I Wish You Double The Pain

Ever since I was a child, I noticed a strange pattern: whatever I wished for, my stepsister got double. She took everything from me, and even my own mother loved her more. Until the day I decided to fight back. “I want a twenty-six-year-old boyfriend.” The next day, she brought home a fifty-two-year-old bald man. “I want to lose ten pounds.” She dropped twenty, landing herself straight in the ICU. My stepfather knelt before me, sobbing, “Please, I beg you, stop wishing!” I smiled. “I wish to stay up late for six hours every single night.” My stepsister lost her mind on the spot. 01 A single line of text popped up on my phone screen. System activated. User may make one wish per day. I stared at it for three seconds, locked my screen, rolled over, and went back to sleep. I’d seen enough of these annoying, intrusive spam ads to last a lifetime. But the next morning, the words were still there. It wasn’t a pop-up. There was no close button, no redirect link. It was just a line of white text against a black background, hovering at the very top of my screen like it had been nailed there. I tried taking a screenshot. The text didn’t show up in the image. I tried taking a photo of my phone with an old camera and sending it to a colleague; in the photo, the screen looked completely normal. I put my phone down and stared at the ceiling for a long time. Then, I typed out four words: I want a hundred dollars. Nothing happened. I tried again, rephrasing it: I wish for a hundred dollars. The text on the screen shifted. Wish granted. I waited all day, but nothing out of the ordinary occurred. That evening, when I walked into the kitchen, my mother slapped a hundred-dollar bill onto the table. “For you,” she said, her eyes glued to her own phone screen. “Go buy a decent coat. Stop walking around looking like a stray.” I picked up the bill. Before I could even feel the warmth of the paper, she spoke again. “Oh, by the way, I bought Dulcie that winter coat she wanted. The two-hundred-dollar one. It looks gorgeous on her.” My fingers tightened around the bill. Two hundred. I got one hundred; she got two hundred. My mother didn’t even look up. “Don’t go getting upset. Hers was on sale. It was originally over three hundred.” I wasn’t upset. I was just remembering things. When I was seven, it was my birthday, and I closed my eyes and wished for a Barbie doll. The next day, my mother brought one home for me. That same afternoon, Dulcie received two. “Her aunt mailed them to her,” my mother had explained back then. “It has nothing to do with you.” When I was nine, I got straight A’s on my report card and wished for a new pair of running shoes. That weekend, my mother took me to the mall and bought them. But as we were checking out, Dulcie pointed to another pair on the shelf and said they were pretty. My mother looked at the price tag, bought them, and then pointed to another pair nearby, saying those looked nice too. She bought both. Two pairs. I got one pair; she got two. When I was twelve, I wished for a bedroom of my own. We moved into a new house that year, and I was given the tiny box room. Dulcie got the massive bedroom right next to the master suite, complete with an attached study nook. “She’s starting middle school soon,” my stepfather had argued. “She needs a proper space to study.” My mother had nodded in agreement. I hadn’t said a word. Looked at individually, every single one of those incidents had a perfectly rational explanation. A gift from an aunt, a sale at the mall, a practical academic need. But what if you lined them up side by side? I wanted one; she got two. I wanted a share; she got double. Every single time. It was too consistent to be dismissed as a series of coincidences. I sat on the edge of my bed, unlocking my phone. The text was still hovering there. System activated. User may make one wish per day. I stared at it, the silence of the room pressing in on me. How long had this system actually been active? I remembered childhood birthdays, the smoke of the candles, the silent promises I whispered into the dark behind my eyelids. Every single one of those wishes had come true. And every single time, Dulcie had received double. I had never connected the two. I had spent my entire life believing the fault lay with me. I thought I wasn’t good enough. I thought I wasn’t likable. Dulcie was the sweet one, the one who knew exactly what to say to make people smile, the one who was inherently easier to love. My mother loved her more because she deserved to be loved. I didn’t. But looking at the cold white text on my screen, a sudden, sharp clarity cut through years of quiet resentment. It