Sweet Romance15 min read
I Woke Up in the Villainess’ Mirror
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I opened my eyes to a ceiling too bright and a voice too gentle.
"She's awake," the nurse said, and the sound of the words felt like a bubble I had to pop.
"Franklin?" I tried to say my brother's name and it came out small. The nurse smiled down at me. "Kinsley, you fell down the stairs. You're going to be fine."
"Fell down the stairs?" The words scrambled. My head felt like a library book dropped from a shelf.
I remembered the book my roommate had shoved into my hands the night before: a dusty school romance with the most ridiculous villainess plot I could imagine. The villainess's name was... exactly my name.
I blinked, and my breath caught. "Wait," I whispered. "Am I—"
"Yes, you are Kinsley Sasaki," the nurse answered kindly. "Rest. Franklin will come soon to pick you up."
I lay back and let the ceiling spin like a question mark. My life had been ordinary until yesterday. Now I was Kinsley Sasaki from that novel—the one who made terrible choices and ended up ruined. I remembered lines: She grew jealous of the little white flower, she pushed and lied until everyone hated her, and she died disgraced. I sat up too fast.
"Don't be dramatic," I told the ceiling. "This is a book. I can change it."
A shadow fell across the curtain. "Kinsley," a calm voice said. "You should rest."
Franklin Petersen stood there like a model in a business suit. He was twenty-five and untouchable at the city’s top of the world. He looked like he'd been carved from marble and given rules to follow.
"Franklin," I said. "You—"
"You shouldn't be out of the bed yet." He crossed the room like a tide. "Hospital said you can leave in a few days. I will take you home."
The nurse left us alone. I tried to remember the two rules the novel had given me: avoid the heroine, and keep away from the main boy who would decide everything.
"I will study hard," I said. "I will not argue with Gabriella. I will not—"
"I know," Franklin said. He put the doctor's discharge paperwork down with a clipped, efficient motion. "Just be careful."
I lied about how shaken I felt and let him help me into the suit he had left by my bed. The skirt he had left fit like a glove and smelled faintly of his cologne. My heart did something I swore it would never do again: it fluttered like a trapped moth.
Outside, the world was exactly as the book said: people who always mattered and some who never did. At home, Franklin hovered for a breath and then left for the office. Gabriella Green—my sweet, older sister in the novel—came back from practice with a laugh and a kind smile that made the room feel like spring.
"You should be careful," she told me, hugging my shoulders. "You could have been worse."
"I'm going to be different," I promised her.
"Good," she said, as if she had never known otherwise.
The next day I met Remy Rodriguez.
He walked in with a shy smile, apologetic and bright. "Hi. I'm Remy. I'm so sorry about the stairs—"
"You bumped me," I said. The book's version of events made me bristle. In the novel, it was my fault and everyone believed the lie I told to avoid shame.
"I'm really sorry," Remy repeated. He had an air of someone used to being blamed for other people's mistakes. He pushed the lunch container toward me. "My mom made soup. I brought the wrong lunch, actually—"
"It's fine," I said, and I meant it. He smiled like the sun had come through.
Franklin watched from the doorway with a frown. "Let him go," he said later, and left the room. He had been listening, like he often did.
At home, the house was full but sparse. Franklin went back to work, Gabriella went to practice, and my life settled into a new rhythm: go to school, pretend to study, avoid the traps the book predicted. I told myself I could change everything.
The first week of school was a cold, perfect blur. Southbridge High—my novel's South華—was full of polished faces and sharper edges. I held my breath the first time I met Fionn Popov, who was known as the top scorers' leader and a quiet star. He saved me from falling on the bus with a single hand, and then he walked away like he had never existed.
"You're in my class," he told me once, quietly.
"You're everywhere," I replied.
Fionn was polite, precise, and distant. He gave me a headphone and a smile that was like a key. "Listen," he said. "Hear the news. Stay steady."
He made me feel like the world had order, and I liked that. I liked it a lot. There were other boys: Torsten Simpson, who ran the basketball team and laughed like a summer storm; Colton Myers, the student council's president who looked like a king in a school uniform; and then there was Youssef Chase.
