The Jealousy That Silenced Me

How could I ever hate Emma?

I just didn't get it. Why, when we were both our mother's daughters, was I the one she didn't love?

I didn't understand until I turned eighteen. She'd wanted a son, and my birth had been her last try. But when I came out a girl, her disappointment ran so deep, she let it turn to resentment.

From then on, my life was nothing but neglect and hurt. All because I wasn't the child she wanted. In her eyes, I'd ruined everything.

Emma got everything. I wore her hand-me-downs, used her leftovers. My allowance was half of hers, even in school.

I thought for years I just wasn't good enough. Then I came in first on a major exam.

That night, she burned my award certificate. "Are you trying to make Emma feel bad? Flaunting your grades when she didn't do well? How could I have raised such a selfish child?"

Emma had bombed that test, yet I was the one being punished.

It wasn't that I wasn't good enough—I'd never been the daughter my mother wanted.

And Emma? She just smirked. "Mom loves me best, no matter what you do."

Kids learn from what they see. Mom didn't like me, and Emma took it to heart.

She tormented me in secret. Even with every advantage, she still failed her college entrance exams. But I got accepted early to a top university because of a national science competition.

For the first time, I thought I could have a future. But just as I was about to move forward, Emma shoved me back.

She blinded me with a laser pointer.

"You really think you can compete with me? Just because you got accepted? That spot should've been mine," she said, laughing as I screamed, unable to stop the searing pain.

In the end, I lost sight in my right eye.

But my mother defended Emma. "Emma was just joking, and you're blowing it up? You're not totally blind—you can still go to college, can't you? What's there to fuss about? If you call the police, let them take me away."

The result? Emma was sent abroad to study, and the loss of my eye became just another "small issue."

I finally accepted my mother would never love me.

Even on the day I died, her last message was still on my phone: [If you have any decency, divorce Hector and let Emma have him.]

I stared at it, choking on smoke, my breath slipping away in that dark basement.

Three days after I went missing, Hector still hadn't looked for me. His whole world was Emma, glued to her side.

Emma had said she'd take back everything that was "hers."

But I had never touched anything of hers. She was the one who'd discarded Hector.

Once, she'd laughed, "Who'd have thought he'd become a billionaire? He was always meant to be mine; I'm only taking back what's mine."

I thought it was ridiculous and ignored her. But before I knew it, Hector started pulling away.

He hated when I touched his phone, wouldn't let me ask about his plans.

"Sienna, I told you I was on a business trip. Do you have to be so paranoid?"