𝔧𝔲𝔰𝔱 𝔞𝔰 𝔴𝔢 𝔭𝔯𝔬𝔪𝔦𝔰𝔢𝔡.

This is the part of the story where most would say, "you should've known better."

I held my hand to the slash the knife left on my neck. Regardless of how much pressure I added, blood continued to flow between my fingers and under my hand. It spilled into my white blouse, the bright red quickly darkening and turning rust colored.

As I plummet to the beige carpet below me, I reflect on everything I could've done, or not done, to avoid any of this. Like if I hadn't become a model in the first place. He wouldn't have known I existed. Or if I hadn't gone to college, or even taken a philosophy class. If I had just stuck with modeling and stayed away from college, I may have not met him.

However, the most asinine thing I did was stay with the man who was obsessed with me to the point of insanity. The man who took the lives of those he felt got in the way of our relationship. The fact that I romanticized the fact that he'd kill for me.

I didn't think I'd be next.

"I'm sorry, dear..." The man I had the audacity to love sighed. "I know, it hurts. Just remember why we're doing this." His hand caressed my cheek gently. "It'll be over soon, then I'll join you. There are a few things I must take care of before I do so, though. First, I'll post online about what we're doing now. The whole world will know of our love. How when you accidentally revealed it all to someone...we decided, before I can be taken into custody, we die together. I stab you, then I take a cyanide pill and hold your prepossessing corpse in my arms as I take my last breath."

If I had any ounce of logic and sensibility, I'd have ran as soon as I ascertained he'd been killing men he deemed a threat to us. I'd report him to authorities and try to forget he existed. But I stayed. I stayed because I had someone who's life revolved around me. Someone who was so tremendously obsessed with me that they'd scourge any man who dared to glance in my general direction. As perilous as it is, I was into it. I found it hot.

As my heart beats weaker, I lose my senses, and my oxygen begins to deplete, I feel nothing but regret. There's so much I could've done differently to avoid my impending death. I knew everything I did this past year was wrong, yet I didn't even think about ending this disgusting relationship. I am truly vacuous.

As I wheeze and fight for air, my eyes snap up to him standing above me once more. He slowly leaned in, and our lips touched gently for a moment. The tips of his fingers lightly brushed my palm, and his fingers intertwined with mine. He then softly kissed my cheek, the way he did when we first confessed our love. It sickened me how he went from slitting my throat to planting a gentle kiss on my cheek, like nothing happened.

"I love you, Spencer." He smiled tenderly as I lost all consciousness.

"We'll be together for all eternity. Just as we promised."

━━━━━━ஜ۩۞۩ஜ━━━━━━━

I was born with the life most work over sixty hours a week to achieve. The kind of lifestyle people play the lottery to attain. The life so many would sell their first-born child to have. I was born into that life. My mother, Marcia Winslow, started as an anesthesiologist - now she's the CEO of both the Northwestern Memorial Hospital of Chicago and the Evanston Hospital, just north of our city. My father, Wilbur Winslow, heir to his extraordinarily wealthy family's fortune, started as a private personal injury attorney, and now serves as a federal judge for the state of Illinois. This immensely successful power-couple only had one problem - both my mother and father are infertile. There was no chance of them ever birthing their own child. So, they began exploring other options. That's where I came into the picture.

My mother's sister, Charlotte Orville, whom I've never met, is my biological mother. She's a heroin and cocaine addict. Her dealer impregnated her...and she wasn't aware she was pregnant until she went into labor. That's all I know of Charlotte. The doctors were certain her baby wouldn't make it, or would be born with severe complications, such as being born an addict...but here I am. By an utter miracle, I was born completely healthy, unexposed to any sort of any harmful drug. My biological aunt and uncle, Marcia and Wilbur Winslow, then took me into custody. They became my mom and dad. They named me Spencer Celine Winslow - my middle name the same as my new mother's.

