In three years of marriage to Adrienne, I had never asked her for a single favor. The only time I did was this summer, after my little sister, Molly, graduated high school. I asked Adrienne if she could find Molly a summer internship at her firm. She hadn’t even looked up from her tablet. "Tell her to report to the reception desk. They can always use a hand." Molly took a seventeen-hour Greyhound bus, wearing her only decent white button-down, and waited in the lobby all afternoon. By evening, I saw the Slack notifications from the company’s general channel. "Who's the country bumpkin at the front desk? Her collar is literally yellowing. I can't." "Apparently, she's the boss's husband's sister." "Wait, seriously? Didn't Adrienne personally walk Lawrence’s little sister around all the departments today?" The attached photo showed Adrienne with her arm around another girl’s shoulder, smiling warmly, looking every bit the elegant CEO. Same floor, same afternoon. Someone replied with a hand-over-mouth emoji. "Both sisters, but what a difference." When Molly came home that night, she pulled a bag of sun-dried peach slices from her backpack. "Travis, I brought these for Adrienne. She was so busy today, I'll try to give them to her next time." "The girl at the front desk gave me a cup of cucumber water. It tasted so good." I smiled, brushing a stray hair from her forehead, then stepped out onto the balcony to call my lawyer. "Could you draft a divorce agreement for me? Yes, as soon as possible." … In the living room, Molly was hunched over the coffee table, writing on a post-it note. As I walked over, she instinctively hid it behind her back, her ears flushing red. "What are you writing?" "Nothing... just nothing." I reached out. She shrank back but couldn't avoid me. I gently took the crumpled piece of paper from her hand. It read: Adrienne, I left the dried peaches on the table for you. They’re from this year’s harvest. Mom said they're your favorite. I stared at her neat, round handwriting, a heavy ache settling in my chest. Five years ago, when Adrienne first came to my hometown, she really did love them. It was Thanksgiving. I had driven eleven hours to take her back to our small town in rural Kentucky. Molly was only in seventh grade then. Hearing her brother’s girlfriend was coming, she ran all the way from the dusty county road to the edge of our driveway. When the car door opened, she stood there panting, clutching a Ziploc bag, her cheap t-shirt damp with sweat. Adrienne had knelt in the gravel, unzipped the bag, and eaten three slices right then and there. "These are incredible. Way better than those organic, overpriced ones I get in Chicago." Molly’s eyes had lit up like stars. For the rest of the trip, Adrienne carried that bag everywhere. My mother pulled me aside later, whispering, "Adrienne is just being sweet. Country things like dried peaches can't compare to what she's used to in the city." I had laughed, completely sure of her. "She's not just being polite, Mom. She truly loves them." My mother beamed and spent the next day dehydrating two massive trays. Now, that bag of freshly dried peaches sat on our marble coffee table, brought all the way from Kentucky. Seventeen hours on a cramped bus, cradled in Molly’s lap so they wouldn't get crushed. The front door clicked open just after eleven. Adrienne walked in, hanging her coat on the rack. Passing the coffee table, she paused, her eyes sweeping over the Ziploc bag. Her nose wrinkled slightly, and she nudged it toward the edge of the table to clear space for her keys. "Is your sister asleep?" "Yeah." She murmured an acknowledgment, leaning against the kitchen island to check her phone. I watched her open Slack. Please arrange a lunch for Chelsea tomorrow. Invite the marketing team so she can start networking. After sending that, she texted Lawrence, her executive assistant. Your sister did great today. I’ll take her to the site visit with me tomorrow so she can get some hands-on experience. Lawrence replied instantly with a smiley face: Thank you so much, Adrienne. Chelsea is thrilled. A faint smile played on Adrienne’s lips. When she finally looked up at me, her expression smoothed into her usual calm facade. "Travis," she said, as if suddenly remembering. "HR mentioned a new face at the front desk. Is that Molly?" I looked at her. "You’re just finding out now?" She blinked, caught off guard, but quickly recovered. "It was a hectic day. I couldn't get away. I assume she's doing fine down there? Megan at the front desk is usually very helpful." I didn't answer. She didn't press, taking her glass of water toward the bedroom. As she passed the coffee table, her sleeve caught the bag of dried peaches, sending it sliding onto the hardwood floor. She didn't stop. I knelt, picked up the bag, smoothed