I Drew the Blank Straw for Eighteen Years Chapter 05

I Drew the Blank Straw for Eighteen Years Chapter 05

Vivienne spoke up.

“Maybe we should call her homeroom teacher first?”

Mom scrolled through her contacts and couldn’t find the number-she’d never bothered saving it.

After a lot of asking around, she finally tracked it down.

She dialed, hands unsteady, and put it on speaker.

“Ms. Bennett, has Wren reached out to you recently? Which community college did she end up going to?”

The teacher’s voice was full of shock.

“You’re Wren’s parent?”

“Yes, I’m her mother. She’s had some kind of falling out with us, and we can’t reach her.”

“Wren was the top scorer in the state this year, in the science track. She had offers from both Elmhurst and Ashcombe-she chose Ashcombe.”

“Ashcombe?” Mom’s face went blank with disbelief.

“That’s right. Ashcombe gave her a full-ride scholarship, too. Wren’s an outstanding student-not only did she set our school’s record, she gave away her own study, notes for free, no charge at all.”

“It was the nineteenth, actually. She came by to pick up her acceptance letter. I offered to take her to lunch, but she said the family was busy planning the send-off party-I thought it was all for her.”

The teacher kept talking. Mom stopped hearing a word of it.

Top scorer. Ashcombe. Full-ride scholarship. Notes other students borrowed.

She couldn’t reconcile those glittering words with the invisible girl who’d never mattered in her own house.

The call ended. Mom’s legs gave out.

She sank onto the floor.

That’s when it hit her-the send-off party, the day I’d rushed there, only to be publicly torn down in front of

relatives.

And that other time, when I’d tried desperately to explain the notes, and she’d sneered that a community-college girl had no business sharing notes with anyone-right before crushing my new hair clip

underfoot.

Something in her chest twisted, over and over.

Julian stated blankly at the star pendant in his hand.

“That’s impossible. How could Wren’s grades get her into Ashcombe-let alone as the top scorer?”

Marielle’s voice cut in abruptly.

No one answered her this time.

Dad silently pushed open the door to the porch, lit a cigarette.”

Smoke curled around his face.

Whatever joy they’d had had been snuffed out instantly.

Later, the high school posted its list of top acceptances.

Relatives chatted with my parents.

“Wren really did well. No tutors, no extras, went to a school like Fairview, and still came out on top.”

“When she’s home for break, she should tutor the younger cousins a bit.”

Mom and Dad’s smiles were painfully forced.

They used to brag to everyone about how brilliant Vivienne and Marielle were, how little they had to worry.

And about me-the story was always that I did badly in school, that I was difficult, ungrateful.

It came out, eventually, that Marielle had been the one who posted the photo of me and the boy in the group

chat, captioned with all that venom.

Mom hit her for the first time in her life.

“Marielle, your usual little tantrums are one thing. But you’d go and destroy your own sister’s reputation?”

Marielle shot back, unrepentant.

“Wasn’t it you who said it? Said she doesn’t look like you or Dad at all. Said you couldn’t bring yourselves to

like her one bit.”

Her words landed like a needle in Mom and Dad’s chest-painful, but there was nothing to say.

Dad finally remembered how hard those two slaps had landed on my face that day.

Julian stood frozen outside the door, hearing every word of it clearly.

That line-[No wonder that out of all three of you, you’re the one your parents never doted on. Guess you

had it coming.]—kept exploding over and over in his head.

After that, he stopped coming around the house.

No matter how many Inessages Marielle sent him, he never answered a single one.

That night, Dad turned to look at Mom.

“Did we actually get this wrong?”

Mom wiped away the tears that kept spilling from the corners of her eyes.

She didn’t answer.