There was always a bottle of pesticide sitting on our dining table. Paraquat. A restricted herbicide. One sip, and your lungs turn to stone; you suffocate while fully conscious. There is no antidote. My parents would often slam that bottle down in front of me: "If you don't study hard, you have no future! Are you trying to kill us?" "If you drop out of the top three in your class next exam, your mom and I are splitting this bottle right here!" They tightened the screws, day by day, until the day the SAT scores came out. I was the Valedictorian. Top fifty in the state. And I had a full-ride acceptance letter to an Ivy League university in my hand. That night, the Paraquat on the table was replaced by a bottle of cheap whiskey. Under the dim, flickering bulb of our kitchen, my dad drank half the bottle with a look of immense relief. He even dipped his chopsticks in the booze and fed a few drops to my paralyzed mother. "My girl made it," they kept muttering, over and over. "My girl is going to be somebody." I was drowning in the joy of finally escaping this hellhole. I didn't know Dad had spiked the whiskey with the Paraquat. 1 The hospital hallway was a blur of noise and antiseptic smells. Someone patted my shoulder, eyes full of pity, telling me "sorry for your loss." But I was still stuck in a state of paralyzed shock. Just the night before, the acceptance letter had arrived. The heavy, cream-colored envelope. It was my golden ticket, the only way I could imagine escaping this suffocating house. For as long as I could remember, my parents were the extreme version of "tiger parents," but twisted by poverty and tragedy. They were nobodies outside, trampled by society, but at home, they were tyrants. When I was in fifth grade, a sedan hit my mom while she was riding her scooter. The rear wheel crushed her spine. She was paralyzed from the waist down instantly. She stayed in the hospital for three months. No improvement. The doctor hinted that if we didn't have deep pockets, we should just go home. It was pointless. In the end, we ran out of money. My dad and a few of his construction buddies carried her home on a stretcher. The neighbors pitied me. They thought my mom was coming home to die. She didn't die. But even though she couldn't walk or feel her legs, her voice was louder than ever. She would scream at me: "Chloe! Turn me over!" "Chloe! Water!" "Chloe! Carry me to the toilet!" Our neighbor, Mrs. Miller, used to be Mom's friend back when they worked at the textile mill. But Mrs. Miller's husband went into sales and made some money. After Mom's accident, Mrs. Miller loved to visit. She always brought her son, Brian. And she loved to brag. "My Brian won first place in the math league again. I'm telling you, this kid is going places!" "My husband says degrees are everything these days. Look at your Chloe’s grades... she’s not college material. Maybe she should just stay home and take care of you. Save your husband from working himself to death like a dog." Everyone knew Mrs. Miller’s husband was never home and probably had a second family, but she projected her insecurities onto us. That day, Brian sat on our worn-out sofa eating McNuggets, dropping crumbs everywhere. I didn't dare talk back to the adults, but the malice inside me was bubbling over. I looked at Brian and mouthed, Fat ass. Tiny dick. Brian had never seen such a vicious look on a girl. He started bawling. Mrs. Miller grabbed him and stormed out, slamming the door so hard the walls shook. After that, Mom stopped asking me for water during the day. She wouldn't drink a drop, even if I put the cup to her cracked lips. She refused to use the bathroom until Dad came home from the construction site at night, exhausted and covered in dust, to carry her. That was when their demands on me became singular. Study. Only study. It was singular, and it was suffocating. The summer before middle school, a group of college grads came to my dad’s site. While my dad broke his back in the heat, they stood in the air-conditioned trailer holding blueprints, pointing fingers. That night, Dad drank two shots and spat on the floor, cursing his fate. The next day, I brought home a mediocre report card. I tried to hide it until bedtime. Dad looked at me. A sound like grinding gears came from his throat. He walked