My Brother Faked Cancer for Love

My younger brother, Anthony Chapman, the only family I had left, was suddenly diagnosed with cancer. Overnight, my modest salary became our only hope. I pushed myself to the brink of exhaustion, working overtime and taking on every extra assignment I could to earn enough bonuses and overtime pay to cover his treatment. But the universe seemed determined to make us suffer. One morning, just as I arrived at work, I received a notice that my brother was in critical condition. Below it was a string of voice messages from his girlfriend, Paige Fleming. Through helpless sobs, she told me they'd been through countless tests and had finally run out of money. My heart ached. I quickly reassured her and transferred the last 2,800 dollars in my bank account to her. Still consumed by worry, I took out another 14,000 dollars as a cash advance on my credit card. I urged her not to panic and to take good care of my brother, promising I'd find a way to cover the expenses somehow. I wanted to cry, but I couldn't afford to break down. I forced myself to regain my composure and returned to my desk. Just then, my best friend rushed over and thrust his phone toward me, a photo playing on the screen. "Clement, look at this! Isn't that your brother and his girlfriend? They're eating at some fancy restaurant!" Chapter 1 I turned stiffly toward him, my gaze settling on her phone screen. It was a social media post shared by one of Ryan's wealthy friends. The photo had been taken at a rooftop revolving restaurant in a neighboring city, where floor-to-ceiling windows offered a sweeping view of the skyline. Reflected in the glass was a couple nestled intimately against each other. The man wore an expensive, custom-tailored suit from the latest luxury collection. He held a glass of red wine, his expression relaxed and his cheeks flushed with health. Beside him, a woman gently fed him a bite of foie gras. The man was my younger brother. The brother I'd raised with my own hands. The same brother who was supposed to be lying in a hospital bed, barely clinging to life, his hair gone from the treatments. Just half an hour earlier, I'd received a video from his girlfriend. In the video, Anthony's face was deathly pale. A knitted beanie covered his head, and he lay weakly in bed with an oxygen mask over his face. Every breath seemed to drain what little strength he had left. Paige had accompanied the video with a voice message, her voice nearly drowned out by hysterical sobs. "Clement, Anthony just threw up blood again! The doctors say he's in critical condition. There's still a huge outstanding balance on his hospital account, and they've stopped his medication because we can't pay. I honestly don't know what to do anymore…" My heart had ached so fiercely that I'd nearly collapsed. Without a second thought, I'd transferred the entire 14,000 dollars I'd managed to scrape together by maxing out my credit card. Yet here he was, the same man who'd supposedly been at death's door just half an hour ago, sitting in a restaurant where a single meal cost over 400 dollars per person. He was leisurely enjoying a lavish dinner with money I'd worked myself to the bone to earn. My best friend, Ryan Reed, reached out to steady me, his face full of concern. "Clement, what's wrong? You look terrible." I stared at the photo, my hands trembling so violently that I could barely hold the phone. "Ryan, send me that picture. The original file. I need the original." Back at my desk, I held my breath and opened the video Paige had sent me of Anthony in critical condition. As a director at a financial firm, I had a keen eye for numbers and an almost obsessive attention to detail. Both had long since become second nature to me. But until now, I'd been so worried about my brother that I couldn't bear to examine the videos of his suffering too closely. Every time I opened one, I'd glance at it briefly before hastily closing it. This time, however, I suppressed the ache in my chest and replayed the video frame by frame. Something wasn't right. Anthony's face looked deathly pale, but beneath the hospital lights, the edges of that pallor appeared almost imperceptibly jagged. When he turned his head, the shadows around his neck shifted with an unnatural abruptness. I immediately forwarded the video to a friend who specialized in video post-production technology. Five minutes later, his reply arrived. [Clement, this video was AI-generated. They probably took footage of a real patient in critical condition and used AI face-swapping technology to superimpose Anthony's face onto it. It's pretty sophisticated, but professional analysis software shows that the model overlap is less than 90%. Look here. The lighting and shadow tracking don't line up properly.] My fingers went numb. The coffee cup slipped from my grasp and crashed to the floor, splashing dark brown liquid everywhere. The spreading stain resembled a pool of blood. Deep inside me, something finally shattered beyond repair. Chapter 2 I'd been surviving on just four hours of sleep a night, desperate to scrape together enough money to cover his medical bills. I lived on the cheapest brand of pasta I could find and even resorted to cash advances on my credit cards, despite knowing how outrageous the interest rates were. And what had he been doing all that time? He'd exploited my fear and love for him to bleed me dry, while he and that woman enjoyed the fruits of all my hard work. I shot to my feet, snatched up my car keys, and headed straight for the door. "Clement! Where are you going?" Ryan called after me. I gritted my teeth, barely able to force the words out. "To the neighboring city. I'm going to see my brother." … The drive to the neighboring city took three hours. By the time I pulled up outside Central City Hospital, it was already five in the afternoon. Armed with the hospital information they'd given me, I searched one floor after another. "Excuse me, could you check if Anthony Chapman in Room 1203 has gone for some tests?" I asked a nurse, struggling to keep my voice steady. She checked the records before she looked up at me, visibly confused. "Room 1203? The patient in that room is an elderly woman who just had her appendix removed. "Her name isn't Anthony Chapman. In fact, we haven't had a patient by that name in our oncology department for the past six months." I stood frozen in the hallway, my eyes fixed on the stark white walls. Confusion and exhaustion washed over me, so overwhelming that I could barely think straight. What had I been doing all these months? What had all my sacrifices been for? Just then, my phone vibrated. The message came from Anthony's account, but I immediately recognized Paige's tone. [Clement, Anthony still hasn't woken up. The doctor says he needs additional treatment. I don't even know what the machine is called, but it'll cost another 2,800 dollars just to turn it on.] My stomach churned as I read