My Family Made a Group Chat Without Me, I Rose Above Them Chapter 06

My Family Made a Group Chat Without Me, I Rose Above Them Chapter 06

On the afternoon of the third day, I went back to the house to collect the last of my things.

The door was unlocked. Ethan sat on the living–room sofa, with the divorce papers I’d signed spread across the table in front of him.

Leo was there too, clutching a toy as he sat beside Ethan.

“You ran off after that fight and stayed in a hotel alone. Leo thinks you don’t want him/anymore.

Ethan spoke first.

I ignored him, went into the bedroom, and pulled my clothes from the closet into my suitcase.

“Nora, can you listen to me for once?”

He followed me and leaned against the doorjamb. “We can get divorced. We’ll divide the property according to the law. But think carefully. You know what kind of work you’ve been doing these past few years. Without me and my family’s connections, what can someone with your limited abilities

even do?”

I kept folding clothes.

“Sophie deleted your core project file by accident. She said she didn’t know it was yours.”

“By accident?”

I turned to him. “Deleting a folder takes two confirmations. Emptying the recycle bin takes a third.”

He paused.

“She was trying to help. She thought they were obsolete files. At worst, I’ll have the company start

the project over and put you in charge.”

“I don’t want it.”

I zipped my suitcase and headed out.

Leo stood up and blocked me.

“Mom, where are you going?”

“Don’t call me Mom.”

Leo’s mouth puckered, and his eyes turned red.

Ethan’s face darkened at once.

“Why are you taking that tone with a child? He doesn’t know anything!”

“He doesn’t know anything? At the last parent–teacher conference, he said, ‘Good thing Aunt

Sophie was there, or everyone would’ve laughed at me for not having a mom.‘ Did you teach him to say that, or did he come up with it himself?”

Ethan didn’t answer.

He must have realized I was really leaving. Leo suddenly ran over and wrapped both arms around

my leg.

“Mom, don’t go. I won’t call Aunt Sophie Mom anymore. I’ll call you Mom, okay?”

He tipped his head back, tears sliding down his cheeks.

I looked down at him.

I knew he wasn’t afraid of losing me. He was afraid no one else would care for him as carefully as I

did.

Four years earlier, I’d given birth to him. After postpartum hemorrhaging left me in the ICU for three days, he was the first thing I saw when I woke up.

But day by day, his eyes and brows looked more like Sophie’s. I should have noticed long ago.

“Leo, let go.”

“No!”

Ethan walked over and lifted Leo into his arms. He glanced at me.

“Go. Don’t look back.”

I dragged my suitcase out the door.

At seven that night, the jet landed at a private airstrip outside the city.

As I carried my suitcase onto the plane, a message came through on my phone.

It was from Mom. There was only one line.

“Nora, at the hospital all those years ago, Marlene Hart deliberately switched the babies while the nurses changed shifts. We caught her later, but she got on her knees and begged me not to call the police. She said Sophie was innocent too, and I lost my nerve. I’m sorry, Nora.”

I stared at the screen for five seconds, then put my phone on airplane mode.

The plane took off. The city lights outside the window slowly shrank into scattered gold.

I closed my eyes. The cut on the back of my head pressed painfully against the pillow, but I didn’t

move.

Three days later, I deactivated every social–media account I’d kept back home.

Nora Bennett disappeared from everyone’s world.

A month later, the client suddenly terminated a three–year master agreement with Ethan’s

company.

The official reason was “strategic realignment,” but the story making the rounds in the industry

was this:

The project’s core technical plan was shockingly similar to a proposal submitted by a newly founded company overseas. Its CTO was an American woman named Nora Bennett.

Half a month later, Ethan discovered a serious flaw in his company’s core algorithm. Nora, who had already left the company, was the only person authorized to patch it.

He called the disconnected number again and again.

It didn’t go through.

At the same time, Sophie received a court summons.

She was being investigated for the intentional destruction of company property. The victim was the owner of the original core project files.

The day the investigation was opened, Marlene Hart cornered Mom outside her apartment building.

“Your daughter is suing my daughter. Go talk to her!”

Mom said nothing. She shut the door.

That night, she dug out a faded family photograph from under her bed.

It showed two new mothers sitting side by side, each holding a swaddled newborn, with a nurse standing between them.

She turned it over. A line had been written on the back in ballpoint pen years ago.

“Marlene insisted we switch babies for a moment, just to share the good luck.”

She stared at the line for a long time.

Then she cried.

It was the first time she’d cried since Nora left.

But she would never reach Nora again. The number was disconnected, the messages were deleted, and every way of contacting her was gone.

She finally understood. She had given her biological daughter away with her own hands.

Marlene had taken Nora away from her once, twenty years ago. Five years ago, Mom had driven her

away herself.

She had made the same mistake twice.

That night, Leo had a dream.

He dreamed Mom stood at the door with her suitcase. He ran over and hugged her leg. She looked down and smiled. “Be good, Leo. Mom’s going to buy some candy.”

Then she left and never came back.

He woke with his pillow soaked.

He rolled over and pushed Ethan.

“Dad, when is Mom coming back?”

Ethan didn’t open his eyes.

“She’s not coming back.”

“What about Aunt Sophie?”

“She’s not coming back either.”

Moonlight poured through the window and lay cold across the floor.

Ethan turned over, the back of his head against the pillow, and remembered the words he’d spoken

when he signed the divorce papers a month earlier: “This is the last time.” He had thought Nora

would cry, make a scene, and beg him to take it back.

She had done none of that.

She had simply left.

He picked up his phone and dialed that number again.

Not in service.