Face-Slapping13 min read
I learned to let go at ten o'clock
ButterPicks13 views
I remember the smell first: dust, damp rope, and something metallic that made my stomach drop. My hands were tied so tight that the skin around my wrists burned. Beside me, Sofia Karim let out a small, weak sound. She looked pale and terrified, clutching at her arm where it had been cut. I tried to meet her eyes, to offer something like comfort, but the rope held me too still.
"Where are we?" Sofia whispered.
"An old warehouse," I said. "I don't know."
"Don't scream," a voice ordered. It was deep, dangerous. Oscar Ibrahim, the man who led them, spoke into his phone like he was ordering a meal. "If they don't bring the money, neither of them goes."
I had been called many things in my life. I had been called naive, lucky, the quiet one. I had never been called disposable until that day.
"Please," Sofia begged. "Please, tell them—"
"Shut up," Oscar laughed. He made a sound that was not quite a laugh. "Your family will pay. The Lin family will pay more. Keep her safe. Keep her pretty."
I heard men below talking. I heard threats. The minutes stretched like rubber. When they moved us later—when they took us to the bridge and placed us on that ledge—fear felt like a heavy stone in my throat.
"My name is—" I wanted to tell them. It felt important then, to be a person. I couldn't find the words.
"Give us money," the leader hissed over the empty river. "Bring five million now. Or choose one. Drop one."
Sofia's voice shook. "Father—"
"Don't be loud," I said. "Please."
"I can't—" was all she managed.
Sofia was their chosen pawn because she was the Lin family's golden child, the trophy. I was their scapegoat. They wanted the show. They wanted the choice.
Someone shouted in the distance. Sirens. People clapped like a stage curtain falling. The kidnappers were stunned. The police were better than ostentatious arguments. They moved in and took them all.
When everything became a blur of lights and uniforms, I remember standing very still and hearing how loud my heartbeat was. I kept my focus on the sound because I thought if I stopped I might dissolve.
An officer loosened my bonds. She was a woman, calm and strong, with tired eyes and a badge that shined. "Are you okay?" she asked.
"No." I thought of too many things at once. I thought of the little scrape on Sofia's arm, of the bridge, of the men laughing. I thought of my own parents' faces when they arrived—the same faces that treated Sofia like glass and me like a shadow.
My voice was thin when I finally spoke. "They're not the same. They chose her."
The officer's hand was warm. "You're safe now," she said. "We saw everything. You don't have to..."
I couldn't hold it. I cried in her arms. I had kept a steady face for so long that the first kindness made me crumble.
"Why are they all fussing over her?" I said later, out of breath, to no one in particular.
"You weren't their favorite," someone answered. It wasn't new. I had known it for years. But knowing is not the same as hearing it in the hush of a hospital room while someone else got all the care.
The hospital assigned one bed to Sofia and left me in the hallway for a long time. The family hovered by Sofia like moths by a lamp. When I fell asleep on the corridor floor, clutching at my bandage, the officer who had helped me sat beside me and whispered, "We will not forget."
She did not forget. She forced the hospital to check me twice. She made sure I had stitches and medicine. She called me "little sister" and it made me cry in a different way.
When the family chose to care for Sofia and ignore me, something inside me stopped expecting mercy. It didn't die. It hardened. It decided.
Two months later I left the hospital. The room where I had watched them fuss over Sofia felt like a battlefield. They had stayed by her bed every hour. They had sent me a bill without a match to the kindness.
"You're leaving already?" the officer asked.
"I have to," I said. "There are things I need to take care of."
"Take care of yourself," she said. "And take this." She shoved a paper and a card into my hand. "If anyone bothers you, call me."
On the card, in shaky handwriting, a note from two elderly hands: We have saved some money for you. If you ever need to go, go. Be happy. Love, your grandparents.
The little paper felt like a light in my palm. It was quiet and steady. I left the hospital with my bag and that note. I rented a small apartment with my savings and the money my grandparents had kept for me. It was a tiny victory. I told myself I was leaving them for good.
The world, however, did not allow "for good" easily. My phone buzzed the day I moved. "Victoria, why did you cause trouble?" my manager demanded. She had always been closer to Sofia than to me. "You made the family look bad. You need to apologize."
"I did nothing," I said.
"You need to do damage control," she said. "Now."
"Not happening."
I opened social media and watched the tidal wave of comments. I had been painted as the villain. Fans called me many things. They wrote words meant to hurt. I closed my phone and breathed.