Youssef Chase had a way of filling space without trying. He wore a black leather jacket like armor and had a grin that could be cruel without being unkind. In the book, he was the commander who later worshiped the heroine. In our world, he'd find me in a shop and say, "You're pretty. Why hide it?"
At first I tried to ignore him.
At the boutique, a boy—I found out later it was Torsten—knocked a rack and needed help rescuing a coat. "Mind handing that here?" he asked, and the mood in the store dissolved into ordinary moments. Torsten was warm; he returned a necklace I had lost earlier and smiled in a way that anchored me. "There," he said, putting the star pendant around my neck, "that's better."
I looked down at the tiny star and felt safe, like I had been given a small piece of armor. Torsten's kindness was a lamp.
Then Youssef found me with a laugh and a lock of menace.
"Who are you?" he asked, and before I knew it he had pressed his hand against my back and looped the fingers of my necklace with a finger. "Just wear less of a parade," he said. "It'd suit you to be less showy."
"Excuse me?" I replied, standing very still. I remembered the novel's lines—the ones where I fell apart and shoved people away—and I decided I would not be that girl.
"Don't be silly," he said, and the sound of his voice on the sidewalk made people look. He leaned in the way villains do in dramas, and I snapped.
"Don't touch me," I said.
"You'll make an enemy of me?" Youssef laughed.
"I'm not your plaything," I told him. "Leave me alone."
He smirked and said something that had poisoned the center of the book: "You're mine."
That night in bed I thought of ways to survive. The book had a clear map of my downfall, but I would take a different path. I would be kind to Gabriella, I would study harder than anyone, and I would refuse to play who they wanted me to be.
The days became a tangle of attempts.
At lunch I sat with Gabriella and two other girls. Colton Myers arrived for the student-council meeting and gave a speech about keeping the school calm. "Southbridge is a place for growth," he said, and then he looked directly at me.
"Do you like the club we run?" Colton asked later, very softly. "Join the Literature Exchange."
"I—"
"Do it," Fionn said from the back, and I found myself nodding.
Colton's office was quiet, and he spoke to me like he had time to savor every word. "I can't promise anything," he said, "but if you're here, I'm glad. New voices matter."
"Thank you," I said, and for the first time I felt like someone had chosen me without needing me to burn myself into flames.
But Youssef did not like being chosen away. The next incident began with a ring of laughter and a passage of gossip.
"Did you see the forum?" someone hissed at a table. "The school thread blew up. They put your picture and said you're the 'sweetheart in a villainous story'—"
"I didn't post that," I said. But the nickname stuck to me like tape.
Colton was complicated. He argued with Torsten over the membership selection, and Torsten teased me mercilessly in a way that made my cheeks hot. Fionn politely refused to step into the mess. I was in a school of dangerous charmers and gentle tyrants.
One afternoon Torsten found me on the rooftop and offered a policy that was equal parts teasing and tender. "Take this," he said, holding out a folded note. "I left this here when you fell—"
"Why would you—"
"Because you would be late otherwise."
We laughed, and it felt like a break in the clouds. "Thank you," I said, and then we spoke like conspirators. "Don't tell anyone."
"I won't," Torsten promised.
But when life gets interesting, it also gets public.
The student forum bloomed into rumors, and one post put my name and Colton's in the same headline as the "student-council president and his sweetheart." Colton, who was usually composed, touched his tie and came into class with a look that stopped the entire room.
"Kinsley," he said quietly after the assembly. "Are you okay?"
"Yes," I lied.
"Good." He smiled. "We will fix this."
It was then that Youssef planned his next move.
He found me in a boutique's changing room, turned the lock, and his voice came out like honey. "You should be grateful," he said. "You should submit."
My skin crawled. I remembered from the book the scenes I would never design for myself. I had a choice: be small and silent, or be loud and right.
"Get out," I said.
"You will do what I want," he stuck out a challenge.
I will not become a villainess. Not today.
I shoved and ran. People gathered. Torsten and several others chased him off with furious shouts. He left like a storm passing.
If this were the novel, the next chapters would be tragedies: misreadings, betrayal, and a funeral bell. But I had other ideas, and I was going to use words to make them real.
