"Nessa!" someone gasped, their voice trembling as they stood frozen in the doorway.
Nessa barely looked up from her desk. Her fingers continued tapping on the keyboard, the pale glow of the monitor reflecting off her tired eyes and brown skin. "Hmm? What is it?" she asked absently.
"It's… it's about your sister!"
The sound of those words snapped through the air like glass shattering. Nessa's hands stilled mid-typing, her whole body stiffening as she turned to face them.
_____
Later, Nessa stood in the back of an ambulance, her knees shaking beneath her. Her eyes locked on the motionless body laid out before her. Olivia's skin was pale, bruised in shades of purple and blue, her lips parted as if she had tried to beg for help but no one had come.
Even in death, she looked like she had suffered.
The nurse lowered her eyes, speaking gently but firmly. "She suffered multiple fractures to the pelvis, severe head trauma, broken ribs, and countless bruises. This was prolonged abuse." Her voice softened, heavy with pity. "I'm so sorry for your loss."
Nessa barely heard her. The words twisted into a blur against the roar in her ears.
'It's alright, big sister, I'm fine,' Olivia's voice whispered in her head, from their last café meeting. Her little sister had laughed, sipping a milkshake, insisting she was happy.
"Ahhhhhh!" Nessa screamed, clutching her head, her voice breaking into raw, animal pain. She dropped to her knees beside the stretcher, tears streaming down her cheeks. "No… no, you can't be gone. Why didn't you tell me? Why didn't you ask me for help?!"
Her words dissolved into sobs, the anguish clawing at her throat. "If I had known, Olivia… I swear I would've stopped him. I would've saved you!"
The crowd outside the house grew louder. Flashes of cameras cut through the night as police dragged Olivia's husband, Aiji, from the doorway. His hair was disheveled, his shirt torn, he looked like a man who had tried to escape and failed.
Nessa's grief burned into fury. She lunged toward him, but an officer stepped in front of her, holding her back.
"You bastard!" she shouted, her voice hoarse. "You destroyed her! I want you to rot in prison until you beg for death!"
Aiji turned his face away, shielding himself from the cameras. His cowardice only enraged her further. "Don't you dare hide! Look at me! Look at what you did to her!" Nessa screamed, thrashing against the officer's grip. Tears blurred her sight, but her rage gave her strength until Aiji was shoved into a van and driven away.
But even as the sirens wailed into the distance, her chest remained hollow.
She stumbled back into the ambulance, collapsing beside Olivia's body. The cold stillness of her sister's hand under the sheet made her feel like her own heartbeat had stopped too.
____
Days later, Olivia was buried. Dirt fell heavily on the coffin. Nessa could only only cry in regret but at least her sister was finally at peace.
When the trial came, she sat in court, her hands clenched so tight her nails drew blood. Witnesses spoke, evidence was presented, and Aiji was finally sentenced to life imprisonment.
He tried to fake madness, tried to play the broken man. The court didn't believe him. The judge's words, life imprisonment for manslaughter, and everyone cheered.
But it still wasn't enough for Nessa; she wanted him to suffer.
____
"What the hell do you mean they want his sentence could be reduced?!" Nessa trembled, wine glass shaking in her grip as her friend Patricia slid a phone toward her.
Patricia sighed, disgust twisting her features. "There's… a petition. A massive group of women are campaigning for his release. They say a singer and actor as handsome as him doesn't deserve to rot in prison. Some are even calling him a broken man who deserves a second chance."
Nessa's jaw dropped. Then she laughed bitterly. "Are they serious? My sister's corpse is still fresh in the ground, and these brainless idiots are hoping to protect her murderer? Concrete proof, broken bones, and they call that man a victim?!"
Patricia only shook her head. "People are insane, Nessa. They romanticize monsters because they've never had to face them in real life."
Nessa slammed the glass down, wine spilling across the table. "They didn't watch their sister being carried out in a body bag. They didn't hear her bones fixed back one by one by a mortician." Her voice cracked, and she looked away, swallowing back another sob.
______
Months later, life dragged on after all Nessa had to continue on with life.
"Nessa!" Annie's voice rang out, pulling her back from her thoughts.
She turned from her sketch board. Braids framed her tired face, shadows etched beneath her eyes. "What's up, Annie?"
Annie was pale, her breath uneven as she clutched a stack of papers. "Have you… heard about the change in the game's script?"
Nessa frowned. "What change?"
"They're turning it into a dark romance. Completely different from the fluffy love story we worked months on!" Annie's voice cracked as her eyes watered. "It's horrible."
"Let me see."
Annie thrust the script into her hands, and Nessa read. The further she went, the deeper her frown carved into her face became.
Slamming her hand onto her desk, she stormed toward the director's office, fury boiling over her. When she entered, two unfamiliar women were seated with her boss, laughing, sipping coffee as if they owned the place.
"What's the meaning of this?" Nessa demanded, slamming the rewritten script onto the desk.
Her boss, a middle aged man, only chuckled, leaning back. "These new affiliates suggested a change. Instead of a standard romance, which won't sell much, we're shifting to a darker one one. Dark romance. More appeal, more profit."
"You mean appealing to fetishizers of abuse and rape?" Nessa snapped.
One of the women sneered. "What do you know? That old way of thinking won't make money."
"This script is garbage!" Nessa spat, trembling with rage. "It's nothing but grown men lusting after a child. You reduced the heroine's age, filled it with abuse and manipulation, and called it romance? This project was supposed to show girls that love could be safe, that they deserve happiness. And you've twisted it into this filth?!"
The younger woman rolled her eyes. "It's fiction. You're taking it too seriously. Our community will pay top dollar for this."
"Fiction influences the emotions of people's reality," Nessa shot back, slamming her fist onto the desk. "Do you want your legacy to be feeding predators a fantasy and calling it art?"
"That's what people want," the older woman said smugly.
"People? Or pedophiles?" Nessa hissed.
"That's enough," her boss cut in sharply. "You'll either follow the new script or you're out."
Nessa's heart pounded. She looked around the room at the smug faces, at the betrayal of months of hard work. At the thought of girls playing a game where abuse was painted as love. It made her sick reminding her about what happened to her sister.
Her voice broke, but it didn't waver. "Then I quit. I won't ever put my name on something that glorifies suffering as romance."
The room went silent. Then, with a dismissive wave, her boss turned away.
"You're a fool, Nessa. Even as our lead writer, you'd throw away a fortune for your morals? Ridiculous."
Nessa stared at them one last time. "I'd keep my morals that participate in writing this shit.."