Chapter 5

The ambulance arrived quickly.

Chloe was rushed to the hospital.

After the examination, the doctor said the baby was fine. It was just a scare, but she needed absolute rest.

In the hospital room, Chloe lay on the bed, looking pale and exhausted. But the moment she spoke, she was back to playing the saint.

"I don't blame Elena. Really."

"She's been through too much lately. She's emotionally unstable. I understand."

I snapped my head up to glare at her.

But she didn't look at me. She just kept talking to my parents. "Maybe you should get her some professional help. I'm really scared that if she stays like this, she'll end up hurting herself... or someone else."

My mom nodded immediately.

"You're right. She hasn't been acting normal lately."

My dad's face was grim, but he didn't object.

I took a step back, my throat tightening.

"I'm not sick."

Liam stood by the bed. He looked troubled, as if he knew something wasn't right.

But in the end, he didn't say a single word to defend me.

My dad quickly made a phone call.

That very night, I was forcefully taken to a private psychiatric facility.

All the way there, I screamed and tried to explain.

I was pinned down in the back of the car, tears and fury blinding me.

"I'm not crazy!"

"What right do you have to lock me up!"

"Liam, say something!"

I stared at him desperately.

But he sat there in silence for a long time, only whispering, "Just try to calm down, Elena."

Calm down.

Hearing those words felt like a knife carving out my heart.

Before the car doors slammed shut, I could still hear Chloe's weak, pathetic whimpering from the hospital room.

Once we arrived at the facility, the nightmare truly began.

Doctors and nurses swarmed me, pinning me down to inject me with a sedative.

The moment the needle pierced my skin, my entire body shivered from the pain.

I looked up at them, suddenly losing the strength to fight.

As the drugs kicked in, my vision blurred.

I faintly heard my mom whispering nearby, "Once she gets better, she'll realize we did this for her own good."

My dad grunted in agreement.

I couldn't hear anything after that.

The last thing I saw before closing my eyes was Liam's blurry shadow standing under the hallway light.

Five years of love. Three years of living together.

I had truly wanted to marry him.

I had dreamed of our wedding, our children, and a long life together.

But now, I regretted ever meeting him.

After being locked in that private facility, I spent the first day trying to explain myself.

And the second day.

By the third day, I realized it was completely useless.

The doctor asked why I was resisting treatment, and I said I wasn't sick.

The nurse forced pills into my hand, and I told her my family had set me up.

They just nodded and wrote in their notebooks:

"Patient is highly unstable. Continuous denial of illness."

When I refused to take the meds, the nurses held me down and forced them down my throat.

When I tried to run, the orderlies dragged me back.

But the absolute worst part was the electroconvulsive therapy.

The first time they wheeled me into that room, I didn't know what it was. But the moment I saw the machines, I started shaking.

I backed away, crying and begging them to stop.

Two orderlies pinned me down while the nurses strapped my wrists.

I fought with everything I had, screaming at the top of my lungs.

Suddenly, the door opened, and Liam walked in.

Like a drowning person grabbing a lifeline, I screamed to him through my tears.

"Liam! I'm not crazy! Please, take me away from here!"

The next second, Liam reached out and held my shoulders down.

"Elena, stop fighting it. It's for your own good."

In that instant, my crying stopped.

When the needles went in and the electricity surged through my body, my entire frame went rigid. I screamed until my vocal cords practically shredded.

When it was over, I threw up so hard I couldn't even stand.

But they said I was still "unstable."

On the consent form for the treatment, Liam had signed his name.

After that, I became quieter and quieter.

The doses of medication kept increasing, and my brain felt like it was trapped in thick fog.

Sometimes, daytime would pass, and I couldn't even tell if it was night.

When someone asked how old I was, I had to think for a long time without finding an answer.

When they asked for my name, it took me minutes to remember.

One day, a nurse slipped a piece of candy into my hand.

"You were very good today. Here's a treat."

I stared at the candy in my palm, sitting motionless for hours.

I began to lose the ability to recognize people.

When my mom came to visit, she stood by my bed crying, but I just found her noise incredibly irritating.

My dad rarely came. He would stand at the door for a long time, and I had no idea who he was.

But when Liam came, I was terrified.

Even though my brain couldn't place his name, the moment I saw him, my arms would begin to throb in phantom pain, and my body would instinctively shrink back into the corner of the bed.

Once, a nurse took me out to get some fresh air.

Liam was standing near the bench, calling my name in a cracked, hoarse voice.

I clutched my stuffed animal tightly and whispered to the nurse, "Who is that man?"

In that split second, Liam looked as if all the life had been sucked out of him.

But I didn't know him anymore.

Then, the original testing hospital called.

They said they had made a mistake with the fertility screening report. The files had been swapped with another patient who shared the same name.

My actual fertility results had been completely normal.

When Liam received the call, he was standing in the hospital corridor.

His phone slipped from his hand, crashing to the floor as his face drained of all color.