Jana Doyle POV:

Kyleigh had done it. She'd taken my thesis, the one Axel had given her, and posted it to the university's online forum, claiming it as her own. She' d been so brazen, so confident in her ability to manipulate everyone around her.

My former mentor, Professor Albright, a brilliant but notoriously meticulous architect, had been the first to notice. He had always seen something in me, a spark of talent that my family had relentlessly tried to extinguish. He' d supported my projects, praised my unique vision, and even offered me a coveted spot in his advanced research lab. He was the one who had gently suggested that my work was too complex, too original, for Kyleigh's usual style.

When the thesis appeared under Kyleigh's name, he'd been suspicious. He'd started asking her questions, delving into the intricate details of the design, the theoretical frameworks. Kyleigh, predictably, stumbled. She couldn't explain the nuances, couldn't defend the innovative approach, couldn't articulate the very soul of the project.

The online community, ever vigilant, quickly caught on. Comments flooded the forum. "This doesn't sound like Kyleigh's work at all." "She can't even answer basic questions about her own thesis." "It's a clear case of plagiarism!"

Accusations spiraled, a wildfire of digital outrage. The university's integrity was at stake.

Axel, his face a thundercloud, dragged me from my bed. My body screamed in protest, a searing pain shooting through my weakened limbs, but he ignored it. He was blinded by his rage, by his fervent need to protect Kyleigh. He shoved me towards my sister, who was still clinging to Joyce, her sobs echoing dramatically in the small room.

"Look at her, Jana!" he snarled, pointing at Kyleigh. "You ruined everything! Apologize! Now!"

I stared at him, at the fury in his eyes, and a single, agonizing question echoed in my mind: When did he become hers?

I remembered the night he found me, five years ago. My parents had just thrown me out, their words a poisoned dagger in my heart. I was broken, adrift, standing alone in the biting wind. Axel, then a promising young businessman, had been there, a beacon in my darkness. He' d wrapped his jacket around me, his eyes filled with a tenderness I' d never known. He' d taken me home, to his apartment, and listened patiently as I sobbed out my story. He was my rescuer, my anchor. He made me believe in love again, in a future I thought was lost.

He swore he' d protect me, that he' d never let anyone hurt me again. "You' re mine, Jana," he' d whispered, his words a balm to my shattered soul. "I' ll always cherish you." He had hated the way my family treated me, hated their favoritism, their casual cruelty. He was my safe harbor, my everything.

But then Kyleigh had started to invade our space, subtly at first. She' d show up at our dates, "accidentally" bumping into us, always looking frail, always needing Axel' s attention. She' d lean into him, whisper secrets, her delicate hand always finding his arm. Their texts became a constant, a silent stream of communication that excluded me, that chipped away at the foundation of our relationship.

My love, my protector, had slowly, insidiously, become the fierce guardian of my tormentor. I thought I was immune to pain now, that my heart was too numb to break. But watching Axel tear me down to build Kyleigh up, it still twisted a knife in my gut.

What did it matter now? I was a ghost anyway, fading fast. My time was running out. I would give them what they wanted. I would perform this last, pathetic act of self-effacement.

"I did it," I said, my voice barely audible. "I plagiarized the thesis. I'm sorry, Kyleigh." The words tasted like bile.

A collective gasp filled the room. Even Kyleigh stopped sobbing, her eyes wide with surprise. My parents stared at me, then at each other, their faces a mixture of shock and bewildered relief.

"Oh, Jana," Joyce sighed, her hand fluttering to her chest. "You finally care about your sister. It's a shame it took so long."

Fred nodded, a smug look on his face. "See? I told you she'd come around. She just needed a push. Always so mature, deep down."

Axel' s eyes softened, a flicker of something akin to guilt passing through them. He stepped towards me, reaching out. "Jana, I… I know this is hard. But we'll get through it. I'll take care of you. You won't have to worry about anything. Even if you can't finish your studies, we'll ensure you live comfortably."

