Seven Years of Marriage, Seven Years of Lies

On the day of my due date, I was driving alone to the hospital when I got into a serious car accident.

Meanwhile, my husband, an emergency room doctor, rushed off to save his first love, who had slit her wrists.

I didn't call him again.

I watched in horror as the car exploded into flames right before my eyes.

In my previous life, it was because I made that one phone call for help that he left Jodie Woods behind to save me.

I survived, and so did our baby, but Jodie bled out and died alone in her apartment. Her body wasn't discovered until three days later.

Zayne Snow told me he didn't blame me, saying everything was his choice.

He even insisted on giving me a proper wedding ceremony.

But the night before the wedding, he knocked me out and dragged me to Jodie's apartment.

There, in the very same bathtub where she had slit her wrists, he tortured me with a knife and even cut the baby out of me.

His eyes were bloodshot, madness gleaming in them as he stood over my mutilated body.

"It was just a car accident. You weren't going to die. But Jodie lost her life because of you. Today, you'll feel the pain she went through that day," he said.

When I opened my eyes again, I had returned to the day of the car accident.

There was a loud crash, and the car rolled over. I lay in a pool of blood, heavily pregnant.

The trolley had smashed into me with such force that thick white smoke began to rise.

I never expected to come back to this moment.

When I realized what was happening, I used every bit of strength I had to pull my body halfway out of the driver's seat.

But my lower body was pinned. I couldn't move.

Terrified that the car might explode, passersby kept their distance.

My cries for help were drowned out by the noise around me.

Realizing I couldn't rely on strangers, I shakily dialed 911.

The pain in my abdomen was unbearable now, cold sweat dripping down my forehead.

The woman on the other end of the line was one of Zayne's colleagues, someone I'd met a few times.

As soon as she recognized my voice, her tone turned cold.

She said, "Eliza, Dr. Snow's busy today. Before he left, he told us you might try calling the office if you couldn't reach him. I know what you're going to ask, but I can't tell you where he is. This line is for emergencies, so please don't waste resources. I'm hanging up now."

Before she could hang up, I panicked.

At that moment, a pile of Jodie's makeup products fell from the passenger seat.

"Wait!" I cried, desperation taking over.

I said, "It's not about Zayne. I was in a car accident, right outside the hospital. The car could explode any minute. Can you please send help..."

She cut me off, sounding irritated.

She said, "Eliza, cut it out. Dr. Snow's not here, and even if we sent an ambulance, you wouldn't see him. Stop this nonsense. This line is for saving lives. Don't take up public resources just to stage some dramatic act."

"He's not ignoring you on purpose," she added dismissively. "He's dealing with a life-or-death situation. You're pregnant, so just stay calm and wait for him to explain everything later."

Then she hung up.

Tears of despair streamed down my face.

I never imagined Zayne could be so heartless, leaving me without a way out.

I had called his office in the past when Jodie would invent one excuse after another to pull him away from me.

But I had never lied or wasted emergency resources.

We were married for seven years, and this was how he saw me.

No wonder he'd had no trouble hurting me in my last life.

But now, I didn't have time to think about that.

The temperature in the car was rising, and it was only a matter of moments before the vehicle would explode.

I took a few deep breaths, my eyes falling on the curve of my swollen belly.

Summoning every ounce of strength, I tried to climb out through the shattered window.

My palms were sliced open by the glass, shards embedding themselves deep into my skin.

I managed to move another ten inches out of the wreckage.

But my strength was fading fast. I collapsed onto the ground, gasping for air.

The heat from the car practically roasted my skin. In just two minutes, the smoke had completely engulfed the vehicle.

More people began to gather around, and some of them started shouting for help, asking if there were any doctors nearby.

Soon, I heard hurried footsteps approaching.

I looked up and saw Robert Jackson, the head of Zayne's department.

Robert quickly assessed the situation and organized some kind-hearted bystanders to help pull me out of the wreckage.

The moment they moved me to a safe distance, the car exploded behind us.

Robert examined my injuries while concerned onlookers crowded around.

They whispered among themselves.

"Why was a pregnant woman driving alone? What was her family thinking?"

"Is she okay? I called an ambulance, but the line was busy for so long. When I finally got through and told them the location, they accused me of lying before I could even explain it was a car crash. What kind of hospital hires people like that?"

"Lady, you're pregnant. You shouldn't be out on your own. That belly looks like you're about to pop. What's your husband's number? I'll call him for you."

Their concern, after initially staying back in fear of the explosion, made my eyes sting with unshed tears.

I endured the pain and weakly shook my head.

Strangers on the street showed me more compassion than my husband.

Zayne had been willing to kill me and our baby for the sake of a woman who had already left him once.

The seven-year itch was true.

Everything that had happened since I was reborn seemed like a cruel reminder of how blind and foolish I had been.