wasn’t that I wasn’t good enough. It was just how the rules were written. I got one; she got two. It wasn’t favoritism, and it wasn’t luck. It was a mechanism, a hidden gear turning in the background of our lives. And now, the gear was waiting for me to turn it. I locked my phone and lay back down on the bed. Through the thin drywall, I could hear Dulcie’s bright, melodic laughter. She was Facetiming my mother from her room, talking about how warm her new two-hundred-dollar coat was. I closed my eyes. Only one thought echoed in the quiet of my mind: I finally know how to use this. 02 My name is Gwen. I’m twenty-two. My mother, Helen, divorced my father when I was six. A year later, she married my stepfather, Robert. Robert had a daughter of his own. She was a year younger than me, and her name was Dulcie. It was a fitting name. She was, in every sense of the word, sweet. When we first moved in together, I was a quiet, sullen seven-year-old. Dulcie, at six, already knew how to charm. The moment she met my mother, she started calling her “Mom” in a voice as soft and sweet as spun sugar. Helen ate it up. “Look at Dulcie, she’s so considerate,” Helen would say, her fingers gently braiding Dulcie’s hair while I watched from the doorway. “Why can’t you try to be more like her?” I would just stand there, silent. How was I supposed to do that? Was I supposed to call a strange man “Dad”? I couldn’t bring myself to do it. Robert didn’t seem to care anyway; his entire world revolved around Dulcie. Over the years, the dynamics of our household shifted into a quiet, suffocating routine. It wasn’t an overt, screaming kind of favoritism; it was a slow, daily erosion. Take dinner, for instance. If Helen made pork chops, Dulcie always reached for the first one. It wasn’t a rule, just a habit of her quick hands. But if I ever reached first, Dulcie would quietly set her fork down, lower her head, and stare at her plate in silence. Then Helen would shoot me a look. I knew that look by heart. It meant: You’re the older sister. Just let her have it. Or take clothes. When the seasons changed and Helen took us shopping, Dulcie would try on three sweaters and declare them all beautiful. Helen would buy all three without hesitation. When it was my turn, I’d try on one. Helen would glance at the price tag and sigh, “This is a bit expensive, Gwen. Let’s find something else.” Dulcie would chime in, “Gwen, that color doesn’t really suit you anyway. The gray one over there would look much better.” The gray one was half the price. Helen would immediately beam. “See? Dulcie has such an eye for these things.” It happened so often that the boundaries blurred. I couldn’t tell where her malice ended and my paranoia began. But there was one memory that remained crystal clear. It was my fifteenth birthday. Helen had ordered a small sheet cake, just big enough for the four of us. Before I blew out the candles, she told me to make a wish. I closed my eyes and silently wished for a phone. Back then, almost everyone in my class had one, and I was tired of being the odd one out. A few days later, Helen handed me a phone. It wasn’t new; it was her old, cracked upgrade. “Make it work,” she said simply. “And don’t go bringing it to school to mess around.” I swallowed my disappointment and took it. That same week, Dulcie came home carrying two brand-new phones. One was a gift from Robert; the other, she claimed, she had won in a school raffle. Two. I got a cracked hand-me-down; she got two brand-new upgrades. At the time, I accepted it as my lot in life. But looking back now, the pattern was flawless. Fifteen years, and the math had never failed once. Did Dulcie know? I wasn’t sure. But I remembered a detail. Every year on my birthday, after the candles were blown out, Dulcie would lean in close, her eyes wide and curious, and whisper, “Gwen, what did you wish for?” I’d tell her that if I said it out loud, it wouldn’t come true. She’d just smile, her eyes curving into crescent moons. “Well, you have to tell me next time, okay?” Next time. Every single year, she asked. I used to think she was just being a sister. Now, I realized she was verifying her inventory. My phone screen flickered in the dark. Remaining wishes today: 1. I didn’t rush. I needed to test the parameters of the system first. I opened my notes app and created a simple spreadsheet. On the left, I wrote my wish; on the right, I left a blank column to record what Dulcie received. In the first row, I typed: $100. On the right, I wrote: $200 (Winter coat). The timeline matched perfectly. But I needed more data. I opened the system and typed: I wish for someone to send me a bouquet of flowers