Chapter 3
I looked at him and, without meaning to, frowned. The feeling he gave me was exactly the same as the one he had given me after our marriage in my last life.
But at this point, he was only supposed to be a college student.
“No wonder you two were childhood sweethearts,” I said, turning back to Chloe. “You’re both equally hard of hearing. Hey, why don’t you repeat it for him?”
Chloe instantly slipped into a practiced expression of grievance. She went over, wrapped herself around Adrian’s arm, lowered her eyes, and in the blink of an eye looked pitiful. “Addie, Tessa told you to go die. I was only looking out for you. I came here to talk her out of using her family’s investment to force you into marrying her.”
“You… did you really say that?”
Adrian’s voice shook as he asked me.
“Why are you asking me? Ask her. Everything she says is right.” I lifted my chin, signaling for him to ask Chloe, then quickened my pace and walked off. If I stayed any longer, I thought I might throw up.
I rushed back to my dorm, looked at myself in the mirror, and when I saw the thick glasses and the painfully ugly outfit, the tension knotted inside me finally eased.
I really had gone back to college,
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Adrian, Chloe, and I had all gone to the same high school. Back then, I was overweight, so I always had to wear the largest size the school
offered.
I was invisible, the kind of person nobody remembered, so whenever people talked about high school, they never remembered having a
classmate like me.
One time, the school was handing out summer uniforms. Everyone ran up excitedly to collect theirs, and then one student suddenly burst into loud, nonstop laughter.
When everyone looked over, they saw that he was holding up an extra- large skirt. “Holy crap, even Thanos wouldn’t need a skirt this big!
“Whose uniform is this? Do we even have somebody like that at this
school?”
For a moment, the laughter didn’t stop.
I had been about to go pick up my uniform, but I immediately ducked out of sight.
“Let’s hang it up here and see which class Thanos has coming to claim
it!”
I watched with my own eyes as he hung my uniform on the fence by the athletic field.
In that instant, with sweat pouring down my back, I felt like the world was collapsing around me.
Then a pair of hands reached out and took my uniform off. That’s
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right. It was Adrian.
I looked over and saw high–school Adrian, his textured haircut falling over his forehead, a lollipop tilted lazily in the corner of his mouth. “What’s wrong with you people? Think this is funny? I’m taking it down. What exactly are you going to do about it?”
He was well–known, and everyone was wary of him. The moment they heard him speak, they scattered.
I was the only one still shrinking in the corner.
“Your uniform. I brought it over for you.”
His voice sounded suddenly beside me. But by the time I looked up, all that was left outside was my uniform skirt hanging there and the sight of his back as he walked away after getting me out of that
situation.
That was the moment I fell for him, with no turning back.
Of course, I was too ashamed of my weight then, so it stayed a secret
crush.
I couldn’t compare to Chloe, who always walked at his side. Even in high school, Chloe wore her hair beautifully and found new ways to make the school uniform look stylish every day. She was the only one who seemed to belong beside Adrian.
I pushed myself desperately to lose weight until I became what I am now. But in the process, I was left with a serious stomach condition.
And the inferiority I felt never really went away. It sank deep into my
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bones. I was majoring in fashion design, yet I dressed worse than
anyone.
Just when I thought I would spend my whole life secretly in love with Adrian, his family’s company ended up needing an investment from
mine.
The night I found out, for the first time, I felt like my secret crush might finally come to light.
I told Dad that I liked Adrian. Dad, a man who ruled the business world, had always felt guilty about the daughter he saw as too insecure and too hard on herself.
For the first time in his life, he used business for personal reasons and set up a dinner with Adrian’s father. The moment I saw Adrian at the table, there was already disgust in his eyes.
Adrian’s father wanted to use me as a way in, to win Dad over and secure the investment.
After graduation, Adrian and I got married, and I became the object of
everyone’s envy.
But only I knew that I had loved him humbly, almost pathetically, and in the end, all of it lost to one careless accusation from Chloe.
I came back to the present, took off my glasses, and threw all the ugly clothes away.
Looking at myself in the mirror, seeing my own beautiful eyes at last, instantly lifted half the weight off my heart.
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Heaven had given me a second chance. This time, I would never make the same mistakes again.