That Was Grandpa’s Life’s Work
Isabella promised to repay me once her project bonus came, so I could buy the house back.
But on payday, the bonus went to a new intern, Ryan Croft.
I confronted her. "Did you give my money to Ryan?"
Isabella rubbed her temples, her eyes weary. "Noah, I know about your gambling debts. That money would vanish in a week. Ryan is talented and hardworkinghe deserves it. This is for your own good."
Her words pierced me like ice. "Gambling debts? Who told you that?"
"It doesnt matter! You promised to change, and now youre lying and trying to steal company funds!"
I looked at her angry face, silent. Picking up the resignation letter on her desk, I signed my name.
1
Isabella didn't even glance at the letter I signed. She simply tossed it into a drawer. There wasn't a trace of regret or sadness on her face, only the quiet relief of having disposed of a problem.
As I walked out of her office, I saw Ryan handing her a cup of coffee.
"Bella, don't waste your energy being angry at people who aren't worth it. Your health is more important," Ryan's voice was a smooth, soothing balm.
Isabella took the coffee, her furrowed brow relaxing into a faint, appreciative smile. "You're always so thoughtful."
That smile was a dagger in my eye.
The hushed whispers of my colleagues followed me as I walked away. The words were quiet, but they sliced through the air with perfect clarity.
"A gambler? I knew he was a lost cause."
"Ms. Byers really did everything she could for him. She tried to save him."
"Serves him right. Five million dollars? Who in their right mind would give that to a degenerate gambler?"
My face was a stone mask as I walked to my desk and began to pack.
On the corner of my desk sat a framed photo from the early days of the company. In it, Isabella and I were crammed into a tiny office, slurping instant noodles. She was grinning at the camera, her smile so bright and pure.
I picked up the frame, hesitated for a single heartbeat, then swept it, along with stacks of my design schematics, into the cardboard box.
Nine years of my life's work, traded for a slanderous lie.
Clutching the box like a shield, I walked out of the building I had watched rise from the ground, a failure in the eyes of the world I had helped create.
When I got back to my small apartment building, I froze.
Piled by the entrance were several cardboard boxes, soaked through by the rain. They were the things I'd moved from my ancestral homeall of my grandfather's old books and belongings. I had asked Isabella to store them at her villa, since my rented place was too small.
A note from her, stuck to one of the boxes, was dissolving in the rain, the ink bleeding into the soggy cardboard.
"No room for this. Get rid of this trash."
Trash
I knelt, my hands trembling as I touched the waterlogged spines of the antique books. The pages were fused together, my grandfather's handwritten notes bleeding into illegible gray smudges. They were his life's work, the last remaining root of my family.
A cold, bottomless rage I had never known before surged through me. My heart felt like it had been encased in ice.
I pulled out my phone to call her, to demand an explanation for this cruelty.
The screen lit up, displaying the smiling face of my grandfathermy chosen wallpaper, a reminder of the man I wanted to be. His expression was so kind.
My thumb hovered over the call button, unable to press it.
Just then, a text message from a real estate agent popped up.
"Mr. Kane, the ownership of the ancestral property was officially transferred at 3 p.m. today. As per your instructions, the funds have been anonymously deposited into the Aetherion Dynamics corporate account."
The last thread of hope snapped.
I opened my banking app. Checking Account xxxx Balance: $86.52.
The leftover change from selling my heritage.
A bitter, self-mocking laugh escaped my lips. For her company, for our supposed future, I had sold my grandfather's home, and now I was penniless, branded a degenerate gambler.
Another notification popped up. It was from the company's internal group chat.
An announcement for a celebratory party, posted by Isabella herself.
The theme: "Celebrating the brilliant success of our genius new talent, Ryan Croft, in securing the military contract!"
My project, my triumph, the contract I had saved by selling my soul, had become the centerpiece of their celebration.
The pain was so deep it had turned to a numb, cold fury.