I forced another smile, a grotesque parody of happiness. Comfortably. He spoke of a future I would never see, a life I would never live. The future he envisioned for "us" was already crumbling into dust.

Kyleigh, who had been watching us with a strange, calculating intensity, suddenly brought out her phone. She turned on the camera, a sly smirk playing on her lips. "I want to record this," she sniffled, her voice still dripping with false tears. "So everyone knows the truth."

She pointed the camera at me. "Jana, you thief! You stole my work! You tried to ruin my life!" she wailed, her performance Oscar-worthy. "Say it! Say you're sorry! Say you plagiarized my thesis!"

My parents and Axel watched, their eyes fixed on me, waiting. Demanding.

I looked into the lens, into the cold, unfeeling eye of the camera. "I… I plagiarized Kyleigh' s thesis," I whispered, my voice breaking. "I apologize. It was wrong. I admit it."

A collective sigh of relief swept through the room. They had their confession. Their golden child was absolved.

Kyleigh, her face still streaked with performative tears, quickly uploaded the video. Within minutes, my phone buzzed with notifications. The online world erupted in a storm of condemnation. "Jana Doyle, the plagiarist! Shame on her!" "How could she do this to her own sister?" Messages of hate, insults, and ridicule flooded my inbox.

Kyleigh, meanwhile, played the gracious victim. She posted a tearful message, "forgiving" me, asking for kindness, portraying herself as the epitome of grace under pressure. While everyone else was distracted, she leaned close to me, her voice a venomous hiss.

"Stupid," she whispered, her eyes alight with triumph. "You never had a chance. You think you can compete with me? You think you deserve their love? They're all mine, Jana. Mom, Dad, Axel. They always were. You don't deserve anyone."

The last words were a hammer blow, cracking what little remained of my spirit. I stared at her, at the pure, unadulterated malice in her eyes, and knew, with a certainty that chilled me to the bone, that she meant every word.

The poison in my veins felt like a welcome embrace. It would be over soon.

Jana Doyle POV:

Kyleigh and I were twins. Identical in appearance, yet worlds apart in every other way. From the moment we could distinguish ourselves, Kyleigh resented me. She hated that we shared a birthday, a face, a family. She wanted to be unique, to be singular in her parents' affection. She hated to share anything, a trait that had only festered over the years. My parents' attention, my toys, my clothes-if it was mine, Kyleigh wanted it. If she wanted it, she took it.

In our younger days, Mom and Dad tried to be fair. They' d scold Kyleigh for stealing my favorite doll, or for pushing me off the swing. "Kyleigh, you have your own," they'd say, a touch of exasperation in their voices.

But that all changed five years ago. The kidney donation. The lie. The moment Kyleigh claimed my sacrifice as her own, everything shifted. Suddenly, she was the hero, the fragile angel. I became the selfish, ungrateful twin who had supposedly abandoned her dying father. All their love, all their attention, poured onto Kyleigh.

Any quarrel, any disagreement, was met with instant favoritism for her. "Jana, why are you always picking on Kyleigh? Can't you see she's not well?" my mother would sigh, her voice laced with disappointment. Dad would glare, his eyes accusing. "Leave your sister alone. She's been through enough."

I gave up. The fight had been a long, exhausting one, and I had lost every round. There was no point in trying to argue with Kyleigh, or with them. Their minds were made up, their narrative set in stone. I was the strong one, the one who could take it. Kyleigh was the delicate one, the one who needed saving.

And now, I was going to save her one last time.

The nurse came in, her face gentle but firm. "It's time, Jana. Your surgery is in two hours."

Two hours. That' s all I had left. The poison had seeped into my bones, into the very marrow of my being. My soul, already tattered and bruised, felt like it was ready to shatter, to simply cease to exist. Soon, there would only be an empty shell.

Would they cry for me? Would Axel, my parents, even shed a single tear when they realized I was truly gone? Or would they simply be relieved? Released from the burden of my inconvenient existence? Kyleigh, the family' s precious gem, would finally have them all to herself.

