- 7.
I woke up in a hospital bed.
Mom sat beside me, her eyes swollen red, like
she’d been crying.
She held my hand, choking, “Brooke, you’re
finally awake, you scared me to death.”
I yanked my hand away, glaring at her.
“Don’t play the grieving mother act!”
She reached out to touch my face, but I
slapped her hand away.
“You just stood there and watched those
psychos hurt me, you watched my face
covered in blood.”
“If that had been Tiffany, would you have
<
watched them beat her to death?”
“Don’t talk to your mother like that, you brat!”
Dad went to hit me, then stopped himself.
Mom cried harder.
“How can you say that? You’re my real
daughter!”
Real daughter?
I remembered Ashley’s death, tears welled up
in my eyes.
“If I hadn’t seen it myself, I wouldn’t believe
my parents could be so cold and cruel.”
“You treat your own daughter like trash, you
<
let them bully her, humiliate her, let her die!”
“Honey, I thought you were acting, I thought you’d hurt yourself to trick us… I didn’t know
you were hurt so bad, if I had, I would have
stopped it…”
She choked on her words, repeating that I’d
“abused my power” and “lied” so much in the
past that she and Dad thought I was faking it.
I weakly curled my lip and closed my eyes.
Abused my power? Lied?
Those were the charges Tiffany put on Ashley
and me.
Since we were little, they’d believed
everything Tiffany said.
No matter how we argued, no matter how
hard we tried, it was useless.
I was exhausted.
I closed my eyes, not wanting to look at them,
not wanting to say another word.
I just wanted to get better and leave, get as
far away from them as possible.
My boss stood by, looking confused.
“Brooke and Ashley were good people,
responsible, hard workers, always trying to
improve,”
“I put them in for promotions and raises,
changed their flight schedules, but they
always got rejected.”
L
He paused, then his voice got louder. “Ashley
is gone, don’t you dare smear her name.”
Dad froze.
This was the third time he’d heard “Ashley is
dead.”
He grabbed our boss’s collar.
“Ashley is fine, don’t say that!”
“What kind of boss are you! Cursing my
daughter to death! I’ll sue you for slander,
you’ll regret this!”
Our boss shoved him away.
“You’re a father, you don’t even know your
daughter is dead, and you’re out here acting
<
like a fool?”
I couldn’t help but laugh through my tears.
Even now, he didn’t believe Ashley was dead.
Shaking, I took Ashley’s death certificate from my bag and threw it at him.
“This is Ashley’s death certificate, you killed
her!”
Dad snatched the certificate, his eyes racing
across the words, his face turning white.
“Fake, it has to be fake…”
“You’re all lying to me…‘
11
Our boss was furious at his behavior.
“It’s from the Cambodian embassy! You think
they’re in on it, too?”
“Go to the embassy and see for yourself!”
He turned to me, apologizing, feeling
responsible for not protecting us.
A stranger, just from professional courtesy
and some work interaction, cared more about
us than our own family.
It was insane.
Mom and Dad looked pale, like they’d lost
their minds, muttering “impossible,
impossible…”
They stumbled out of the room.