I wrote notes. I saved screenshots. I practiced my voice in the mirror and then practiced raising it. When the school announced a semi-formal gala for a birthday, it could have been the end. Instead, I planned a spectacle.
The birthday party was a quiet, arrogant affair with Youssef's friends clustered like black roses around him. The whole city had whispered about the event, and the hall was full of people who liked the scent of power.
Franklin gave a small nod as he left us at the door. "Stay together," he said to Gabriella and me. "I'm not staying." He had business.
I saw Colton across the room, the way a lighthouse is visible at night. He had not been the enemy the forum wanted to make him. He was a man who believed in fairness. He had agreed, reluctantly and with a smile, to attend.
"Stay safe," Colton mouthed to me across the crowd.
I nodded. The room hummed with people and soft music. Youssef strutted toward the podium, and everyone quieted.
"Thank you for being here," he announced, with that grin that could cut. "Tonight I celebrate—"
He had shown his teeth. He had an empire of people to make him a god for the night. He had no idea he was about to be unmade.
"Colton," I whispered as I walked toward the center, because I needed a stage and I planned to use it. "Play the song."
He hesitated and then obeyed.
Music. A single note, then another. I stepped onto the little raised platform where students were given birthdays and speeches. The crowd turned like a tide.
"May I have your attention?" I said into the microphone. My voice felt raw at first, then clear. "I want to thank you all for coming."
There was applause, polite and thin. Youssef leaned forward with interest. I had him and a hundred phones.
"I have something to show you," I said. "Something that I thought would remain hidden."
I pressed the play button on my phone, and the speakers filled the room with the flat sound of message notifications. Screens in the hall blinked with chat logs I had saved for weeks. They were messages from Youssef to another person, messages that called other girls 'toys' and planned meetings he said were "just games." There were also pictures—menacing pictures of him whispering to a shopkeeper, promising favors, of him bragging about pushing people.
Gasps rippled.
"What is this?" Youssef said at first, amusement in his voice. The audience laughed, a flavored laugh that turned into a murmur when the images kept going.
"You can't do this," he said. He smiled at first—so practiced, so certain. "This is private."
"Oh, is it?" I said, and I skimmed another file. "Then let's not be private." I revealed a photograph of Youssef in a VIP room with a woman not on his arm—an arrangement he had bragged was 'for fun.' The woman had posted it to a dating app. That was the last step.
Phones lifted. The chatter turned into a chorus of clicks. Colton's face was like a decision; he gave me a look that said, "Now."
Youssef went from predatory delight to a fast, incredulous silence.
"No," he breathed. He tried to laugh. "You have no right—"
"You accused me of attention," I said. "You thought you could keep everyone in the dark and call the world your playground. You called some of us things you shouldn't have. You thought you could humiliate people for sport."
"That's not true!" he snapped. "Those are lies—"
"I have receipts," I said. The crowd started to press closer. "You called my name in a forum, you harassed me on the street, you locked me in a dressing room and said I was your pet. Is that your idea of a joke?"
He staggered. For a moment his eyes went blank. The self-assured man cracked. He tried to reach for a defense, to call people to his side, but the evidence was clear and the room was full of witnesses.
"Turn it off!" he barked, trying to find his composure. "You can't do this to me—"
Someone in the back shouted, "Record! Record!" and phones lifted like seaweed.
His face collapsed a degree—the mask slipping. He went from a smug predator to a cornered child.
"It isn't fair," he said suddenly, too small for the room. His voice lost the power and was high without meaning. "This is wrong. I'm sorry." It sounded rehearsed.
"No," I said. "No rehearsed apologies."
"You don't understand," he pleaded now, the motion of his hands too frantic. "I— I didn't—"
"I have text messages," I said. "I have photos." The crowd was a wave of quiet disbelief. "You said you used people. You said you owned people."
He stepped back and almost tripped on the stage's edge, then straightened with a hand to his chest. "I never—"
"Look!" someone cried, and turned their phone toward Youssef. The live feed had begun. People in the room started to clap—slow claps, then louder as if to say that the world of predation had finally been caught on its own hook.
