The Daughter They Charged for Love
Chapter 4
4: 4
The next morning, the house was all warmth again.
As if my scene the day before had rolled past without leaving a mark.
"Let's get a trip in before the semester starts."
My mother was already making plans.
"Toby, your government posting hasn't come through yet, right? Once you start working you'll be swamped, no time like now."
Toby and Renata both nodded.
"Five days, four nights. We'll get back just in time for you to check in at your dorm."
My mother glanced at me in the corner of the table, eating my plain oatmeal.
"Maya, it's thirty-nine hundred a person. You coming?"
I shook my head.
"I'll pass."
Any other time, no one would have thought twice about it.
After all, in all these years they'd never once taken me on their trips.
But this time Renata was watching me, something complicated in her eyes.
"Maybe we should bring Maya along this time... it's been so long since the whole family went anywhere together."
Toby chimed in.
"Yeah. I can cover half for her."
Mom and Dad glanced at the two of them and said nothing.
I set down my spoon.
"Thanks, but no. You all go ahead."
Another crack.
My father slammed the table.
"Someone offers to cover half and you still won't take it. You really are greedy!"
He looked at me sideways, like I was an enemy.
Renata spoke up in a small voice.
"I'll cover the other half for her too."
My father jabbed a finger at her.
"You see that? The whole family is bending over backward for you, and your sister has a hundred times more sense than you do!"
I kept shaking my head.
Tomorrow I was leaving to check in.
But of course I wasn't going to tell them.
"I have to work. It wasn't easy finding someone willing to take me on part-time. If I take time off, all that work is for nothing."
My mother's brow furrowed.
"It's almost semester time anyway. What difference does one week make? It's barely any money."
I looked at her steadily.
"Sixty a day, four-twenty for the week. Just enough for a used phone."
Toby and Renata both glanced down at the phone in my hand.
It was my mother's cast-off.
When she gave it to me, I'd signed an IOU for three hundred.
Three years of use later, the screen was cracked, and it took six or seven minutes just to turn on.
Renata pulled her old phone out of her bag.
"Maya, my old one still works. You can have it... no charge."
I looked at her and gave a small shake of my head.
"You've got sense, so I have to have some too. I don't dare take anything from this family for free."
Slap.
Another sharp sound.
This time it didn't land on the table. It landed on my face.
The blow knocked my head to the side.
My father's face was livid.
"How long are you going to keep up this attitude? Ever since we won the lottery you've been like this, this ugly, sulking thing!"
"I always knew it. You're an ungrateful animal we could never tame. The second there's money around you don't know your own family!"
My mother grabbed his hand quickly.
"Talk it out, don't hit her!"
He threw her hand off and left the table.
"If she wants to go, she pays her own way. Nobody's to spoil her!"
He went out to the balcony to smoke.
My mother glared at me.
"A perfectly good family trip, and you've killed the mood for everyone!"
I met her eyes.
"I always kill the mood, don't I?"
"You—!"
My mother's temper flared too, but she didn't raise a hand.
Renata jumped up, flustered, and gripped my mother's hand.
"Enough, enough, Mom, don't be angry."
She turned to me and dropped her voice.
"Maya, I'll cover it for you. Just don't tell Dad."
Then she headed toward my room.
"I'll help you pack. This time we're not leaving anyone out."
It hit me then.
My suitcase was open, my clothes and documents already packed inside.
"Don't touch my things!"
I ran to stop her.
Renata's hand was already on the suitcase, the zipper still undone.
"Maya, let me help you sort it out..."
She flipped the lid open.
"Don't!"
I lunged to stop her, but I wasn't fast enough.
A red college acceptance letter slid out through the gap in the zipper.
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