one of his own.
"I never went bankrupt, ...

I’d spent four years slaving away in the hospital basement sorting medical waste.
I thought I’d finally scraped together enough money to pay for my brother Leo’s brain damage treatment.
But he just took the card and tossed it onto the coffee table.
“I got better ages ago. That lousy little paycheck of yours? I blew it on a necklace for Victoria.”
My husband David pushed open the study door. “Tha...

I was dragged to the stand of the MRI Memory Court by my own flesh and blood.

Their demand? To forcibly extract my kidney to keep their uremic adopted daughter alive.

A guilty verdict meant losing not just my bodily autonomy, but my freedom for the rest of my life.

Bathed in the global spotlight, my parents performed as tragic heroes, while their adopted saint cried a river of deceit.

They t...