Rewriting My Ending

I was terrified. Every time I thought about my ending in the book, I couldn't stop shaking.

It turned out I was the product of my mother's affair. Such a soapy, twisted plot.

According to the novel, my older sister, Abby, was abused by my mother her entire childhood, both physically and mentally. This trauma turned her into a twisted, ruthless, and cold-blooded villainess.

The first thing she did after taking control of the family was expose my true parentage. She threw my mother and me out onto the street and spent the rest of her life torturing us.

But after I transmigrated into this world, I realized something shocking: this older sister was actually the female lead of the story.

My mother kept her locked in the attic, feeding her only once a day.

My scumbag father, after bringing her home, completely ignored her existence.

It wasn't until I was five years old that I even knew I had an older half-sister.

My playboy father only cared about his own pleasure; he never gave a damn about his kids.

My mother left the house right after finishing breakfast with me.

At my age, I should have been in kindergarten, but because of my weak constitution, I was kept at home to rest.

I sneaked into the kitchen and asked Mary, our cook, for another plate of soup dumplings and a glass of milk.

Mary looked down at me, surprised. "Leo, are you still hungry?"

I tilted my head back, my neck aching a bit from looking up at her. "I need to eat more to grow tall."

And just like that, I got my second breakfast.

Holding the small tray, I refused Mary's help and wobbled my way down to the end of the hallway.

I struggled to turn the doorknob, pushed the door open, picked up the tray again, and walked in.

Abby's room wasn't spaciousit was actually smaller than my walk-in closetbut it was clean and well-lit.

She was sitting on the floor by the window, reading a book. She didn't react at all when I walked in.

I set the tray down. "Sister, eat."

I remembered the book saying that my mother starved her, giving her only one meal a day. This eventually caused the female lead to develop chronic stomach issues.

Although her stomach pain later became a plot device to bring her and the male lead closer, I mentally apologized to himhe was the male lead, he could find another way to spark romance with her.

But I was different. I was just a vicious male supporting character destined to die a horrible death.

Abby stared at me blankly, her eyes ice-cold.

I wiped my hands, picked up a dumpling, ate one myself, and then grabbed another and shoved it directly toward her mouth.

The dumpling was honestly too big for me, and I nearly choked to death on the first one.

Abby had no choice but to pat my back and feed me a sip of milk.

Once I finally caught my breath, I looked at the glassI had chugged more than half of the milk. I felt a pang of guilt.

"Mom's not home," I explained softly. "I told Mary I was still hungry, so she gave me this."

Nobody else knew, but Abby was only seven years old. No matter how powerful she became later in the story, right now, she was just a starving child.

She lowered her eyes and slowly, silently, finished the dumplings. At the very end, without any hesitation, she drank the rest of the milk I had started.

Watching her, I felt a spark of hope for my future survival.

I waited a while before taking the empty tray back. Mary just assumed I was a growing boy with a big appetite and didn't suspect a thing.

My mother didn't come home for lunch either.

Mary made me tomato noodles with a bunch of colorful, kid-friendly toppings.

"Mary, can you make a little extra?" I asked.

Mary smiled. "Leo is eating so well today."

I thought to myself, I'll probably be eating this much every single day from now on.

I actually had a very small appetite. Looking at the heavy tray, I thought for a second, then stood up wobbly. "Mary, Leo wants to eat in his room."

"Are you sure you don't want me to carry that for you?" she asked.

"Leo can do it himself," I insisted.

I had a playroom filled with Legos where I spent most of my time, so it wasn't weird for me to walk in that direction.

I walked right past my playroom, straight to the end of the hall. "Sister, open the door!" I called out.

I was using every ounce of strength to hold the heavy tray. If I put it down, I probably wouldn't be able to pick it back up.

Thankfully, Abby opened the door just in time and took the tray from my shaking hands.

I sighed in relief. But when I looked at the table, my expression froze. There was a bowl of plain noodles sitting there. Not a single vegetable, no meat, nothing. It was a miracle the female lead managed to grow tall eating such garbage.

I walked over, pushed the plain noodles aside, and slid my tray into the center. "Sister, eat this."

Abby looked at the colorful, rich tomato noodles, then at me. "Did you eat?"

My stomach chose that exact moment to growl loudly. I yelled, "Sister, you eat first!"

Keeping the female lead fed was my top priority. Plus, I remembered I had an entire cabinet of snacks in my room.

