No Longer Young: My Four Childhood Playmates

“I was the factory owner’s daughter. When I was ten, my dad handpicked four bright, promising boys from his scholarship program to be my…well, future husbands, I guess you could call them that.

Now, here he was, on his deathbed, asking me which one I wanted to choose as my husband.

After agonizing over it, I picked Adam Cooper, the one I got along with best. I thought we’d spend the rest of our lives together.

But only six months into being with Adam, I was constantly sick, always catching something.

Meanwhile, my cousin, Lily Davis, who was staying with us, just kept looking healthier and healthier.

Then everything started going wrong. I failed the first national college entrance exam, even though I’d spent a year preparing.

Lily, who always got terrible grades, somehow got into the best university in the state with Adam.

I was stuck at the factory, miserable. A year later, I was hit by a car and died instantly.

My soul just wouldn’t fade away.

I watched Lily and Adam pull a creepy doll tied with red string out from under my pillow.

They were laughing like lunatics next to my bed.

"”Lily, you’re a genius! Finding that destiny-swapping doll worked perfectly, swapping your life with mine. Now that short-lived bitch is finally dead, and all the Lin family’s wealth is ours!””

I couldn’t believe it. My sweet, gentle cousin and childhood sweetheart had teamed up to kill me.

Then I woke up.

I was back to the day my dad asked me to choose my husband.

I grabbed the doll from under the pillow and chucked it right into the chicken coop.

If Lily loved swapping fates so much, I’d let her have her fill this time.”