In the pre-op room, the scene was a painful replay of the last few hours. My parents and Axel surrounded Kyleigh, a protective circle of love and concern. Fred, my father, his voice softer than I' d ever heard it, murmured promises of recovery. "You'll be just fine, my angel. Stronger than ever."

Joyce, my mother, her eyes glistening, stroked Kyleigh' s hand. "When you're out, I'll make all your favorite dishes, sweetie. Anything you want."

Axel, his face alight with a fervent hope, pulled a delicate, expensive-looking necklace from his pocket. It shimmered in the fluorescent light. "For you, my love," he whispered, his gaze fixed on Kyleigh. "I'll put it on you myself, the moment you wake up. A symbol of our future."

They were so consumed, so utterly focused on Kyleigh, that they didn' t even glance my way. It was as if I didn' t exist, as if I wasn' t also about to undergo a major surgery, one that would steal my last remaining organ. I thought I was used to it, this constant erasure, but a sharp shard of pain still pierced my heart. A deep, aching sorrow.

I couldn't stop myself. The words spilled out, raw and fragile, a desperate whisper from a dying soul. "What if... what if I don't make it? What if I die on the table?"

My parents froze, their heads snapping towards me as if they' d just remembered I was in the room. A flash of irritation, then embarrassment, crossed Joyce' s face. "Jana! Don't say such morbid things! Don't curse yourself!" she snapped, her voice sharp.

Fred shot me a disapproving look. "Of course, you'll be fine. You're strong, Jana. Much stronger than Kyleigh. You'll bounce back in no time. I'll even cook you that seafood feast you love when you're home." His words were hollow, a transparent attempt to appease me, to shut me up.

Axel stepped forward, taking my hand, his grip surprisingly firm. But his eyes, though filled with a performative tenderness, held no true concern. "You'll be okay, Jana. I promise. And when you wake up, I'll buy you anything you want. Anything at all."

A wave of nausea washed over me. His empty promises, his attempts to buy my silence, my life, with trinkets and false comfort. He was relieved, that' s all. Relieved that his problem was solving itself.

He' ll be glad when I' m gone. The thought was a cold, hard truth.

I looked at them one last time – my mother, my father, Axel – a trio of blind devotion, their gazes fixed on the one they cherished. Then, the orderlies wheeled me away, down the long, antiseptic corridor.

The operating room was bright, shockingly so. I closed my eyes, taking one last, shuddering breath. I felt the prick of the IV, the cold swipe of antiseptic on my skin. Then, the steel of the scalpel, a searing line across my abdomen. My already compromised body, stripped of its last defense, buckled. The poison, rampant in my system, found its perfect opportunity. It raged, consuming whatever life force remained. My bones felt like they were dissolving, my very soul tearing itself apart.

Then, nothing. Silence. Darkness.

Will they regret it? The thought flickered, a dying ember. When they know the truth? That I was the one who saved Dad five years ago? That I lived with their accusations, their neglect, their endless preference for Kyleigh? That I died, giving my last, just for them to continue their charade?

But it wouldn't matter. Not to me. I was done.

If there' s an afterlife, I thought, as the last vestiges of my consciousness faded, I hope I never see any of you again.

Jana Doyle POV:

I shot up from the mattress, my hands clawing wildly at my own throat.

My lungs screamed for air. I gasped, sucking in huge, greedy mouthfuls of oxygen, but the phantom sensation of suffocation still gripped my windpipe. The memory of the black-market clinic, the dirty needle, and the cheap, burning anesthetic forcing the life out of me was so fresh I could taste the metallic tang of blood in my mouth.

Cold sweat pasted my silk nightgown to my spine. A violent shiver ripped through my shoulders.

I whipped my head around, my eyes wide and frantic. There was no rusty surgical table. There was no overwhelming stench of bleach mixed with rotting flesh.

Soft, golden morning light filtered through the blinds of my Manhattan apartment, casting long shadows across the familiar plush carpet. This was my old bedroom.

