I REFUSED TO BE HER SIDE CHARACTER

I met the fake daughter in the living room the first day they brought me back to the mansion. "What makes her the heroine?" The System couldn't stop gushing about her. "Now that's a heroine.

Look how pretty she is. You can tell she was raised in a greenhouse, a little rich girl with everything handed to her." "Not like you.

Skin rough from the sun, no meat on your bones, cheap junk head to toe." It said a rich dad, a socialite mom, and on top of that a brother who spoiled his sister rotten—that was the standard package for a webnovel heroine.

I looked at the fake daughter standing in front of me and said nothing. Because all three pieces of that socalled standard package had been mine to begin with.

Chapter 1 The living room. My mother called me over, her voice unusually gentle. "Billie, Cece is going to stay in this family. She was only a baby back then.

None of it had anything to do with her." "As for Maureen—we're all hoping you can forgive her. Don't take this to the police. She's been with us for sixteen years.

If nothing else, she's worked hard for this family." Maureen Mabry. The fake daughter Celeste's birth mother.

Sixteen years ago, a few days before her due date, she spent every dollar she had to check into a small private birthing center and wait there to deliver.

After the delivery, Maureen slipped past the doctors and the nurses on their rounds without a single hitch, and switched her own daughter with the daughter of a rich woman who had also just given birth.

Then she dropped that baby—me—into a dumpster in an alley off the street.

Not long after, she went to that woman's house on her own, interviewed for the job, and got herself hired as the family's livein housekeeper. And then.

Maureen spent the next sixteen years at her own daughter's side, as the help. Until a while back, when the fake daughter Celeste ended up in the hospital and her identity came out.

And me, the real daughter—the Brantleys found me not long after that. It took until today for them to bring me home. When my mother finished, I didn't answer right away.

I just looked, without a word, at the woman who had wrecked the first half of my life.

She stood in the living room with her head slightly bowed, guilt and regret written all over her face. Like a defendant in the dock, waiting for the judge to hand down a sentence.

The fake daughter Celeste came over, watching me carefully, a catch in her voice. "Wilhelmina, I'm begging you. Please?" "Maureen's getting old.

If you don't let her off, she'll end up in prison." "She really does know she was wrong.

She says if you let this go, just this once, she'll work herself to the bone for this family for the rest of her life to pay you back." She's begging me? Ha.

Who does she think she is? And she has the nerve to put on that face and come begging me.

The System caught what I was thinking and snapped at me. "Host, watch your attitude." "The heroine is purehearted and goodnatured.

She only found out who she really is a little while ago. She has no real feeling for Maureen.

She just sees an older woman, someone getting on in years, and she doesn't want her to suffer. She wants her to have a peaceful old age.

That's all." "Why can't you be bigger than this? Open your heart a little. Let the whole thing go." "The heroine forgave Maureen, you know.

All those years, she called that woman by her first name and treated her like household help—and the woman turned out to be her own mother.

Do you have any idea how devastated she was when she learned the truth?" So this really is one of those NPC stories. Even the System is out of its mind.

I lowered my eyes, fixed my expression, and pulled a thin smile onto my mouth.

Then I said to my mother: Chapter 2 "Mom, honestly, just being able to come back to you and Dad is enough for me." "As for Maureen—if she's really sorry, I… I can forgive her.

I won't go to the police." My mother stared at me, like she couldn't believe I could be that generous. "Billie, do you mean that?

You really don't hold it against Maureen?" I nodded, serious. "No. I'm home. I'm back with you and Dad.

Nothing else matters." Celeste finally laughed through her tears, a smile spreading across that sweet little face.

She looked up at my mother, wideeyed and innocent. "That's wonderful! Mom, Wilhelmina forgave Maureen.

So Maureen doesn't have to go to prison, right?" "Of course not." My mother smoothed her hair, her voice soft with affection.

As for Maureen, she was beside herself, eyes brimming, one step short of dropping to her knees. "Thank you, ma'am. Thank you, Miss Celeste.

