1 I was born a natural optimist, the kind of girl who found silver linings in storm clouds. Yet, here I was, diagnosed with a case of clinical depression so severe the doctors looked at me with pity. The reason was simple, though no doctor could ever find it in a blood test: my parents had traded my joy away. They had walked into a place called The Ninth Exchange and bartered my capacity for happiness to buy my younger sister’s health. When Piper was born with osteogenesis imperfecta—brittle bone disease—my parents were consumed by a terrified, suffocating love for her. They were so afraid I might accidentally bump into her, so scared my childhood energy would shatter her porcelain frame, that they shipped me off to my grandmother’s house in the countryside without a second thought. The day they finally brought me back home, I thought my exile was over. I thought I had finally earned my place back in the circle of their warmth. I didn’t realize I was just being brought back as currency. With every “transaction” they made at the Exchange, my memories of them began to fray at the edges, turning gray and indistinct. I could no longer remember the sound of my father’s laughter when he hoisted me onto his shoulders to watch the Fourth of July fireworks. I couldn’t recall the melody of the lullabies my mother used to hum while stroking my hair. All that remained were the sharp, jagged memories: the scoldings, the cold shoulders, the way they looked through me to get to her. By the time they had drained ninety-nine segments of my happiness, I found myself sitting on the ledge of our sixth-floor balcony. My legs dangled over the abyss, the wind whipping through my thin hair. A neighbor hanging laundry below spotted me and shrieked, her voice frantic as she called my mother. “Sarah! Your girl has been sitting out on the ledge for ages! She looks sick, she looks depressed—for God’s sake, take her to a doctor!” My mother didn’t even look up from her phone. Her voice drifted through the screen door, airy and dismissive. “Her? She’s a natural-born ray of sunshine. She doesn’t have a depressed bone in her body. She’s just being dramatic, throwing a tantrum for attention.” A moment later, she called for my father to drag me inside. Not out of concern, but because it was time for the final transaction. What they didn’t know was that the only thing keeping me from leaning forward into the wind was the very last scrap of joy I had left. I pulled back, my fingers white-knuckled as I clawed at the stairwell railing. “I won’t go,” I whispered. “I’m not doing the exchange anymore.” My father’s face darkened, the muscles in his jaw tightening. Without a word, he swung his hand. The slap echoed in the narrow hallway, the sting blooming across my cheek like a sudden fire. “Have you had enough yet?” he hissed. He pointed at Piper, who stood by the door. In her haste to follow us, she had tripped, a tiny scrape blooming on her knee. “Look at your sister! She’s bleeding! Do you have any heart at all? Do you even care about her?” I looked down, dazed. Care? What did that even feel like? I stared at my own arms, exposed by my short-sleeved shirt. They were covered in a lattice of dark red lines—scars, some old, some fresh. I couldn’t remember when I started doing it, only that the sharp, biting sting was the only thing that made me feel like I was still tethered to the world. But my parents never hovered over me. They never asked about my wounds. They only frowned, their faces twisted in a permanent mask of disgust. “What kind of performance is this now?” my mother snapped. “You’re using these pathetic stunts just to avoid helping your sister? After everything we’ve done for you? How did we raise such a cold-blooded creature?” They always talked about the past. They told me stories of how they took me to Disney World, how they bought me the prettiest dresses, how much they adored me. But my mind was a blank slate of ash and fog. I only knew the screaming. “I’m sorry. I was wrong,” I said, my voice mechanical. It was a survival instinct I’d honed at my grandmother’s. Apologize immediately. If you accept the blame, the hitting stops sooner. But this time, it only seemed to make my father angrier. His face turned a bruised purple, his fists trembling at his sides. “Enough,” my mother interrupted, her voice sharp with impatience. “We’re going to be late for the appointment. Let’s go.” Piper grabbed my mother’s hand, skipping toward the car. “Mommy, after we’re done today, can I have a Haagen-Dazs? The big one?” 2 The ice in my mother’s expression thawed instantly. she reached down, smoothing Piper’s hair with a tenderness that felt like a physical blow to my chest. “Of