Chapter 1

I was born cursed.

Whatever terrible thing I spoke aloud—it came true.

To protect Cole, I spent three years in silence, swallowing every word that climbed up my throat.

But he always came to me in the dead of night, pressing me to speak—begging me to curse him. "Just say I'll get hit by a car," he'd whisper. "Say the company's going under."

And when I finally broke—when I screamed every ugly curse I had—he kissed the tears off my face with something that looked so much like love.

I thought he was holding space for the darkest part of me. Until the words appeared, floating in the air above his head like closed captions scrolling across a screen:

[Cole's performance is FLAWLESS. Using the law of conservation, he transfers Zoe's curses onto himself—only for the disaster to rebound entirely onto Zoe, canceling out Iris's death flag!]

[Poor stand-in. She's about to take the hit for the multi-car pileup that was meant for the female lead!]

The love in my throat curdled into something iron and sweet.

No wonder every curse I spoke landed on me instead of him.

The system prompt appeared in my peripheral vision: Death flag countdown: 3 days.

To survive: strike back. Now.

Cole was watching me, expectant and soft-eyed. "Come on. One more. Tell me you wish I were dead."

I smiled. My eyes went cold.

"Cole." I said his name like a door clicking shut. "Since you want to hear it so badly."

"Then I wish you a long life. And the loneliness to match."

...

He blinked.

Then he laughed—fond and exasperated—and dragged his thumb across the tip of my nose. "Zoe. What kind of curse is that?"

"Long life is a gift. And lonely?" He pulled me against his chest, his chin resting on my forehead. "As long as you're here, how could I ever be lonely?"

The gesture was so practiced it made my ribs ache.

I almost believed him again—until the next line appeared, bold and blood-red:

[LMAO, he thinks that was a joke. She meant every word. He's reading sincerity as flirting!]

[MOVE IT. The female lead's death flag just spiked! We need a nastier curse—NOW!]

[Hold steady, Cole! One more round. Get her to curse a car accident tonight, and Iris's flight lands safe tomorrow!]

I went rigid. My fingernails pressed crescents into my palms.

So that's what it was.

Three years of silence—and to him, I was just a battery. Something to charge.

Every late-night coaxing. Every "just say it, baby." All of it was fuel he was feeding to another woman's fire.

"You're shaking," he said.

His hand moved to my back, slow and warm. "Did I scare you?"

"Don't be scared, Zoe."

He kissed the top of my head. "Just say the words. The bad energy leaves with them. I stay safe. That's all."

"Just one more sentence."

"Say I'll get in a wreck. Say I won't make it out."

He cupped my face. His eyes were full of something that should have been love.

But underneath—urgency. A clock ticking.

He was waiting for me to load Iris Langford's death onto my own back.

The iron taste in my throat got worse.

The system's countdown detonated somewhere behind my eyes:

Death flag countdown: 2 days, 23 hours, 59 minutes.

Host's vitals in critical decline. Strike back immediately.

Strike back?

I looked at the face I had loved for five years.

God, it was disgusting.

I opened my mouth. My voice came out raw.

"Cole."

He lit up. "Yeah?"

"Since you want it so much—"

I pulled my lips into something that wasn't quite a smile.

"I wish you a love that lives across an ocean. One that can never close the distance."

"I wish you betrayal. Ruin. A name no one respects."

"I wish you the permanent loss of everything you love."

Cole's smile froze.

The script overhead went berserk:

[What the—why is she going off-script?]

[That curse... something's wrong with it.]

[Whatever, bad words are bad words! Law of conservation: ACTIVATED!]

The air thickened.

Cole's expression flickered—irritation, then the mask slipping back into place.

He exhaled like someone tolerating a difficult child. "Zoe. Stop messing around."

"That kind of curse doesn't work. It's too vague."

"I need specifics."

He gripped my shoulders hard. "Say I'll bleed. Say I'll break a leg. Say it."

I wanted to.

But I was already paying.

The moment those curses left my mouth, the rebound hit—a fist closing around my heart, darkness crowding the edges of my vision.

"Cole—"

I folded into him, and a mouthful of blood bloomed red across his white shirt.

Vivid. Impossible to look away from.

Cole's pupils blew wide.

Not from grief.

The script confirmed it:

[YES! She's bleeding! Rebound complete!]

[Female lead's flight hit turbulence—but she's through it! The stand-in just bought her safe landing with a mouthful of blood!]

Cole caught me, his voice tight with urgency. "Zoe! What happened—call an ambulance!"

Panic written all over his face.

But the arms holding me—steady as stone. Not a tremor.

And his eyes kept drifting down to his watch.

Calculating the minutes until Iris's wheels touched ground.