tomorrow. Wish granted. The next afternoon, a delivery courier arrived at our apartment with a modest arrangement of wildflowers. The card read, “Thank you for being a valued customer,” sent from an online nursery where I had purchased a ceramic planter months ago. I took a photo of the flowers. When I got home from work that evening, there were two massive, elaborate arrangements sitting on the entryway table—one of deep red roses, the other of delicate baby’s breath, both arranged in heavy glass vases. Helen was arranging them, a proud smile on her face. “Some guys from Dulcie’s office sent them. She really is popular wherever she goes.” Dulcie was curled up on the couch, taking photos of the bouquets for her social media. When she saw me walk in, she offered a sweet, sympathetic smile. “Oh, Gwen, you got flowers today too? What a strange coincidence.” I looked at her smile and said nothing. One bouquet for me; two for her. A strange coincidence indeed. Back in my room, I opened my spreadsheet and filled in the second row: 1 bouquet -> 2 bouquets. The data was conclusive. The rule was absolute: I wish for X, and Dulcie receives 2X. No exceptions. I closed the spreadsheet, unlocked the system interface, and stared at the glowing white text. It was time for her to return what she had taken from me over the last fifteen years. But I had to be careful. She had been receiving double benefits for so long that she had grown comfortable. If the supply suddenly cut off, she’d notice. But what if the wishes weren’t beneficial? What if I wished for something negative? If I wished for hardship X, would she receive hardship 2X? I sat on my bed, planning my first move. It had to be precise, devastating, and entirely disconnected from me. I stayed up all night thinking. By the time the sky turned gray outside my window, I was smiling. 03 Before leaving for work the next morning, I stood in front of the bathroom mirror for a long time. Twenty-two, and I had never been in a relationship. It wasn’t for a lack of interest from others; I just didn’t have the mental bandwidth. Surviving the quiet warfare of my household took every ounce of energy I had. Dulcie was different. She had been dating since she was eighteen, swapping boyfriends as easily as she swapped seasons, each one wealthier and more attentive than the last. And every time, Helen would sigh happily and say, “Dulcie really knows how to choose them.” I never replied. Today, I was going to make my first real wish. But before I did, I had to lay the groundwork. During breakfast, I casually brought up a fake detail. “Mom, a colleague of mine offered to set me up with someone. I’m thinking about meeting him.” Helen’s fork paused mid-air. She glanced at me. “What’s his deal?” “Nothing crazy. He’s twenty-six, works in corporate.” Helen let out a soft, dismissive grunt. “Twenty-six? You’re only twenty-two, Gwen. Why are you looking for someone so much older?” Dulcie, who was quietly sipping her smoothie next to her, looked up at me but remained silent. “It’s just a coffee date,” I said, shrug shrugged. “It doesn’t mean we’re getting married.” “Whatever,” Helen said, turning back to her food. The conversation didn’t matter. What mattered was that I had planted the phrase “twenty-six-year-old boyfriend” firmly in Dulcie’s ears. Back in my room, I unlocked my phone and opened the system. Taking a deep breath, I typed: I wish to have a twenty-six-year-old boyfriend. Wish granted. My heart hammered against my ribs as I stared at those words. It wasn’t anxiety; it was pure, cold anticipation. Double of twenty-six is fifty-two. That afternoon, a guy from another department actually messaged me on the company Slack. We had chatted briefly during a seminar a few weeks back. He asked if I wanted to grab coffee over the weekend. He was twenty-six, worked in marketing, and had a kind, ordinary face in his profile picture. That was my portion. Now, I waited for Dulcie’s. The following evening, I walked home from the subway and heard a strange voice in the living room the moment I opened the front door. It was deep, slightly raspy, and carried an unpleasant, oily slide to it. I took off my shoes and walked into the space. Sitting on our sofa was a man. He had a severe receding hairline, a prominent beer belly, and wore a tight, faded polo shirt that strained against his midsection. He had his legs crossed comfortably, holding a mug of tea Helen had brewed for him. Dulcie was sitting beside him, her face completely drained of color. Helen was standing near the kitchen doorway, looking equally pale. Robert sat at the dining table, staring silently at the floor. When the man saw me enter, he