course, sweetie. I’ll buy you the most expensive one on the menu.” I followed them to the car like a ghost. I couldn’t help it; the words slipped out before I could stop them. “What does it taste like? The ice cream?” Piper turned around, a smug grin on her face. “It’s sweet. It’s the best thing in the world.” Sweet. I pressed my lips together, tasting only the bitterness of my own saliva. “Could I… could I have a bite later? Just a taste?” The car jerked as my mother slammed on the brakes. She twisted in her seat, her eyes flashing with a vitriol that took my breath away. “Wren, have you no shame?” she spat. “Think of all the ice cream you gorged on when you were little. Now you’re trying to snatch food out of your sick sister’s mouth? When did you become so incredibly selfish?” Did I eat ice cream when I was little? I didn’t know. Looking at her furious face, a strange, hollow thought drifted through my mind. I’d read somewhere that death row inmates get a final meal before their execution. If I were dying, would she buy me something sweet? Would she look at me with something other than hate? Before the thought could take root, the car pulled up to the curb in front of The Ninth Exchange. It was a narrow building with a charcoal-black door that seemed to swallow the sunlight. My body began to shake, a primal, rhythmic Tremor I couldn’t control. As the door opened, Piper scrambled to get out, but her foot caught on the ledge. “Ow!” she wailed, sliding onto the pavement. Her knee hit the concrete, adding a fresh bruise to the scrape. My mother shrieked, scooping her up as if she were made of spun sugar. My father’s eyes went red with rage. He turned and slammed his fist into my shoulder. “Wren! Are you a literal statue? Why weren’t you watching her? You know how fragile she is!” I felt my collarbone throb, a sharp, clicking pain, but I didn’t say a word. I just watched their mouths move. I knew they were cursing me, but the words sounded like they were underwater. My brain was simply refusing to let them in anymore. Finally, my father grabbed my arm and dragged me toward the shop. “We’re here for the transaction,” he told the man behind the counter. “Extract the memory. We want the health for our youngest daughter.” The proprietor, a man with eyes like polished flint, looked at me and sighed. “The previous extractions have already brought your younger daughter to a standard level of health,” he said quietly. “There is no medical necessity for more.” He looked at my bloodless face. “Furthermore, if the subject’s happiness levels are too low, a forced extraction could have… unpredictable consequences.” My mother let out a sharp, derisive laugh. “Consequences? What could possibly happen? We gave her everything when she was a child. She was spoiled rotten. How could she not have enough happiness? She’s a sensible girl—it’s not like she’s going to kill herself over a few memories.” My father nodded, tapping his watch. “Stop wasting time. We planned for a hundred extractions to make it a perfect cycle. We want to ensure Piper never gets sick again.” 3 The proprietor shook his head and pulled out a silver instrument that looked like a vintage camera lens. This time, he didn’t pull the velvet curtain as he usually did. When the machine hummed to life, a soft blue light washed over me. But instead of the usual silent void, something went wrong. My memory didn’t just vanish. It projected. Images flickered into existence in the air, vivid and haunting, turning the dim shop into a theater of my past. The image showed a seven-year-old me standing at a muddy crossroads in the country. My mother was kneeling, wiping a smudge of dirt from my cheek. “Be a good girl, Wren,” her voice echoed from the projection, sounding younger, softer. “As soon as your father and I get settled in the city, we’ll come back for you.” My father was there too, ruffling my hair. “That’s right. And when we do, we’re going to make it up to you. We’ll give you twice as much love.” The car in the memory started its engine, kicking up a cloud of dust. The little girl in the image waved frantically, her tiny hand disappearing in the haze. You could hear my mother’s voice trailing off from the car window: “Remember, Wren! Mommy and Daddy love you forever!” The image froze there. In the real world, my mother pursed her lips and laughed. “I thought it was going to be something important. It’s just that? Why are we being so dramatic? Just take it and let’s go.” My father nodded in agreement. They had no idea that this single memory was the foundation of my entire existence. During those years in the country, my grandmother treated me like a burden, a “useless mouth to feed.” She woke