When the college admissions results came out, the fake heiress—who had coasted through high school on cheating and excuses—was finally exposed. She bombed her SATs, scoring in the lowest possible percentile. My parents and brother took turns comforting her, insisting it was just a temporary setback. They promised to take her on a European vacation to cheer her up. No one cared how I did. My mother even confiscated my phone so I couldn't check my own scores. At the dinner table, my father spoke, his tone leaving no room for argument: "I've already pulled some strings and enrolled you both in an elite college prep program for a gap year. You'll go with Mia. It'll be good for her to have someone looking out for her." My brother, Ashton, chimed in without even glancing my way: "You're grounded for the time being. We're locking up your tablet and laptop so you don't do anything stupid like applying to some community college on impulse." "We're converting your bedroom into Mia's new art studio," he continued. "For the next two months, you can sleep in the attic. You'll be living in a dorm when the prep school starts anyway." I didn't argue. I just nodded quietly. "Okay. Have a good trip." My early admission acceptance letter from MIT was already locked safely inside my desk drawer. As for this family? I had already prepared myself to throw them away, too. 1 Ashton seemed taken aback by how readily I agreed. But soon enough, that familiar, entitled arrogance returned to his face. "Glad you finally learned how to be sensible." He looked away, his tone returning to its usual airy indifference. "Hurry up and clear your stuff out of the room. If it's in the housekeeper's way when she cleans, it's going in the trash. Don't say I didn't warn you." I kept my head down, poking at the food on my plate, and gave a soft "Okay." At that moment, Mia looked up, her eyes rimmed with red. "Ashton, let's just leave the room for Chloe. I scored so badly... I'm too embarrassed to even pick up a paintbrush right now..." "Mia!" my mother immediately interrupted. "Don't talk about yourself like that. You usually get such good grades. You just had a bad case of test anxiety, that's all." "Besides, so what if your scores aren't perfect? You've been talented since you were a little girl. Your paintings are beautiful. We'll fund a private gallery exhibition for you. That'll look great on your college applications next year!" My father set down his wine glass and offered a warm, comforting smile. "Your mother is right, Mia. Don't overthink it. Your brother made a good point. I had to call in a lot of favors to get you into this prep program. Next year, you'll get into a top-tier school, no problem." Mia lowered her head. Her shoulders trembled slightly, as if she were too moved to speak. But a second later, she looked up timidly, hesitating. "But... Chloe hasn't checked her scores yet. What if she did really well? I'd feel terrible dragging her down to do a gap year with me." I raised my eyelids and gave her a look. I knew exactly what she was waiting for. She was waiting for me to clumsily explain, like I had a hundred times before, that "I don't mind" and "Mia's future is more important." Or, if I were stupider, I'd go check the score they specifically forbade me from checking, only to be reprimanded again for "ruining Mia's mood." But this time, I didn't say a word. Sure enough, when I didn't take the bait, nobody expected me to anyway. Ashton scoffed, immediately picking up where Mia left off. "Mia, why would you even worry about that?" "How high of a score could someone who grew up in the sticks possibly get? The only reason she's getting into that elite prep program next year is because she's riding your coattails." He said it with such absolute certainty. My father didn't correct him. Neither did my mother. None of them even glanced at me. It was as if Ashton wasn't hurling insults, but simply stating a universal fact. Everyone in this house subconsciously looked down on me. Even though I had expected it, hearing those words come out of their mouths still caused a dull ache in my chest. The dining table became lively again. My mother started planning the itinerary for their European tour. My father promised to buy Mia a diamond necklace she'd been eyeing in Paris, while Ashton smilingly suggested they hit up the art galleries in London first. I put down my silverware, the food tasting like ash in my mouth. "I'm full," I said softly. No one responded. It wasn't until I stood up to leave that Ashton finally shot me an impatient look. "Don't forget to pack up your room." I nodded and headed for the stairs. Behind me, I heard Mia's tearful voice. "Do you think Chloe is mad at me...?" Followed by my mother's gentle cooing. "Of course not, sweetheart. Your sister is the most sensible girl in the world." "Now, now, let's not dwell on this. Tomorrow, Mom will take you to buy that designer bag you've been wanting. How does that sound?" Sensible. I had heard that word for eighteen years. At my foster parents' house, being "sensible" meant getting beaten without fighting back, getting cursed at without talking back. After returning to this biological family, being "sensible" meant stepping aside and giving everything to Mia, whose world had supposedly been "turned upside down." As I walked up the stairs, I heard Ashton say, "Oh, right, Mia, didn't you say you wanted to learn horseback riding? I have a buddy with an equestrian estate in Switzerland. I'll take you..." The voices faded away. I pushed open the door to my room and looked around. There really wasn't much to pack. After all, most of the things in this room had never truly belonged to me. 2 I opened the closet. Inside hung a few plain, modest outfits the family had hastily bought for me when I was first brought back. The tags were off, but they were already out of style. Meanwhile, Mia's walk-in closet was lined wall-to-wall with designer brands and custom pieces. I opened my desk drawer and pulled out a small tin box hidden at the very bottom. Inside was a yellowed slip of paper