let out a loud, hearty laugh. “Ah, this must be the older sister! Great to meet you. I’m Howard, Dulcie’s boyfriend.” Howard. Fifty-two years old if he was a day. I had to bite the inside of my cheek to keep from laughing out loud. Dulcie’s hands were shaking. She reached out, desperately tugging at Howard’s sleeve. “I told you, you need to leave. Stop saying these things.” Howard looked at her, his expression a picture of mild confusion. “What do you mean, sweetheart? You’re the one who added me on that app yesterday. You said you liked mature, established men. That’s why I’m here.” Dulcie’s face flushed a deep, humiliated red before turning a sickly shade of gray. “I didn’t! I don’t even know who you are!” Howard pulled out his phone, unlocked it, and held the screen up to Robert. “Look for yourself, sir. Is this your daughter’s profile or not?” Robert leaned forward, glanced at the screen, and slammed his coffee mug onto the table with a sharp crack. “Dulcie, explain this.” Dulcie’s voice pitched into a desperate, panicked shriek. “Dad, I swear I don’t know him! I have no idea how he got my account! He added me yesterday, we exchanged two messages, and suddenly he’s showing up at our apartment demanding to meet my parents! I tried to stop him—” “Why didn’t you just block him?” Robert demanded. Dulcie’s mouth opened, but no sound came out. I stood by the entryway, taking in the scene. The system’s logic was far more precise than I had anticipated. It wasn’t just a simple mathematical doubling of a number. I wished for a twenty-six-year-old boyfriend, and I received a normal, age-appropriate relationship. Dulcie received a man twice that age—delivered into her life in a way she could neither prevent nor explain away. That was the true meaning of “double.” It wasn’t just the quantity that multiplied; it was the gravity of the consequences. Howard sat back, taking another sip of his tea, looking entirely like a man who believed he was visiting his future in-laws. Finally, Helen spoke, her voice strained. “Dulcie… be honest with us. Have you been talking to strangers on those online apps again?” “Mom!” Tears welled in Dulcie’s eyes. “I swear I haven’t!” She looked at me, and for a split second, her eyes held an expression I knew all too well. It was a plea for help. Whenever she got into trouble as a kid, she’d look at me exactly like that. It meant: Gwen, say something to save me. In the past, I always had. Now, I slowly slipped my hands into my coat pockets. “I’m going to my room,” I said quietly. “Have a good night.” As I turned the corner, I heard Dulcie call out behind me, “Gwen!” I didn’t look back. I shut my bedroom door, leaned against the wood, and took three long, steady breaths. My phone screen lit up. Daily wishes exhausted. Resetting tomorrow. A small, quiet smile touched my lips. What should I wish for tomorrow? Through the wall, I could hear Dulcie’s muffled sobs, Robert’s rising anger, and Howard’s oily voice repeating, “Hey now, let’s all calm down and talk this out like adults.” I opened my spreadsheet and added the third entry: 26-year-old boyfriend -> 52-year-old bald man. Status: Verified. I already knew what my next wish would be. 04 Howard didn’t leave until nearly eleven that night. When Robert finally pushed him out the door, Howard turned back and shouted down the hallway, “Call me, Dulcie! I’ll be waiting!” The door slammed shut with a force that rattled the frames on the wall. I lay in bed, listening to the muffled chaos in the living room. Robert was shouting, Helen was trying to play peacemaker, and Dulcie was crying. The crying lasted for about forty minutes before the apartment finally fell into an uneasy silence. I figured the drama would simmer down by morning. But when I stepped out of my room the next day to pour a glass of water, Dulcie was already sitting at the dining table. Her eyes were swollen to the size of walnuts. When she saw me, she said nothing. I remained silent too. Helen walked out of the kitchen, setting a bowl of oatmeal in front of Dulcie. She gently patted her head. “Don’t think about it anymore, sweetie. That man was clearly a lunatic. It has nothing to do with you.” Dulcie stared at her bowl, took a tiny bite, and then slowly set her spoon down. “Mom, something feels wrong.” Helen paused. “What do you mean?” Dulcie glanced at me. Just a brief, flickering look, before she quickly averted her eyes. “Nothing,” she muttered. “It’s just… it all feels too coincidental.” I stood by the water dispenser, holding my glass, entirely still. Helen didn’t catch the underlying tension, continuing to ramble about whether Howard had harvested Dulcie’s information from some