I Was the One They Were Willing to Lose Chapter 08

I Was the One They Were Willing to Lose Chapter 08

Before winter break, the observation project I was working on hit a milestone.

My advisor listed my name in the report and recommended me for the following year’s

undergraduate research program.

When the news hit the family group chat, Mom sent a string of congratulations emojis.

Even Dad, rarely one to call, phoned to say he wanted to throw a party for me.

After the divorce, Dad had started a new family pretty quickly.

Over the years, he’d occasionally send living expenses but rarely asked about my life.

Now that I’d landed a major research spot, he suddenly remembered he had a daughter worth being proud of.

I turned down the party. I didn’t go home for the holidays either.

Mom asked if I was still angry at her. I told her the winter observation project was short-staffed.

It wasn’t an excuse.

Compared to going back to that house full of old memories, I’d rather stay at the freezing observation station.

Christmas Eve, down the mountain, decorated trees glowed with tiny, twinkling lights. A few of us who’d stayed on campus had turkey together.

Josie put a drumstick into my bowl.

“Everyone else is fighting over the meat and you’re just eating potatoes the whole time. Don’t be polite, we made plenty.”

I paused, then took a bite of the drumstick.

Back when the five of us used to eat turkey together, Poppy couldn’t handle spice, so the turkey was never brushed with chili sauce.

She liked drumstick, so Beckett would would save them all for her. Julian remembered she didn’t eat cilantro. Griffin remembered cold drinks upset her stomach.

And what I liked-that was something they never once seemed to ask.

Turns out being remembered doesn’t take years and years of history.

The people who actually care about you will see you in no time at all.

Amidnight, my phone filled up with messages. Griffin sent one too.

[Merry Christmas.]

[We didn’t have turkey together this year. It felt strange for everyone.]

I didn’t reply.

Half an hour later, he sent a photo.

Three of them, standing in the alley where we used to play. An empty space between them.

Poppy wasn’t in it.

Later, I heard from Mom that Beckett had dug back up the whole graduation trip video thing.

Poppy had initially insisted it was just a typo. Then Julian recovered a draft she’d deleted.

The original had clearly read: [Finally, it’s just the four of us.]

No misunderstanding. No slip of the thumb.

She’d wanted me gone the whole time.

Even the second round of the Sync Game had been something she’d set up in advance.

She knew the three boys would pick me–because before the game even started, she’d asked each of them privately: “If Wren doesn’t want to stay local, will you still stay with me?”

They’d all said yes.

So she’d deliberately asked that question in front of everyone, just to watch me get left behind, up

close.

When Mom told me all this, her voice was full of anger.

“We were all fooled by her.”

I just found it funny, once she’d finished.

“She didn’t force any of you to treat me badly.”

Mom went silent.

Poppy had absolutely been stirring the pot. But it was Mom who’d offered up my room on her own.

It was Griffin who’d taken my money without asking. It was Julian who’d assigned me the storage closet. And the cards with my name on them had been held in all three of their hands.

Poppy was at fault. But she wasn’t the whole reason they hurt me:

They were rushing to pin all the blame on her because it made their own guilt easier to carry.

“Wren, she’s already moved out.”

“Beckett and the others aren’t speaking to her anymore either.”

“If you’re willing to come back, everything can go back to how it was.”

Back to how it was, again.

Like all it took was removing Poppy, and I’d happily slot myself back in among them.

But what actually broke wasn’t the five of us as a group.

It was every bit of trust I had in them.

“Mom, I’m not coming back.”

“Then what do you want us to do?”

Her voice cracked.

looked at the Christmas tree outside the window and said calmly: “Nothing. There’s nothing to do.”

“Just accept that I won’t be close to you all anymore-the same way I had to accept that you all

loved her more.”

After I hung up, I opened the lab door. Fireworks lit up the whole sky above me.

Josie stood in the snow, waving me over. Desmond handed me a lit sparkler.

“Make a wish.”

I closed my eyes.

This time, my wish had no one from my old life in it.