Youssef's face changed. He went through every stage the book had foreshadowed: arrogance, smug denial, furious attempts to twist the truth, a brittle pause, then panic. He reached for me—"Kinsley—" he called—but the sound was weak, pleading. "Please—"
"Please what?" I asked, and everyone leaned in. "Beg me? Beg the room? Beg Colton? Beg Franklin?"
He laughed once, but it was a dry sound. "This is a setup. It's a setup!"
Phones recorded. A woman nearby held a camera steady and said, "I saw him whisper someone's name last month." Another student muttered, "He bragged about his 'power' in the locker room."
"You're a liar," I said.
"No—" He began to shake. The tight hand that had once pushed others around was trembling finally. He sank to his knees on the hardwood floor as if the floor had grown teeth.
"Kinsley—please—" he begged, and the room went silent.
It was a small, perfectly filthy surrender: a man in a designer jacket on his knees, the crowd above him, phones capturing every second.
"What do you want?" I asked.
He dug at the gown of his own jacket as if searching for a script. "Don't—please. Don't tell my parents. Don't tell—"
"I will tell the school," I said. "I will tell the police if that's needed. I will tell Franklin. I will tell everyone you've hurt." I said it slowly, watching the way his eyes lost color.
Around us, people shifted. Some were shocked, some were filming, some were furious. Franklin's presence at the door was like a thunderhead. He had arrived in time to see Youssef on his knees and the lights of the hall turned to a hard, cleansing white.
"You need to leave," Franklin said quietly once he understood what had happened. Then his voice sharpened. "Security, escort this young man out."
"No!" Youssef squealed. He clung to the edge of the stage and tried to stand but the crowd's judgement pushed him back. "You can't—this is a smear! You—"
Someone in the crowd hissed, "Shut up."
Then his face crumpled. He started to cry, awkward and ugly, like someone who had been told that comfort would not be given anymore.
"No one is laughing now," Colton said. He stepped forward, voice steady as if made for commands. "You hurt people."
People around us muttered agreement, some clapped—hesitant applause for the survivor rather than the predator. The room had turned into a courtroom of eyes.
Youssef's reaction was perfect theater for a downfall: from sneer to shock to denials, to tremor, to collapse into begging. "Kinsley—please," he kept saying. "Please—I'll do anything."
"You'll do anything?" I asked. "Will you apologize to every person you called names? Will you resign from the club? Will you accept support classes? Will you stop harassing people?"
"I'll—I'll—" He couldn't finish. The cameras kept rolling.
A dozen people surrounded him, voices full of accusation. "We saw him bully her at the forums," one student called. "He shoved someone in the hallway last month," another yelled. People were looking for him in every shadow.
"You're finished," someone else whispered.
He tried denial, then begging, then collapse. All of it was captured. People recorded, some took photos for their feeds, a few students started clapping, not cruelly but like safety had arrived.
"Let him go," Franklin said quietly to the security guards. "But make sure everything is documented. Kinsley, we'll handle it."
I walked down the platform. Youssef looked up as if some life was still possible for him. His face was wet with loss. He reached for me.
"No," I said, and turned my head. The room erupted with phone lights and murmurs that would bloom grow into the school’s conversation for days. I felt something heavy lift like a stone pulled from the bottom of a well.
"Thank you," Colton said. "For standing up."
"Thank you," Fionn said, very quietly. He had been watching from the fringe, and his voice had depth.
People came up to me afterward. Some were shocked, some were wise, some were simple and kind. "You were brave," Torsten told me, and he put his hand on my shoulder like a friend.
Franklin took me to the side. "You handled that well," he said. I wanted to cry. He looked at me and then glanced at the star pendant at my throat. "Wear that," he said. "Always."
School was no longer exactly like the book. It had danger, yes, but it also had defenders. Colton called a student council meeting. The administration called meetings. Youssef… Youssef sent messages that were part apology, part excuse. The student body gathered evidence with a zeal I had not expected.
The aftermath had a cold edge but it also started a ripple.
In the days that followed, the forum warmed into conversation. The post that had placed me at the center of its gossip turned into a badge of shame for him instead. People whispered and people watched. Certain boys who had once circled like sharks now kept their distance. Other boys offered friendship without expectation.
Fionn offered a small hand one afternoon as we left an empty library. "Walk with me," he said. He gave me a book he loved and wrote a note on the inside: For someone who chooses better.