dating application. But I caught it. Dulcie was starting to suspect me. She had no proof, but her instincts had always been sharp. That was the most dangerous thing about her; she wasn’t just a good actress, she was highly perceptive. She could smell an anomaly from a mile away. I needed to act faster. I went to work, performed my duties, and came home at my usual time. But when I walked through the door that evening, the air in the apartment felt heavy. Helen was sitting on the sofa, her expression dark. Robert sat beside her, staring blankly at the television screen without changing the channel. Dulcie was nowhere to be seen. “Gwen, sit down,” Helen said, her voice unusually formal. I put my bag down and sat on the armchair opposite them. “Dulcie told me something today,” Helen began, pausing to gauge my reaction. “She thinks you hired that man to humiliate her.” I said nothing. “She says you’ve been acting strange lately. She says you keep staring at her, and that you’ve been writing things down in a notebook.” My chest tightened slightly. The spreadsheet. I had kept the record on my phone’s secure folder, but she must have noticed me typing immediately after the incidents occurred. “I didn’t hire anyone,” I said flatly. “Then explain how that man showed up here yesterday,” Helen demanded, her voice rising. “That’s Dulcie’s business. How would I know?” “You’re her sister—” “I’m her stepsister,” I corrected. “And since when is her dating life my responsibility?” Helen blinked, momentarily stunned. Robert spoke up, his tone cold. “Gwen, your mother isn’t accusing you. She’s just asking. There’s no need to be defensive.” I looked at Robert. This man had lived under the same roof as me for fifteen years, and we had barely spoken a hundred words to each other. Every single one of those words had been some variation of “Your mother didn’t mean it that way,” “You’re overthinking,” or “You’re the older sister.” I stood up. “Are we done? I have things to do.” “Stop right there,” Helen snapped. I paused, but I didn’t turn around. “What is wrong with you lately?” Helen asked, her tone shifting to one of deep frustration. “Dulcie says you’ve changed.” “She said I’ve changed?” “She says the way you look at her is different.” I turned slowly to face my mother. “Mom, in fifteen years, have you ever asked me how I was doing? Just once? Have you ever asked if I was happy, or if there was anything I wanted? Have you ever cared?” Helen’s mouth opened slightly, but no words came out. “You never did. Whenever Dulcie says something, you believe it without question. The moment she claims I’ve ‘changed,’ you haul me in for an interrogation. It’s been fifteen years of this.” The living room fell into a dead silence. Robert lowered his head, avoiding my gaze. Helen’s lips pressed into a thin line, her voice dropping an octave. “I’m not interrogating you, I’m just—” “Save it,” I interrupted. “I get it.” I went into my room and locked the door behind me. Sitting on the edge of my bed, I pulled out my phone. The system interface was glowing. Remaining wishes today: 1. Dulcie was trying to turn my mother against me to keep me in line, just like she did when we were kids. Whenever she made a mistake, she’d cry, point her finger at me, and Helen would instantly take her side. I used to swallow it. Not today. I opened the input box and typed: I wish to lose ten pounds. Wish granted. I set my phone on the nightstand, turned off the light, and closed my eyes. The double of ten pounds was twenty. Dulcie only weighed about a hundred and ten pounds. I wanted to see if she’d still have the energy to cry to my mother when twenty pounds vanished from her frame. 05 The effects manifested even faster than I had anticipated. By the third day after the wish, I stepped onto the scale and saw that I had lost four pounds. It was a healthy, gradual descent, the kind that felt natural and didn’t leave me feeling drained. Dulcie’s experience, however, was entirely different. When I came home on the third evening, she wasn’t in the living room. Helen was in the kitchen stirring a pot of soup. When she saw me, she handed me a bowl. “Your sister hasn’t had much of an appetite lately. Take this to her room, will you?” I carried the bowl down the hall and knocked on Dulcie’s door. When the door opened, I barely recognized her. In just three days, her cheeks had hollowed out. Her collarbones protruded sharply beneath her shirt, and the delicate bones of her wrists looked like fragile twigs. She leaned heavily against the doorframe, her voice barely a whisper. “Just leave it on the desk.” I set the bowl down and glanced around. There were three untouched takeout