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On the big screen in the wedding hall, Lucas’s bloodied face appeared.
Along with me sitting behind him, smiling.
The bride and groom appearing in this form was truly quite strange.
I saw the guests start to stir uneasily.
Then Lucas’s aunt was the first to notice Ethan’s memorial photo beside me.
She let out a shrill scream, pushing Lucas’s father: “Something’s wrong! Run! Run now!”
Too late.
The doors to the hall had long been locked.
I had all the staff evacuate and help me livestream online.
I said: “Let me reintroduce myself.”
“My name is Rachel Jiang.”
My name is Rachel Jiang.
Jiang wasn’t my parents‘ surname. I don’t know what their surname was.
Because before I was old enough to remember, they had already sold me to a 40–year–old man.
That man was a doctor.
On the surface, the doctor was my adoptive father.
In private, he made me his lover his lover.
Whenever I was the slightest bit disobedient, he would tie me to an electroshock chair.
Repeated electric shocks destroyed my nerves
3:28 pm DDDD
<
I stopped feeling pain, stopped feeling fear.
Also stopped feeling love.
All the normal human emotions, I lost them all.
The doctor was very satisfied. Only like this would I never leave him.
But then I met Ethan.
He was my neighbor, and also my classmate.
At school, I was often bullied because of my strange personality.
Only Ethan was willing to play with me.
He was also the first person to notice something was off about my relationship with my adoptive
father.
He tried to break into my house more than once, but my adoptive father’s precautions were too
thorough.
So Ethan started gathering evidence, going to our teacher, contacting reporters, writing letters to TV
stations.
That day, my adoptive father was drunk. He mumbled by the table, holding a wine bottle:
“Gotta find a way to get rid of him, that Jiang brat, how did I not see how much trouble he’d be..”
He closed his eyes, took another swig of wine, and set the bottle on the table.
When he reached for the bottle again, he found it was gone.
My adoptive father opened his eyes.
In the reflection of the dirty glass, he saw me standing behind him, holding the bottle high.
Once, then again.
Blood splattered across the glass.
3:28 pm D
<
That was the first time I killed someone.
Because I was diagnosed as mentally ill, I wasn’t held criminally responsible.
I was admitted to Southside Psychiatric Center, a very remote place. Looking out from the, I could only see I could see was a desolate little courtyard.
Suddenly one day, a splash of red appeared there.
I rubbed my eyes, confirming I wasn’t seeing things.
It was a rose bush.
The young man planting the roses looked up and smiled at me.
He said: “Let’s give you a new name. How about Rachel? From now on, may your life be free of storms and rain, always clear and bright.”
He handed me a book of surnames: “Pick a new surname too. Choose whichever one you think
sounds best.”
I was so annoyed by him, I waved my hand:
“No need to choose. Jiang, I’ll use Jiang!‘
And so I became Rachel Jiang.
Ethan was my only family.