I really… I really can't thank you enough." She didn't thank me. She didn't even glance at the person standing right there whose early life she had destroyed. Of course.

I didn't want her thanks anyway. Prison? She wishes. Dinnertime. Dad, Mom, my brother, all at the table.

When I was little, every time I saw a family on TV crowded around a table together, warm and happy, I'd be eaten alive with envy. Thanksgiving especially.

Every time the screen filled up with golden turkey, thick slices of ham, roasts, side dish after side dish, I'd sit there with the other kids at the group home and drool. This time.

I finally didn't have to drool at food on a screen. Because the table in front of me was covered in it. Mom said: "Cece, didn't you say yesterday you wanted the lobster bisque?

Maureen made it specially for you today." "Thanks, Mom!" Dad said: "Good girl. You did well on your last exams.

That watch you mentioned—I already put it in your room." "Dad, you're the best. Love you!" My brother said: "Look at her, over the moon. All right, fine, you did well this time.

That Birkin you were talking about—I guess I'll get it for you." "Oh my god, really?

I hereby declare you the best big brother in the world." That was when my heart started sinking, inch by inch.

Watching the four of them across the table, talking and laughing, loud and warm.

It was like being small again, sitting in front of the TV, watching a family of strangers who loved each other—eating good food, talking, laughing. Why do this to me?

This was my first dinner with my dad, my mom, my brother. I wasn't asking for much. I just wanted them to talk to me gently. Ask about the life I'd had. Ask about school.

Ask if I had any friends. But it was like they'd all forgotten I existed. The System's voice came in, mocking. "What's going through your head, Host?" "You're a side character.

Please get your position straight and play your part. Stop holding yourself up against the heroine every five minutes.

Ask yourself if you even rate." I tightened my grip on my fork. The resentment kept climbing, and so did the restlessness. Get my position straight? Says who?

I'm not playing anybody's damn side character. Chapter 3 Celeste took my dad, my mom, my brother. She took the happy, easy, comfortable childhood that should have been mine.

And now I'm supposed to trot around after her like a puppy and play filler in her life. Screw that. Footsteps cut into my thoughts. Maureen came out of the kitchen.

She was carrying a tray, and on the tray were four individual crocks of soup.

She set them down one by one in front of my dad, my mom, my brother, and Celeste, then picked up the tray and started to turn away. "Stop." The word came out of nowhere, and the warm, easy dining room went silent.

Everyone looked at me, lost. I looked across the table at Maureen, my voice cold. "Didn't you say you were going to work yourself to the bone for me?

Then why does everyone get lobster bisque except me?" "Maureen Mabry. Is your life a little too comfortable?

You want to find out what three hots and a cot taste like?" "Or would you rather see how long you last in a prison cell?" My dad's face changed a little. So did my mom's.

They both stared at me, shocked, like they'd never expected those words to come out of my mouth. My brother Quentin dropped the smile too, his eyes going dark on me.

Only Celeste didn't get it. She turned to Quentin, blankfaced. "Quentin, what's three hots and a cot? What needle?" Tsk. She's like an actual idiot.

Are braindead heroines in style now? Maureen had gone white, a little panic showing through. After a moment she finally came up with a decent reason. "I'm sorry, Miss Brantley.

I'm just used to doing it that way. I forgot there's one more person in the house now. I… I didn't do it on purpose." Like hell she didn't.

That old woman kept poking at me for exactly one reason: she'd decided her own daughter's place in this family was locked in. She had nothing to be afraid of. Fine.

Then she can't blame me for losing it. Otherwise everyone under this roof would go on thinking I was easy to push around.

I stood up, walked around the table, and picked up all four crocks, one after another. Bang, crash, bang, bang! Every one of them, smashed to pieces.

When I was done, I picked up the damp towel off the table and wiped the grease off my hands.

Then I looked at Maureen, ice in my voice. "Since there's no portion for me, nobody needs to drink any.

Got it?" Maureen stood there frozen midstep, mouth open, staring at me. "Wilhelmina!" My brother Quentin was on his feet, his eyes hard. "What do you think you're doing?

