Your Fortune Wont Buy My Heart

The day the acceptance letters for university arrived was the same day the Blackwood familythe wealthiest dynasty in the stateshowed up at our doorstep.

Until that moment, I had no idea that the boy Id grown up with in the group home, the boy who shared my stolen snacks and my darkest fears, was the long-lost heir to a multi-billion-dollar empire.

Wyatt gripped my hand so tight it hurt, his eyes defiant as he faced the men in tailored suits. "If you want me to come home," he said, his voice ringing through the dilapidated hallway of the orphanage, "she comes with me. Thats the deal."

His mother, a woman who looked like shed been carved out of expensive marble, didn't flinch. She offered a thin, practiced smile and pulled a check from her designer handbag. She slid it across the scratched wooden table toward me.

"Five million dollars," she said, her tone as cool as a January morning. "Consider it a scholarship. The Blackwood familys way of ensuring you finish your education."

The politeness in her voice was a weapon. It was a buyouta clean, surgical strike to sever the bond between us.

Wyatt was livid, ready to drag me out of the room right then and there, but I stayed his hand. I gently pulled my fingers from his, the ghost of his warmth lingering on my skin. I reached out and took the check.

"Go home, Wyatt," I said quietly.

"What?" He looked at me like Id just slapped him.

"I like my life here," I lied, the words tasting like ash. "I wouldn't know what to do with a life like yours. Go be a Blackwood. Leave me to be a nobody."

He didn't know the truth. He didn't know that I had already gone back with him once before.

In another life, I had followed him into that world. I had died in that house, broken and discarded. The memories of my final moments were still so vivid they felt like bruises on my soul. This time, I wasn't going to let history repeat itself.

01

Outside, the younger kids were playing on the rusted swing set, their laughter filtered through the cracks in the door.

Wyatt grabbed my hand again, his eyes rimmed with red. "Norma, what the hell are you talking about? You dont mean that."

He looked vulnerable, terrifiedexactly like the boy Id met years ago. He looked like a stray kitten expecting a kick.

In my past life, that look would have shattered me. I would have folded instantly. But this time, my heart stayed cold. I looked past him at the sea of bodyguards and assistants, then looked him dead in the eye.

"Wyatt, this money is more than Id make in three lifetimes. Its security. Its a way out." I paused, letting the cruelty settle in my expression. "So, stop being a weight around my neck, okay? Just let me go."

His grip faltered.

When I first met Wyatt at age eight, he had just been diagnosed with Bipolar II. He was volatile, prone to explosive outbursts and crushing silences. Nobody wanted to play with him; even the staff looked at him with a mix of pity and exhaustion.

I was the exception.

Maybe it was a girls naive sense of heroism, or maybe it was because I saw him sitting alone in the corner of the yard, staring at nothing, and felt a kinship in that loneliness.

Because I stayed by his side, the other kids stayed away from me, too. They called Wyatt a "psycho" and me his "keeper."

Whenever Wyatt heard them, hed charge, fists flying. And every time, I would catch him. Id cup his ears with my hands and whisper, "Don't listen, Wyatt. Don't think about them. If you don't hear the words, they stay in their mouths. They cant touch us."

He always listened to me.

So now, his hands trembled as he mimicked that old gesture, reaching up to cover his own ears.

"Look, Norma. Im not listening. Just don't leave me, okay?"

I pulled my hands back and looked away.

"Its okay," he whispered, his voice cracking. "If you don't want to go to the city, Ill stay here. I won't go anywhere. Ill just stay with you."

Before he could finish, Mrs. Blackwood stepped forward, the click of her heels sounding like a death knell.

"Wyatt, honey, don't be ridiculous," she said, her voice dripping with artificial maternal grief. "Weve spent years looking for you. How can you break our hearts for a girl whos clearly telling you shes moved on?"

She looked like a grieving mother. I looked like the villain.

