Three Years Hollow Novels & Stories

I worked for a restaurant, and our boss loved making empty promises about giving us restaurant shares. The boss said we would start with zero shares, but we could earn 0.01% for every two hours of overtime, covering someone else’s work or saving the restaurant 1,000 bucks. I suggested she write this down in an official document and have someone track it properly. She just smiled and told everyone to work harder. She never actually put it in writing. The experienced staff did not believe her, but one prep cook took it seriously. At the end of the year, he went to the boss to claim his shares. The boss said, “Sorry, the head chef told me there’s no official document, so it doesn’t count. You can’t claim any shares.” The prep cook worked hard all year and got nothing for it, so he took his anger out on me. The day before I was going home for the New Year, he killed me with a knife. “If you hadn’t said it doesn’t count without an official document, this whole restaurant would’ve been mine!” I lay in a pool of blood. When I opened my eyes, I was back to the day the boss first made those empty promises.

My husband, Commander Jonathan Shelby, was leaving for the military. During his farewell dinner, our neighbor, Mrs. Murphy spoke with glee, as if she was gloating at somebody else’s misfortune. “You’re truly a magnanimous woman. Commander Shelby gave his military spouse quota to Anna instead of you, and you’re still sending him off!” I found her statement ridiculous. “Impossible. My husband hates pulling strings. In the past, he also had a quota on hand. Instead of giving it to me, he gave it to an educated young man so that he could return to his city.” Mrs. Murphy only grew more animated. “I saw the approval report with my own eyes. Under the column of Commander Shelby’s family member, the name ‘Anna Stewart’ was written on it. “Commander Shelby has been supporting two households for a long time. Weren’t you aware of it?” I felt as if a bolt of lightning had struck me. I turned to look at my parents and Jonathan. Guilt was written all over their faces. My parents took my hand. “Anna is a widow. Being a widow alone has already spoiled her reputation. If she remains in the village, they’d judge her for the rest of her life. “Nancy, you’re Jonathan’s legal wife. You need to help her out.” At that moment, my heart ached as if someone had sliced it piece by piece. Fine. I would be as magnanimous as they wanted me to be. I would personally give Jonathan to his widowed sister-in-law.

Ian Tost was the prince of the notorious underworld. Everyone in Harbor City knew he spoiled me rotten. He even went so far as to hire ninety-nine female bodyguards to keep me from harm. It did not prevent a kidnapping attempt on me. One of those bodyguards, Cece Yates, ended up with nothing more than a scratch. Ian immediately brought in the nation’s top medical specialists to treat her. To comfort her, he even took her to the Maldives for a vacation and gifted her an island. Not long after they returned from their trip, Beatrix Kazinsky, my mother, suddenly suffered a stroke and was hospitalized. Then, Michael Kazinsky, my younger brother, died in an accident during a competition. I burst into the morgue while in tears, only to overhear Ian comforting Cece. “All right now, it was my fault you got hurt last time. I’ve made Mira’s family pay for it. You’ve got too much grace to hold a grudge against her.” With my nails digging into my palms, I finally realized everything that had happened to my family was Ian’s doing. It was all just because his precious bodyguard got hurt because of me! I stumbled out of the hospital with my brother’s death certificate in a daze. On my phone, messages from that person kept coming. It added up to ninety-nine share transfer agreements, along with his promise. [As long as you want me, my arms will always be open for you.]

I was locked in a fridge for 40 days while the uncensored photos of me spread like wildfire across the internet. In the face of the salacious rumors about me, my mother reacted by reposting them. Then, she turned to warn my sister, "Look at how disgusting the entertainment industry is. Don't join it, alright? Stay home and inherit your sister's assets instead. My dearest daughter must be innocent and pure, unlike her." She forgot. She forgot I only joined this 'disgusting' industry to pay for her cancer treatment.

On the seventh day of freshman orientation, I ran into the cafeteria like I was running the hundred-meter dash, desperate to get my favorite grilled sausage. Instead, I crashed straight into my childhood friend's embrace. The idiot was shirtless, and his huge pecs smacked me right in the face and the impact knocked me onto my butt. In the seconds I lost, the grilled sausage was almost gone. I almost fell apart. Seven days, and I had only managed to eat them once. My childhood friend waved a plate of grilled sausages in my face, then spat on it. "Yup, no. Not giving you any." Furious, I slapped his hand away. "Stay away from me. I get dizzy around big pecs." My childhood friend instantly lost it. "I'm still better than that useless fiance of yours!"

On our wedding day, Kayla Rowan left halfway through. No matter how much I begged her to stay, she left without a second thought because her first love, Andrew Quinn, was having surgery. She said sorry to me, but I did not respond with my usual reassurance that everything was okay.

When I'm eight months pregnant, my husband, Levi West, becomes a donor to help his ex-girlfriend get pregnant. He even brings her and their illegitimate child home, wanting me to serve them. I refuse, and he calls me inhumane. "Audie's lost her husband—what's so bad about her wanting to have a child? You're a woman, too! How can you be so cruel?" I leave the house in anger, but Levi doesn't care. "Where can a country girl like you go when you're so heavily pregnant? You're going to come back and beg me to take you in again!" I head to the hospital to get an abortion. Then, I return to the countryside and rear pigs with my grandmother. Later, when Levi sees my flat belly and asks to see our child, I throw a handful of ashes in his face. "There you go. It's all there."

The mountain has gotten sealed due to the heavy blizzard. As the only driver who has cleared the winding mountain road with 72 bends repeatedly without a casualty under my belt, I've received a ten-million-dollar rescue order to rescue someone at the end of the treacherous road. Ten years ago, I had been there once. Back then, my daughter, Hannah Reed, and her classmates were met with a storm turbulence when they went parachuting. Left without a choice, they activated the emergency landing protocols. But Hannah, my darling daughter whom I had doted on and loved for 17 years, ended up dying there due to the search and rescue team not arriving in time. Later on, I found out that my wife, Grace Ellwood, completely disregarded Hannah's safety. Instead, she chose to dump a million dollars into rerouting the entire search and rescue team to another route, where they ended up rescuing Grace's first love, Elias Quinn's daughter, Kiara Quinn. The thing was, Kiara had merely twisted her ankle from climbing the mountain that day. After Hannah's death, I give up on my prestigious career as a professor and retreat all the way to this place willingly as a low-income driver. Since then, I keep driving down the road of death over and over again, with my life hanging on the balance. I take the time to remember every single bend of the road. For the next ten years, no one else dies on this mountain. Today, my best friend, Julian Hayes, issues me the ten-million-dollar rescue request. Apparently, I am to set off immediately.

Steven Lambert claimed my mother almost killed his wife and daughter, branding me as a sinner from birth. For twenty years, he and his family tormented me in the name of atonement. I was forced into a cruel marriage with the vile Caleb Carpenter in Cindy's place, only to suffer a tragic end. Only then did the Lamberts realize I was their daughter. Yet all this time, the very existence they believed to be a sinner enjoyed their bottomless affection and adoration.

I'm having a mental breakdown as I face a clogged drain with my feverish and fussing daughter in my arms. Meanwhile, my husband has reserved a hotel to celebrate another woman's birthday. My mother-in-law spits on the floor. "This is what you deserve. You can't even capture a man's heart!" I clench a fist around the winning lottery ticket in my pocket. I want to get a divorce.