No one seemed to notice Robert's expression growing darker with every word the crowd said.

Once he finished checking me over, he immediately pulled out his phone and called the ER.

The line went through.

He barked in frustration, "Get an ambulance to the corner now. Did you not realize there was a car accident? If I hadn't been passing by, this patient would be a corpse. How many calls do we have to make to get you here? Who gave you the nerve to handle this so poorly?

"Do you have any idea how important the ER is? If you can't do your job, then get ready to pack up and leave."

Within five minutes, I was in the back of an ambulance.

That was when my phone rang.

Robert answered it for me and held the phone to my ear.

Zayne's furious voice came, making my blood run cold.

He snapped, "You're still calling the ER? When will you stop this? Didn't I tell you I had something important today? Why do you have to bother me now? Look at yourself. You're about to give birth, and this is how you act?

"I've been working all day. Can't you handle your crap without calling me every five minutes? What, you can't live without me? Plenty of women get pregnant, and none of them act as crazy as you.

"If I hadn't come today, Jodie might've bled out. Do you even care? Can you stop being so selfish? I'll come home when I'm done. Don't bother me again."

I could hear Jodie's pitiful sobbing in the background as he unleashed his anger on me.

He didn't even let me get a word in or bother to ask how I was or what had happened before hanging up.

The memory of his cold, indifferent face from my previous life flashed before my eyes.

Tears streamed down my face and landed on the stretcher.

I trembled uncontrollably.

The pain in my abdomen brought me back to reality.

Blood, mixed with amniotic fluid, pooled beneath me.

But none of this compared to the agony of being cut apart by Zayne.

As I was rushed into the emergency room, the woman who had hung up on me earlier saw my pale face and froze.

Her eyes widened with horror.

She immediately rushed over, stammering apologies.

She said she had thought it was a false alarm.

She excused herself and called it a mistake.

Robert, noticing something was wrong, asked a few questions. When he found out I was Zayne's wife, his expression turned dark with anger.

Without hesitation, he pulled out his phone and called Zayne.

He put the call on speaker so I could hear it.

Robert asked, "Zayne, where the hell are you? Your wife is in critical condition and about to undergo surgery. Get back here immediately."

I had thought that hearing from his superior might make Zayne reconsider.

But instead, his voice came through the phone, cold and dismissive.

He said, "Mr. Jackson? Has Eliza found you and started acting crazy? Don't believe a word she says. She's completely lost it. She's been fighting with me nonstop, and I'm a doctor. I can't just sit around and let someone die because she's jealous, can I?

"If I had been even a little late today, Jodie could have died from blood loss. Her emotions are still unstable.

"Can you tell Eliza to stop bothering me and to handle the birth on her own? If she doesn't want to listen, that's her problem."

Robert was on the verge of exploding.

The veins were popping on his forehead.

Before he could say anything, Jodie's weak voice cut through the line.

She said, "Is that Eliza calling you? Are you going to leave me? I'll be all alone again, right? I know, I should've let you go. It's my fault for still holding onto you. After all, your baby's about to be born."

Zayne abruptly hung up the phone.

Another intense contraction wracked my body, and the world went black as I lost consciousness.

Robert wasted no time and rushed me into surgery.

In the darkness of unconsciousness, memories of my past life flooded back.

Back then, as soon as the accident happened, I called Zayne for help.

He had been on his way to see Jodie.

Upon hearing I'd been in a crash, he turned around and rushed to save me.

He had dragged me out of the wrecked car, cradling me in his arms as he ran into the ER.

I was covered with blood.

He only relaxed once I was out of immediate danger.

However, the shock from the accident caused complications, and the baby wasn't born on time.

After getting me home, Zayne had gone straight to find Jodie, only to discover her cold, lifeless body in the bathtub.

Her wrist was slashed so deep the bone was visible.

He handled her funeral arrangements in silence.

When he came back two days later, he was as calm as if nothing had happened.

He told me about Jodie's death as though it was some distant news story.

He indifferently shook his head when I looked at him apologetically.

He reassured me that he didn't blame me. He said the accident had shown him how unpredictable life could be.

He even proposed to give me the wedding I deserved.

I believed him.

The night before our wedding, he knocked me out and dragged me to Jodie's apartment.

When I woke up, I was bound, curled up in the bathtub where Jodie had died.

There was no love left in Zayne's eyes, only hatred.

He looked like a maniac who had lost his true love.

He had a knife, sharpened to a deadly gleam.

I stared at him in terror.

He spoke slowly. "It was just a car accident. You weren't going to die. But Jodie lost her life.

"Do you know how deep her wounds were? Do you know how much blood she lost that day?

"She was lying here, just like you, blood running down her legs. After all my years as a doctor, I never knew a human body could hold so much blood. So much that it drowned out everything else.

"It's fine if you don't know. You're about to find out."

