He was trailing his grandmother in the dead of winter, scavenging rotting cabbage leaves from the market floor because they couldn't afford fresh food.
I'd been a child then, but I knew how to manipulate my father. I faked a fainting spell from "hunger," claiming Dad's cooking was inedible, just to force him to hire a nanny.
My father, a widower who indulged my every whim, saw through the act but hired Grandma Weston anyway.
Her cooking was atrocious—worse than Dad's—but I ate every bite so Victor wouldn't have to scavenge again.
Under my father's tutelage, Victor's genius flourished. For a decade, Dad drove him to competitions, nurturing his talent until Victor swept every award in the state.
We built him.
And now, he was tearing me apart.
When college entrance exams came, Victor abandoned mathematics for computer science.
"Math Olympiad is fine," he'd said, "but I want to make money. A lot of it."
I remembered my promise. "If you want to be an academic titan like your uncle, I'll fund you. If you want to coast, I'll give you enough to spend however you please."
He achieved his dream—tech mogul, billions in the bank. But he betrayed the boy he used to be. The man who once vowed to shield me from the storm became the one plotting against me for Georgia's sake.
In my previous life, Georgia achieved a breakthrough in high-throughput DNA synthesis during her second year of graduate school. It fast-tracked her graduation.
I called a press conference with irrefutable evidence of her plagiarism. Victor intervened. The proof meant to hang Georgia became the noose around my own neck.
His PR team spun the narrative with terrifying efficiency. Recordings meant to expose Georgia were doctored to frame me—soliciting bribes, forcing students to entertain clients. My research notes were twisted into a petition detailing my "obscene tyranny."
Overnight, I went from respected scholar to pariah. The public bayed for my blood.
I gambled everything on one final press conference. Victor responded with a single medical report. He had me committed.
"I failed her as a husband," he told the cameras. "My wife is suffering from severe delusional disorder."
Five years later, when Victor finally remembered I existed, I truly had lost my mind. Georgia had tampered with my medication to secure her position. Clarity returned only in the final moments before death.