After getting treated at the hospital and discharging himself, Eric walked aimlessly with a bandage slapped across his nose. Going ho was out of the question—they would just throw him out again. He checked the remaining cash in the envelope; there wasn’t much left since a chunk of it had gone toward his dical bills.
He sank onto a roadside bench and unzipped his duffel bag. Pulling out a manila folder, he looked inside. It held all his vital docunts: his birth certificate and his diplomas from elentary school all the way through high school, which he had just graduated from a month ago.
"Crinkle." He gripped the folder tightly with both hands. His heart ached at how easily his family had discarded him without even hearing his side of the story. He rembered the ti he went to lissa’s apartnt. She had asked him for help moving so furniture around because she wanted to rearrange her living room. There was absolutely no physical contact, let alone kissing.
Besides, lissa was like an older sister to him; he would never even dream of crossing that line with her. Eric replayed the video footage in his mind—the scene where lissa was the one who initially hugged the guy who looked just like him, then kissed him passionately.
"I didn’t do it. None of this makes sense. In that video, lissa was clearly being intimate with that guy, and that guy definitely wasn’t . That ans she’s cheating on Jason. But how do I prove it? The video looked so real and seamless, like it wasn’t even edited. But... even if I could prove my innocence, Mom and Dad wouldn’t listen to anyway. They always put Jason and Ruby on a pedestal. I’ve never mattered to them," he muttered to himself.
Eric recalled his childhood, which he had spent entirely in the shadows of his siblings. Jason was six years older, and Ruby was just two years younger than him. Whenever he got an A in elentary school, his parents’ only response was a dry, "Good, keep it up."
But when Jason was in middle school and scraped by with a C, his parents threw a massive celebration. It was the sa story whenever Ruby got a B or lower, anything she wanted, they bought her instantly.
Despite the blatant favoritism from his parents, he had always been incredibly close with his siblings. They used to help and support one another, up until now. In fact, Ruby was the one who had introduced him to her best friend, Vivian, so they could date.
He was also close with his cousin, Jade. The five of them had played together constantly since childhood, with Jason always looking out for them. But everything changed the mont Jason brought lissa ho to et the family. Jason wasn’t as warm as he used to be; he seed to care way more about lissa’s feelings than those of his own siblings.
Ruby and Jade also grew tight with lissa, leaving only Vivian to stay by his side and keep him company. Reflecting on it all, Eric leaned back and stared up at the blue sky.
"Hahaha, even Vivian believed that video... Honestly, I can’t even bla her. I’d probably believe it too. It was a flawless setup, whoever made it," Eric muttered bitterly.
"Ding." A text notification chid on his phone. He quickly pulled the smartphone from his suit pocket to check it. His eyes went wide. The video he had just seen was now being blasted to the extended family group chat. Eric sat upright, staring at his screen, his face turning pale. If his extended family found out, he would have nowhere left to run. Since he lived in a small town, the entire community would catch wind of this scandal, branding him a disgrace for sothing he didn’t even do.
"Ding." Another ssage popped up in the family group. This ti it was Jason speaking. He officially declared that he was calling off the wedding with lissa. His reason? lissa had confessed to cheating on him with Eric—and claid she was now pregnant with Eric’s baby.
"W-what? No... way... I didn’t touch her... Seriously! I don’t want anything to do with lissa. She’s five years older than , and she’s even a year older than Jason... This is insane... It’s impossible. I am not the father of her baby," Eric thought to himself, panic seizing him.
"Ding." "Ding." "Ding." The family group chat exploded with reactions to Jason’s ssage. Distant uncles, aunts, cousins he had never even t, and elders who used to be kind to him were all tearing him and lissa to shreds without asking for his side of the story. But the absolute heaviest blow ca when Jason texted the group:
"Eric, if you’re reading this, thank you and I hope you’re happy. Congratulations, you’re a father now. I no longer consider you my brother. To , you’re just a stranger who happens to share my DNA. Don’t ever co ho or show your face to again, because as far as I’m concerned, you’re dead."
Tears began to stream down Eric’s cheeks. Jason had been his role model and the brother he loved most in the world. His hands shook violently against his phone as he read the words. To make matters worse, Ruby and even Jade, who had just promised to support him and said she believed him, imdiately blocked his number after sending ssages condemning him in the group chat.
Vivian, the girlfriend he loved and envisioned a future with, blocked him too without saying a single word. "Ding." Another notification hit Eric’s phone. He checked it and saw an incoming email. When he opened it, his entire future crumbled. The email detailed his formal withdrawal and the cancellation of his tuition funding for the local university. His father had pulled all of his educational funds and terminated his enrollnt.
"Hahahahaha... I’m ruined... I am completely ruined because of that toxic woman!" Eric scread in sheer frustration, causing several pedestrians to snap their heads around and steer clear of him.
Eric slumped over, processing the sudden wreckage of his life. In the blink of an eye, he had lost everything: his family, his siblings, his relatives, his girlfriend, and his entire future. Burying his face in his hands, his ssy hair falling forward, he sobbed uncontrollably while sitting huddled on the sidewalk bench.
"Ding."
Another text ca through, but Eric didn’t even want to look at it, assuming it was just more vitriol from the family group chat. But then, suddenly, "ring!" his phone started ringing. He snatched the phone and looked at the caller ID. His blood instantly boiled, his rage hitting a breaking point. He swiped to answer.
"lissa! Why the hell are you framing like this?!" he yelled.
"Oops, sorry! There was no other way out. Just so you know, my relationship with your brother died a long ti ago. I’m just waiting on my new boyfriend, so my bad, haha," lissa replied smoothly.
"But why fra ? What do you have against , huh?" Eric demanded.
"Yep, I have a problem with you. Before you could expose my cheating, I figured I’d beat you to the punch. When you ca over to my apartnt, you ran into my new guy, didn’t you?" lissa asked.
It clicked. Eric instantly rembered that when he had gone over to help move the furniture, there was another guy inside the apartnt besides lissa. He hadn’t thought anything of it at the ti because lissa claid she had asked a coworker to help out too. He had also spotted the guy later on his way out to the motorcycle parking lot; the man was leaning against a catering van, staring at his phone.
"So... that video was intentionally made to fra ? And that guy, is he Jason’s friend? Blake?" Eric asked.
"Hmm, the first video wasn’t, since you couldn’t see the face. But the one inside the van? Yeah. Wow, you recognize Blake? He’s actually the one who edited the video. Pretty clever, right? Anyway, sorry and thanks. Bye-bye," lissa said.
The line went dead. Eric gripped his phone, ready to smash it into pieces. Instead, he forced himself to stand up, threw his duffel bag back over his shoulder, and resolved to head straight to his house to lay out the whole truth to his family.
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