out the plastic, and placed it back on the table. My phone buzzed. A text from Molly, sent from her room—likely because she didn't want to say it aloud. Travis, can I go to the office early tomorrow? Megan said she'd show me how to organize the files. I want to get a head start so I don't embarrass Adrienne. The next afternoon, I brought a lunchbox to the office. Megan, the receptionist, smiled awkwardly. "Travis. Adrienne is upstairs in a meeting. Should I page her?" "No need. I’m here to see my sister. Where is Molly?" Megan’s smile faltered. "Molly... she’s down in Basement 2. The archives. Lawrence reassigned her yesterday." She leaned in, lowering her voice. "Travis, there's no AC down there, and the air is really musty. Do you want me to mention it to Adrienne? Maybe she can move her." "I'll go down first." When the elevator doors opened at B2, the smell of damp cardboard hit me instantly. At the end of the dimly lit hallway, the heavy metal door was propped half-open. Old folders were stacked nearly to the ceiling. Molly was crouching on the concrete floor, her white sleeves rolled up to her elbows, her forehead slick with sweat. Her face brightened when she saw me. "Travis! What are you doing here? It's not even lunchtime yet." She grinned, looking like the same goofy kid from Kentucky. "Brought you lunch. Isn't it hot down here?" She took the lunchbox, wiping her dusty hands on her jeans before opening it. "It's fine. There's a fan." She pointed to a rusted box fan rattling in the corner, its blades coated in thick gray dust. "Actually, Travis, I really like this job," she said, taking a bite. "Look, I've already organized three shelves. I put little colored labels on every single bin. Now, anyone looking for old tax records can find them in five seconds." I looked where she was pointing. The labels were written in her neat, careful handwriting. On a few of them, she’d drawn tiny, hand-drawn flowers in the corner—a habit she'd had since she was a little girl. I knelt beside her, helping her close a heavy storage box. "Eat your lunch first. Then take a break." "I can't," she said, swallowing quickly and looking up at me with absolute earnestness. "Lawrence said this whole section needs to be logged by Friday. I don't want to slack off and make Adrienne look bad." I looked at her damp eyelashes, clenching my jaw to keep my composure. When I took the empty lunchbox back upstairs, the elevator stopped on the seventeenth floor. As the doors slid open, I saw the glass-walled conference room directly opposite. Adrienne sat at the head of the long table. Chelsea sat opposite her. A few marketing directors were gathered around them, laughing. Adrienne leaned over, gently adjusting Chelsea’s hand as she held her pen, showing her how to annotate a brief. The gesture was incredibly natural, filled with the patient warmth of an older mentor. Chelsea smiled shyly, and Adrienne tapped her shoulder encouragingly, her eyes soft. The elevator doors slowly slid shut. It was the same look Adrienne had given Molly at our wedding three years ago. Molly, wearing a rented dress, had been so nervous her fingers wouldn't stop shaking. Adrienne had taken her hands, gently placing the silver spoon in her palm. "Don't worry," Adrienne had whispered. "You've got me now." Molly had looked up, her eyes rimmed with red, smiling so wide. "Adrienne." "We’re family now, Molly." The seventeenth floor: a bright room, shared laughter, and an artisanal catered lunch. Basement 2: dust, heat, and a broken fan. In the lobby, I ran into Lawrence. He was carrying two iced lattes, his leather shoes clicking sharply on the polished tile. "Travis, hey. Adrienne was just asking about you," he said smoothly. "By the way, is Molly settling into the archives okay? Let me know if she needs anything." I forced a tight smile and walked past him without a word. Molly came home very late that night. Her white shirt had a dark, blotchy stain right below the collar. "What happened to your shirt?" She looked down, quickly pulling her collar up to hide it. "It's nothing, Travis." "Molly." She didn't answer, slipping past me into the kitchen. The sink faucet began to run. I stood at the doorway, watching her vigorously scrub the stain with dish soap. After a long silence, she spoke in a small, tight voice. "I was delivering some old files upstairs this afternoon. I ran into Chelsea." "She and Adrienne were coming out of a conference room. Chelsea was holding an iced coffee. She said I was blocking the hallway." "I tried to step aside, but she bumped into me... I'm sure it was an accident." Her voice trailed off, lacking any real conviction. "Did Adrienne see it?" Molly’s hands paused. She shook her head, then quickly forced a smile. "Really, Travis, it's fine. It'll wash out. Tomorrow I’ll wear