On a reality show, I was driving my childhood-friend-turned-movie-star past a cemetery. The car stalled four or five times in the span of a mile. I lost my temper, got out of the car, and started screaming at the graves. Miraculously, the car didn't stall again. My childhood friend quietly reminded me from the passenger seat: "It stalled the first time because you ran out of gas." The next day, the top three trending topics online were: #TheMovieStarAndHisAngryAssistant #SeenPeopleFramedButNeverGhosts #Ghosts: LeaveUsAloneYouPsycho 1 Liam Vance and I grew up together. He became an A-list movie star, and I became his slacker personal assistant. When he was on set acting, I was sleeping. When he was on variety shows, I was sleeping. Once word got out, being Liam's assistant became the most coveted job in the industry. A lot of Ivy League grads heard that the A-lister's assistant just slept all day, so they started competing fiercely, trying to drag me down and take my spot. With so many jealous eyes on me at the agency, I felt a rare sense of impending crisis. Just like when we were kids, I cornered Liam against the wall, stood on my tiptoes, and raised a threatening fist. "Tell me the truth, are you going to replace me?!" Liam raised an eyebrow. He reached out, wrapped his hand around my fist, and pinned my arm above my head, leaning in to trap me between his body and the wall. When our faces were only inches apart, he drawled in a slow, lazy voice: "Who told you I was getting a new assistant?" Liam's dark eyes stared intensely into mine. His eyelashes were incredibly long. In that split second, my heart skipped a beat. My throat felt dry, and I inexplicably swallowed hard. I feigned composure, turning my head away. "Sooner or later, I'll show them that I'm irreplaceable!" "Oh?" "Well, aren't I?" Liam said it like it was an indisputable fact. But thinking about my actual job performance, I blushed in sheer shame. 2 Liam was invited to be a panelist on a workplace reality show. It featured professionals from all walks of life. Unfortunately, the show featured an absolutely perfect executive assistant named Sarah Sterling. She memorized all her CEO's habits and preferences, organized documents with ruthless efficiency, and never procrastinated. She was the textbook definition of a corporate elite. A celebrity guest teased Liam: "Does watching her make you want to swap assistants?" Liam didn't even pause to think. "Not considering it. I think my assistant is perfectly fine." After the episode aired, Liam's fans flooded his Twitter replies with photos. The first photo: Me drooling on a sofa while asleep on a movie set. The second photo: Liam handing me a coffee, looking at me with a helpless, fond expression, saying, "Wake up, shift's over." The third photo: Liam standing up, memorizing a script, while I sat next to him playing games on my phone and grinning like an idiot. The fans went wild: [THIS is your 'perfectly fine' assistant? The hierarchy is completely upside down!] [Listen to us, Liam! You're an A-lister now, it's time to upgrade your staff.] On the show, Sarah subtly hinted that if Liam wanted to poach her, she wouldn't mind jumping ship. 3 People immediately smelled the drama. The CEO of Sterling Corporation publicly stated: "Sarah is my younger sister, and she's a huge fan of Liam Vance. If she really jumps ship to work for him, as her brother, I can only give them my blessing." Fans started desperately pleading with Liam: [Sarah is a corporate elite AND a CEO's sister. Be smart, fire the slacker and hire Sarah!] [Exactly! With Sarah as your assistant, your career will hit the stratosphere.] [The little assistant needs to stop leeching off Liam and leave.] The internet was a bloodbath over this trivial issue. For the finale episode, the CEO of Sterling Corp specifically requested to meet Liam. Usually, Liam drove while I sat in the passenger seat eating snacks. But to avoid getting ripped apart online, I aggressively teleported to the driver's side door. I yanked it open, started the engine, rolled down the window, and yelled at Liam: "Get in." Liam leaned close to the cameraman. The cameraman, assuming Liam was about to serve some premium handsome B-roll, focused intensely, his hands steady as a rock. In the next second, Liam said: "My little assistant is always this hardworking. Tell me, if I don't treat her well, where else could I find an assistant this good?" With that, he got in the car. The cameraman froze, looking thoroughly confused. 