the message. The sheer disgust made me want to throw up. My fingers trembled as I typed a reply. [What's actually going on with Anthony? Wasn't he doing fine before? How did his condition suddenly become so critical? If things are really that bad, I'll come over right away!] Her reply arrived almost immediately. [Please don't, Clement! If you take more time off work, think how much money you'll lose! This whole family is counting on you!] [Don't worry. I'll take care of him here. My mom came over recently, too, so we've been taking turns looking after him. We won't let anything happen to Anthony!] I stared at the messages on my screen, and the last shred of hope I'd been clinging to finally vanished. A bitter laugh escaped me as I thought back over everything that had happened. Anthony had supposedly received his diagnosis six months earlier. Back then, he'd come to me with a medical report from a major hospital. His eyes had been red with tears, and his voice had trembled as he struggled to break the news. I'd been so devastated that all I could do was pull him into my arms and comfort him. The possibility that his diagnosis might be fake had never even crossed my mind. Later, he'd suggested seeking treatment in the neighboring city. He claimed the specialists there were better qualified and insisted that he didn't want me to witness his suffering, as he feared it would affect my work. Without fail, I sent him money every month. And whenever I asked to visit, Paige always had an excuse ready to stop me. [Clement, Anthony just finished chemotherapy. His immune system is weak, and the doctor won't allow visitors.] [Clement, he barely looks like himself anymore. You know how sensitive he is about his appearance. He doesn't want you to see him like this.] And like a fool, I'd believed every word. Once I'd finished exchanging messages with Paige, I immediately called Ryan. "Ryan, can you lend me 2,800 dollars? I'll pay you back once this whole mess is over," I said. "Clement, what's going on? Is something wrong with Anthony?" Ryan asked. "Don't panic. I'll transfer the money right now!" A moment later, my phone chimed with a bank notification confirming the deposit. For the first time in hours, a faint warmth spread through my chest. I'd explain everything to Ryan once this was over. But right now, I had to put my plan into motion. Simply exposing their lies wasn't enough. I couldn't let them walk away without facing the consequences. They were going to pay for everything they'd done. Chapter 3 That night, I didn't drive home. Instead, I checked into a hotel near the hospital. I sat alone in the pitch-black room, staring at the countless lights twinkling outside the window. The pain in my chest was so intense that it felt as though my heart had been put through a meat grinder. Our parents had died when we were young, and I'd entered the workforce at just 22. Back then, my salary was barely enough to make ends meet, but I'd gritted my teeth and scraped together every penny I could to put Anthony through school. The two of us had endured some incredibly difficult years together. Eventually, I climbed the corporate ladder through sheer hard work and determination. Once I started earning more, I made sure Anthony had everything he wanted. When he wanted to attend graduate school, I paid his tuition. When he wanted a designer watch, I bought him one. When he told me he wanted to date Paige, I had my reservations about her. But I knew how much he liked her, so I merely warned him in private to be careful. I'd always believed I was the only person Anthony could truly rely on in this world. But as it turned out, I was nothing more than a walking ATM to him. At 2:00 a.m., a lawyer friend sent me a document. He was confident we had a strong case. "The evidence of fraud is pretty clear, and the facts are overwhelmingly in your favor. But there's something else you need to look into. There are several personal accident insurance policies in your name," he said. My heart skipped a beat. I immediately opened the insurance company's app and logged into my account. Nothing could have prepared me for what I found. The moment I saw the records, an icy chill swept through me. Five high-value personal accident insurance policies had been taken out in my name without my knowledge. I was listed as the policyholder on every one of them, and Anthony was the sole beneficiary of all five. As a senior executive, I kept copies of numerous personal documents at home. It would've been child's play for Anthony to get his hands on my ID and samples of my signature. Every policy had taken effect during the second month after his supposed cancer diagnosis. Even more chilling was the signature in one of the agent signature fields. At first glance, it looked remarkably like mine. But the distinctive way certain letters connected was unmistakably Anthony's. He wasn't just stealing my money. He was waiting for something to happen to me. No. He was planning to make something happen to me. Only my death would trigger the insurance payouts, worth millions of dollars. That money would be enough to wipe out Paige's gambling debts and allow the two of them to live lavishly overseas. I slumped to the floor, cold sweat soaking through my pajamas. This was the younger brother I'd loved and protected for twenty years. And for money, he actually wanted me dead. Why would he go to such lengths? If he needed money, why couldn't he simply ask me? Why resort to something so elaborate and cruel? Why would he risk murdering the only immediate family he had left in the world just to get his hands on a fortune? Just then, my phone erupted with a barrage of notifications. The company group chat was in chaos. [Emergency! Ryan's been in a car accident near the office! An SUV was going the wrong way and slammed straight into the passenger side of his car!] [Oh my God! How's Ryan? Is he okay?] [I heard they rushed him to the hospital. There was blood everywhere at the scene!] I stared at the photos that flooded the group chat. Beside the wrecked car lay a men's cashmere coat. It was the very coat I'd left draped over my office chair when I'd rushed out earlier. Ryan had been on his way to a business meeting when he'd remarked that the weather was getting colder. He hadn't dressed warmly enough, so when he spotted my coat on the chair, he'd asked to borrow it. That coat held a special place in my heart. Before our parents died, Anthony had spent an entire year saving his allowance to buy it for my 18th birthday. A deafening buzz filled my head as I recalled what the lawyer had told me earlier that night about the accident insurance policies. Ryan and I were roughly the same height and build, and even our hairstyles were similar. With my coat on, he could easily be mistaken for me at a glance. From a distance, we looked almost identical. Which meant that car hadn't been targeting Ryan. I'd been the intended target all along!