a cardigan over it, no one will see." That was her only decent white shirt. Before going to bed, I opened my phone. A photo was circulating in the company’s group chat. Adrienne was standing at the podium of the main boardroom, Chelsea beside her. The caption read: The CEO personally mentoring our new intern. Chelsea knocked her first presentation out of the park today! Below it, someone had forwarded Adrienne's quote: Chelsea is young, but she has a rare spark. I already look at her like a little sister. I stared at those words until the screen went black. Molly finished organizing the entire archives on her fifth day. When she told me, she looked incredibly proud but slightly anxious. "Travis, do you think I could show the catalog to Adrienne? Do you think she'd like it?" I smoothed her hair. "She will." She washed her face carefully before we left. She spent a long time in front of the mirror, buttoning her collar all the way to the top, then unbuttoning it, and finally buttoning it back up. Megan told me what happened next. When Molly reached the executive suite, the assistant told her Adrienne was in a meeting. Molly nodded, clutched her stack of organized folders, and stood quietly against the hallway wall. She waited for two hours. People walked past, casting curious sidelong glances, whispering to one another. Megan tried to persuade her to go down to the breakroom, but Molly shook her head, holding the folders even tighter. "I want to give them to her myself." Finally, the boardroom doors opened. Adrienne and Chelsea walked out side-by-side, deep in conversation. Molly’s eyes lit up. She took a step forward. "Adrienne..." Adrienne’s gaze swept over her, pausing for less than a second on Molly’s frayed collar and dusty shoes. "Mmm." She didn't even break her stride. Molly’s outstretched hand froze in midair, the heavy folders slipping slightly in her grip. Chelsea looked back, her eyes lingering on the stain on Molly’s collar. A faint, mocking smile touched her lips before she turned and caught up with Adrienne. Megan said that when she went to comfort Molly, Molly just stood there for a long time, staring down at the folders in her arms. Then, she whispered, "Adrienne must just be really busy today." Those folders were eventually tossed into a storage bin by HR. Adrienne never saw them. That night, Adrienne arrived home before Molly. I set a glass of water on the kitchen island in front of her. "Molly went to see you today." Her hand paused on her cufflink. "Oh. I think I saw her outside the boardroom. What did she want?" "She finished the archives. She wanted to show you her work." Adrienne leaned back against the sofa, sighing. "She should have just handed that to HR. Tell her to text me next time instead of standing in the hallway like that. It doesn't look professional." "Professional?" "Travis, we have clients coming in and out of the executive suite. Having her stand outside my door looking like that..." She stopped herself. "Just tell her to wait downstairs next time." Silence stretched across the living room. I stared at her, suddenly remembering the hardest year of her startup. Molly had pawned the gold baby locket our parents had left her and spent two weeks doing heavy labor at a warehouse to help us pay rent. She was only thirteen then. Her hands were so raw and dry from the cold that they bled when she washed them, yet she’d smiled and said she was just glad to help her sister-in-law. That winter, Adrienne had gotten drunk and cried, holding Molly tight. She had sworn she would always protect Molly, would treat her like her own flesh and blood. "Have you forgotten all of that?" I asked quietly. Adrienne’s face went momentarily blank. She rubbed her temples, looking irritated. "Travis, things are different now. Can you please stop bringing up the past every time we have a minor issue?" "My position is different. People are watching me. I can't exactly introduce a girl who looks like she just crawled out of a coal mine as my sister-in-law to my board of directors, can I?" She sighed. "Look, what is she unhappy about? Does she want a different department?" I looked at her. "I'm sending her back home the day after tomorrow." Adrienne frowned. "I thought she was staying for the whole summer." "Her classes start soon." "In July? Her semester doesn't start until September." I didn't answer. When I opened Molly’s bedroom door, she was already packing her duffel bag. The white shirt was folded into a neat square, tucked at the very bottom. "Travis." She didn't turn around. "Is it... hard for Adrienne to have me around?" "No. She’s just got a lot on her plate at the company." Molly nodded quietly. After a moment, she whispered, "Actually, Travis, I know." She turned to face me. At eighteen, the bright, eager girl who had run down a dirt