The Perfect Victim

Once again, my wife, Claire Winters, stabbed me with a silver needle.

A reporter tracked me down and asked, "Louis Sterling, wasn't your wife, Claire, one of the winners of the National Inspiration Awards from ten years ago? She won the reward for saving you during the earthquake and ending up paralyzed from the waist down, right?"

I stayed quiet for a moment, then nodded.

"Louis, we're from a TV station, and we're producing a tenth anniversary special about the earthquake."

I rubbed my arm, which was covered in tiny needle marks, and looked her straight in the eye.

I replied, "That's fine, but can you keep the cameras discreet? Claire isn't used to being in front of so many lenses."

However, I never expected that on the very first day of the live broadcast, I would be dragged onto the trending charts and torn apart online.

When I got home, Claire Winters was still in the bedroom. Later, I carefully finished setting up the hidden cameras.

"You're back?"

My heart skipped.

"Why are you home so early? Don't you have work today?"

Claire smiled and waved me over. I forced myself to ignore the discomfort in my body and walked toward her.

The hidden cameras began streaming live across the internet, and the comments started flooding in.

[So, she's the one who sacrificed her own legs to save her boyfriend during the earthquake!]

[She's so beautiful. Loyal and gorgeous... She's the kind of woman men should marry!]

[Why's her husband acting so weird? It's like he doesn't even want to get close to her.]

Claire gently ran her hand over my arm. Although I pretended to stay calm, every touch made my stomach churn, especially when I saw those hands resting on the blanket.

I quickly looked away.

Just a few days ago, those same hands had jabbed silver needles into my body.

[It's settled! He's disgusted because Claire's paralyzed. Look, the second he glanced at her legs, he avoided eye contact.]

[Seriously? If it weren't for him, Claire wouldn't even be paralyzed, and now he's acting like this?]

On the day of the earthquake, I had planned to break up with Claire.

When we were together, her obsessive possessiveness had always made me uncomfortable. However, what really did it was finding out she had poisoned the stray cat I had been feeding since freshman year.

Fear, anger, and grief flooded my entire body as I realized she was terrifying.

She grabbed my arm and begged, "Louis Sterling, I was wrong. Please don't break up with me, okay? Louis, I just love you too much. I was already jealous because you spent so much time on that cat. Then, you said you were taking it with you after graduation... I couldn't handle it."

I did not want to argue with her any longer, so I turned around to leave the classroom. Just then, I felt the room start to shake.

It was an earthquake!

Our classroom was on the first floor. If I ran outside, I would make it to the open field. Just as I was about to run out, Claire yanked me back hard.

"Louis, if you're going to break up with me, I have no reason to live anymore. Let's die together."

I watched helplessly as the beam above us came crashing down.

I had no idea how long I was trapped under the rubble. All I knew was that when the rescue team finally pulled me out, countless cameras were pointed right at me.