I tried calling Isabella one last time.
The only reply was the robotic voice of the automated system: "The person you are calling is unavailable. Please try again later."
She was busy, no doubt, celebrating with her "genius."
I blocked her number, and with it, the entire absurd chapter of my life.
I didn't go home. I dragged the soaked boxes to a cheap motel nearby.
The next morning, I went to the bank. I had one other savings account with a little over a hundred thousand dollars in itmy life savings, my last emergency fund.
"Sir, I'm sorry, but all accounts under your name have been frozen," the teller said, her voice flat and impersonal.
I stared at her. "Frozen? Why?"
"The request was made by your fiance, Ms. Isabella Byers. The reason cited is a request from family to cooperate with a police investigation into your 'illegal gambling activities.'"
Isabella.
Again.
She didn't just refuse to believe me; she was determined to cut me off at the knees, to destroy any chance I had of starting over.
An icy dread snaked its way up my spine.
I walked out of the bank and called her from my secondary phone, the one she hadn't blocked. It rang for a long time before she picked up.
"Who is this?" Her voice was hoarse, thick with a hangover.
"It's me."
A few seconds of silence, then her tone became frigid. "Noah. Why are you calling? Have you finally come to your senses? Are you ready to admit you were wrong?"
"Why did you freeze my bank accounts?" I asked, my voice tight with suppressed rage.
"For your own good," she said, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. "When you finally kick your addiction and show some real remorse, I'll unfreeze them. Until then, I'll manage your money for you."
"What gives you the right"
"The right of being your fiance! I will not stand by and watch you destroy yourself!" she snapped, cutting me off. "I have a meeting. I'm hanging up."
The line went dead.
At that exact moment, a call came in from an unknown number.
"Is this Noah Kane?" a rough voice growled. "You owe Titan Financial three hundred grand. When are you planning on paying up?"
"I've never borrowed money from you."
"Oh yeah? Social Security number ending in xxxx, sound familiar?" He recited my entire SSN. "We've got your picture, too. Don't try to weasel out of this. You've got three days. Pay up, or you're going to find out what happens when you don't."
He hung up.
I understood instantly. Ryan's setup was more than just a few photoshopped pictures. He had woven an entire web of fabricated debt around me.
Before I could even process the shock, my landlord called.
"Noah? Have you gotten yourself into some kind of trouble?" he asked, his voice wary. "Ms. Byers's assistant paid me a visit today. Said you've got a bad gambling problem, told me to be careful. I can't have that kind of thing in my building. The apartment's no longer yours. I need you out in three days."
My career, my savings, my home.
In a single day, I had been wiped clean, thrown out onto the street.
I sent my resume to a few other tech firms, but the responses were all the same.
"Mr. Kane, we're sorry, but there are some concerns about your professional reputation. We cannot offer you a position at this time."
Every road was blocked.
Desperate for cash, I took the high-performance computer I had built myselfa machine with the power of a serverto a second-hand electronics market.
As the dealer stuffed a few crumpled bills into my hand, I felt the last piece of my spirit being stripped away.
I found myself walking aimlessly, my feet eventually leading me back to my grandfather's house. I just wanted to see it one last time.
The iron gate swung open, and a group of people emerged, centered around one man.
Leading them was Ryan Croft.
He was dressed in a tailored suit, beaming like he owned the worldand this house.
"Well, well, if it isn't Noah," he said, patting the grand, red-lacquered door behind him. "This place has great energy. My girlfriend rented it for me. A little reward for single-handedly landing the military project. It's going to be my new studio."
He deliberately walked over and bumped my shoulder, whispering in a voice only I could hear.
"Your house, your woman, your achievements they're all mine now."
I stared at him, my fists clenched at my sides.
Just then, my phone rang. It was Isabella.
I answered on instinct.
"Noah, where have you been? I've been looking all over for you. If you're out of money, just tell me. Don't do anything stupid. I'll take care of your finances for you, and I've asked Ryan to keep an eye on the old house for you, so don't worry, okay?"