"I am not going to be silent anymore," I said to myself.
A contract sat on my desk: one week left with the company. One more show and I would be free. But the company and the Lin family were tied, and that meant my freedom had strings.
I wasn't the kind to beg. But I was human. I thought about how much more peaceful things would be if I simply left and made no more noise. I almost left the industry that day.
Then the selection-show offer came. The program producers wanted drama, but they also wanted talent. I went because I believed in my work and because I wanted to make something I could claim for myself.
The training building smelled like music and sweat. I met Zoya Fernandez in a corner when everyone else was picking beds. "Do you want to share a room?" she asked in a voice softer than her dyed hair.
"Sure," I said.
We hit it off. She was honest, funny, and not interested in drama. We learned to laugh together.
I had prepared a dance for the audition. When I performed, the room accepted me in a way I had never felt in the Lin house. People who had only ever known my "online story" saw me move, saw me breathe the music. For the first time in years I felt recognized for what I could do.
Sitting by the stage, I met Kellan Marques—the mentor everyone called Weisi. He was focused and kind. He gave measured praise that felt like sunlight.
"That was good," he said simply.
"Thanks," I replied.
Then Sofia came, smiling as if she had never plotted anything. "Sister, I'm sorry about the social media post," she said, sweetness dripping.
I pushed her hand away. "Don't."
Her brothers—William Guerrero and Brandon English—hovered behind her like storm clouds. They were the sort of men who were proud and protective of her public face and more than willing to gaslight others to keep it clean.
"You promised to behave," William said.
"I didn't promise you anything," I answered.
That moment lit something in me. I began to speak. I started to tell the people who would listen that I had a right to my work, to my name, and to my life. I started to show the drafts I had made—lyrics, arrangements, handwritten sheets from years back. I kept a private folder. I had worked under the pen name Emelia Galli in secret for years. I had hidden my songs because being known would have complicated everything when I had nowhere safe to be.
One night, I released a song at ten o'clock. It had been my habit. I had written the melody when I was sixteen on a tattered piano. The song went out and so did the whispers.
Then the accusation came: plagiarism. An old classmate—Birgitta Golubev—stood up in the rehearsal building and shouted that my song was stolen from Sofia. She claimed she had seen the sheet music before. The moment she spoke, someone in the crowd lit the fuse that always explodes in public: suspicion.
"That's not true," I said.
"Prove it," Birgitta retaliated. "You have no proof."
I did something tight and cold in my chest: I produced the proof. I had given the directors a copy of my recordings and the original drafts swaddled in coffee stains and cross-outs. I had the timestamped files. I had the security footage showing someone picking up a paper sheet in a hallway and calling Sofia. I had the audio of their plotting.
The show stopped for a breathless moment. People whispered. Kellan looked at me with an expression I finally understood—trust.
The director cleared his throat and announced, "Until the investigation is finished, the results are provisional."
The crowd shifted like a living thing. I felt the same hunger to be judged fairly that I'd felt my whole life. In the chaos, I made a choice that surprised even me.
"I will leave after this contract cycle," I told Kellan and the team. "This show was supposed to be for me to do my music my way. It's done. I'm stepping out."
"Why?" Zoya asked, panic in her voice.
"Because it's time," I said.
They protested, they begged. I hugged them and told them to be brave. They said my music would carry them. I said good-bye like someone closing the curtain for the last time. The directors promised to keep a spot open for my compositions.
Then things went louder.
Someone tipped the media: the recordings, the phone calls, the footage. The police came with evidence clear as light. They arrested Birgitta—Sofia's colluding partner—on the spot. They dug further and found more. The kidnap plan, the bribed men, the script for the show of terror. It was as if someone had painstakingly collected all lies and wrapped them up to send back.
Sofia denied it in public.
"What? No! This is a setup," she cried. "How dare—"
"Quiet." The officer who had once comforted me stepped forward and spoke in that calm voice that makes people listen. "We have evidence. We need you to come with us."
Her face shifted: arrogance, then surprise, then a flash of calculation, then terror. It was a terrible, beautiful unraveling to watch. The room filled with people—reporters, cameras, other contestants, volunteers. They leaned forward like birds wanting to see the fall.
I stood very still.
Sofia's eyes darted about. "This is impossible. I'm a talent. I wouldn't do—"
"Please cooperate," the officer said.
Sofia made a sound like an anchor being cut. She looked at William and Brandon for help, but they all turned away. Her father—Rohan Esposito—was nowhere to be seen. Her mother—Claudia Matthews—pressed her hand to her mouth and refused to meet my eyes. The family looked smaller, shriveled by their own lies.
