The War Correspondent's Homecoming

In my third year working overseas as a war correspondent, a grenade blast left me wounded and stripped me of my memories. The PTSD that followed was severe enough to keep me in a psychiatric hospital for two years. It wasn't until two months ago that I finally remembered who I was. The day I came home, my best friend and my husband met me at the airport, both of them crying harder than I was. Russell Ellison's eyes were red-rimmed, but his voice was as gentle as ever. "The new place is all set up. Move in for now. I'll come keep you company after work." I went back to our old house instead. The moment I pushed the door open, I saw a wedding photo hanging on the wall. The bride in it wasn't me. It was my best friend. A key turned in the lock outside. The man who was supposed to be buried in work at the office walked in, fingers laced with hers. A child was tucked against his chest, calling him "Daddy" in a small, unsteady voice. I stood frozen, too stunned to breathe. We'd only been apart for two years. So how was their child already three? Chapter 1 Russell Ellison and Pamela Hester both looked stunned. Pamela's smile froze on her face, and Russell let go of her hand as though he'd been shocked by it. He passed the child into Pamela's arms, his voice unsteady. "Harper, what are you doing here?" I stared at the three of them—their little family—and said nothing. Pamela clutched the child tighter, her eyes reddening instantly. "Harper, let me explain. It's not what you think—" "Then what is it?" I pointed a shaking finger at the wedding photo on the wall. "Russell, you married Pamela, and nobody thought to invite me to the wedding?" Russell started to reach for me, then stopped halfway. "Harper, it's complicated. Everyone thought you were dead, so we—" My voice shook as I cut him off. "I've only been missing for two years, and your child is already three. You two were together long before that, weren't you?" Russell remarrying wasn't even the part I couldn't stomach. What I truly couldn't accept was that he'd cheated on me while we were still married—and with my best friend, of all people. Neither of them had an answer for that. Pamela kept crying, apologizing over and over, while Russell just stood there in silence. I looked around the house again. The living room was cluttered with toys; the sofa and curtains had both been replaced. A family photo of the three of them hung on the wall—Pamela holding the child, smiling as she leaned against Russell's chest. That smile cut into me like a blade. After a long silence, Russell finally spoke. "Harper, let's just let the past be the past. We're all just glad you're alive." "I went from being your lawful wife to the other woman. Is that something I can just let go of, Russell?" The moment I said it, the child burst into tears. Pamela fussed over him, flustered, while Russell glanced at the boy, his brow knitting. "Harper, I know I owe you an apology. But Pamela and the kid didn't do anything wrong. Don't make a scene here." This house had been our wedding home. Now someone else was living in it, and he wanted to throw me out of it besides. "I'm not leaving! This is my house!" Russell grabbed my wrist and dragged me all the way to the door. "Harper, calm down. Whatever this is, we can talk tomorrow. You're scaring the boy." The front door slammed shut behind me. A moment later, I heard the child laughing inside, Russell murmuring, "Daddy's got you, Daddy's got you," and Pamela calling him "honey" in that sweet, familiar voice of hers. They were a happy little family. And I was the madwoman making a scene outside their door. My ears started ringing. For a second I was back on that battlefield two years ago, shells falling like rain, shrapnel tearing into my skin, the pain too much for words. When I woke up again, I couldn't remember any of it. But there was a voice in my head that never stopped. 'I have to stay alive. Someone is waiting for me to come home.' That thought was the only thing that pulled me back from the edge, over and over, through months of medication, IV drips, and therapy sessions. Eventually, it all came back to me—my family, the man I'd loved since childhood, the best friend I'd grown up with. Against my doctor's advice, I flew more than ten hours to get home, my body still held together by scar tissue. I never imagined this was the surprise waiting for me. I crouched at the front gate and cried for a long time. Then I stood, wiped my face, and drove straight to the Eastwood family estate. When I got there, my mother was sitting on the sofa reading. The tears came again. I threw my arms around her, my voice breaking. "Mom, I'm home." Before I could say another word, she shoved me off. A slap landed a second later. "Harper Eastwood! How dare you show your face here after everything you've done?" Chapter 2 I touched my stinging cheek and looked up in disbelief. "So the little bird's finally grown her wings, has she? Off to be a big war correspondent? What are you even doing back here?" I took a deep breath. "Mom, Russell married Pamela. They have a child together. Did you know that?" My mother's expression didn't so much as flicker. "Of course I knew. Both our families threw the wedding together." "What did you just say?" My eyes went wide, and the words came out before I could stop them. "I'm Russell's wife. I'm your daughter. How could you—" "And you still have the nerve to say that!" My father stormed out at the sound of her voice, his face dark as a storm cloud. "We told you not to go overseas, and you had to go anyway. You had a good life here, and you threw it away to go get yourself killed in that place. "You went missing two years ago. We all thought you were dead. Your mother cried herself sick every single day. "And here you are, alive this whole time, without so much as a phone call—and the second you show up, you barge in here making accusations?" I was