4 It was getting late, and we were driving past a large, desolate cemetery. The car stalled out four or five times. I finally lost it and slammed the car into park. Liam looked at me in a panic, but couldn't grab me fast enough. I stormed out of the car and started screaming into the dark: "Alright, alright! Wake up, all of you, and listen to me! "I don't care if you're someone's great-aunt, second cousin, or grandpa! I don't care if you died last year or got buried today, I want to know what the hell your problem is! "You think just because Liam is nice, you can bully us?! It's a one-mile stretch of road and you stalled my car five times! Is there no law and order in the afterlife?! "I don't care who you are, back off right now! I'm starting this car, and if it stalls one more time, I'm digging up your bones to make soup!" When I got back in the car, Liam's expression was incredibly complicated. I thought he was scared, so I patted his shoulder. "Don't worry!" "The elders always say when you run into paranormal crap, you just have to cuss them out. You can't show fear." I turned the key. The car started perfectly and didn't stall a single time until we reached our destination. I smirked at Liam. "See? Told you it works." Right before we got out of the car, Liam looked at me and said quietly, "Actually, the first time it stalled, it was because we were out of gas." The cameraman sitting in the back seat didn't dare breathe. And me: "..." Oh, crap. Unsurprisingly, the internet exploded the next day. #TheMovieStarAndHisAngryAssistant #SeenPeopleFramedButNeverGhosts #Ghosts: LeaveUsAloneYouPsycho Netizens: [Oh man, if she can curse out a ghost like that, cursing me out would be a piece of cake.] 5 The incident trended for days. People were so curious that they purposely drove empty cars to graveyards at night to yell at tombs. They used the exact same speech I did. The result? The cops found dozens of people walking in circles around gravestones, looking exhausted with massive dark circles under their eyes. At the break of dawn, the cops stood there in total confusion as people hugged their legs, sobbing: "Officer, help! There are real ghosts!" If one person claims it, it's a coincidence. If a whole crowd claims it, it's a pattern. Since no one else successfully replicated my "method," the internet decided I was a complete fake. [If this graveyard thing is real, I'll eat literal garbage while doing a handstand!] [It's obviously a PR stunt. Since when do personal assistants need PR stunts?] [Did you guys watch the show? Sarah is competing for her job. Sarah is amazing, so this useless slacker had to invent a viral stunt to stay relevant. It's not that hard to understand.] Sarah Sterling posted on X: [I believe all high-level positions should be built on solid professional skills. Cheap gimmicks never last. My professional background is rock solid, so I think Liam Vance should consider my offer. I think we'd make a great team.] The implication was clear: I didn't deserve to be Liam's assistant. The CEO of Sterling Corp retweeted his sister, adding: [Anyone with eyes can see how outstanding my sister is. I will always be the ultimate financial backer for my sister's idol-chasing dreams!] How interesting. I read the posts out loud, using a highly sarcastic tone toward Liam: "Wow, she's the sister of a corporate CEO, and she's so professional. If she became your assistant, she could take perfect care of you and bring in massive sponsorships." I sighed, shaking my head dramatically. "Unlike me, who is just a complete waste of space." Liam's lips curved into a faint smile. "Who called you a waste of space? Is the emotional value you provide not valuable? In my eyes, eight hundred Sarahs wouldn't equal one of you." I knew Liam was just buttering me up. 6 Thinking back on our childhood, I clicked my tongue. "When the kindergarten teacher assigned arts and crafts, you did mine without a word. "Through all our school years, whenever it was our turn to clean the classroom, I stood to the side playing while you scrubbed the floors. "In college, you attended events to earn extracurricular credits for me. Even now at work, I'm just a salted fish. "Liam, why are you so good to me?" Liam raised an eyebrow, his gentle voice low and deep: "Because someone told me she was going to marry me, so I had to do all her chores." He looked at me with a lingering, almost resentful gaze. I coughed dryly to cover my embarrassment. Okay, that did happen, but it was just dumb kid stuff. Liam and I had been neighbors since we were in diapers. When we were little, I watched a wedding on TV. I grabbed one of my mom's silk scarves, threw it over Liam's head, and declared: "Liam, you are the bride now. You have to marry me!" Little Liam's usually stoic face turned red. His eyes sparkled, and he held my hand like a little adult. "No, you have to marry me." I was too lazy to argue, so I threw the scarf over my own head and chirped: "Fine, I'll marry you. But you have to give me all your snacks and do all the chores I don't want to do." Little Liam nodded seriously. "Okay." It was an absolutely tyrannical contract, but Liam had strictly enforced it to this day. Hearing Liam bring it up, my briefly motivated heart immediately went back into slacker mode. "True. Why should I try hard? As long as I have you, I'm set." Liam was wearing gold-rimmed glasses, making him look elegant and refined, but the gaze behind the lenses was burning hot. Seemingly very satisfied with my answer, he whispered, "Exactly. You just need to stay by my side." Liam had always possessed an inexplicable possessiveness over me. I knew that. Growing up, any boy who tried to get close to me inexplicably distanced themselves shortly after. They all had one thing in common: they looked at Liam with pure fear. Other people might be scared of him, but not me. I was socially anxious and hated dealing with people anyway. His hovering suited me perfectly. 7 Liam was famous for his sharp tongue. Many netizens were furious that I was his assistant and demanded he fire me. Liam posted on X: [Are you paying my salary?] The translation: Why do you care? I'll hire whoever I want. You're getting way too comfortable trying to manage my personal life. His fans decoded the message and immediately pivoted to stand by his side: [Look, maybe our Liam's assistant is a bit useless, but she's cute! She's easy on the eyes.] [So what if it was a PR stunt? People are bullying her right to her face; is she supposed to just take it? I support the little assistant!] Since I didn't have any actual professional skills to brag about, the fans scraped the bottom of the barrel and settled on praising my face. Absolutely no one believed that my graveyard stunt wasn't staged. Because the fans couldn't find any solid arguments to defend me, they were racking their brains trying to fight off the haters. God knows they hadn't even fought this hard for Liam before. Maybe it was a "love me, love my dog" situation. But the fans were ultimately losing ground to the haters, simply because there really wasn't much to defend. The head of Liam's fan club messaged their group chat: [Girls, my brain is about to explode.] I was secretly lurking in the fan group chat, absolutely terrified to say a word. 8 Furious at the rejection, Sarah Sterling went and became the assistant to Liam's biggest rival. His rival was an actor named Carter Hayes. He debuted around the same time as Liam. But no matter the project, Liam always eclipsed him. The final nominees for Best Actor last year were Liam and Carter, and Liam took the trophy. So Carter had the industry nickname "Forever Number Two." Since Carter couldn't beat Liam in acting, he looked for other ways to win. The moment Liam posted his defense of me, Carter immediately signed Sarah. Sarah was bitter, and the two struck a deal. Carter posted a thinly veiled insult toward Liam: [Thank you to Mr. Vance for allowing me to hire such incredible talent. Mr. Vance might run his team based on 'feelings,' but I believe the world needs capable people. If everyone just relied on nepotism...] Carter left the thought unfinished, but it resonated with a lot of hardworking people online. For the first time in his career, Liam was hit with a massive wave of hate. [How did he even win Best Actor? Was that nepotism too?] [In this world, there really is no place for people who actually work hard, huh.] [If the assistant fakes paranormal stunts, the boss is probably a fraud too. A word of advice: don't play with the occult for clout, you might actually get cursed!] I finally understood what it felt like to be completely unable to defend yourself. Liam's manager, Brenda, came to see us. She knew about my relationship with Liam and both our family backgrounds, so she wasn't worried at all. Liam raised an eyebrow, a bit surprised. "People are still offering me scripts in the middle of a PR crisis?" Brenda rolled her eyes at him. "Sorry, it's not for you. The offer is for Chloe." I whipped my head around, even more shocked than Liam. "Wait, for me?! Who?" Brenda said, "It's for that insanely popular paranormal reality show, Maximum Hauntings. The number-one ranked expert on the show specifically asked for Chloe. Word is they've run into something incredibly dangerous." Liam went silent for a moment. He gritted his teeth and asked, "I heard that expert is really handsome and in his early twenties?" Brenda nodded, completely hyped. "Exactly! A hot guy specifically requested our Chloe. She's so lucky..." Brenda kept praising the guy. Liam's face grew darker and darker. I could tell he was about to explode.
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