with the name Chloe written on it in crooked handwriting. It was the only memento I had from my past life. Memories flooded my mind like an uncontrollable tide. When I was seven, my foster father whipped my back with a leather belt because I accidentally burned the oatmeal on the stove. I knelt in the snow, my lips purple from the cold, while my foster mother chewed sunflower seeds and spat the shells at me. "Worthless trash. Can't even do one simple chore. We should have left you in a ditch!" When I was twelve, I became the valedictorian of my rural middle school. My foster father tore my high school acceptance letter to shreds. "School? What do you need school for? What good is a girl reading books? In two years, we're marrying you off to the mechanic's idiot son down the road!" When I was fifteen, my real parents stormed into that dilapidated house with the police. While my foster parents were pinned to the floor, I was still cowering behind the woodstove, shivering. A woman, impeccably dressed but with her makeup ruined by tears, lunged forward and hugged me, her voice hoarse. "My daughter! This is my daughter!" That was the day I learned I wasn't their child. My biological mother had gone into premature labor while on a road trip, forcing her to deliver at a small, underfunded rural clinic. My foster mother, who shared the maternity ward, was so jealous of the Sterling family's obvious wealth that she deliberately swapped the babies. She placed her own healthy daughter into the Sterling family's bassinet and took the premature, fragile me back to her life of poverty. The day I was brought back to the Sterling estate, Mia cried until she passed out three times. Ashton held her, his eyes red, screaming at my parents. "Mia is a victim too! She didn't know anything! Are you really going to kick her out?!" My mother wept. "Mia is innocent..." My father sighed. "We've lived together for fifteen years, Chloe. Try to understand. Right now, Mia has nothing in the world but us." Watching the four of them hold each other and cry, I suddenly felt like I was the intruder breaking into someone else's home. They all promised to make it up to me. But when I actually moved in, I realized "making it up to me" meant giving me a bedroom, feeding me, and sending me to school. The love? That belonged exclusively to Mia. She was still the beloved Sterling heiress. I was just the daughter they dragged back from the sticks. At my first family dinner, I didn't know the proper etiquette for a multi-course meal and used the wrong fork. Mia gently corrected me, but the disdain in her eyes was impossible to hide. Ashton scoffed right at the table. "You can take the girl out of the trailer park..." My mother said softly, "You'll learn eventually." But then she turned and put a piece of premium steak on Mia's plate. "Eat more, Mia. You've lost weight these past few days." On my first mid-term exams, I ranked first in the entire grade. Mia scored in the dead middle. When we got home, she locked herself in her room and cried. Ashton banged on my door, his tone freezing. "Could you try keeping a low profile? Did you really have to trigger Mia like that?" My mother came to me too. "Chloe, next time there's an exam, could you maybe hold back a little? Mia is under a lot of psychological stress lately." I agreed. On the next set of exams, I purposely skipped two subjects. My rank plummeted. Mia cheated her way into the Top 50. The whole family threw a celebration for her. My father even bought her a designer watch. No one noticed my drop in grades. Or rather, no one cared. 3 During my junior year, I won a gold medal at the National Physics Olympiad, which qualified me for a highly exclusive summer STEM camp at MIT. Mia wanted to go too, but her grades weren't anywhere near the cutoff. My mother tried to persuade me. "Chloe, why don't you give your spot to her? You'll have plenty of other opportunities in the future." That was the first time I ever said no. Ashton slammed his silverware down on the table. "Why are you so selfish?! Can't you see Mia is crying?" In the end, I went to the camp. But during those seven days, not a single person from my family called me. When I came back, I found my gold medal shattered on the floor. "I'm so sorry, Sister," Mia said, blinking her innocent eyes. "I just wanted to look at it, and it slipped out of my hands. But you'll win more medals like this in the future anyway, right?" I didn't say a word. I just quietly swept up the broken pieces of my medal and locked them in my drawer, much like how I locked away the shattered pieces of my heart. Similar things happened countless times over those three years. Every time, they would say: "Mia didn't do it on purpose." "You're the biological daughter, you should be the bigger person." "You've endured hardship, so you're tougher. We spoiled Mia growing up, she's fragile." I gradually realized that if something doesn't belong to you, it will never belong to you. Blood might have brought me back to this house, but a fifteen-year gap could never compete with fifteen years of shared memories. I started studying like my life depended on it. I entered every competition I could find and took home every award. Because I knew this was my only way out. Three months before the SATs, the admissions office at MIT contacted me secretly. I was locked in for the Apex Scholars Program. It was a guaranteed full-ride early admission. I signed a non-disclosure agreement; not even my high school guidance counselor knew. When the official acceptance letter arrived at my school, I quietly brought it home and locked it in the deepest part of my drawer. I wanted to wait until the final exams were over to give them a surprise. I thought, maybe then, they'll finally see me. Looking back now, it was laughable. If they didn't even care about me, why would they care about an acceptance letter? Now, to soothe Mia's ego, the family was rushing off on a European vacation. It wasn't until they were packing that they realized they had completely "forgotten" to book a ticket for me. My mother