Abby stayed silent for a moment. She picked up a pair of chopsticks, scooped a small bowl of noodles, sat in front of me, and held some up to my mouth. "I'm not hungry. You eat."

I shivered slightly and obediently opened my mouth.

I always felt that she didn't seem like a female lead at all; she felt more like the ultimate villain. She was only seven, but she was already terrifying.

I took a few bites and was instantly full, just chewing without swallowing.

Abby glanced at me. "Full?"

I nodded rapidly. Only then did she begin to eat the rest of the noodles from the tray.

This time, I didn't take the tray back to the kitchen. I left it in my playroom, knocked it around to make it look messy, and then told my nanny to clean it up.

That night, both my father and mother came home together.

My eyelid twitched. When these two were in the same room, it was usually like Mars colliding with Earth.

My mother patted my head and went straight upstairs. My father, however, knelt down and looked at me. "Did Leo have fun playing today?"

I nodded. "Yes."

My father actually cared about his son at this point. He held me and talked to me for a good while.

My heart skipped a beat. I just hoped that when this cheap dad found out I wasn't his biological son, he would still speak to me this gently.

Even Abby was called down for dinner that night.

I quickly realized that when my father was around, my mother didn't dare go too far.

Our family sat around the dining table, putting on a fake show of harmony, eating in complete silence.

My father cut the steak on my plate into tiny pieces and handed it back to me. "Does Leo want to go to kindergarten and make some new friends?"

I completely froze. I blinked my big eyes at him. "Leo doesn't want to go to school. Leo wants to stay home."

My father and mother exchanged a look. When it came to me, they were actually on the same page.

"How about we invite your cousin from your uncle's house to come play with you?" my mother suggested.

It took me half a minute to remember who she was talking about. It was a minor bully character who tormented the female lead in the book.

"I want that huge Lego set! I want to play by myself!" I quickly said, using my hands to gesture how big it was.

After a lot of frantic hand waving, my mother finally understood.

My father laughed. "Alright, Daddy will buy it for you."

It was obvious my father didn't want me interacting too much with my mother's side of the family either, so the conversation hit a dead end.

After a while, my mother put down her silverware and went upstairs. My father wiped his mouth and said, "Leo, keep eating with your sister."

I nodded. "Okay."

Once my father was out of sight, I looked around to make sure the coast was clear. I grabbed a spoon, scooped up a massive piece of my favorite stir-fried meat, and stretched my little arm across the table. "Sister, this is really good."

Abby watched my shaking hand. Seeing that the meat was about to fall off the spoon, she sighed softly, picked up her plate, and caught it.

I finished my dinner feeling incredibly satisfied. I firmly believed that the bond we were building, meal by meal, would eventually convince the female lead to spare my life.

The childhood phase that passed by in a single blink in the novel, I had to survive day by day.

My fake parents actually treated me really well. Even though they were rarely home, they never deprived me of anything material.

This made it easy for me to secretly take care of Abby. But every time my mother came home, it was absolute torture for me.

I wanted to be close to her, but I was also terrified of her.

As the mother of my original character, I had thought about trying to pull her back from the edgeat least save her from her miserable fate in the book.

But whenever she looked at Abby, she turned into a monster. She used every excuse to torment the girl, venting all her hatred for my father onto this innocent child.

Once, I was so terrified by one of her cruel punishments that I developed a high fever in the middle of the night and started hallucinating.

The next morning, when Abby and I saw each other, it was hard to tell who looked worse.

I couldn't change my mother's mind, so I just focused on making Abby's life a little more bearable.

I even managed to skip grades so I could be in the same class as the female lead.

From elementary to middle school, my father arranged for both of us to attend the same elite private academy.

My mother threw a fit at first, but eventually, for some reason, she agreed.

Having read the book, I knew exactly why.

Because everyone knew Abby was an illegitimate child hated by her own family. The kids at the academy came from wealthy, powerful backgrounds, and they loved bullying her for entertainment.

Although the novel only mentioned it briefly, I could imagine the absolute hell she went through at school.

One Monday morning, I sat in the car, fighting back yawns. As soon as Abby got in, I hit the button to raise the privacy partition between us and the driver. Then, I pulled a bag of cookies and a carton of milk out of my backpack. "Breakfast. You have fifteen minutes."

In the original novel, my character inherited my mother's nasty temper and kicked Abby out of the car on the very first day of school, forcing her to walk.

Abby had to walk for an hour and obviously arrived late.

After that, she woke up before dawn every single day to walk to school, until our elderly butler finally took pity on her and secretly lent her his son's bicycle.