Have you lost your mind?" Ha. He has no idea what I look like when I actually lose my mind. My mother sat there sizing me up, startled and not at all pleased.

Probably thrown by the two faces I'd shown her. After all, that afternoon I'd been sweet, wellbehaved, and pitiful. Funny. Every kid who grows up in a group home is a chameleon.

My dad swept his eyes around the whole living room, then gave me an order. "Wilhelmina, Maureen just forgot there's suddenly one more person in this house.

There is no reason to throw a fit like this. Apologize to her. Now." Another NPC dad. If I weren't after his money, I'd have cursed him into the floor.

Maureen Mabry, that old woman, wrecked sixteen years of my life, and I'm the one who has to apologize. Keep dreaming. My voice went flat. Chapter 4 "You want an apology? Sure.

Once Maureen Mabry's been hauled off, I'll give her one during visiting hours." My dad stared at me like he'd never seen me before. Fair enough.

The two of us were strangers to begin with. "Tonight is my first night back in this house, and all of you have made me very unhappy. Go think about that.

I'm going upstairs to sleep. Nobody bother me." And I left them all standing there like statues and went straight up to my room.

The System was already screaming inside my head. "Damn it, Host, what is wrong with you?" "Don't forget you're filler in this novel.

Your single most important job is to set off the heroine, to make her goodness shine, to make her more loved in this family." "You think stacking up this much extra screen time is going to promote you to heroine?

Look at yourself. You don't have the heroine's luck, but you sure caught her disease." "That's a serious plot violation.

Stand by for a shock." The day before the Brantleys found me, the System bound itself to me. That was when I learned I was the side character of this world.

And that the fake daughter, Celeste, was its heroine. Beautiful, bright, sunny, warm. The kind of girl everybody adores and flowers bloom for. Spare me.

If her shameless mother hadn't swapped us when we were babies, I promise you I'd be prettier and brighter and sweeter than she ever was.

She stole someone else's whole life, and she still got picked as this book's destined heroine. The nerve.

But the System said I had to follow the way I'm written in the original and see the plot through to the end.

Right up until the fake daughter Celeste and the boy she'd grown up with hold their wedding in the last chapter and walk down the aisle. Only then does my part close out.

At which point I'd not only be free of the script for good, I'd get a onemilliondollar bonus from the main System on top of it. I had no words.

In the finale, the fake daughter marries a gorgeous heir worth billions. And I run the whole race as the pacer.

I play second fiddle to my enemy's daughter, and once I'm back in this house I get sneered at by my own father, my own mother, my own brother, and swallow it all, so that when the lights come up at the end I can collect a whole one million dollars.

How many drinks did it take to come up with that? Once I was back in this house, they'd be lucky if I didn't come after that mother and daughter with a knife.

The System picked up on what I was feeling and issued a warning. "Host, I advise you not to deviate from the plot.

Any violation will be punished." I didn't believe a word of it, naturally.

In the original, I'm written as meek, timid, longsuffering, and pitiful—someone who wouldn't fight back even if people climbed on her head and used her as a toilet.

Which honestly matched the image I'd built for myself at the group home. But that was all an act. Because there was nobody standing behind me.

The older boys at that group home were vicious and violent, twisted and mean.

Once they had their eye on you, all you had to do was play dumb and scared and small, and pretty soon they lost interest. But if I'd ever dared to fight back.

No question, it would have ended very badly for me. I'm not stupid. You don't go walking into the lion's den when you already know the lion's home.

But once I found out I was the real daughter, my back straightened right up. The night before I left the group home, I got my chance.

I picked up a brick and cracked it down on the head of one of the boys who had molested me. Chapter 5 Except a few minutes later, a warning came through in my head from the System.

Serious violation of the character I'm written as. Deviation from the plot. Punishment incoming. I'd barely found a closet to hide in when a massive current knocked me out cold.

I didn't wake up until the next morning. That was when I learned the System wasn't just running its mouth. It meant every word. After that I reined myself in a little.

