The Bully’s Wedding Gift

I was eight when I learned monsters don’t just hide under the bed — some sit behind you, whispering venom with a smile. Nancy wasn’t the kind of bully who bruised skin; she bruised spirit. Teachers adored her, my parents said “ignore it,” but how do you ignore a nightmare that never stops breathing down your neck?

By high school, I’d mastered invisibility. Then I escaped — college, peace, freedom. Until one call shattered it.

“My fiancée’s name is Nancy,” my brother said.

The Nancy.

At the engagement party, she greeted me with that same sugary smile. “Still rocking that old haircut? Bold.” Her words sliced with elegance, her cruelty refined. The whispers returned — “Still single? Still strange?”

That night, I remembered her secret — her crippling fear of butterflies. And I decided on the perfect wedding gift.

Two hundred live butterflies. Delivered to her home. Open indoors.

When the box was opened, beauty turned to terror. She screamed, sobbed, collapsed. The footage was poetic justice.

Matt called, furious. “You traumatized her!”

“No,” I said quietly, “I reminded her.”

Some monsters never change. But sometimes, the prey learns to bite back.