Chapter 3

It was long after dark by the time I finally dragged myself home.

I had barely shoved the door open and collapsed onto the bed when the phone in my pocket started buzzing.

The screen lit up with one word: Mom.

I took a deep breath and pressed answer.

"Katie, sweetie, why do you have to be so stubborn?"

My mother's voice came through the line, sounding frantic.

"I just called the hospital, and the nurse said you checked yourself out? What exactly did the doctor say? Is the leg any better? Why did you go home so fast?"

Hearing all that worry in her voice, my nose stung, sharp and sudden.

But before I could get a word out, my father's voice came from the other end, deliberately lowered.

"All right, quit asking all that useless stuff."

"She's been out in the big city four years. If she could save up over half a million, she's definitely got other accounts too."

"Feel her out, and quick. Hubert's still got no wedding money lined up. Get her to cough up some more."

Hubert's voice was mixed in there too.

"Yeah, Mom, that's right. She broke her leg, the company's bound to pay her a big settlement. You've got to get your hands on it fast, before she goes and spends it all in secret."

The last thread of hope inside me was ground to dust.

My fingertips dug into my palm, and I was just about to hang up.

Then a key turned in the lock outside the door.

With a click, the door swung open.

My parents walked in trailing the cold air, faces stretched into big smiles.

I froze. How did they have a key to my rented apartment?

"Katie, look at you. Your leg's like that and you're still running all over the place. You scared me half to death!"

My mother hung up her phone at once, hurried to the bedside, and reached out to touch my face, her whole expression aching with concern.

I turned my head away on instinct, then spoke coldly.

"How did you two even know the address of my apartment?"

Her hand froze in midair, but she didn't get angry. She just turned naturally and started tidying my bed.

"Your coworkers told us, of course. Silly girl."

My father set the insulated food container he was carrying down on the table.

"Katie, your dad was worried you weren't eating right these few days in the hospital, so I borrowed the kitchen at the little diner downstairs and made your favorite, pepper steak stir-fry."

"Eat it while it's hot. Build your strength back up."

Looking at the food steaming on the table, and at my mother folding my scattered clothes into the wardrobe.

If I hadn't just heard those words on the phone.

I might have almost believed they really loved me.

So it turned out they had only just noticed I'd grown up and could make money now.

"You always were careless when you're out here on your own, girl."

My mother nattered on as she folded my clothes.

"Look how pale your face is. And I talk to you and you won't even answer."

She sighed, and a note of complaint crept into her voice.

"Katie, I don't mean to lecture, but that temperament of yours really does need to change."

"You barely talked as a child, and now you go around every day with that miserable face. It's not the least bit likable."

"Look at how good your brother is with people. Sweet-talks everyone, and who doesn't praise him for it? You, now. If you were even half as likable as Hubert, I wouldn't have to worry about you like this."

My heart felt like it had been packed with shards of ice, cold enough to hurt.

"Likable?"

I stared at her, my voice shaking.

"My whole life, every good thing to eat, every good thing to wear, it always went to Hubert first."

"He made a mistake, I got the beating. He wanted a toy, my meal money got cut."

"I was always the one being cut short, the one sacrificed. How am I supposed to be likable? How could I ever manage to smile?"

My mother's hands stopped. A flicker of awkwardness crossed her face, but she quickly put on a wounded expression.

"Why do you keep dragging up old business, girl? I'm old, I've forgotten it all. Besides, aren't I taking good care of you right now?"

"Taking care of me?"

I pointed at that swollen, casted, ruined leg of mine, and the tears broke loose.

"This is how you take care of me? You couldn't even leave my lifesaving money alone?"

"The five hundred and twenty thousand in my paycheck account, that was money I traded my life for, all those late nights and overtime!"

"Why did you take every cent of it without a word to buy Hubert a car?"

"Did you know that was my surgery money? If I don't pay, I'm going to end up crippled!"

Faced with my sharp questions, my father turned his head away guiltily and pretended to wipe the table.

My mother hurried to sit on the edge of the bed, grabbed my hand, and her eyes went red in an instant.

"Katie, don't talk like that. Four years with no contact, do you have any idea how much your mother missed you in her heart?"

"We came all this way just to see you properly, to look after you."

She wiped at her tears, and her voice thickened.

"About the car, I'll be honest with you. Hubert met a girl from the big city a few days back."

"Her family's well-off. If we don't put together a decent wedding gift and a car, how could a girl like that ever look twice at Hubert?"

"You know how it is back home. You can work the land all year round and still barely scrape together any money."

She held my hand tight, her eyes full of pleading and something small and low.

"You've made something of yourself now. You can earn real money in the big city."

"We're family. Break a bone and the tendons still hold it together. What's wrong with helping your brother out?"

"Do you really have the heart to stand by and watch the Finch bloodline die out?"