That thing really does hurt when it shocks you. But none of it changed what I am. Me, playing supporting cast to the fake daughter. In her dreams.

Her mother rewrote her own daughter's fate against every rule there is, and that makes it fine to wipe out somebody else's whole life? Ha.

I'm never letting Maureen's little scheme pay off. And I am never letting the fake daughter be the heroine. I thought it with my fists clenched, viciously.

A sharp current tore through me and my body started to convulse. And then. Out cold. The next day. Morning. I came downstairs to the dining room.

Dad, Mom, my brother—none of them were there. Only Celeste, sitting alone, about to start breakfast.

I sat down in a chair, saw the sunnysideup egg and the sandwich on Celeste's plate, and said to Maureen, standing off to the side: "I want exactly what she's having." Maureen said yes and came back from the kitchen with the same breakfast.

Celeste hadn't started yet. So I switched my plate with hers. She glanced at me and picked up her fork. Maureen made a small sound. Celeste and I both looked at her.

Maureen's face twisted a little, and she stumbled through it. "Miss Celeste, let me get you a different plate.

I put peanut butter in that one, and aren't you allergic to peanuts?" Confusion flickered across Celeste's face, and then something clicked. "Okay.

Thanks, Maureen." Quick on the uptake this time, apparently. Maybe she only plays adorably stupid in front of Dad, Mom, and my brother. "You're allergic to peanuts?" I said mildly.

Celeste nodded. "Yeah, I am." I got up and called over the other maid, who was busy in the breakfast room next door. "Edna, is Celeste allergic to peanuts?" Edna blinked, her face going strange. "Miss Celeste, allergic to peanuts?

Since when? How come I never heard about it? She's always been fine. Since when is she allergic to peanuts?" Celeste looked mortified.

Maureen, though, stayed perfectly calm. "I must have gotten confused. It's nothing.

Miss Celeste, let me bring you a different plate." At that point there was nothing left to figure out. Maybe Maureen had spit in the breakfast she'd just handed me. Maybe boogers.

Or worse— Forget it. I'm not picturing it. It's disgusting enough already. Turns out Maureen and I have pretty similar personalities. Petty. We settle every score. Good.

If she's that determined to dig her own grave, she can't blame me. I wasn't about to spend my time guessing what she might drop in my soup next.

I made my move after Maureen finished cleaning Celeste's room. Second floor. Top of the stairs. No camera. Nobody watching that corner. I kicked her straight down from behind.

She never got the chance to see who it was. She went down like a bouncing ball. Chapter 6 The ceilings in that house are ridiculous.

One flight is thirtysome steps, and she rolled all the way to the bottom in one go and passed out. The System started shrieking in my head. "Host, this is murder!

Murder, do you understand that?" "You're insane, you're completely insane, that's a severe plot violation and total disregard for human life.

You're a coldblooded lunatic." I disregard human life? And Maureen throwing a newborn in a dumpster, that wasn't disregard for human life? NPC system.

It broke instantly. "You're the NPC! Your whole family are NPCs! Stand by for punishment." Back in my room, I put my phone on the charger and lay down calmly on the bed.

Soon enough, that familiar current ran through me. I went out again. When I woke up, I was in the hospital. There was nobody else in the room, just Edna.

She brightened when she saw my eyes open. "Miss Billie, you're finally awake.

Do you want some water?" I rubbed my forehead and waited for my head to clear. "Edna, what time is it?" "Now? Seven.

It's getting dark out." Doing the math, I'd been out a little over nine hours this time. A little shorter than last time.

Every other time the System punished me, it was at least ten hours. I wasn't sure whether that counted as good news. Edna called my mother the second I woke up.

Before long, my mother and my father both appeared in my room. I looked at the two of them, dazed. "Dad, Mom, what happened?

Why am I in the hospital?" My mother came past me, looked me over carefully, and only then explained. "You fainted in your room." Oh, I said, and patted my own forehead. "No wonder my head feels so fuzzy." My father came over and studied me a long moment, his eyes dark. "Wilhelmina, Maureen fell down the stairs from the second floor this morning.

