Chapter 2
Clarissa got the bedroom overlooking the garden. I got the room next to the garage, where the water heater rattled all night.
At fourteen, I started working at a bakery downtown, telling my parents I wanted spending money. The truth was I needed school supplies. Meanwhile, Clarissa's room filled with new clothes every season, and my mother called her "a reflection of our family's success." At sixteen, I bought a used Toyota Corolla with my own savings. Two years later, when Clarissa graduated with a 2.8 GPA against my 3.7, our parents surprised her with a brand-new Mazda. "She deserves it," Mom said. "She worked so hard."
I didn't hate my sister. I envied how easily she was loved.
By twenty-four, I'd graduated community college with a degree in restaurant management and landed my first real job as a prep cook downtown. Then Mom called. "Athena, it's an emergency. Your father lost his job. We can't make the mortgage."
"How much do you need?"
"Three thousand. Just for this month."
I wired it that day on a credit card I'd sworn never to touch. That month I lived on instant noodles. When I checked Facebook one night, I saw pictures of my parents at Red Lobster — endless shrimp platters, margaritas, smiles wide. "We deserved a night out!" Mom's caption read. Clarissa had posted too: "Spa day with Mom! Self-care before my birthday bash!"
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I told myself it was a one-time thing. But once you give freely to people who only take, they start to believe it's a rule, not a favor.
That happened four more times over the following six years. A car repair. A "temporary" loan for Clarissa's failed boutique idea that was never repaid. A roof replacement the same month Clarissa got a destination birthday trip to Cabo. Each time, I told myself it was the last. Each time, I was wrong, because saying no to my parents had never once, in thirty-two years, felt like an option that belonged to me.
