But Zach and Gale found something surprising when they were on their way to destroy my torso.

I was pregnant.

Zach even saw the burns he had adored on my stomach.

Throughout the years, Zach always turned off the lights when he slept with me. It was probably because he did not want to see my disgusting face.

But he should have been familiar with my body.

Those burns were all marks left behind courtesy of my father, who burned me with cigarettes.

Zach loved kissing those marks and said that they were like blossoming flowers. They were marks God gave me.

But when he saw those familiar marks, he was only taken aback for a second before he threw me into a pool of sulphuric acid without even blinking.

How strange. I knew that I was dead, but when my torso touched the sulphuric acid, I still felt excruciating pain.

And when I saw Zach’s cool, unfeeling gaze, I could not help but think, ‘Zach, do you know this torso is mine? Or have you always wanted to do this?’

“Whose family does she belong to? How could they dismember her when she was pregnant?” Gale lamented behind Zach.

Zach stilled for a moment before he laughed uncaringly.

“If she’s sold to the black market, it means that no one will miss or care about her.”

No one would miss me or care about me, huh?

Those words were an apt description of the life I had no control over.

And Zach, those words fully described how you felt about me too, right?

When he got back, Zach massaged the center of his brows because he was feeling tired.

He had accomplished a major task, but for some reason, he felt uneasy.

Then, as if he thought of something, he tapped on WhatsApp.

His finger hovered over our chat.

It still contained records of our argument.

One month ago, Zach suddenly said that he was willing to marry me.

Honestly, once I became an adult, we started sleeping together.

Over the years, Zach never admitted that I was his girlfriend. He only ever told the others that I was his sister, much less talked about marrying me.

But suddenly, he said that he was willing to marry me.

In retrospect, that was one of the few moments of happiness that I had ever had, but in the next second, he said something that completely destroyed that happiness.

“But on one condition: You have to donate a kidney to Catherine.”

Catherine Queen was the girl whom he loved for years.

I did not even know what I signed to Zach at that time, but when I was finally aware of what was going on around me, I found that I had already rejected his proposal.

Zach flew into a rage, and we got into a major argument.

“Stella Riverra, how could you be so selfish?!

“You’re the only match for Catherine, so just trust me! I’m the best nephrologist, I won’t let anything happen to you two.”

I signed to Zach that I did not want to donate my kidney.

But he shoved me away in disappointment.

“Stella, I’m disappointed in you. To you, you’re losing a kidney, but Catherine will be losing her life!

“You’re just as disgusting as your monster of a father! You should just die!”

Then, he turned away and left. No matter what I signed behind him, he never turned around to look, so he did not see what I signed.

[I’m sorry, Zach. It’s not that I don’t want to, but I only have one kidney left.]

Even though I felt utterly dejected because of what he had said, I still wanted to stay by his side while living and breathing until the day I died.

But as I thought about it at this moment, it would not have mattered even if Zach had known about it back then. He might not even have cared.

Right from the start, he hated me.

Because I had a hand in his mother’s death.

Zach and I were neighbors, and we grew up together.

I lost my mother when I was really young and lived with my alcoholic father.

Meanwhile, Zach’s parents divorced, and he lived next door to me with his gentle mother.

Zach’s mother loved me and would occasionally ask me whether I would become Zach’s wife.

Whenever she did that, Zach would be highly against it.

“Who’d want to marry a mute?!”

Even so, Zach always protected me.

When other people threw stones at me, ordered their dogs to bite me, or stole my stuff, he always ran over and fought against my bullies.

Even if he was battered and bruised all over, he still stood in front of me as my protector.

He said that he did not like me because I was mute, but he would always protect me because I was his star.

Then, one year, my father got into major debt and wanted to sell me because I was useless, but Zach’s mother discovered his plot.

She saved me, but my drunk father stabbed her thirteen times, and she never woke up again.

I would forever remember how Zach looked at me when I woke up in the hospital.

His eyes were full of despair and endless hatred.

“Why didn’t you die?! I hate you! I’ll forever hate you, Stella!”

In his rage, Zach slapped me.

He struck me so hard that I was dizzy from the blow, and I lost my hearing in my left ear because of it.

But it was also because of this slap that Zach stayed by my side.