Slice of Life

A couple lived next door to me, and they were like tinder and flint-always ready to ignite.

Every night, their loud, frantic wailing kept me from getting a wink of sleep.

I tried reasoning with them, I tried cursing them out, and I even called the police, but nothing worked.

So, I decided to start pursuing his wife.

On Valentine’s Day, I went out of my way to tuck a small note inside a bouquet of roses: “Your husband hasn’t found out about us yet, has he?” Then, her husband absolutely blew his top.

While my brother discussed the most elegant way to sever an artery, I tended my vegetables.

While my sister sharpened her fangs for the coming feast, I tended my vegetables.

While the whole family prepared to revel beneath the blood moon, I was still tending my vegetables.

I cared so much about growing them well that I converted the cellar into a climate-controlled greenhouse and trained our familiar bats to serve as pollinators.

Mom and Dad took one look at the sea of green filling our grounds.

Exasperated but helpless to change me, they took the rest of the family on vacation so they would not have to see it.

For a long while after that, I enjoyed the idyllic peace of country life.

Then one day, as I was picking pests off my cucumbers, a luxury car screeched to a halt outside the gates.

A wealthy young lady in a lace dress pointed at my castle and shrieked coquettishly to her eight brothers, “Baby wants it turned into a Barbie dream castle!

This is where a princess belongs!”

On the day I was diagnosed with late-stage lung cancer, I lost the cat that Chi Zhou and his ex-girlfriend had raised together.

He said, “Xia Zhi, if you can’t find the cat, then don’t come back either!”

Later, I died out there and never returned to our home again.

When I was four, a fortune-teller said I was fated to bring misfortune upon my parents. So they sent me away to a rural estate. For ten years, they never came to see me, nor did they care whether I lived or died.

At fourteen, they brought me home-so they could marry me off.

My legitimate elder sister laughed. “A fool marrying a sickly wretch. A match made in heaven.”

My parents said, “If this engagement weren’t impossible to break, and if your sister weren’t about to marry into a noble family, you wouldn’t even be worthy of carrying his shoes.”

“A married daughter is water poured out. Once you’re gone, don’t come back for anything.”

Only he held my hand and taught me to write my own name.

And then he taught me to write: “A woman, too, must respect and cherish herself, strive without ceasing, and press ever forward.”

A diary chronicling the last two months of my life…

Maybe I was simply born unworthy of love. Why else would everyone who loved me leave?

The year my parents died in an accident, I was a sophomore in high school.

My relatives had their eyes on the inheritance and compensation money they left behind, and they kept coming by to harass me.

Finally, I knocked on the door of my Tattooed Neighbor.

“Hey, are you in the underworld?”

When a wealthy family came to the orphanage to choose a child, they wavered between me and Cheng Yun.

A barrage of comments scrolled before my eyes:

[The female supporting character is about to start acting pitiful again so she can get adopted.]

[Even if she does get adopted, she’ll just be abandoned later anyway.]

[She’ll spend her whole life hated by everyone, chasing what she can never have. Just another girl obsessed with competing against other girls.]

I silently lowered my head.

Because the “female supporting character” they were talking about was me.

Suddenly, two figures loomed over me.

A Northeastern couple who had never been mentioned in the plot looked down at me, their faces lighting up with surprise.

“Oh my goodness, look at this pretty little thing!”

“Sweetheart, your uncle and auntie are having pork and glass noodle stew at home today. Smells amazing. Wanna come back with us and have some?”

When I was on the verge of death, Cheng An borrowed one tael of silver and bought me to be his wife.

He was so poor he could barely feed himself, yet he bought medicine on credit and saved my life.

Later, I told him, “If you don’t despise me for having once served as another man’s concubine, I am willing to spend the rest of my life with you.”

Cheng An nodded firmly. “Then it’s settled. A lifetime.”

I was abducted and sold.

But I didn’t cry, and I didn’t cause a scene.

I even married a handsome man.

He asked me, “Do you want to escape?”

I replied with a beaming smile, “How could I, Brother?

“In life, I am yours; in death, I am your ghost.

“I will be with you for all eternity.”

He finally smiled and leaned down to kiss me.

I closed my eyes.

That’s right, of course I’m going to be with you for all eternity.

My life was destroyed by you.

Naturally, I’m going to drag you down to hell with me.

“I’m sorry, ma’am, but this card has insufficient funds.”

I froze for a heartbeat before quickly handing over another one.

The red light flashed again.

“I’m sorry, this card is also declined.”

“…What?”

I steadied my breathing and dialed my husband’s number.

“Honey, haven’t you been paid yet? The baby is out of formula.”

His voice through the receiver was devoid of warmth.

“A household isn’t supported by one person alone. I expect you to learn how to be independent instead of living like some pathetic parasite.”

With those words, he declared war.

Fine.

Then let the hunt begin.