But now? I was terrified of not treating her well enough. There was no way I'd let her walk.

Abby ate quietly. Right as the car pulled up to the school gates, I grabbed the empty wrappers, shoved them into my bag, and hopped out of the car pretending nothing had happened.

"Sister," I whispered, "if anyone bullies you, tell me. I'll beat them up."

At school, I always pretended not to know her well. That was, until the day I saw three kids cornering her, digging through her books, and shoving her shoulder. As I got closer, I heard their ugly laughter. I couldn't take it.

I had no idea how Abby managed to stay so expressionless through it all.

I marched right up and kicked the lead kid's desk as hard as I could. It flipped over with a massive crash, scattering textbooks everywhere.

I sneered at them. "No matter what, her last name is still the same as mine. Who gave you the right to teach her a lesson?"

Even though I was short, my cold voice and aggressive entrance terrified the entire classroom into dead silence.

The boy leading the group started to get angry, but his friend pulled his sleeve. They muttered under their breath, flipped the desk back over, and slinked away.

The kid's last name was Vance. His family did a lot of business with my mother's side, so he didn't dare cross me.

Abby quietly picked up her books from the floor without saying a single word.

When I sat down, I realized my foot was throbbing in pain. Thinking about my fragile glass-doll body, I fell silent.

Eventually, I begged my mother to let me take taekwondo classes. She agreed and hired a private coach to train me at home.

Because of that, Abby heard me screaming in pain on a regular basis.

She looked at me with very complicated eyes back then, but ultimately just patted my head.

During lunch break, I sat on the school roof with the massive bento box delivered from home, waiting in absolute boredom.

Just as I was starting to panic that she hadn't seen the note I slipped her, she finally appeared.

I scratched my head. "I thought you didn't see the note."

She explained that she got held up by something. My internal alarms instantly went off. "Did they bully you again?"

Ever since I kicked that desk, nobody had dared touch her.

She shook her head. "No."

Then I noticed the apple in her hand, and my brain started spinning.

Who else would give the female lead an apple at school besides the male lead?

Before high school, their interactions were supposed to be minimal, but the plot always found a way to push them together.

The male lead was smart, handsome, and incredibly kind. He stepped up to help her multiple times, acting as the single ray of light in her childhood outside of her mother.

This was all laying the groundwork for them to meet, understand each other, and fall in love.

I relaxed and opened the food container.

Mary knew exactly how much I "ate." Every single box had two massive layersway more than both of us could finish.

The school cafeteria had amazing food, but I remembered a scene from the book where someone dumped a tray of food all over Abby, leaving her starving after she had to change clothes.

I was not letting her suffer that indignity.

After we finished eating, Abby packed up the containers for me and left the apple behind.

I stared at it. "This apple..."

"What?" she asked. "You don't want it?"

"It's not that I don't want it," I mumbled.

Abby turned to leave, her face blank. "If you don't want it, throw it away."

I stared at the apple in a daze.

The novel spent so much time describing her intense control issues and possessivenessespecially when it came to the male lead and anything related to him. Did this apple really mean absolutely nothing to her?

This was a gift from your childhood crush!

I didn't dare eat it. I just packed it in my bag, figuring that if she regretted it later, I could give it back. But days passed, the apple started to rot, and she never brought it up again.

I chalked it up to the timeline. They were still kids. Their real romance didn't blossom until high school.

During my last year of middle school, my mother's side of the family took a massive financial hit. Whenever my parents were home together, it was a warzone.

Back when our family was struggling, my mother's family helped a lot. Now that they were crashing, my father refused to lift a finger.

Their screaming matches echoed from the second floor all the way down to the living room. I sat on the couch with my earbuds in, calmly doing my homework.

Abby raised an eyebrow. "You're not worried?"

I pulled out an earbud. "What?"

She pointed toward the ceiling.

I shrugged. "Adult problems. Kids shouldn't get involved. Besides, I know her family will take a hit, but they won't go bankrupt."

They were stepping stones for the female lead. Until she grew powerful enough to crush them, they couldn't fall.

As long as her family stayed afloat, my secret parentage wouldn't be exposed, and everything was manageable.

I smiled. "I need to finish this fast so I can watch TV."

I was obsessed with a new drama and needed to catch up on the latest episodes.

That day, my father slammed the front door and left. My mother threw an absolute fit.

That night, my mother claimed she lost an expensive necklace and "found" it in Abby's room.