about to explain myself when the doorbell rang. Russell and Pamela walked in with the child. "Dad, Mom," Pamela called out sweetly. My mother's face lit up as she hurried over. "Oh, there's my darling daughter. Come in, come in." She scooped the baby out of Pamela's arms. "Is Teddy hungry? Grandma will make you something delicious." Daughter? Grandma? Watching the scene unfold in front of me felt like a knife twisting in my chest. Pamela spotted me and gave an awkward little smile. "Harper, you're here too?" "Don't call me that. I don't have a friend like you. "Feeling pretty pleased with yourself, aren't you? Stealing my husband and my family." My mother rounded on me, her eyes red with fury. "Harper, watch your mouth! Do you have to turn this whole house upside down? "We watched Pamela grow up. She's always been sweeter and more considerate than you, more devoted to us. She's the one who's looked after your father and me all these years. Not like you—an ungrateful wretch." I looked at Russell. He glanced away, guilt written across his face. Back when I'd wanted the overseas post, both families had been dead set against it. It was Russell who'd shouldered all the pressure and helped me go anyway. The day I left, we'd held each other at the airport for the longest time. He'd kissed my forehead and said, "Harper, go do whatever it is you want to do. I'll always be right behind you." But now, with my parents laying into me, he didn't say a single word in my defense. In the end, it was Pamela who smoothed things over. "Mom, don't be upset. Harper's finally back after all this time—let's just have a family dinner together." At the table, the five of them sat down together. I was pushed off into a corner, and nobody even bothered to set a place for me. My mother kept piling food onto Pamela's plate like she was afraid the girl might go hungry. My father spent the whole meal making the baby laugh, then slipped a fat little envelope of cash into his hands. They talked about everyday things—the company's latest project, what the baby would need for preschool. And I sat there like I was invisible. The food in my mouth turned tasteless, like chewing on wax. I set down my fork and stood. "I'm full." Their attention stayed fixed on the baby. Nobody so much as looked my way. I walked out of the Eastwood estate into a night wind that cut straight through me. That was when I remembered my old job. I rushed home and dug out the computer I used to use—it still had years of footage and material from the war zone saved on it. I logged into my work account, meaning to upload the videos, only to find the account had been deactivated. The next morning, I went straight to the station. A young woman at the front desk stopped me. "You can't come in without a staff badge." "My name is Harper Eastwood. This station sent me to Veyland as a correspondent, and I'm here to apply to get my old position back." She checked her computer and froze. "Harper Eastwood... that name's already been deactivated. And besides, someone else already has that position." "Someone else? Who?" The corner of her mouth curled up. "Pamela Hester, of course. She's the youngest senior correspondent we've got—she just won an international award not long ago." Chapter 3 At the mention of Pamela's name, the young woman's eyes lit up. "Pamela is amazing. That documentary she shot in Veyland was incredible!" She pulled it up on her computer to show me. Pamela's name sat right there in the credits, under Executive Producer and Director. "Look how good it is—we all cried watching it!" The footage on the screen was painfully familiar. Every photograph, every interview, had cost me blood to get. They'd cut out every shot of me on camera and dubbed Pamela's voice over the rest. From start to finish, my name didn't appear anywhere in the credits. The Ellison Group sat at the top of the sponsor list. Russell. He was the only one who knew the password to my computer. I closed the video and drove straight for the Ellison Group's offices. A truck behind me leaned on its horn, the blast deafening. My head started pounding, and that same explosion sound roared to life in my ears. I clapped my hands over my ears, lost control of the wheel, and slammed into the guardrail. By the time Russell got there, his face had gone ashen. He looked like he wanted to lay into me, but the second he saw how pale I was, he pulled me into his arms instead. "It's all right, Harper. I'm here." His arms were still just as warm as I remembered—warm enough to make me want to cry. I shoved him off, tears streaming down my face. "Russell, why did you give my footage to Pamela? You know exactly how many times I nearly died getting that material. You know how much it means to me." I'd started planning that documentary two years earlier. I'd carried a camera through gunfire and shelling to get the footage I needed. I'd been shot. I'd been thrown by explosions. I'd brushed past death more times than I could count. Every piece of footage in that documentary had cost me something real. Russell reached out and wiped the tears from the corners of my eyes, one by one. "Harper, after what happened to you, everyone thought you were dead. I handed your material over to Pamela so she could finish the project in your place. What's wrong with that?" I knocked his hand away. "And the credit? Why isn't my name on it? Why is everyone saying Pamela made it?" "Because you were already dead." His voice turned ice-cold. "But Pamela's different. She needs this to secure her place at the station. I invested in her project, and if it does well, that's good for the company too." I looked at him and suddenly felt like I didn't know him at all. The old Russell would never have let me suffer even the smallest slight, never let me shed a single tear. And now, only days after coming home, I felt like I'd cried every tear I had left in me. Russell forced me into his car and drove me back to