The System Gave Me One Job Then Regretted Choosing Me Chapter 02

The System Gave Me One Job Then Regretted Choosing Me Chapter 02

The nurse looked at me as if I had lost my mind.

“I’m calling psychiatry for an emergency evaluation,” she said, then hurried from the room.

At last, Eleanor’s elegant composure cracked. She took half a step back as if I were something dangerous.

“Emma, what is wrong with you?”

She kept her voice low, but disbelief sharpened every word.

“We’re only trying to reason with you. What do you gain by threatening us with suicide again and again?”

I closed my eyes.

The exhaustion of depression rose like floodwater. I did not want to speak. Even breathing felt like work.

How had the girl whose life I had inherited survived twenty years in this world?

Fragments of her memories drifted through my mind.

At six, her adoptive parents locked her in an unheated shed in the middle of winter. She nearly froze to death.

At twelve, she developed a dangerously high fever. They refused to take her to the hospital because they wanted the money for their biological son’s new gaming system.

Her life had been darkness layered upon darkness.

Then the Whitmores found her.

She thought she had finally reached the light.

Instead, she found Vivian’s beautiful tears.

And with her own parents, who kept pushing her to the edge just to protect the impostor heiress’s place in the family.

[Emma, are you okay?] the System asked cautiously.

[Maybe you should apologize for now. This is a rough starting position.]

I ignored the noise in my head.

Wheels whispered across the floor outside. An orderly pushed Vivian into the room in a wheelchair.

She wore a hospital gown. Her face was white as paper, and her eyes were swollen from crying.

“Emma…”

Tears slid down her cheeks before she finished my name.

“Please don’t be angry with Mom, Dad, or Adrian. This is all my fault.”

She struggled to rise from the wheelchair.

Grant caught her immediately, his voice turning gentle. “You’re still weak. Stop pushing yourself.”

Using his arm for support, Vivian stood and looked at me with fragile determination.

“This private suite was supposed to be yours. But I had an asthma attack, and the nurse said the equipment was better in here, so they moved me in temporarily.”

She bit her lower lip, the very picture of someone suffering nobly.

“If it bothers you, I’ll move to a shared room right now.”

Eleanor hurried over and took her hand.

“Don’t be ridiculous. Your health has always been delicate. You need peace and quiet.”

She turned to me. Her tone sounded like a request, but the decision had already been made.

“Emma, you only broke one leg. You’ll receive perfectly adequate care in a regular room. Vivian’s condition is different. Can you please be generous about this?”

Adrian added, “My assistant has already handled the transfer. We’ll arrange a private-duty nurse for you. Vivian needs the monitoring equipment in this room. Giving it to her is the only sensible choice, so don’t turn this into another grievance.”

They dressed favoritism in the language of common sense.

Every sentence reminded me that I was the unreasonable one.

Grant watched me coldly.

“Emma, if you’re capable of listening to anyone, do the gracious thing for once.”

I looked at the polished, respectable people gathered around my bed and felt nothing but boredom.

I took my phone from beneath the pillow, searched for a number, and called it while they watched in confusion.

“Hello, is this Greenwood Funeral Home?”

The room became so quiet I could hear the fluorescent lights hum.

“Yes, I’d like to ask about your urns. Nothing expensive. It only needs to hold ashes.”

“And how soon can I schedule a cremation?”

“Why would I need a family member’s signature? Can’t I sign the paperwork myself?”

The person on the other end seemed at a loss.

Vivian gasped, sagging against Grant.

“Enough!”

Adrian strode over, snatched the phone from my hand, and ended the call.

For the first time, a crack appeared in his mask of perfect reason.

“Emma Reed, do you have to use something this disgusting to punish the entire family?”

I looked up at his furious face.

“I already told you. I want to die.”

“Since none of you believe me, I’m making my own arrangements.

Isn’t that the kind of rational resource management you value so much?”