magical realism

I applied for a popular online job as a personal chef. I thought I'd be cooking simple, home-style meals, but I quickly found myself trapped in a world of surprises. The food they were craving was me, served on a platter. The wealthy women were looking for excitement, torturing me night after night. But what they didn't realize was, the real thrill came when the dogs turned on each other.

How crazy can night-shift nurses really be? As a doctor, I am well aware of this. That night, while making my rounds, I passed by the break room and heard strange noises from inside. Curious, I took a quick glance and saw two people in white coats pressed closely together, one in front of the other. One of them was Veronica Adams, a nurse widely admired for her beauty and innocence, often referred to as the hospital's 'angel.' When she saw me, she didn’t shy away; instead, she invited me to join them...

During lunch, an older female colleague asked me, "How old are you? Do you have a boyfriend? When are you planning to get married?" I shook my head. "Twenty-seven, no boyfriend, and no plans to get married." She was momentarily stunned. "What are you talking about? How can a woman not get married?" she asked. I smiled without responding. Realizing I wasn't joking, her expression darkened. "Did you work as a escort and get caught? Is that why no man wants you?"

When my parents were having an argument, my brother and I were put on the condenser fan unit out the window. We were tens of stories high. Our love-struck mother refused to let us back inside because he wanted our father to regret his decision. But that wasn't going to happen. Our father only felt that our mother was annoying. He then went out of the house after slamming the door behind him. Our mother was infuriated as she pointed as us. "If it weren't for you two drawbacks, I would have divorced him a long time ago. Shut your mouths or you can forget about coming back in!" My tears were blew dry by the cold wind. I swore inwardly that I would never forgive them. Later on, when our father was drunk driving and accidentally rammed into our mother. The two of them became disabled due to the car accident. The insurance company paid us over 1 million dollars, but I chose not to treat them.

My husband is the perfect doctor… or so everyone thinks. However, he delays the critical treatment of an accident patient so he can accompany his first love's son. Later, he even secretly switches out a patient's medication and watches as she dies from the pain. That way, he can take her heart and perform a heart transplant for his first love's son. What he doesn't know is that the patient whose heart he's taken is his daughter's. She's disfigured in an accident after her treatment is delayed. He calls her family's phone number, hoping they'll agree to donate her body to contribute to the medical field. That's when he hears my phone ring.

In my past life, I toiled away at the Lincoln family and treated my in-laws like they were a king and a queen. I also gave my stepson the best education possible and helped him get into a renowned college. Yet, I later ended up dead on the street. My stepson said, "You're not my mother. You'll never be her!" He breaks my legs, kicks me out of the house, and watches as I starve to death. It's only after my death that I find out he's the illegitimate son of my husband and his true love! When I open my eyes again, I'm back to the day my husband, Simon Lincoln, brings my stepson home.

When I was ten, I accidentally overheard my mother on the phone. It seemed like she was talking about me being a switched-at-birth rich girl, and that my real last name was Gardner. The coldness and cruelty my mother had shown me all these years suddenly made sense. When I turned 11, I paid an adult to get a maternity test done for both my mother and me. The results confirmed that I was indeed her biological daughter. I kept the report to myself and pretended I was still in the dark.

On a rainy day, I gave my pregnant neighbor a ride home since it was on my way. As a result, she became clingy and started insisting I drive her home every day. When I refused, she teared up and accused me of lacking compassion. Her husband even showed up at my door, demanding, "Why won't you take my wife to and from work? Are you looking down on us?" In the end, I sold my car and moved to a new place. If I couldn’t afford to offend them, at least I could avoid them!

I'm my brother's walking blood bank. Mom and Dad keep forcing me to go for blood transfusions to the point that I don't even weigh 80 pounds. Later, my brother's kidney fails. Mom and Dad want to gouge mine out to be transplanted into his body. At the peak of my despair, the thief who sneaks in from the ventilation hood secretly carries me out and helps me escape. He says, "I'm here for you. Don't be scared."

Mom has extreme mania. Dad was murdered when I was eight, and I went blind while trying to save Mom. I became her only family and weakness. Anyone who makes fun of me for being blind has their eyes gouged out; anyone who disrespects me is sliced and diced before being fed to the dogs. Later, Mom turns into a she-devil with a hundred-billion-dollar net worth. Everyone in Gristport fears her, but she treats me like a princess. The whole city knows not to offend Eleanor Heinrich's daughter. She scours the world for the best optometrists to treat my eyes. On the day I regain my vision, I hear about Mom finding her birth daughter. She says, "You'll soon have a sister who loves you very much, Sienna." I hear that my sister has been through a lot since childhood and is introverted. I prepare many gifts for her, even wanting to give her the pendant Dad gave me. Yet she instructs her people to take me to a deserted roof. "You're nothing but a faker who stole my place in life! I'm going to slice your tongue—let's see how you can continue lying to Mom when you can't speak!" She shatters the pendant, gouges my eyeballs out, slashes my tongue, and has several men torment me to death. Lastly, she includes my eyeballs as decorations in a bouquet and brings it to Mom. "This is a gift I've prepared for your birthday, Mom. Do you like it?"