It was almost funny. I knew how this story ended. I knew exactly how much I would eventually weigh in Wyatts heart when he was surrounded by gold and silk.

I looked up, forcing a look of pure annoyance.

"Wyatt, Ive made it clear. If you have any dignity left, youll stop begging. To be honest, even if you stay, Im going to college. I want to meet someone normal. I want a normal life, a normal relationship. Not... this."

"Norma..."

His name for me was a plea. His eyes were wide with a hurt so deep it should have killed me.

I looked past him at the bodyguards. "What are you waiting for? Take him home. He's making a scene."

The guards moved in, hoisting him up. Wyatt struggled, his screams echoing through the hallways.

"Norma! Did they threaten you? Is it my mother? I know you don't mean this! I don't believe you!"

A flash of memory hit me.

In my previous life, I was the one screaming. I was the one begging him not to do this to me, refusing to believe he could be so cruel.

It hadn't mattered then. My pleas hadn't softened his heart for a second.

Wyatt, you don't understand. In that life, I chose you. And the moment you stopped believing in methe moment you chose someone elseI realized what a fool Id been.

I had prayed to whatever god was listening: If I get one more chance, I will never go back to New York with him.

02

After the Blackwood motorcade disappeared, the director of the home and the teachers crowded around me, their eyes fixed on the check Mrs. Blackwood had left behind.

They were beaming, their faces flushed with excitement.

"Norma, you really hit the jackpot! Make sure you keep in touch with him. Hes a Blackwood now!"

"Exactly! Hes an only child. One day youll be a Blackwood yourself. A real-life Cinderella."

Even the kids Id grown up with joined in. "No wonder Wyatt was always so moody. He was a prince in disguise."

They swarmed me, planning out my future as a trophy wife before Id even packed a bag. The air felt thin, suffocating.

"Im not staying in touch with him," I snapped, cutting through the noise. "And Im definitely not marrying him."

The room went silent.

"Norma, don't be stupid," the director said. Shed watched us grow up; she knew how intertwined our lives were.

"Im not being stupid," I said, my voice flat. "Im an orphan. They are the Blackwoods. People like us don't belong in their world. Don't mention this again."

For ten years, I had been the only person in Wyatts world. Everyone assumed he couldn't breathe without me. They assumed I was just as obsessed with him.

I didn't bother arguing. I pushed past the whispers of "shes crazy" and "shes throwing away her life" and went to my room.

"Norma?"

A tiny, bird-like voice called from the corner.

Seeing her pale, thin face made my throat tighten. I almost broke then.

Her name was Lucy. Wyatt and I had found her on the side of the road on our way home from school when she was only four. We called her our sister. We loved her like she was our own blood.

Three months ago, she was diagnosed with leukemia. She needed a bone marrow transplant.

In my past life, the Blackwoods had used their connections to find a match at the last minute. But Wyatt had given that donor's spot to someone elseto Biancaleaving Lucy to die at the age of six.

"Norma, youre crying," Lucy whispered. "Are you sad because Wyatt left?"

I knelt beside her bed and stroked her hair, pushing down the bile in my throat.

"No, sweetie. Im not sad. I just want to stay here with you."

She smiled, showing her two little dimples. "I want to stay with you, too. But Wyatt said he wanted to be with you forever. Why did he go?"

I froze. "Wyatt... Wyatt found his family."

Every kid in the system dreams of that. That afternoon, Lucy talked incessantly about how lucky Wyatt was, until her energy faded and she drifted off to sleep.

I leaned against her bed, closing my eyes. And as sleep took me, I was dragged back into the nightmare.

03

The day I arrived at the Blackwood estate in my first life, I had worn my best clothes. Everything was clean, pressed, and hole-free.

But standing in that gold-leafed foyer, I felt like a stain. My palms were sweating, and my feet felt glued to the marble.

Wyatt sensed my panic and grabbed my hand. He leaned in, a bright, genuine smile on his face. "Don't be afraid," he whispered. "Ive got you."