He placed Jodie's photo at the foot of the tub.

In front of her picture, he began his revenge.

The first stab of the knife was enough to make me wish for death.

But no matter how much I sobbed and pleaded, Zayne showed no mercy.

He gutted me.

Our child, who was so close to being born, took its last breath the moment it entered this cruel world.

I thought that was the end of his vengeance.

But it was only the beginning.

He kept going, the blade rising and falling with each strike, both on me and the child.

He muttered under his breath like a madman, "This deep, this spot, this much blood. Jodie must've been in so much pain. She must've needed me so badly."

Before I finally died, I endured one thousand stabs.

It was an ordeal.

Then he tossed our bodies into the bathtub.

He cradled Jodie's ashes in his arms and held a wedding.

As my soul drifted beside him, I saw the madness in his eyes.

I realized how blind I had been.

But by then, it was far too late.

I should've known this from the call Jodie made at our wedding when she returned from abroad seven years ago.

She had abandoned Zayne and provoked me in the first place.

Still, I stood no chance against her.

In our loveless marriage, I had suffered for seven years.

It only ended with my death.

When I opened my eyes again, I was lying in a hospital room.

Full of regret, a nurse told me that my baby didn't make it.

I slowly moved my hands to my belly. Now, there was nothing left but the loose skin, a faint reminder of the child that had once been there.

Staring blankly at the ceiling, I reached for my phone on the pillow beside me.

I wanted to text Zayne to tell him I wanted a divorce.

That was when his call came through.

I pressed the answer button.

Before I could say a word, he started yelling, "What the hell are those rumors online? Did you start them? Are you out of your mind? Do you even know how much damage this is doing to the hospital? You better take it down now. I can't stand you for another day. Do you even realize spreading lies is illegal? Can you, for once, act like a normal human being?

"Delete it! Or I'm divorcing you on the spot."

Before I could even process his words, he hung up on me.

Hatred swelled up, drowning out my reason.

I dug my nails deep into my palms, my knuckles shaking from the pressure.

But this time, Jodie was fine, and Zayne hadn't done anything overtly illegal. I had no grounds to call the police on him.

His words echoed in my mind. I unlocked my phone and checked.

It turned out, that on the day of the car accident, some random passerby had filmed a video and posted it online.

People noticed right away how no one seemed to care when I called for help, even though I was in critical condition.

The hospital's emergency department was being dragged across the internet, trending for all the wrong reasons.

If Robert hadn't stepped in, things could've gotten even worse. Maybe the whole hospital would've been forced to shut down.

I searched for the hospital's account, only to find it had been deleted after being flooded with hate.

The emergency department had undeniably screwed up in a life-or-death situation.

I had no reason to make the video go away.

In fact, I was glad it was out there.

Then I clicked on Jodie's social media. Unlike the chaos at the hospital, her life seemed untouched.

Her posts were all peaceful, full of sunshine and tranquility.

There wasn't the slightest hint of a breakdown or distress.

While I was in surgery, she posted an update.

[A perfect lover is the best cure for any mental illness.]

I stared at the words, a mocking smile creeping across my face.

I silently gave her post a thumbs-up for her flawless acting skills.

She could keep Zayne all to herself.

My phone rang again. Zayne was calling.

I didn't bother answering. I hit decline and blocked his number.

A notification still popped up from him.

Zayne: [What the hell are you saying to Jodie? If you've got a problem, take it out on me, but stop acting crazy around her.]

I: [Divorce me.]

Then I blocked him on that app too.

Outside, I could hear a commotion in the hallway.

Reporters had swarmed into the hospital, demanding an interview with the head of the emergency department.

Nurses and doctors yelled at them, trying to prevent anyone from taking photos.

Robert stepped out of his office, trying to restore order.

He claimed to be the one in the video, but it didn't help.

The hospital head arrived, rushing over to deal with the situation, but nobody was listening to him either.

Under public pressure, the hospital threw one of its own under the busthe woman who had taken my emergency call.

She broke down, sobbing as she explained that Zayne had used her.

She claimed it was just a mistake on her part.

Then the hospital head called Zayne.

He was ordered to show up within half an hour.

Robert came into my room, worried that the reporters might get to me. He advised me to stay put, promising they'd handle everything since it was their fault.

I barely nodded when the door burst open, and there was Zayne, kicking his way in.

He stormed past Robert, his face twisted in fury.

He yelled at me, "Are you too stupid to understand what I'm saying? You know what happened, so why haven't you explained it? If you keep spreading lies, I'll sue you. Is this all just some pathetic attempt to force me into divorcing you?"

"Let's get divorced then," I said.

He didn't seem to hear me. His eyes locked on my flat stomach.

For a moment, his expression froze.

After a few seconds of stunned silence, he looked around the room.

Finally, he asked, "Where's the baby?"