me before dawn to shovel snow and feed the livestock. My hands were always mapped with bloody cracks from the cold. If I slowed down, her broom found my back. I spent every night crying under a thin blanket, replaying those words. Mommy and Daddy love you forever. That promise was my North Star. It was the only reason I survived. I thought that if I could just get back to them, the pain would stop. But as I watched the projection fade into static, something inside me snapped. I realized I had been waiting for a day that was never going to come. My mother reached out to grab my hand, a tired, fake smile on her face. “Come on, Wren. Be a good girl. Let’s go home.” I flinched, stepping back. Images began to flood my mind, unbidden. Me at the kitchen sink, hands numb from the freezing water. A plate slipping from my fingers and shattering. My mother rushing in, pushing me aside. “I don’t have a daughter this clumsy. You’re doing this on purpose just to spite me, aren’t you?” My father coming home, seeing the shards. “Don’t call me Dad. I’ve never seen anything so stupid. We waste our money feeding you and you can’t even do a simple dish?” The words were like needles in my brain. I clutched my head, sinking to my knees. “Stop it… please, just stop…” I whispered. “You aren’t my parents. You’re monsters.” 4 I turned and bolted for the door, pouring every ounce of my remaining strength into my legs. “Wren! Get back here!” my father roared. I didn’t get far. He caught me by the collar and slammed me against the brick wall of the alleyway. The impact knocked the wind out of me, and tears finally broke through. “Running? You think you can run?” he hissed. “Your sister is sick, and you’re out here playing these psychotic games to get attention! You ungrateful little bitch, saying we aren’t your parents?” My mother caught up, her face red and streaked with performative tears. Passersby began to slow down, whispering and pointing. “Look at that girl,” a woman muttered. “How can she treat her parents like that? They look devastated.” “Kids these days,” another man sighed. “So entitled. No respect for what their parents sacrifice.” I wanted to scream. I wanted to tell them I wasn’t acting. But my throat was constricted, my brain a chaotic storm of gray noise. My cheek burned where he’d slapped me, but my heart was a block of ice. Why was I always the one who was wrong? My father gripped my arm like a vice, dragging me toward the car. Just then, Piper came running over, clutching a Haagen-Dazs cone topped with sprinkles. As she reached us, her foot “tripped” on the uneven sidewalk. She lurched forward, intentionally slamming her weight into me. The cold, multicolored ice cream smeared across my chest, staining my shirt in a sticky, frozen mess. “Oops!” Piper squealed. The cone hit the ground, shattering into a puddle of sugary filth. My mother’s face transformed into a mask of fury. She shoved me—hard. I was already weak, my balance gone. I sprawled onto the concrete, the palms of my hands scraping raw against the gravel. “Wren! Are you blind?” my mother screamed. “Your sister’s leg is hurt and you’re still trying to sabotage her?” I sat there on the ground, staring at the stains on my shirt. The dam finally broke. “I didn’t… she ran into me…” My mother didn’t hear me. She knelt down with a cold, terrifying smile and scooped up the remains of the ice cream—the part covered in dirt and grit from the street. She grabbed my jaw, her fingers digging into my skin, and forced the filthy slush into my mouth. “You wanted a taste, didn’t you? You’ve been eyeing your sister’s things like a vulture since we got here. You don’t think you’re good enough for your own? Fine. Eat it!” “Eat it all!” she hissed, her hand clamped over my mouth. The ice cream was freezing, gritty with sand and tasting of road salt and bitterness. I tried to gag, to spit it out, but she held me tight. “Swallow it! Maybe you’ll remember this lesson!” My father stood by the car, leaning on the horn. “Enough, Sarah. Don’t waste your breath. Throw her in the car.” He looked at me, his eyes filled with nothing but loathing. “I’m warning you, Wren. When we get home, don’t you dare try that ‘depressed’ act again. If you really want to die so bad, go find a busy intersection and do it properly. Don’t die in my house and bring a curse on us.” I looked at him. I nodded slowly, the grit still grinding between my teeth. “Okay,” I said. Before they could react, before they could even reach for the door, I turned and sprinted directly into the flow of rushing traffic.
🌟 Continue the story here 👉🏻 📲 Download the “MotoNovel” app 🔍 search for “551324”, and watch the full series ✨! #MotoNovel
Leave a Reply