I Found Out I Was the Real Daughter Before the SAT So I Tanked It Chapter 08

I Found Out I Was the Real Daughter Before the SAT So I Tanked It Chapter 08

I tilted my head. “Besides, didn’t that backwoods bachelor uncle of mine die years ago? If I don’t

live off you, who else am I supposed to live off? You wouldn’t kick me out, would you? That would be

so embarrassing for you.”

Dad trembled with rage. “You-!”

At some point, Willa had come downstairs. She stood at the staircase with a worried expression. “Annalise, stop upsetting Mom and Dad. Just apologize…”

I turned to look at her. “Willa, you got an 840, and I got a 400. We’re basically in the same boat. The company can go to both of us someday, and we can support each other as sisters. Wouldn’t that be

nice?”

Mom screamed, “What does the company have to do with you? You’re not part of the Nolan family!

I stood, walked slowly to the door, and looked back at them. “Really? Then why didn’t you send me away sooner? Even a dog would become family after eighteen years, wouldn’t it? I’m at least a little better than a dog.”

I paused.

“Anyway, I’m hungry. I’m going to get something to eat. Everyone was too busy keeping up appearances earlier, and I didn’t even get a bite of hot food.”

I opened the door and walked out.

Behind me came Mom’s sobs and the sound of Dad smashing things.

I didn’t look back.

When I reached the corner of the hallway, I pushed up my sleeve.

On the inside of my arm, several pale old scars crossed over one another.

They were from ninth grade, after Willa brought a group of people to corner me in the bathroom, slap me, strip me, take photos, and record a video they threatened to post in the school group chat. After that, I broke down and cut myself with a box cutter.

I survived it.

But she didn’t stop.

She “accidentally” shoved me down the stairs, and I fractured my tailbone. I was bedridden for two

months.

She “accidentally” spilled boiling water across the back of my hand, leaving a scar.

Because I said one sentence to Landon, she turned around and stuffed a dead mouse into my

backpack.

Throughout high school, she “accidentally” threw the study guides I had painstakingly organized

into the bathtub or tossed them out the window dozens of times.

Every time she targeted me, and every time she hurt me, I said it had been an accident.

I didn’t dare tell Mom and Dad.

Because Willa would cry, and the second she cried, everyone believed her.

If I told the truth, all I got was, “Sisters should be understanding,” followed by an even harsher

punishment.

I looked at those marks and suddenly laughed.

So that was how it was. They would never truly bring themselves to do anything to their biological

child.

They would not actually send her away. They would not actually abandon her.

Yet because of that lie, I had lived in fear for ten years.

Ten years.