Sofia's bravado collapsed. A microphone floated near her face. "Sofia, did you organize the kidnapping?"
"No!" she screamed. "You have no proof!"
We played the audio clips. People all around gasped. Phones went up. The hall buzzed with the kind of noise that means history is being recorded.
"You betrayed your family," someone said.
Sofia's expression moved in a flash: from denial to bluster to frantic bargaining to collapse. She stammered, "I didn't—it's not like that—I was pressured—please—"
"No one forced you to sign that agreement," the investigator said. "You were a willing conspirator."
Her shoulders sank. She clutched at her dress like a drowning woman at a rope. Cameras flashed. People started to whisper into their phones. Someone recorded her on their feed. Another person started streaming, the comments feeding like hungry fish.
"Please!" Sofia fell to her knees as if pulled by strings, right in front of everyone.
She cried out, "Please! I'm sorry! I'm sorry! I didn't mean—"
Silence waited, expectant.
"Get up," a voice behind the camera said. "Say you're sorry."
Sofia was not rehearsed for this. "I'm—I'm sorry," she croaked.
"Say what you did."
Sofia broke down. "I set them up. I called those men. I... I wanted her gone. I wanted the attention. I didn't think they'd hurt her. I didn't think—"
The words came out in a rush. Her denial had burned into confession. People around us couldn't hold back. Some yelled, "Shame!" Some slapped their hands into applause. Someone near the front shouted, "Record this!"
Sofia's face flickered like a bad light bulb: triumph, then fright, then pleading. She looked at her family as if begging them to help. They could not. Her father clenched his jaw. Her mother’s face crumpled into a mask of regret. Her brothers simply lowered their eyes.
"How could you?" I asked quietly when the cameras had moved away from the kneeling woman and focused on me like I was the next act. My voice was soft but it carried.
"She said it would ruin you," Sofia sobbed. "She said you'd be forgotten."
The crowd hissed. A hundred people recorded the word "ruin" as if it were gold.
Sofia started to beg. Her voice went thin and raw. "I didn't mean to go this far. Please—"
"No!" someone shouted. "Let her taste the truth."
Sofia's body shook. Her face was wet and streaked. For a terrible moment, she laughed—a small, sharp laugh. "You think crying will fix this? You think a kneel will make it all okay?"
"Put her in the car," the officer said.
Sofia kept looking at me as if her gaze could burn me down. "You will regret this," she hissed. "You think this ends here? You think they'll not come for you?"
Her voice lost power as a thousand cameras watched. "You will regret it."
A woman in the crowd stepped forward and spat. "You're the regret," she said. "You made this by choice."
The crowd echoed like a wave. Phones recorded and uploaded. People started to clap, slowly at first, then louder as if the sound could measure justice.
"Stop clapping," the lead officer ordered. But the sound had already spread.
Sofia was led away. She cried and begged in the car. The cameras followed. A thousand different feeds streamed different versions of the same scene. A million people watched.
I did not cheer. I did not dance. I only breathed.
After the arrest, the police made rounds. They took statements. They found the men who had done it. They were small, pathetic things when the law focused on them. Money changed hands. Lies were exposed.
The days that followed felt unreal. The show gave me time and space to step back and breathe. People came to me: journalists, the producers, even strangers who had seen the tape and felt something change.
One afternoon, I was at a small café with Zoya when my phone buzzed with a simple message: Victoria, we want to sign you. The message came from a large entertainment company I had once feared.
"You ready?" Zoya asked, sugar clinging to her lips.
"Not for fame," I said. "For music."
I started to write again. I started to make songs and let them loose at my ten o'clock hour—because ten had become my quiet. Ten was when my songs left the safe room and entered the world. Ten was when the old habit of midnight edits became a ritual of ownership.
Sofia's punishment was not the end of it. The Lin family fractured under the strain. Rohan, her father, tried to speak for her at first, but no one listened. There were apologies recorded and tests and lawyers. The public did not forgive as one; they varied between cold satisfaction, pity, and a kind of curious hunger that reads every new headline with a slow, consuming focus.
My life changed, but not in ways I had imagined. I moved into a small apartment given by two men who introduced themselves as Dean Emerson and Alexander Lange—my father's distant kin. They called themselves my uncles but acted like brothers. They gave me keys, a mattress, and a strange kind of quiet affection I had never known.
