Chapter 4 - The Price of Silence
“I need everyone in the library.”
Lucas said it at nine the next morning.
Mom tried to object.
He didn't let her.
It was the first time I had ever seen my brother speak to her that way.
Dad entered first.
Then Marlene.
Sophie sat beside Lucas.
Alexander stood near the window until I pulled him toward the sofa.
“You belong here,” I whispered.
He looked at me.
“Only if you want me here.”
“I do.”
Mom came in last.
“What is this?”
Lucas placed the invoice on the coffee table.
“Did you do this?”
Mom glanced down.
Her face barely changed.
That told me enough.
“Do what?”
“Use Emily’s name on a wedding payment.”
Dad sat forward.
“What?”
“It wasn't her bank account,” Mom said.
Nobody moved.
She had confessed before realizing it.
Lucas stared.
“So you did.”
Mom sighed.
“The planner offered a family discount connected to Emily’s employer.”
I felt cold.
“My company has a corporate events partnership.”
“Exactly.”
“You used my employee information?”
“Don't make it sound criminal.”
“I didn't authorize it.”
“It saved almost six thousand dollars.”
Lucas pushed the paper away.
“You told me you negotiated that discount.”
“I did.”
“No. Emily apparently did without knowing.”
Mom’s mouth tightened.
Marlene interrupted.
“This is getting ridiculous.”
Alexander spoke for the first time.
“I agree.”
Marlene looked relieved.
Then he added, “Emily should never have been put in this position.”
Her face fell.
Mom looked at him.
“This has nothing to do with you.”
“It has everything to do with me when it affects my wife.”
I touched Alexander’s wrist.
He stopped.
Not because I disagreed.
Because I needed to say the next part myself.
“Why do you hate me?”
Mom stared at me.
The room became completely still.
“I don't hate you.”
“Then explain it.”
“Emily—”
“No. Explain why Lucas gets to exist without apologizing and I don't.”
Lucas lowered his eyes.
I continued.
“When I succeed, you hide it. When something good happens to me, you minimize it. When nothing bad happens, you invent something.”
Mom’s face changed.
For the first time, I saw something beneath the anger.
Fear.
“You always wanted more.”
I frowned.
“More what?”
“Attention.”
I almost laughed.
Lucas did.
Not cruelly.
In disbelief.
“Mom, Emily barely talked at dinner growing up.”
“She knew exactly what she was doing.”
“What was I doing?”
Mom looked at me.
“Making your father proud.”
That stopped everything.
Dad stared at her.
“What?”
Mom’s eyes filled unexpectedly.
“You don't remember?”
“Remember what?”
“The science fair.”
I did.
I had been eleven.
I built a model water-filtration system.
Dad had helped me solder one tiny connection the night before.
I won first place.
He took me for ice cream.
That was one of my happiest childhood memories.
Mom remembered it differently.
“You talked about it for months,” she told Dad. “Emily this. Emily that. Meanwhile Lucas was struggling.”
Lucas stared at her.
“I was eight.”
“You needed us.”
“So did she.”
Mom ignored him.
“Emily always had things easily.”
I couldn't believe what I was hearing.
“Easily?”
“School. Friends. Teachers. Your father.”
Dad looked devastated.
“Diane.”
“You never saw it.”
“Saw what?”
“How she looked at me whenever you praised her.”
I searched my memory.
I remembered wanting Mom at the science fair.
She hadn't come.
She had taken Lucas to soccer practice.
“I wasn't competing with you,” I whispered.
“You didn't have to.”
And suddenly twenty years rearranged themselves.
The forgotten birthdays.
The minimized achievements.
The constant insistence that Lucas needed more.
I had spent my life assuming there was something defective about me.
But I had been punished for a competition I never knew existed.
Dad stood.
“You were jealous of our daughter?”
Mom recoiled.
“Don't say it like that.”
“How should I say it?”
“I sacrificed everything for this family.”
“And Emily paid for it?”
Mom started crying.
For years, her tears had ended arguments.
This time nobody moved.
Even Marlene looked uncomfortable.
Lucas spoke quietly.
“Did you tell Sophie I didn't want Emily in the wedding?”
Mom wiped her face.
“I was trying to prevent tension.”
“What tension?”
“You know how Emily gets.”
“No,” Lucas said. “I know how you told me she gets.”
Mom stared at him.
That sentence landed.
Lucas turned toward me.
“I owe you more than an apology.”
“You were a kid too.”
“I haven't been a kid for a long time.”
That was true.
He had benefited from the system.
But for the first time, he wasn't hiding from that fact.
Dad sat beside me.
His voice broke.
“I should have seen it.”
“Yes.”
He looked surprised.
Maybe he expected me to rescue him.
I didn't.
“You should have.”
He nodded slowly.
“I thought staying out of arguments kept peace.”
“It kept you comfortable.”
He closed his eyes.
“Yes.”
Alexander said nothing.
That was one of the reasons I loved him.
He knew when support meant speaking.
And when it meant letting me own my voice.
Mom stood.
“So what now? Everyone blames me and destroys Lucas’s wedding?”
Sophie spoke.
“Nobody is destroying our wedding.”
She reached for Lucas’s hand.
“But we aren't pretending this didn't happen.”
Mom looked at me.
“This is what you wanted.”
There it was.
Even now.
“This?”
“You arrive with a billionaire and suddenly everyone turns against me.”
I stood.
“Alexander didn't make you cut my dresses.”
Silence.
“He didn't make you lie to relatives.”
Another silence.
“He didn't use my name for a wedding discount.”
Mom’s face hardened.
“And he didn't spend twenty years teaching me that love was something I had to earn by being smaller.”
Her eyes widened.
I had never said anything like that to her.
Neither had anyone else.
I picked up my purse.
“I’m going to breakfast.”
Mom laughed bitterly.
“Run away. That's what you always do.”
I turned at the doorway.
“No. Running away is leaving because I'm afraid you'll be angry.”
I looked at Alexander.
He came beside me.
“Walking away because I refuse to be treated badly is different.”
We left.
Outside, I finally breathed.
Alexander opened the car door but I didn't get in.
Instead, I leaned against him.
He wrapped his arms around me.
“I feel awful,” I whispered.
“You did something difficult.”
“Lucas gets married tomorrow.”
“And he will.”
“I don't want this to ruin it.”
“Then don't let it.”
I pulled back.
“How?”
“Celebrate your brother. Love Sophie. Dance with your husband.”
He brushed a strand of hair from my face.
“And let everyone else be responsible for their own behavior.”
Simple.
Terrifying.
Maybe possible.
That afternoon, Sophie called.
“Emily, I have a question.”
“Okay.”
“Will you stand with me tomorrow?”
I froze.
“What?”
“One bridesmaid dropped out.”
“Sophie, you don't have to—”
“I know.”
A pause.
“I’m asking because I want you there.”
Tears filled my eyes.
“Yes.”
Then her voice changed.
“There’s one problem.”
“What?”
“Your mother already found out.”
My stomach sank.
“And?”
“She told the wedding coordinator that if you're added to the bridal party, she won't attend the ceremony.”
I looked across the hotel room at Alexander.
May you like
Tomorrow, my brother was getting married.
And my mother had just forced him to choose.