I was a conventionally beautiful baby. I was born with these hypnotic, icy blue eyes. The color of the glacier meltwater of an arctic peninsula. I held the kind of buttermilk blonde hair that brunette hair appears to be under sunlit rays. To top it off, I had a small head, proportionate to the rest of my body, and an evenly shaped, symmetrical face. One day, as my mother was pushing me in my stroller through the Lurie Garden in Chicago, a woman from a modeling agency for children noticed me. She introduced herself to my mother and proclaimed I was the most beautiful baby girl she'd ever seen...and I suppose the rest is self-explanatory. I got into modeling.

As I grew older, I no longer possess those electric blue eyes or luminescent golden locks. The blue hues of my irises turned to caramel brown and my hair faded to russet brunette. However, this didn't end my career. I began appearing in commercials, magazines - and I even appeared in a few TV shows in very minor roles. Of course, I'm a detestable actor (I couldn't go more than thirty seconds without laughing) so that didn't last long - but it indubitably helped my resume. As of now, I'm a prominent fashion model and influencer. At nineteen, I have my own fashion brand, SCW, (although the real work that goes along with it is done for me) and, with no plastic surgery whatsoever, I'm what every girl in the country desires to look like. The most astonishing part of my pathway to fame is that the hardest work I've done in this field is learn winged eyeliner and how to blend eyeshadow. Other than that, I just...pose for photos and look pretty. I virtually make millions by simply existing.

Believe me when I say I'm grateful. I am eminently thankful for everything I've achieved, for my highly supportive family, my abundance of wealth, my beauty, fame, and simply having a roof over my head and food on my plate. Especially considering that roof over my head happens to be a spectacular, million-dollar mansion, and the food on my plate is cooked by my five-star private chef. It's safe to say I have it all. I truly have no right to complain about anything at all.

Yet, at this point in my life, I suppose I wasn't doing what I really wanted to do. I wasn't leaving the impression on the world I truly wanted to make.

I was homeschooled by the most intelligent individual I've met - my mother. How she was able to educate me so wonderfully while juggling being the CEO of two hospitals, I'll never wrap my head around. Being homeschooled, I was able to avoid the atrocious education of American public schools and learn what I sincerely wanted to know. My favorite thing to do growing up - and still remains my favorite thing as an adult - is learning about space. I wanted to be an astronomer.

I had perfect, straight A+'s in every subject since kindergarten. Now that I think about this, it makes sense that I'd have perfect grades, being homeschooled - my mother likely gave me an A+ in every single subject...oh well, that isn't important. The point is, I could easily get into any university I wanted - with my extraordinary grades, my exceptional resume, and my extremely powerful mother and father. If I wanted to, I could apply to Harvard right this second and likely be accepted. So, why don't I just go to school for astronomy to work for NASA like I wanted?

It's my parents. I knew they love what I do. The fact that they're the parents of Spencer Winslow - A-List fashion model. How I'd have to take a few years not really engaging in the modeling industry that often - in order to be an astronomer, I'd have to focus solely on my studies for several years. I worried they wouldn't be as exceedingly supportive as they were when I finally talked to them about it.

I took them out to the luxurious Oriole and treated them to any meal they wanted, regardless of price. Not that it really matters for people of our status anyway - but they still behaved very gratefully. Halfway through our meal, I suddenly mentioned my interest in applying to the University of Chicago for their Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics.

Saying they were overjoyed is a complete understatement. They were so, so proud of me. My parents offered to pay my entire tuition fee and anything else I needed to have the college experience of my dreams. They'd support me unconditionally, whether I did well or not - I could simply go back to modeling if I failed.

So, I applied to UChicago. To absolutely no one's surprise, I was accepted and received a thirty-grand scholarship - my parents paid for the rest. Now, I'm majoring in astronomy and minoring in philosophy. If all goes well, I will enter the PhD program for astronomy and astrophysics...and I suppose I'll go from there.

That is the rise of Spencer Celine Winslow. Now, to what you're likely here to see...how I lost it all.