His eyes were so full of light then. I believed him.

Those were the words I used to say to him. When his episodes hitthe mania that made him pick fights, or the crushing depression that sent him hiding in the dark corners of the orphanageI was always there.

The other kids would make a game of finding him just to poke at him. I would always find him first. Id stand in front of him like a shield and say, "Don't be afraid. I've got you."

Every single time.

Until the day he looked at the scrapes on my arms from protecting him and said, "Norma, from now on, Im the one who protects you."

I believed him. I was wrong.

"Your name is Norma?"

It was Wyatts father. He looked at our interlaced fingers, and a tiny, almost imperceptible frown marred his face. I pulled my hand away instantly. "Yes, sir. It's nice to meet you."

He just nodded.

At dinner, I followed Wyatt like a shadow. The silence at the table was heavy, punctuated only by the sound of Wyatt piling food onto my plate. I could feel the resentment in the room; my presence had soured their long-awaited reunion.

Then, the front door opened, and a voice like honey drifted in.

"Mr. and Mrs. Blackwood! Im here!"

Mrs. Blackwood was on her feet instantly, her face lighting up with a warmth she hadn't shown her own son. Even Mr. Blackwood softened.

That was the first time I saw Bianca. She was the personification of "old money." Elegant, effortless, confidenta swan in human form.

She walked straight to our table and looked at the chair I was sitting in.

"Could you move? Thats my seat. Thanks."

She said it with such casual authority. That was when I learned that the seatand the lifetruly did belong to her. She and Wyatt had been "betrothed" in a sense since they were toddlers, a pact between two powerful families.

I watched her flirt with Wyatt. I watched his ears turn red.

Something shifted that night.

The Blackwoods bought me an apartment near the university. Wyatt would visit whenever he didn't have class. Wed go to dinner, movies, walksall the things normal couples do.

Eventually, he used the familys influence to bring Lucy to New York. She was placed in the best private hospital, with a team of specialists hunting for a marrow match.

Those months were the only sweetness I had in that life. Wed visit Lucy together, and shed hold both our hands, beaming. Wed huddle on the sofa watching old movies.

I thought we were safe.

But the safety shattered. Wyatt started coming home later and later. First, it was "schoolwork," then "fraternity events," then "family business."

Id cook dinner and watch it go cold. Id reheat it, then let it go cold again, eventually falling asleep at the table until hed carry me to bed in the early hours of the morning.

Then, he stopped coming home at all.

He didn't answer his phone. My texts went unread. Sometimes two weeks would pass without a word.

For his nineteenth birthday, the Blackwoods threw a gala at their estate. I took a deep breath, wrapped the scarf Id spent weeks knitting for him around my neck, and walked in.

I saw him immediately. He was in the center of the ballroom, leading the first dance with Bianca. He looked regal, his movements fluid and sure. The boy who used to be too anxious to speak to strangers was now perfectly at home in her arms.

Golden couple. The words whispered through the crowd. They felt like lead in my chest.

The guests looked at me with pity or disgust. I didn't fit. I never had. And this time, Wyatt didn't look my way. He didn't come to grab my hand and say, "I've got you."

After the dance, Wyatt was pulled away by his father. Bianca walked up to me.

"Norma," she said, her voice low. "Look around. This is Wyatts world. Do you really think you belong in it?"

I tried to walk away, but she blocked me. She looked at my handshands that were calloused and rough from years of chores at the home. I tried to hide them in my pockets.

She grabbed my wrist, her grip surprisingly strong. "These hands don't belong on someone like him. Youre a ghost, Norma. Why don't you just disappear?"

I tried to pull away. "Let go of me, Bianca."

But as I pulled, she let go suddenly, throwing herself backward into a pyramid of champagne glasses.

The sound of shattering crystal was deafening. The entire room went silent.

Wyatt rushed out from the crowd.

"Norma! What the hell did you do?"