"Please call us Dean and Alex," Dean said on his first visit. He had a laugh that felt like sunlight. "No formalities here."
"I will," I promised.
They were not rich men in flashy ways. They had grown tough in their own hard life, and their protection felt practical. Alexander, who always smiled with half a secret, teased Dean about being sentimental.
"You're soft," Alex said once, and Dean only smiled.
When I moved into the place on a rainy night, they handed me a small box. "For your courage," Dean said.
I opened it to find a jade bracelet—old, worn, and warm from being held. "From your grandmother," Alex said. "She wanted you to have it. She said it would keep you calm."
I wore it like armor, little beads against my wrist.
My music found ears. People heard songs at my ten o'clock posting and felt the quiet honesty in them. Emelia Galli—the name I had used as a secret—was revealed, but the revelation did not end me. It gave me breathing room.
And then there was him—沈北良 in my memories, but here he was as Rohan? No—he was Kellan's friend, an investor named Evren Omar? I think of him as the man with the tired smile who stopped me in the hallway and said, "You sing like you mean it." No, that is not right either. His name steadied into one I would learn to love—Oscar?—no. The man I wanted to call "North" was Alexander Lange's friend, and his name was Dean? The city is crowded with names. What mattered was the way he looked at my songs and the way his gaze slowed my breath.
He came to see me perform once, sitting in an unmarked row near the back, his face unreadable. Later, when I walked out, he approached shyly.
"You were ... honest," he said. "Your music is honest."
"Thank you," I said. My heart beat fast enough to shake.
"Would you like dinner?" he asked.
"Yes," I said. The word took off like paper on wind.
We ate in small places and talked about small things. He asked, "Do you always post at ten?"
"Almost always," I admitted.
"Why ten?" he asked, teasing.
"It was when I could finally spare the time," I said. "It became a habit."
"Keep the habit," he said. Then he took my hand.
He was not the type to drop everything for me. He did not cancel plans because I asked. He kept his life whole, which made his small gestures weighty. He showed up when he said he would. He listened. He did not try to fight my ghosts, but sometimes he stood beside them so they did not feel so loud.
The days softened. I wrote with an intensity I had never known. I wrote about light and windows and the jade bracelet that clicked against my notebook. I wrote at ten. I posted at ten. People found meaning in those hours.
But the past never completely left.
One cold morning on the program stage, I saw Rohan Esposito in the crowd. He stood awkward and embarrassed, like a man caught on the wrong side of his own conscience. He had come that day to demand something—an apology?—I am not sure. He opened his mouth and called my name.
"You will take her back," he said. It was not a question.
"I have no desire to go back," I answered.
He faltered. "She was my daughter."
"Not mine," I said softly. "I have my own family now."
That day the cameras captured him like a man who had traded respect for comfort. The crowd watched as he shrank. He could not pretend to be the strong parent anymore.
Sofia served her time in the kind of way that looks like justice: a fall from grace, a public humbling, remorse on camera. She sent messages that begged for forgiveness. Sometimes she would call and say, "You will regret this."
I never did. I let the anger close like a door. I did not want it as a companion.
At ten o'clock every night I post something. It could be a melody, a line of lyrics, or a short voice note. Ten is a gentle rebellion. Ten is the hour the old me used to stay up late and write in secret. Ten is the hour when I learned to own my voice and when I finally stopped waiting for someone else to choose me.
The jade bracelet looks dull in the light and precious in the dark. It clinks against my wrist when I write. Sometimes I think about the warehouse bridge and the warm hand of a cop who believed me, who cut the ropes and told me to breathe. Sometimes I think of the hollow look on the faces of the people who chose to ignore me.
"Do you ever think about going back?" Dean asked one evening as we sat on my little balcony and watched the city pulse below.
"No," I said. "I go forward."
He nodded, as if that were the right answer, as if we both had been waiting for permission to mean it.
The world still moves like a crowd that sometimes shouts and sometimes applauds. I learned to accept both. I learned to write my lines and to sing them at ten. I learned to let go of the family that never wanted me, to accept the cousins who gave me a home, and to make room for people like Zoya and Kellan and the officer who became my friend.
Sometimes, at night, I tighten the jade bracelet on my wrist and listen for the sound of the minute hand on my cheap clock. Ten o'clock is a small sound: a click, like a promise. I wind myself to that time and let my voice go out into the dark.
"Goodnight," I tell the empty room sometimes.
"Goodnight," I always post at ten.
The End
— Thank you for reading —