Liam gently pushed Mia away, but there was no trace of anger in his eyes.

"Why did you run out dressed like that?" he asked, his brow furrowed softly.

If it had been me, he would never have spoken so gently.

He would have scowled and snapped at me.

I suppose that was the difference between being loved and not being loved.

A wave of sorrow washed over me, for all the years I had wasted on my stubborn love.

The woman giggled, sticking her tongue out playfully.

"I heard your car pull up. I just couldn't wait."

She smiled and took my arm.

"Welcome back, Chloe."

But even as she smiled, her eyes were icy cold, like a snake's.

I shivered, instinctively pulling my hand away.

I wanted to run.

Mia's expression was identical to the Director's.

It was the same look the Director gave me right before she was about to torture me.

Every time Mia called the hospital, my punishment that day would be longer and more severe.

The Director said it was because I, the worthless slut, had made Mia unhappy, so I had to pay the price for my depravity.

Mia looked at Liam with a wounded expression.

"Liam, is Chloe still mad at me? About what happened..."

"Enough!" Liam snapped, grabbing my shoulders. "What are you trying to pull now? What happened back then was your fault. Why can't you just accept it?"

He stared at me impatiently.

"Don't tell me—is your Bipolar Disorder still not under control?"

Suddenly, I lost all desire to explain myself.

Liam had already passed judgment.

He believed every word Mia said.

My mother had Bipolar Disorder, it was true, but I didn't.

Before they sent me to that hospital, I pleaded with him, telling him over and over that I wasn't sick, but he refused to believe me.

"Just go to the hospital and get treatment," he had said. "It's for the best, for you and for everyone else."

"Acting out like this, hurting people... you're a danger."

But I didn't have a disorder, and I hadn't hurt anyone.

That day, it was Mia who had provoked me, insulting my dead mother.

Her smile was vicious and cruel, her words like daggers twisting in my oldest wounds.

"You're just like your mother, a crazy bitch nobody loves. No matter how many scenes your mother made, even killing herself, she couldn't hold on to your father's heart. It's pathetic and laughable, utterly useless."

"And you," she had continued, "are just as pathetic as she was. Liam loves me. You're just some trashy groupie who threw herself at him!"

Mia leaned in close, her smile triumphant.

"No matter how hard you try, you'll never mean more to him than I do."

I was furious, desperate.

I wouldn't let anyone talk about my mother like that.

Rage took over, and I raised my hand.

In the ensuing scuffle, Mia tumbled down the stairs, a streak of blood appearing on her leg.

But I swear I barely pushed her.

And given where we were standing, with Mia closer to the wall, how could she have possibly fallen down the stairs?

My head was spinning, but as Mia lay there, injured, she wore a victorious smirk.

That's when I heard Liam's furious roar.

"Chloe, how could you be so vicious?!"

Over Mia's pained sobs, Liam stared at me with pure hatred.

"If anything happens to her, I will make you pay."

I grabbed his arm, trying to explain, but he shoved me away.

He scooped Mia up and walked away without looking back.

The doctors diagnosed Mia with a leg injury that, while not preventing her from walking, meant she would never be able to dance ballet again.

For a dancer, it was a death sentence.

Mia cried for days in her hospital room.

And Liam forced me to my knees at her bedside, humiliated and ashamed.

"I really didn't push her."

"You still won't admit it!"

My explanations were just excuses to him.

At Liam's signal, one of his bodyguards grabbed my right hand and snapped my pinky finger.

The pain was electric, shooting up my arm and making me break out in a cold sweat.

But Liam just watched, a cold, indifferent smile on his face.

"You deserved that," he said, his voice like ice. "You broke Mia's leg, and now she can never dance again. So it's only fair that you can never play the piano again. That makes things even."

I started to laugh, a wild, crazy sound.

Even. What a joke.

He refused to believe me. All those years of devotion meant nothing.

I didn't do it, yet my dream had to be sacrificed as payment. He knew, he knew how much the piano meant to me.

In our happiest moments, I would lean against him and declare, "I'm going to be a concert pianist. It's not just my dream, it's my mother's dream for me."

And now he was using that, my deepest vulnerability, to deliver the fatal blow.

Mia watched my finger being broken, a flash of satisfaction and triumph in her eyes.

But her face was a mask of compassion.

She said she didn't blame me, that it must have been my hereditary Bipolar Disorder that made me do it.

She then declared righteously, "If you have a disorder, you need treatment. You can't just go around hurting people."

"Liam, I don't have Bipolar Disorder. That day, Mia..."

I tried desperately to explain, I didn't want to be sent to a hospital.

A sane person sent to a mental institution would surely go insane, right?

But my words were drowned out by Mia's crying.

"Liam, my leg hurts so much," she wept. "Liam, I can't dance ballet anymore. I don't know what I'm going to do."

The woman clung to Liam helplessly, as if he were her only anchor in the world.

Liam looked at me with rage, refusing to hear another word.

He was determined to send me away.

His expression was stone-cold.

"Chloe, people have to atone for their mistakes. You'll stay in the hospital, get treatment, and think about what you've done."

"Chloe grew up so sheltered," Mia said, her face a picture of concern. "She's never really had to suffer. I'm worried she won't be comfortable in a place with poor conditions."

Then, as if an idea had just struck her, her eyes lit up.

"I happen to know a very good facility, with excellent conditions, and I know someone there. I can ask her to take good care of Chloe. I'm sure she'll be better in no time."

Mia turned to look at me, and the malice and coldness in her eyes sent a shiver down my spine.

Liam nodded in agreement.

And just like that, I was taken to that mental hospital, and my life in hell began.

It was only after I arrived that I understood what "good care" really meant.

I was an object of ridicule for everyone.

Their punching bag.

I was the Director's special project, the chicken killed to scare the monkeys.

I will never forget being stripped naked by the Director, forced onto the floor and ordered to bark like a dog while she whipped me mercilessly.

"This slut is a shameless homewrecker! Everyone take a good look at her face!"

The others would circle me, spitting on me, laughing their strange, contemptuous laughs.

They would slap me, kick me, lock me in a bathroom stall, kick over my bowl of soup…