containers sitting by her trash can. “Are you not eating?” I asked. “I can’t,” she muttered, her eyes shot through with thick red veins. “Everything I swallow, I throw right back up.” She stared at me, her gaze intense and fearful. “Gwen… do you think I’m sick with something?” “You should probably see a doctor,” I replied neutrally. “I’m going tomorrow.” I nodded and stepped out, closing the door behind me. As the latch clicked, I heard the faint, wet sound of her dry-heaving inside. By the fifth day, I was down six pounds. My skin looked clear, my energy was high, and my clothes fit with a comfortable, loose drape. A few people at work commented on how rested I looked. Dulcie had lost twelve pounds. She had gone to the clinic, gotten blood work done, and run a battery of tests. The results were completely normal. There was no physical illness, no infection, no underlying pathology. But she still couldn’t keep food down. Even a sip of water made her nauseous. Her weight continued to plummet. On the seventh day, I came home to an empty apartment. I called my mother’s phone. It rang through several times before she finally picked up, her voice trembling. “Gwen… Dulcie collapsed. We’re at the hospital. Get over here now.” When I arrived at the emergency room, Dulcie was lying on a gurney, a clear line running from an IV bag into her bruised arm. Her face was completely devoid of color. Her skin seemed stretched tight over her cheekbones, and her eyes looked like two dark, sunken hollows. Helen sat on a plastic chair by the bedside, clutching Dulcie’s limp hand, her eyes rimmed with red. Robert stood out in the hallway, speaking in hushed, urgent tones with a doctor. As I walked toward them, I caught the tail end of the doctor’s assessment. “…extreme weight loss has led to severe dehydration and hypoglycemia. We can’t find any organic cause, so we’re keeping her for observation.” Robert nodded slowly. When he turned and saw me, the look on his face wasn’t anger. It was fear. “You’re here,” he muttered. “Yes.” “Go inside. See your sister.” I stepped into the curtained cubicle. Dulcie’s eyes fluttered open. When she saw me, her dry lips parted slightly. “Gwen.” “Yeah.” “I’ve lost so much weight.” “I see that.” “I’m scared,” she whispered, her voice like paper scraping against stone. “I can’t control it. It just keeps dropping, and nothing I do stops it.” I stood at the foot of the bed, observing her. I had looked at this face for fifteen years. For as long as I could remember, it had been covered in a bright, effortless smile. She smiled at Helen, she smiled at Robert, she smiled at strangers, and she smiled at me. I never knew how much of that sweetness was real. But there was no sweetness left now. Just a terrified twenty-one-year-old girl lying in a hospital bed, wasting away. “Get some rest,” I said after a long silence. “The doctors will figure it out.” I turned and walked back into the hallway. Robert intercepted me before I reached the exit. “Gwen, wait.” I stopped. “Let’s talk,” he said, keeping his voice low. “Just the two of us. Tomorrow morning.” His eyes were wide, scanning my face as if searching for a crack in a mask. It was a look I had never seen on him before. “Okay,” I said. “Tomorrow.” I walked toward the elevators. My phone buzzed in my pocket. Current wish progress: Lose 10 lbs (6 lbs achieved, 4 lbs remaining). Double effect active. The process was still running. Dulcie had already lost twelve pounds; she had eight more to go. Twenty pounds total. For someone of her size, losing twenty pounds wouldn’t kill her, but it would push her body to the absolute brink of collapse. I walked out of the hospital lobby. Outside, a cold rain was starting to fall. I stood on the sidewalk, letting the chill settle into my skin. I didn’t open my umbrella. This isn’t your fault, I reminded myself. For fifteen years, every bit of double fortune she received was carved out of my life. My toys, my shoes, my space, my mother’s affection. It was all hers, doubled, while I starved. Now, the balance was simply shifting. I wiped the rainwater from my face and walked toward the bus stop. Robert wanted to talk tomorrow. I knew exactly what he was going to say. But I wasn’t afraid. 