The Season I Left You Behind

This time, I'm not waiting for you.

Inside the mansion, Sheila was trying on the wedding gown.

She rose onto her toes and turned in a slow, graceful circle.

I thought of the intimate photos she'd sent me.

"Sister, you trained Stanley so beautifully. I'm very pleased with him."

Rhys watched her with open indulgence, and Stanley turned his head to warn me. "Sheila's in a good mood today. Smile. Stop sitting there with that face."

I didn't answer. I just stared down at the bloodstained hem in the trash can.

Sheila gasped and stumbled back into Stanley's arms.

Her eyes brimmed with tears. "I'm so sorry, sister. Fluffy got hurt, and I used your dance dress by accident. You won't be angry with me, will you?"

My dance dress hung at the very back of the closet. It must have taken real effort to use it by accident.

Stanley brushed the tip of her nose, his voice soft with affection.

"She doesn't even have her leg anymore. What does she need a dance dress for? Everything she owns belongs to the Masons. It all belongs to you, little princess."

"Eudora. Smile. Don't upset Sheila."

I said nothing. I wheeled myself over to the trash can and, with difficulty, dug the dance dress back out.

Rhys's jaw tightened, and the words came out flat with impatience.

"Can you not fight Sheila over every single thing? You don't even have a leg, and you're still thinking about dresses, still competing with her? Her depression just lifted, the first thing she wanted was to bring you home from the hospital, and all you know how to do is fight with her!"

I lifted the dance dress with effort and held it out to Rhys.

"That's not it, brother. I only wanted to return it to its owner."

Rhys froze. He remembered. This dance dress was the one he'd given Eudora the year she turned eighteen.

Their mother had died young. From the time he was ten, it had been just him and his little sister, leaning on each other to survive. Their father had poured his whole heart into his mistress, and would have been glad to see his son dead, to clear the way for the bastard child.

They hadn't dared hire a nanny. Eudora was three years younger, a scrap of a thing who stood at the stove every morning to make his breakfast. She quit her dance lessons. On the way to school she held his hand tight, terrified of watching their father put him in the hospital again.

Back then he'd sworn that when he grew up, he would buy his sister a new dance dress every year, and that in her graduation year he would watch her shine on a stage.

I spoke calmly. "Mr. Mason, since this dress was your gift to your sister, I don't want it anymore."

And neither do I want you for a brother.

Rhys frowned. He took a step toward me.

"What did you just call me? Mr. Mason?"

Sheila suddenly shrieked.

"Blood! No! Get it away from me!" Her hands flailed wildly, and Stanley pulled her against him, frantic, murmuring to soothe her.

Rhys flew into a rage. He slapped the dress out of my hands, hard enough that my wheelchair tilted sideways.

"Enough! So this is what you were scheming! I already told you, Sheila coming back changes nothing for you, so why can't you make room for her!"

Sheila hiccuped through her sobs, and then her eyes rolled back and she fainted.

"Sheila!"

Rhys lunged forward and knocked my wheelchair over.

I hit the floor hard.

"Doctor! Doctor!"

The two men carried Sheila off in a rush.

The mansion went quiet.

I thought, all at once, of the year I was ten, the year my father staged a car crash. He meant to kill Rhys, and I shoved him out of the way.

When I went down on the road, the boy came tearing toward me like he'd lost his mind.

His own arm was broken, and still he tried to lift me, again and again, and when he failed he sobbed like something was being ripped out of him, slamming his head against the pavement toward the crowd. "Please, I'm begging you, take my sister to the hospital! She can't die, she's all I have..."

It became a huge scandal. Eventually it made the local news, and our father was arrested and sent to prison, and only then did we escape those days of living in fear.