17 Years of Empty Draws: The Neglected Triplet Never Forgives Chapter 05

17 Years of Empty Draws: The Neglected Triplet Never Forgives Chapter 05

The room was empty. The clothes hanging on the rack and my old suitcase were gone.

Only the trash can beside the table remained, filled with all the “birthday gifts” they’d given me over the years.

“Celestine ran off?” Mom said, turning to Dad.

“Her temper’s gotten worse and worse. Leave her alone. Let her tough it out for a few days, and she’ll come crawling back to us begging for forgiveness.”

Dad’s tone was utterly indifferent.

One week passed.

My parents took Maren and Aurelia to buy everything they needed for school.

Two weeks went by. They finally sensed something was wrong and decided to call me.

Mom dialed my number, only to hear the cold message saying it was no longer in service.

Dad, Maren, Aurelia and Soren tried calling too, and got the same result every time.

At last, all of them turned to look at Soren.

Back then, I always replied to Soren’s messages right away.

He pulled out his phone and tapped on my profile picture.

His fingers froze. He suddenly remembered he had blocked me that day.

A bad feeling washed over him.

Soren rushed to the storage room and spotted the IV paperwork for acute allergies inside the trash can.

The star charm he’d given me lay right next to it.

I had treasured that charm all this time and never let it get scratched.

He clutched the two items tightly, and his heart twisting.

“So…where exactly did she go?”

Nobody answered.

Maren stepped forward.

“Maybe we can reach out to Celestine’s old teachers and ask where she went?”

“That’s right!”

But she scrolled through her contacts and found no numbers for any teachers from West Ridge.

She had never saved any of them over those three years.

In the end, she asked several Pack neighbors and finally got Mr. Hadrian’s number.

“Mr. Hadrian, has Celestine gotten in touch with you lately? Which community college did she sign up for?”

Mr. Hadrian’s voice rang with shock.

“Are you her parent?”

“Yes, I’m her mom. She had a small fight with the family recently, and we can’t reach her.”

“She was one of the few female werewolves who earned an S-rank this year. She received an offer from Royal Evergreen Academy a long time ago.”

“They also gave her a full scholarship. Celestine is an excellent student. She not only broke our school’s academic record, but also shared her notes for free.”

“On the nineteenth, she came to pick up her acceptance letter. I wanted her to stay for lunch, but she said the family was busy with the college send-off party. She thought it was for her.”

Mr. Hadrian kept talking, but Mom couldn’t hear a single word.

“S-rank, Royal Evergreen Academy, full scholarship, top student notes.”

She simply couldn’t link those dazzling titles to the overlooked girl who faded into the background at home.

The call ended, and Mom’s strength left her. She slumped down onto the floor.

She suddenly remembered how I’d rushed over on the day of the college send-off party, only for her to berate me harshly in front of all the relatives.

She also recalled the time I tried desperately to explain I was just lending notes to an underclassman, yet she mocked me and crushed my hair clip under her foot.

Her chest felt tight, and sharp twinges of pain shot through her heart.

Soren stared blankly at the star charm in his hand.

“It can’t be. How could Celestine get into Royal Evergreen Academy? And with an S-rating.”

Aurelia’s voice cut through the air out of nowhere.

But no one replied to her this time.

Dad silently pushed open the balcony door and lit a cigarette. Smoke shrouded his face.

The joy from the family’s recent concert trip vanished in an instant.

A few days later, Royal Evergreen Academy released that year’s full-scholarship cohort list.

Celestine’s name stood plainly among them.

News quickly spread back to Northvale, and Pack relatives and friends started stopping by one after another.

“Celestine is amazing. She pulled off grades like that even at a rough school like West Ridge.”

“When she comes home for break, can she tutor my kid?”

The smiles on my parents’ faces looked painfully forced.

They used to brag to everyone about how bright Maren and Aurelia were, how effortlessly they excelled.

They told anyone who listened that I had bad grades and was rebellious and ungrateful.

Now those words had turned into a joke.

What shocked them even more was that the source of the anonymous photo on the forum was traced soon after.

It was Aurelia.

That night, Mom hit her for the first time.

“Aurelia, I overlooked your little pranks before. How could you ruin Celestine’s reputation like this?”

Aurelia shot back without remorse.

“Didn’t you always say Celestine doesn’t look like you or Dad at all. You just can’t bring yourselves to care about her.”

Aurelia’s words stabbed my parents like needles.

The pain was there, yet neither of them could utter a single word.

Dad finally thought about how hard he’d slapped my face that day.

Soren froze outside the door and heard every word of their conversation inside.

His earlier line that I “had a bad character and deserved my parents’ coldness” replayed over and over in his head.

After that day, he never came to the Veyne house again.

No matter how many messages Aurelia sent him, he never replied.

That night, Dad turned his head toward Mom.

“Did we really do everything wrong?”

Mom wiped the tears streaming down her cheeks and said nothing.