the new house he'd set up for me. Before he left, he tossed a bank card onto the table. "Harper, just behave and stay home and get better. I'll pay you back however much you need. Pamela's career matters. Don't get in her way—that's what your parents want too." I sank onto the floor of the empty living room and started laughing. Between the three of them, they'd handed everything that was mine over to Pamela—all because I hadn't been obedient enough. I opened my computer, logged into my cloud storage, and pulled up the original footage. My face. My voice, all of it. I edited the clips together, added a detailed write-up, and posted it online. Then I went straight to bed. By morning, the story had exploded. My phone was flooded with notifications—thousands of messages and comments, the video shared more than ten million times. Pamela's account was buried under an avalanche of backlash, and the Ellison Group's official page had been overrun too. [So Pamela stole someone else's work?] [That's disgusting. Stepping on her own best friend to get ahead.] [Poor Harper...] Chapter 4 Russell called me half a dozen times. I didn't pick up. My parents texted me demanding I take the video down. I ignored them too. Within the hour, Pamela's name topped every trending list. But the tide turned fast. The Ellison Group put out a statement claiming I was mentally unstable and that nothing I said could be trusted. The Eastwood Group followed with a press conference of its own. My parents took the stage themselves and released my psychiatric records from overseas—cherry-picked excerpts, taken out of context—claiming I was mentally disturbed and had deliberately slandered Pamela. My mother sobbed through the whole conference. "My own daughter, so ungrateful. We searched for her for two years, and all along she was alive and never once came looking for us. Now she comes back and starts spreading lies. How did our family end up with a daughter like this?" Pamela sat beside her, eyes rimmed red. "Harper is my best friend. I had no idea she was sick. I don't blame her for any of this." Public opinion flipped overnight. [So she's mentally ill? No wonder none of it can be trusted.] [Poor Eastwood family, stuck with a daughter like that.] [My heart breaks for Pamela, being hounded by someone unstable like this...] Tens of thousands of comments flooded into my video within minutes—the words "crazy," "kill yourself," "there's something wrong with her" filled every line. I'd barely set my phone down when a crowd of people burst through the door. They were the Eastwood family staff. "Miss Eastwood, Mrs. Eastwood sent us to bring you home." Home? What home did I even have left? I threw whatever I could get my hands on and screamed at them to get out, but it didn't matter—they hauled me into a car and dragged me back to the Eastwood estate. They locked me in a third-floor bedroom. From downstairs, I could hear my mother and Pamela talking. "Don't worry, Pamela, I'll handle this." "Thank you, Mom. I just worry about Harper, she—" "That's what she gets. Nobody made her disobey us and run off overseas in the first place." I sat on the floor and buried my face in my knees. My whole life, my parents had held me up like a treasure. I'd thought I'd always be the apple of their eye. I never imagined that the one time in my life I ever stood up for myself, it would cost me everything. They kept me locked up for three days. My phone and computer were both confiscated, and I spent every hour trapped in that cramped little room. On the fourth day, they brought me downstairs. It was Russell and Pamela's wedding anniversary, and the party was being held at the Eastwood estate. Pamela wore a wine-red gown, a glittering diamond necklace at her throat—the same necklace Russell had given me as a wedding gift, back when we'd just gotten married. Russell slid an arm around her waist, and the two of them kissed sweetly to the crowd's cheers. Fireworks burst across the night sky in a riot of color. I clapped my hands over my ears, my whole body starting to shake. The crack of the fireworks and the sound of falling shells layered over each other in my head—every burst felt like it was detonating inside me. "Stop it! Please, stop the fireworks!" Nobody paid me any attention. I stood up, trying to run, but Russell caught my wrist. "Harper, what are you causing a scene about now?" "The fireworks... Russell, please... make them stop the fireworks... I..." I clutched at his sleeve, my voice breaking apart. He pulled his hand free, his expression turning cold. "Harper, drop the act. I know exactly what you're doing." "I'm not acting!" I screamed, my eyes burning, and the scream collapsed into a broken plea. "Russell, please... no more fireworks..." Pamela came over and looped her arm through his, leaning her head against his shoulder with a smile. "Russell, the fireworks are so beautiful tonight. I love them." He tapped her nose fondly. "Then we'll set off fireworks all night long, just for you." He hesitated for exactly one second before shoving me at a pair of bodyguards. "Take her back to her room and lock the door. Don't open it again until the party's over." I fought with everything I had, but it was useless. I ended up thrown back into that third-floor room, the door bolted tight. Outside, the fireworks kept going, louder and more relentless by the minute. I clapped my hands over my ears and screamed until my voice went raw. I saw ruins. I saw blood. I saw bodies torn in half, and fire filling the sky. I heard the wails of countless people, screaming for help one second and reduced to ash the next. An overwhelming agony swallowed me whole. One moment it was shells, the next fireworks, then the psychiatric hospital, then home again. I threw myself against the door over and over until my head split open and my nails tore loose from my fingers, but no one came. In the end, I stumbled to the windowsill and threw myself off.