They Poisoned My Voice So She Could Steal My Future, Not Knowing I Already Chose a Different One Chapter 01

They Poisoned My Voice So She Could Steal My Future, Not Knowing I Already Chose a Different One Chapter 01

After I spent three years repeating senior year just to get into Blackwood University, my parents injected me with veterinary-grade lidocaine to take away my voice.

My mother held me, sobbing, “Don’t blame us for this. Only if you’re mute can we make sure no one finds out Sophia is taking your place.”

I stared at them in disbelief.

My father sighed. “Your fiancé will be here soon with his pickup. He didn’t want a thing from us, just a young, obedient wife who can’t speak.”

My mother cried even harder. “Can’t we wait a couple of days? She’s only twenty.”

My father’s voice was ice cold. “Every extra day she stays is another day of risk.”

My sister, Sophia, crouched beside me and gently wiped my tears. “Don’t blame me, Emily. You shouldn’t have grabbed my My Little Pony when we were kids.”

But they didn’t know. I never applied to Blackwood University.

I applied to Fort Morrison Federal Academy, a school with intense background checks, where enrollment requires fingerprint and iris scans.

…

The so-called fiancé arrived on time. He looked me up and down. “Pretty face, but those eyes are too fierce. She’ll be hard to tame up in the holler.”

My father sighed. “She’s still our daughter. She’s obedient. Don’t beat her too much.”

I struggled wildly, but my throat only produced strange, rasping sounds.

My mother stood to the side, her shoulders shaking. “Don’t blame me for being cruel, Emily.”

“When you were little, a psychic at the county fair said you were smart but had no luck. The only way our family can be happy is if you live a poor, hard life.”

She tucked a St. Christopher medal inside my collar as she spoke. “Go on and have a good life over there. Give your new husband a big healthy boy soon.”

I vaguely remembered, as a child with a high fever, she would drive to a distant church for a holy medal.

She would wipe my burning body and press the medal to my chest, whispering, “Emily will be okay.”

But now… I turned my head away, dodging her hand.

The medal fell to the ground, landing in the mud.

Buck Higgins snorted and stomped on the medal. “Alright, enough of this mother-daughter act. The truck’s waiting at the crossroads.”

Sophia walked out from the back room. She was wearing my new sundress, the one I’d saved up three months of diner tips to buy, and holding my driver’s license.

“Hey Emily, the waist on this dress is a little big. I’ll get it tailored tomorrow.” She smiled sweetly, as if she didn’t have a cruel bone in her body.

“I’ve never seen an acceptance letter from Blackwood before. It’s so simple, just the campus address. When I get to the city, I’ll send you lots of pictures.”

She then covered her mouth in a mock gasp. “Oh, I forgot. There’s no cell service up in the mountains. You won’t even have a phone.”

Buck yanked me forward. I stumbled, instinctively looking back at my parents.

Just because of a fortune-teller’s prediction, I was the sacrifice.

The poorer and more miserable my life, the happier they would be. For this ridiculous idea, my own parents would sell me to a man in the mountains, destroy my future, and force me to have his children.

My chest felt like it was being crushed by a giant hand, and I was blinded by tears.