My hands shook violently as I threw off the heavy duvet. I looked down, grabbing the hem of my nightgown, and ripped it upward to expose my stomach.

I stared at my pale skin. There was only one scar. It was the old, faded surgical line from five years ago. The mark of my desperation. The physical proof of how much I had craved my father Fred's love, so much so that I had willingly let them cut a kidney out of my body to save him.

But the other wound—the fresh, gaping, bloody hole where they had brutally carved out my remaining kidney in my past life—was gone.

I stumbled out of bed. My bare feet hit the freezing hardwood floor, sending a shock of reality up my legs. I wasn't dead.

I lunged for the desk and snatched my phone. The screen lit up, flashing a date that made my breath hitch. It was exactly one year ago.

I had been reborn. I was back six months before my so-called "terminal illness" diagnosis.

A wave of pure, unadulterated ecstasy crashed into a wall of venomous hatred inside my chest. I bit down on my lower lip so hard that the skin broke. The sharp, rusty taste of my own blood flooded my tongue, grounding me in the present.

Out of the corner of my eye, a flash of bright color caught my attention.

Sitting innocently on my nightstand was a delicate, orange velvet Hermes box.

My stomach dropped. My legs felt like lead as I walked over to it. I reached out, my fingers stiff and cold, and slowly flipped the lid open. Inside rested a small, expensive-looking glass bottle filled with a pale yellow liquid.

It was the "nutrient supplement."

My sweet, caring twin sister Kyleigh had just given this to me yesterday. She had smiled her perfect, innocent smile and told me she pulled strings to get this special conditioning medicine from Switzerland, just for my health.

In my past life, I had cried tears of gratitude. I had swallowed this liquid every single day. And six months later, my hair started falling out in clumps. I started coughing up blood into white handkerchiefs. My organs began to shut down one by one.

Kyleigh had always been an expert at using the smallest, most invisible things to destroy everything I had.

The realization exploded in my brain. The mystery of my terminal illness was solved. This wasn't medicine. It was a slow-acting, lethal poison.

I grabbed the bottle. I squeezed the glass so hard my knuckles turned a bruised, pale white.

The image of Kyleigh standing over my dying body in that filthy clinic, a smug, victorious smile twisting her beautiful face, flashed behind my eyes. My stomach convulsed.

I dropped the bottle back into the box and sprinted to the bathroom.

I gripped the edges of the marble sink and dry-heaved violently. Bile burned the back of my throat. I turned on the faucet, cupped the freezing water in my hands, and splashed it brutally against my face.

I forced myself to look up.

The woman staring back at me in the mirror had red, bloodshot eyes, but the gaze was as cold and sharp as a butcher's knife.

For years, I had begged for my parents' affection. I had clung to my fiancé Axel, hoping his love would be my salvation. Instead, they had drained my blood, harvested my organs, and thrown me away like garbage.

I reached for a towel and slowly, methodically, wiped the water from my face. With every drop I wiped away, I locked every ounce of weakness, every pathetic hope for love, deep inside a steel vault in my chest.

Suddenly, the harsh, demanding buzz of the intercom doorbell shattered the morning silence. It rang again, long and entitled.

I walked out of the bathroom, my steps silent on the hardwood, and approached the intercom screen by the front door.

On the video feed, Axel stood in the hallway. He was wearing a custom Armani suit, his jaw tight, his finger pressing the button with visible impatience.

And right beside him, leaning intimately against his arm, was Kyleigh. She looked up at the camera and waved with a sickeningly sweet smile.

Today was the monthly Doyle family dinner. In my past life, I would have been up two hours ago, doing my makeup, picking the perfect dress, standing by the door like an obedient dog waiting to please them. Axel loved having both sisters fawn over him. Kyleigh used these moments to show him how much softer and sweeter she was compared to me.

I stared at the two of them through the screen. My lips curled into a slow, cruel smile.

They thought I was still the same desperate, love-starved fool. They had no idea I had crawled back from hell.

I pressed the talk button. My voice came out like a blade forged in ice.

"Get in. The door is unlocked."