06 Robert asked to meet me at a small, quiet diner near our apartment. At 7:30 AM, the place was mostly empty, save for a few regulars at the counter. He sat in a booth in the back, two plates of scrambled eggs and toast untouched between us. Neither of us picked up a fork. A full minute of heavy silence passed before he finally spoke. “Gwen, I’m going to ask you something, and I need you to be honest with me.” “Go ahead.” “Does what’s happening to Dulcie have anything to do with you?” I stared at him. “What could I possibly have to do with it?” “She suddenly wastes away to nothing, and the doctors have no explanation. Before that, some fifty-year-old stranger shows up at our house claiming to be her boyfriend. These things only started happening recently.” He paused, leaning in. “Are you… doing something to her?” I picked up my coffee mug and took a slow sip. “Robert, do you honestly think a regular office worker like me has the power to make someone lose twenty pounds by magic? Or force a stranger into her life?” He stared at me, his eyes dark with suspicion. “I don’t know how you’re doing it. But I know that none of these bizarre things are happening to you. They’re only happening to her.” “Maybe it’s just a run of bad luck.” “Gwen.” His voice was low, but it vibrated with a quiet, desperate rage. “Dulcie is my daughter. She’s lying in a hospital bed. Don’t sit there and talk to me about bad luck.” I set my mug down. “And I’ve lived in your house for fifteen years, Robert. How many times did you look out for me in all those years?” He didn’t answer. “Dulcie got whatever she wanted. If I wanted something, you didn’t even look up. When my mother ignored me, you pretended not to see. When Dulcie took my things, you told me to let it go because I was older.” “That was different—” “How was it different?” My voice remained level, but the words were sharp. “On my fifteenth birthday, my mother gave me her cracked, discarded phone. That same day, Dulcie got two brand-new ones. Do you remember that?” His jaw clenched. “When we moved when I was twelve, I got the closet-sized room, and she got the master-adjacent suite. You said she was starting middle school and needed a study space. I was starting middle school too, Robert. Do you remember that?” He looked away, his gaze dropping to the laminate table. “Every year, every single time, I got one share and she got two. You and my mother acted like it was the natural order of the world. In fifteen years, did either of you ever look at me and ask, ‘Gwen, does this hurt?’” The diner’s refrigerator hummed loudly in the silence. Robert kept his head bowed, his hands clasped tightly together, his knuckles white. “I admit,” he said, his voice thick, “we could have paid more attention to you. But Gwen, those were decisions made by adults. You can’t take your anger out on Dulcie. You can’t destroy her life.” “I’m not destroying anything.” “Then why is this happening to her?” “I don’t know.” He raised his head, his eyes rimmed with red. “You really expect me to believe that?” “I don’t care what you believe,” I said, meeting his gaze without flinching. He couldn’t read me. He had spent fifteen years ignoring my existence; he had no idea what my lies sounded like, or what my truth looked like. To him, I was a stranger who happened to sleep down the hall. “Gwen, please,” he whispered, his voice cracking. “If anything happens to her…” “Robert,” I cut in, “do you realize you’re doing the exact same thing my mother used to do?” He froze. “Whenever Dulcie cried, my mother blamed me. Now that Dulcie is sick, you’re blaming me. To both of you, the problem is always me.” I slid out of the booth and stood up. “Ask Dulcie about the things she’s taken from me over the years. Once you have those answers, then you can come talk to me.” I grabbed my coat and walked out. My hands were trembling as I stepped onto the sidewalk. It wasn’t fear; it was a decades-old anger that had finally found its way to the surface. I took a deep breath, refusing to let the tears fall. I wouldn’t cry in front of him. I wouldn’t cry in front of anyone. When I got home, Helen was sitting on the sofa. She looked up as I entered, her mouth opening as if to speak, but she hesitated. I walked over and stood in front of her. “Mom, do you think I’m behind what’s happening to Dulcie too?” She avoided my eyes. “I didn’t say that.” “But you believe it. You knew Robert was meeting me this morning, didn’t you?” She remained silent. “Mom, let me ask you something.” She finally looked up at me. “Who do you think I am?” Her lips parted slightly. “You’re my daughter.” “Then why have you never once stood by my side?” She had no answer. I nodded slowly. “Understood. Watch closely then.” I walked into my room and locked the door. Sitting on the bed, I pulled out my phone. The system was active. Remaining wishes today: 1. Dulcie was trying to use Robert and Helen to crush me, just like she always did. Whenever she ran into trouble, she’d cry, point her fin

🌟 Continue the story here 👉🏻 📲 Download the “MotoNovel” app 🔍 search for “478346”, and watch the full series ✨! #MotoNovel