Torsten gave me two tickets to a game and sat next to me like someone proud. Colton and I edited the literature club's policy together, making space for those who wanted to join without being judged.
My life had turned, but not into the one the book had promised. It had become something better: messy, honest, and, yes, a little loud.
A month later there was an assembly. The principal asked for calm. The student council gave a presentation about consent and respect. Youssef, removed from positions of campus leadership, stood at the edge, humiliated and small. He had lost his protective cloak of friends.
I sat next to Gabriella, who squeezed my hand. "You did well," she told me.
"We did it together," I said.
That night I sat on the roof of our house and watched the city lay out its lights like a promise. Franklin came out quietly, sat beside me, and did not say much at first.
"You changed the script," he said finally.
"I didn't change it," I said. "I just refused to act parts that were written for me."
He traced the edge of the star pendant. "Then write the rest."
I laughed softly. "No dramatic burns or deaths."
"Good," he said. "Because I will not have my sister die unhappy."
We both watched the stars above the city. In my pocket I felt the old notes I had typed—plans and proofs and lists. I thought of Colton’s steady hand and Fionn’s quiet presence and Torsten's bright laugh. I thought of moments, small and fierce, where other people took a stand.
"Are you okay to keep going?" Franklin asked, and his voice was soft with question.
"I am," I said. "I can't promise every day will be bright." I looked at him. "But I can promise I'll try. I will study. I will be gentle to Gabriella, and I will stand when I must. And I will not be a villainess."
He smiled like a rare thing. "Then let's get some sleep. You have math tomorrow."
"Of course," I said.
Before he left he tugged my sleeve and said, "Keep the star close."
I touched the pendant and let its metal be a cold reminder of the night the floor had fallen away and the city had shone back. I thought of the blue tulips I had carried in my arms earlier—flowers that had been cheerful and ordinary until someone had tried to steal them. They had been my small armor, like the pendant.
The weeks that followed were not all victory speeches and declarations. There were quizzes and awkward compliments and moments when I felt like I was acting too kind. I failed sometimes at being brave and sometimes at staying quiet. But I kept living.
Colton sat in the student council office one afternoon, leaning both elbows on his desk. "There are rumors," he said. "People still talk about Youssef's fall."
"And?" I asked.
"And it's making other people brave," he replied. "They speak up."
That made me smile.
Sometimes I would trip and look down. But the pendant warmed against my chest every time, and I would remember the flush of phones and the hush, the way the room had shifted, the sound of my voice cutting through. The star glinted.
At the year’s end, the forum that once mocked me posted a new thread: Surviving Southbridge: How to Stand Up. I read every comment and allowed a small pride to settle. Not all the comments were kind. But many were honest.
On graduation day some months later, with sun stretched like gold across the steps, I was given a folded note. It was from Fionn. "For someone who chose better," it read, matching the book he had given me months ago.
I looked across the field at my friends: Torsten with a grin, Colton with a careful pride, Gabriella with a smile that looked almost holy. Franklin stood a little to the side, not wanting attention.
"Come here," Torsten called. He had a silly grin. "Let us take a photo."
We all laughed, and the flash caught us at the instant. I felt like an ordinary girl in an ordinary picture with extraordinary people.
If someone asks me what changed me, I'll tell them: a locked door, a necklace found, a stage, a thousand phones, a man who fell from his arrogance. But mostly I'll say it was waking up.
"I woke up," I said when someone asked. "Not just from the hospital bed. From the script."
And if someone asks what I'll do with the rest of my life, I'll touch the star that hangs heavy and warm and say, "Keep it."
On the roof, beneath the city's lights and Franklin's long shadow, I open my hand and clip the little star between my fingers. It glints like a dare.
"One more promise," Colton said, eyes not leaving me. "Don't ever be anyone others expect."
"I won't," I said.
He smiled. "Good."
I tucked the star into my palm and closed it. The little thing fit like a memory.
A final detail—the star pendant has a tiny flaw, a small nick on its rim. Every time I run my thumb over it I remember the night the phones lit up and the room went silent. I run my thumb over it still, and it reminds me who I was, who I am, and who I refuse to be.
The End
— Thank you for reading —