Her perfectly timed "concern" was the final, twisted joke. Keeping an eye on it for me meant giving it to her new lover.
I hung up without a word, a dead silence filling my soul.
Looking at their triumphant faces, the last shred of my love for Isabella withered and died.
I turned and walked into the drizzling rain. I had no destination, and I needed none.
I pulled out my phone and made one more call.
"Hello? Is this the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office?"
The next day, Aetherion Dynamics published a long article on their official company blog.
In it, Isabella wrote in the first person, a heart-wrenching account of how she had "accidentally discovered" my crippling gambling addiction, which had driven me to financial ruin. She detailed her desperate, failed attempts to reason with me, and her ultimate, painful decision to "do what was necessary" to pull me back from the brink, even if it meant public shame.
The article was accompanied by a series of expertly photoshopped images, courtesy of Ryan. There were pictures of me entering and exiting casinos in Macau, the backgrounds blurry but my face perfectly clear. There were even forged IOUs for massive sums, with a sloppy imitation of my signature at the bottom.
The narrative painted Ryan as the heroic young talent who had stepped up in a moment of crisis to save the company.
And I was cast as the ungrateful degenerate who had nearly destroyed it all.
The story exploded online.
It was picked up by major news outlets. My name became a trending topic, tagged with "gambling," "traitor," and "scumbag."
My parents, back in my hometown, obviously saw the news.
The moment I answered their call, my father's rage-choked voice roared through the phone.
"You worthless son! If your grandfather knew you sold his house to gamble, he'd be rolling in his grave!"
I opened my mouth to explain.
"How could you do this to his memory! How could you!"
His shouting grew louder, and in the background, I could hear a commotion, other voices yelling.
"How could the Kane family produce such a disgrace!"
"You should be ashamed to be alive!"
I heard strangers' voices cursing me. "Get out of our town!" "The family of a gambler is just as bad!"
It hit me like a ton of bricks. The online mob, using the information Isabella had so conveniently provided, had found my parents' home.
"Dad, listen to me"
"Don't you dare call me Dad!" he bellowed. "Do you have any idea what just happened? Those people, they came to the house!"
"They broke our windows!"
"Your mother was so scared, she had a heart attack!"
My world went silent. The phone nearly slipped from my hand.
"I didn't gamble, Dad, you have to believe me"
"Still lying!" My father's voice was cracking now, turning into a sob. "The pictures, the IOUs online, it's all right there in black and white! Are you saying it's all fake?"
"That nice girl Isabella even spoke out about it! Who are you trying to fool?"
My mother must have snatched the phone, because all I could hear was her muffled, desperate crying. "Son, please, it's not too late! Isabella is a good girl, she's still waiting for you to come back to your senses. You can't disappoint her again. Just go back, apologize to her our family needs you"
"A good girl?" The words were like knives in my heart. She hadn't just ruined me; she had manipulated my own family into becoming her accomplices.
I was defenseless. I stood there in silence, listening to the agonizing sting of being condemned by the people I loved most, until my heart was completely numb.
After I hung up, a text from Isabella arrived, as if on cue.
"See how much your family is hurting for you, Noah? Does it feel bad?"
"Just admit it, and come back. If you're willing to confess, I can find it in my heart to forgive you this one time."
Her condescending offer of charity, her nauseating hypocrisy, made my stomach turn. I finally understood the exquisite pleasure one could derive from grinding a person into the dirt, then magnanimously offering them a hand up.
I didn't reply. I walked into a nearby internet cafe and sent one last email.
"Due to personal reasons, I, the sole patent holder, am hereby freezing all commercial use of said patent, effective immediately."
You wanted to play dirty? Fine. My turn.
First, search for and download the MotoNovel app from Google. Then, open the app and use the code "307424" to read the entire book.
MotoNovel
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