coughed awkwardly and instructed me: "Stay here and look after the house. Don't touch anything you shouldn't. The housekeeper took the week off, so you'll have to figure out your own meals." She didn't even ask if I had any money on me. Ashton threw a stack of prep-school brochures at me, telling me to get a head start on studying since they weren't taking me with them. I watched in silence as their luxury SUV disappeared around the corner. Then, I turned and walked quickly up to the attic. From the lining of my old, worn-out backpack, I pulled out a bulky, outdated flip phone. It was the only possession I had brought with me from my foster home. The Sterling family thought it was an embarrassment and told me to throw it away. I had kept it hidden. For three years, I had secretly charged it, keeping it tucked away in the most obscure corners of the house. Relying on memory, I dialed a number. A few seconds later, the call connected. "Hello, MIT Admissions Office." "Hi," I kept my voice low. "This is Chloe Sterling. I'm calling to confirm the details regarding my early admission enrollment..." 4 Ten minutes later, I hung up the phone. My palms were sweating. I opened the bottom layer of my tin box. Inside sat a neat stack of bank cards and savings books. They contained the prize money from all the district and state-level scholarships I had won over the past three years. Added up, it was more than enough to cover my living expenses for four years of college. I carefully tucked the cards into a small pouch hidden under my shirt. Then, I grabbed a notepad and started calculating exactly how much the Sterling family had spent on me over the last three years. When I added it all up, I realized it wasn't much at all. My tuition was standard public school fare—just a few thousand a year. My clothes were all clearance items the housekeeper ordered online, totaling less than a thousand dollars over three years. My pocket money was supposed to be a hundred bucks a month, but they frequently forgot to give it to me. The grand total came out to about $9,000. I planned to pay every single cent back. It wasn't out of spite. It was just that, since I was leaving, I wanted to make a clean break. I owed them nothing, and they owed me nothing. The so-called "family bond" and the affection I had begged for never belonged to me in the first place. Suddenly, the doorbell rang. I froze, then hurried downstairs to open the door. "Are you..." "Hello, Chloe!" A middle-aged man's eyes lit up as he extended his hand. "I'm Director Evans from the MIT Admissions Office. This is Professor Bennett from the Physics Department, and this is Ms. Hayes from our PR team." I was completely dumbfounded. "Director Evans... what are you doing here?" "Well," Director Evans smiled warmly, "The Apex Scholars Program is a major initiative for our university this year, and the board takes it very seriously. We like to do a home visit for the selected students, and we brought a small gift." He gestured, and Ms. Hayes immediately unfurled a large banner. [Congratulations to Chloe Sterling on her Acceptance to MIT!] Professor Bennett handed me a beautifully wrapped gift box. "This is a little token from the Physics Department. Welcome to MIT, Chloe." I took the box, my mind completely blank. "Um... my family isn't home. They went on a trip to Europe." "That's completely fine!" Director Evans waved his hand dismissively. "Let's just take a quick photo in front of the door, then. For the memories." Before I could even process what was happening, I was pulled in front of the banner. Ms. Hayes pulled out a professional DSLR camera and snapped several photos. "You have a beautiful front yard, Chloe," Professor Bennett praised, looking around. "We'll be putting these photos up on the university's showcase board. You don't mind, do you?" "...Of course not." "Excellent." Director Evans pulled a folder from his briefcase. "This is the freshman handbook and some enrollment guidelines. Look them over when you have time. If you have any questions, reach out to us." I took the folder mechanically. The entire home visit lasted less than twenty minutes. But even after they packed up and left, I hadn't fully snapped back to reality. That is, until I saw our neighbor across the street, Mrs. Higgins, poking her head out. "Chloe! Who were those people? They looked very official." "They're... teachers from my school." "Teachers?" Mrs. Higgins's eyes widened. "Were they delivering an acceptance letter? Oh my, I could have sworn I saw 'MIT' on that banner!" She had a loud voice. Her shouting prompted a few other neighbors to open their doors. My scalp prickled. "You must have misread it, Mrs. Higgins! I have things to do, I have to go inside." I practically fled back inside and slammed the door, leaning against it as my heart pounded against my ribs. Meanwhile, seven time zones away in Paris... Mia was shopping in a luxury boutique. She took a selfie with a mountain of designer shopping bags in the background and typed out a caption: [My family brought me to Europe to relax after I messed up my exams. I feel so guilty. It's all my fault I bombed the test, and now my sister has to suffer through a gap year at prep school with me...] Her finger slipped, and she tapped the wrong chat group. The message went straight into her high school's massive senior class group chat. There were over five hundred people in there—teachers, classmates, and everyone she had desperately been trying to hide her gap-year from. She hit "Unsend" a second later, but it was too late. The chat exploded. "Wait, what? Mia is doing a gap year? Didn't she brag that she was a shoo-in for an Ivy?" "Hold up, her sister is doing a gap year too?" "Wasn't there a rumor that Chloe got an early admission offer to MIT? Was that fake?" "@MiaSterling, care to explain?" Mia panicked and typed: "Sent to the wrong chat! Just a joke!" Then she immediately left the group. But screenshots had already been saved. In their social circle, the gossip spread like wildfire.
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