She accused Abby of stealing and forced her to kneel outside in the snow for two hours.

It was the dead of winter. Abby knelt in the snow wearing nothing but thin pajamas. I was so anxious I was on the verge of tears, but one sharp look from Abby forced me to stay calm.

My mother did it on purpose. Whether a maid actually stole it and hid it, or my mother orchestrated the whole thing, she just needed an excuse to punish her.

Abby's existence was a thorn in her side, and my father's refusal to help her family today had driven that thorn even deeper.

I sat on the stairs, hugging my knees, looking out the window at the frail girl kneeling in the snow.

I felt like I had tried so hard for years, but nothing had really changed.

The next morning at school, I tracked down the male lead, Ethan, and asked him to help me buy some medicine.

He looked confused. "Doesn't the school clinic have that stuff?"

I lowered my head, looking embarrassed. "I got frostbite playing in the snow, and I don't want my mom to know. If I go to the clinic, they'll log my name and call my parents."

Ethan immediately understood. "Don't worry, your secret is safe with me."

I sighed in relief. This was the safest way I could think of.

I knew the male lead was a good guy, and it was a great excuse to earn some favor with him.

That night, my mother thankfully wasn't home. I breathed a sigh of relief and snuck into Abby's room with my backpack.

She was sitting up in bed, reading. Her face was frighteningly pale, but her expression was perfectly calm. You couldn't tell what she was thinking.

"I asked Ethan to buy some medicine," I said softly. "Do you remember him? The guy in the white shirt who smiles with his eyes?"

Abby gave a faint "Mm."

I reached out to roll up her pajama pants, but she grabbed my wrist.

She looked a bit uncomfortable. "I can do it myself."

I obediently let go. "I'll go check what's for dinner."

When I came back with the tray, she had finished applying the ointment and was out of bed.

Usually, I was the one keeping the conversation going, but I was in a terrible mood today, so we ate in silence.

I pulled a test paper out of my bag. "They handed this out today. With your grades, it doesn't matter if you don't do it."

Abby was a master at hiding her true potential. She purposely kept her grades slightly above averagenot terrible, but never standing out.

She took the paper from me and coughed twice.

I stared at her pale face, feeling my chest tighten. "Are you sick?"

The moment I asked, I felt stupid. Who wouldn't be sick after kneeling in the freezing snow for two hours?

"I'm fine," she said flatly.

I didn't believe her. I ran to my room and grabbed the first-aid kit.

Unsurprisingly, she was running a high fever. Thank god we had the right medicine in the box.

Looking at her miserable state, my nose started to sting. I tried to hold it back, but I couldn't. Fat tears started rolling down my face.

For the first time, Abby looked panicked. "What's wrong?"

I shook my head. "Nothing. I just feel so useless."

In the beginning, I only took care of her to save my own skin. But after spending so many years together, I truly saw her as my family, my friend.

Yet every time she suffered, I was powerless to stop it. I could only stand by and watch.

Abby shifted on the bed. She reached out and placed her hand gently on my head. "I don't blame you. Stop crying."

Hearing that made me want to cry even harder. I couldn't help itI lunged forward, wrapped my arms around her, and sobbed for a good ten minutes.

She froze completely, her body rigid, but she didn't push me away.

When I finally stopped crying, I realized what I had just done and was too embarrassed to look her in the eye.

"Get some rest," I mumbled, scrambling toward the door. "I'm going to do my homework."

The next day, her fever was worse.

I woke up extra early to sneak her some breakfast and medicine, only to find I couldn't even wake her up.

My eyes got hot. I took a deep breath, blinked hard, and forced myself to act completely normal. I packed away the food and medicine, made sure my face wasn't red, and walked out to the dining room for breakfast.

I frowned, putting on my best annoyed brat act. "Is she not going to school again today?"

Mary paused while serving porridge. "I think she's still feeling unwell."

I scoffed loudly. "Get a doctor to look at her. If something happens to her, Dad is just going to come home and scream at Mom again."

Mary nodded quickly. "You're right. I'll let the butler know right away."

I let out a breath. If the butler knew, my father would find out, and there was no way he would let her die of a fever.

I spent the entire day at school completely distracted. I kept staring at her empty desk, wondering if the doctor ever showed up.

I prayed her brain didn't get fried by the fever.

It wasn't until I rushed home and saw her sitting on the couch that my heart finally settled back into my chest. Thank god she was alive.

I rushed over, worried. "Why are you out of bed?"