Two Thousand Kilometers South, Away From Everyone I Loved Chapter 08

Two Thousand Kilometers South, Away From Everyone I Loved Chapter 08

News of Lucas’s failure in Miami quickly traveled back home. But it didn’t spark much reflection.

Because something far more explosive had erupted up in Chicago.

Anna had been caught in an egregious case of academic misconduct during her prep school finals.

She hadn’t just plagiarized a classmate’s design draft-she’d also paid someone else to build her

model for her. When she was exposed, she threw a massive tantrum in the office and physically

shoved her pregnant instructor to the ground.

Northwestern issued an immediate expulsion and a public campus-wide condemnation. On top of

that, the instructor was pressing criminal charges for assault.

The pride they had once held up to the sky had, in an instant, become the family’s deepest disgrace.

My parents and Leo completely panicked. They called in every favor, knocked on every door, tried

every connection they could think of—and hit a dead end every single time. With absolutely no options left, they finally thought of me. The biological daughter who had ranked first in her major

down at the Miami campus.

Two days later, my parents and Leo showed up, travel-worn and haggard, at a café across the street from my university. My advisor had called to tell me that family members were looking for me, and

I went only because I had to.

Three months apart, and they looked like they’d aged ten years. My mother’s hair was a disheveled mess, her eyes red and swollen. Leo had none of his old confidence and swagger. He just looked

utterly defeated.

The moment she saw me walking over, my mother shot to her feet and grabbed my hand in a death grip. “Stella, you have to help your sister! She’s still so young-she didn’t know what she was doing. You know so many professors up at Northwestern. Can’t you go plead her case for her? Please! She can’t be expelled!”

I pulled my hand back coldly, took out a tissue, and wiped the spot where she had touched me. “I’m

just a freshman. I don’t have that kind of power.”

Leo slammed his hand on the table in frustration. “Stella, stop playing dead! That instructor who

got pushed-she used to coach you in that summer intensive. She absolutely loved you. Go apologize to her and take the blame for Anna! Just shoulder it!”

I looked at Leo’s self-righteous face and couldn’t help but laugh out loud. “Take the blame for her? Leo, have you all completely lost your minds? She broke the law. She committed academic fraud.

And you want me to go take the fall for her crimes?”

My father, who had been silent the entire time, finally spoke, his face grim and dark. “Stella, we’re family. We don’t talk like strangers. If Anna is ruined, this entire family is ruined. You’ve always been the sensible one. This once-your father is begging you. Just bend a little and endure this one

injustice.”

“Bend?” The smile vanished from my face. My eyes turned to ice.

I pulled out my phone and tapped on an audio recording. It was a file I had recorded standing outside my parents’ bedroom door on the day the exam results were released.

My mother’s voice rang out with perfect clarity from the speaker: “With scores that high, Anna’s a lock for the Northwestern main campus. Stella scored so much lower–the prep program is her only path. Once Stella gets there, she can take care of Anna. Have her give all her scholarship money to Anna. Stella’s tough anyway. A little hardship won’t kill her.’

The recording ended. The café was so silent you could hear a pin drop. My parents’ faces had drained of all color, turned deathly white.

“From the very moment you booked those flights to Chicago,” I said, rising to my feet and looking down at them from above, “I no longer had a family. Anna is the way she is because you spoiled her rotten. You brewed this poison yourselves. Now drink it. Don’t ever come looking for me again.”

I turned and walked away. Behind me, my mother’s hysterical sobs and Leo’s furious curses faded into the background. I didn’t look back. My steps were firm and steady, walking straight toward the light that belonged to me.