Do you know anything about that?" I froze, then stared at him like I couldn't believe it. "Maureen fell down the stairs? When?

Is she okay?" My father watched my face closely, like he was hunting for a crack in it. "Not really. The doctor says she hit the back of her head.

She's still unconscious." I let my brow crease and sighed. "Poor Maureen." If she came out of it paralyzed from the neck down, that would be ideal. But not too far gone, either.

If she ended up a vegetable, gone entirely, Maureen would never get to watch her own daughter get thrown out of this house by me. That would be a shame.

I could tell my parents suspected I'd pushed Maureen down those stairs. Luckily, the attending gave me a perfect alibi.

He figured I'd been completely unresponsive for at least ten hours, impossible to wake no matter what anyone tried.

Which meant that when Maureen went down the stairs, I was already out. A girl in that condition obviously had no window to commit anything.

They ran a whole series of tests on me at the hospital. The result: nothing wrong with me. The attending was baffled.

A person who can't be roused for ten straight hours and not a single cause turns up—that's genuinely eerie. Only I knew. It was the System, all of it.

After I was discharged, I went home. Celeste's eyes were red. She'd obviously been crying. Maureen was her mother, after all.

With something like this happening, of course she was upset. Chapter 7 Except all that motherdaughter devotion looked pretty ironic from where I was standing.

They get to be human beings, and some other mother and daughter don't? Every bit of this was Maureen's own doing. There was nobody else to blame. The family hired a new cook.

My appetite came roaring back. Because I didn't have to worry anymore about someone putting strange things in my food. Aside from me, nobody in that house was in a good mood.

The table wasn't easy and cheerful the way it had been a couple of days earlier. It was dead silent.

While I was happily working my way toward a second helping, Celeste's eyes came up at me. She didn't say anything, but I could feel exactly how she felt about me.

Because her own plate hadn't been touched. She was miserable, like a daughter burying a parent.

Because her mother, Maureen, had finally woken up, and the doctors had diagnosed a cervical spine injury: quadriplegia. Nothing below the neck moved. Exactly the way I'd hoped.

My brother Quentin's eyes landed on me too, his voice cold enough to freeze. "Wilhelmina, do you have to be like this?" I had no idea what he meant. "Like what?" "Maureen just got hurt.

You can't see that nobody's in the mood? Cece is already devastated, and you have to make it this obvious? You can't sit there quietly?" I'm eating my damn dinner.

Who exactly did I bother? I knew this was an NPC story, that every character in the book existed to serve the fake daughter.

I still couldn't keep my temper. "Maureen Mabry ended up paralyzed for life because that's what she had coming. I'm happy about it, so I'm having two helpings.

What's it to you?" Quentin sat there blinking, with nothing to say back. Celeste, who had been holding it in on the other side of the table, let two clean tears fall.

She turned on me, half crying. "Wilhelmina, is it because my mom—because Maureen went after you that morning? You held it against her and pushed her down the stairs on purpose?

I know what Maureen did was wrong, but you didn't have to be that cruel." It didn't make me angry at all.

I just asked her, calmly: "You're saying I pushed your mother down the stairs. Where's your proof?" Celeste didn't answer. She just looked at me, hating it.

Of course she had no proof. And not just her. My dad, my mom, my brother—all of them probably suspected I'd pushed Maureen down those stairs. But none of them had proof.

No proof, no point in talking. I kept eating. Celeste shoved her chair back and stood up, her face cold. "I'm done." I knew what that was. She was making a show of it for me.

Please. Like anyone wanted to deal with her. "I'm done too." Quentin put down his fork, his voice just as cold. If you don't like the food, leave.

A moment later, my dad and my mom put down their silverware too. Nobody seemed to have much of an appetite.

I thought about that picture from not long ago, the four of them around this table, warm and happy. And then this. Dismal. Cold. Quiet. It made me smug. Smiles don't disappear.

They just relocate. They're unhappy, so I'm happy. September. Summer break ended. I went into eleventh grade