road to hand a stranger a bag of dried peaches was gone. "I saw the Slack messages. I borrowed Megan's phone to look up some transit directions, and the notifications popped up." She offered a small, fragile smile. "They said I was a country bumpkin. They laughed at my shirt." She looked down at her hands. "It is yellow. I couldn't get the stain out." A lump formed in my throat, thick and painful. Molly reached out, squeezing my arm to comfort me instead. "Don't be mad at Adrienne, Travis. She runs a huge company. It was nice of her to let me work there at all." She pressed the white shirt deeper into her bag. "I'm just not cut out for the city." Before she left, Molly went to a department store downtown. Her stipend for those five days was only three hundred dollars. She spent a hundred and twenty of it on a silk scarf. She had stared at it in the display case for an hour before finally pulling out her crumpled bills. "Travis, do you think this color looks good on Adrienne? Will she like it?" The price tag was still attached, and she held the box so carefully to ensure the corners wouldn't get dented. Looking at her hopeful, anxious face, my chest tightened. "It's beautiful. She'll love it." Molly let out a sigh of relief. Then she reached into her backpack pocket and pulled out a white envelope, placing it on the coffee table. "This is for you." "What's this?" She rubbed the back of her neck, blushing. "My savings. My stipend, plus the allowance money you sent me over the years that I didn't spend. I saved it all." "It's not much, but... happy early third anniversary to you and Adrienne." I opened the envelope. Three thousand two hundred dollars. A few hundred-dollar bills, but mostly crumpled twenties, tens, and fives. On the way to the Greyhound station, Molly kept her eyes glued to the window. "Chicago is so big, Travis." "If I get into grad school here, we can see each other every day." She smiled but didn't say anything else. After a while, she asked softly, "Travis, do you remember the creek behind our old house?" "Of course." "Remember when it flooded, and Adrienne carried me across? The water came all the way up to her waist. I begged her to put me down, but she wouldn't." She smiled down at her lap. "She told me that when she made it big, she’d build a real bridge for our town. I thought she was just bragging." She paused, staring out at the passing highway, her voice barely a whisper. "But she actually sent the money to the town council. The bridge was finished this summer, Travis. I don't think she even knows." The bus station was packed. Molly handed me the gift box for Adrienne, with a small note tucked inside. "Go home, Travis. I can handle the ride." "It's seventeen hours, Molly." "It was seventeen hours coming here, and I survived." She flashed her teeth, showing her familiar dimples. "Besides, I bought instant ramen." As she walked through the gate, she turned and waved. Her lips moved, her voice drowned out by the roaring engines, but I could read her lips perfectly. Tell Adrienne I said thank you. The metal gate clicked shut. I stood there for a long time until my phone buzzed. A message in the company chat: Adrienne is hosting a farewell dinner for Chelsea at the Peninsula Hotel tonight. Private room, all the VPs are there. Wow, that's huge. Wait, didn't the boss's sister-in-law intern here too? Why is only one getting a send-off? One is a VIP guest. The other was basically a volunteer. You can't compare them. I stared at the screen and felt a sudden, bitter urge to laugh. On the exact same day. Molly was starting a seventeen-hour bus ride with a cup of instant ramen, having spent half her money on a gift for Adrienne. Chelsea was sitting in a five-star dining room, wearing a designer necklace Adrienne had bought her, surrounded by executives. I had seen that necklace in a boutique window last week. Twelve thousand dollars. When I got back to the empty apartment, I set the silk scarf on the coffee table. Next to it sat the bag of dried peaches, untouched since the day Molly arrived. I went into the study and pulled out the divorce papers. As I lowered the pen to the paper, memories flooded back. Adrienne sitting on the gravel eating dried peaches; Molly laughing on her shoulders; Adrienne tucking the spoon into Molly’s hand at our wedding. But my hand didn't tremble. I signed my name. I went into the bedroom, pulled out my suitcase, and began to pack. The front door opened around midnight. Adrienne stepped in, smelling faintly of wine. She kicked off her heels, calling out, "Travis? Why are the lights—" Her voice stopped dead. She was staring at the coffee table. The signed divorce papers, my wedding ring, the bag of dried peaches. And the cheap box containing the silk scarf.
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