"Ms. Carter, based on your results, you've got stomach cancer, and... it's already at the late stage."
Amelia Carter sat frozen at the bus stop, holding the diagnosis report she’d just picked up from the hospital. Her beautiful eyes were blank, full of sorrow.
It was midsummer, yet she felt like someone had dumped a bucket of ice water over her.
For the past two years, she'd been living with stomach pain. It got worse recently, so she came to the hospital for meds—then the doctor suggested a gastroscopy. She thought it was just some mild gastritis. Turns out it wasn't. It was cancer.
She had just turned twenty-three last week. How did things spiral like this so fast…
Amelia opened her WeChat.
There was a photo. A pregnancy report. The name on it: Grace West.
Grace West: [So what if you two have been married for three years? Did he ever publicly acknowledge you? He even takes me on his business trips now.
He wants me to keep this baby. As a woman, here’s some advice: Just sign the divorce papers. The longer you drag this on, the more Nathaniel will hate you.]
Amelia zoomed in on the photo, staring at every line of Grace’s prenatal report.
Then she looked down at the one in her own hand.
His first love was having his baby. And she—his legal wife—was dying of cancer.
It was honestly ridiculous.
She let out a laugh. But halfway through, her eyes started to well up.
Four years ago, when Nathaniel Grant was in a car crash and in a coma, Grace took off to chase her dance dream overseas.
Amelia ignored everyone who told her not to. She buried her pride, changed her name, moved into his hospital room, and quietly took care of him.
A year later, he woke up, fully recovered.
He asked her what she wanted as a thank-you.
She was just twenty, but she forced out the words: “I want you.”
The next day, they got married.
No wedding. Just them moving into a sleek villa halfway up the hill—‘Jing’an Garden.’
They kept it a secret for three years. Nathaniel never made their relationship public. The most he did was bring her along for family dinners at the Grant estate on weekends.
In front of others, she was his chief assistant.
Behind closed doors, she gave it her all to be the perfect Mrs. Grant.
But to him, she was someone who never really mattered.He couldn’t remember her birthday, didn’t know she was allergic to shrimp and pollen, and never once asked about her family.
Three years of marriage, sharing a bed, sharing a house—but in the end, they were just strangers who happened to live under the same roof.
Even so, Amelia Carter once thought that maybe just coexisting like this wasn’t so bad. At least it meant she could stay by his side.
But even that pathetic little hope got crushed two months ago.
Someone on Weibo spilled the tea—Grace West, the rising star of Broadway, had returned home, and Nathaniel Grant, CEO of the Grant Group, welcomed her at the airport himself, followed by a cozy candlelit dinner together.
Then came an endless stream of gossip: apparently, Grace and Nathaniel were about to tie the knot.
No one in Beicheng knew Nathaniel had been secretly married for years. And absolutely no one knew that it was Amelia who was his hidden wife.
The most ironic part? A journalist once interviewed her—“the secretary Miss Carter”—and asked if the rumors about Grace and Nathaniel’s engagement were true.
Staring straight into the camera, she had calmly replied, “That’s Mr. Grant’s personal matter, I’m just his secretary. Not really my place to say.”
But reality? She had asked him, the very next day after Grace came back.
And his response? “You don’t have the right to question me about anything.”
Those words hit her like a slap, shattering every bit of her self-control.
She totally lost it, yelled like a madwoman, dragged out all the past dirt about how Grace dumped him back then.
Did he care? Not one bit.
That fight—it was their first since getting married. And the only time Amelia ever let her emotions go completely in front of Nathaniel.
It ended abruptly when he snapped, “Let’s just get a divorce,” and walked out without another word.
He slammed the door, leaving her there frozen, unable to move or think.
He didn’t come home that night.
She waited on the couch all night, just staring at the door.
Next morning, she got their first divorce agreement.
And over the following weeks? One every Monday. Last week marked number eight and counting.
Snapping back to the present, Amelia blinked, tipping her head back to hold the tears in.
Six months. That’s her countdown.
She wasn’t gonna spend those final days clinging to something so painful and ridiculous.
She’d loved. She’d tried. She’d given it her all.
So now? Time to let go.