out and came back with a bottle of Paraquat. In the sweltering heat of a mid-Atlantic summer, sweat dripped from his dark, sun-baked skin onto the table. He said: "If you don't get into a top university, your mom and I will drink this right in front of you." Mom, lying in the dark bedroom, yelled out: "That's right! If you don't study, if you lose to that fat kid next door, you can just watch your parents die!" Suddenly, a voice cut through my memory. "Chloe? Do you have any idea why your parents committed suicide?" I wiped the fog from my eyes. It was a policewoman. Why? Why did they do it? I had the acceptance letter. They were proud. Mom had even said, just hours ago, that when I made money, I had to buy her a condo with an elevator so she could see the sun again. She even threatened to drag her useless legs to my campus and make a scene if I wasn't filial. Parents like that... they don't just kill themselves. 2 "Chloe, think carefully. What happened in the last few days?" the policewoman asked gently. What happened? I sank into my memories. After the SAT scores came out, relatives we hadn't seen in years suddenly appeared like vultures. My dad's two sisters—Aunt Sarah and Aunt Helen—showed up with fruit baskets and red envelopes. "Brother, look at you! So poor, yet you raised such a genius," Aunt Sarah beamed. Aunt Helen shoved an envelope into my hands. "Chloe is so smart. Ivy League, huh? It really is the Chen family genes. Brother, you were always the smart one." Then, the pivot. Aunt Helen's boss, the CEO of Vance Corp, had a son failing high school. Since I was the local Valedictorian, she asked if I could tutor him over the summer. My dad, a man beaten down by life, rubbed his hands nervously. We already had plans. My homeroom teacher knew our situation and got me a gig at a legit tutoring center. They were paying $50 an hour because of my scores. If I worked all summer, I could buy Mom a wheelchair, pay my freshman fees, and maybe get a smartphone. But Mom swept a lamp off the nightstand. Crash. "Helen! Don't think I don't know you!" she screamed from the bedroom. "You're trying to sell my daughter for favors! I wouldn't have lost my factory job if your mother hadn't forced me to sign that layoff paperwork to 'save the family'! I wouldn't have been on that scooter! You sucked my blood then, and now you want to suck my daughter's blood?!" "Get out!" Aunt Helen looked embarrassed, mumbling about how the Vance family pays well, but she wouldn't give a number. Dad stood up, his face dark. "Leave!" They left, heels clicking angrily. But Aunt Helen’s husband was on the verge of being laid off. He needed to suck up to the boss. And then, Vance Corp announced a PR stunt: They would gift a condo to the top scholar in the district. Me. Aunt Sarah's son was getting married, and his fiancée demanded a house. Aunt Helen leaked the news to Aunt Sarah. The sisters started tagging-teaming us. Two days ago, Aunt Sarah came back with her son and pregnant future daughter-in-law. They knelt at our door, begging to "borrow" the condo. "Brother! My grandson is coming! You can't leave us to die!" "Uncle, please," the girl sobbed. While they wailed outside, the FedEx guy delivered my acceptance letter. Aunt Sarah lost it. She pounded on the door. "Chloe will have a degree! She'll have money! Helen told me the Vance kid will pay $100 an hour for tutoring! Help your family!" Inside, silence. Outside, chaos. Then, Aunt Sarah lowered her voice to a vicious hiss through the crack in the door: "Don't think I don't know what your Chloe did that night..." Dad exploded. He threw a plate of peanuts at the door. That night, we sat in the dark to save electricity. Dad smoked his cheap cigarettes, a silhouette of despair. "So..." the policewoman murmured, taking notes. "You suspect your aunts pressured them into suicide?" 3 Click. A camera shutter went off in the hallway. The policewoman jumped up. "No photos! Who let the press in?" She chased the reporter out, but the story was already spinning. A moment later, her phone rang. I overheard her. "What? Someone smashed Sarah and Helen's windows?" The aunts had gone into hiding. When the police called Aunt Helen, she screamed over the phone. "It's not my fault! Have you seen their house? That pesticide bottle was always on the table! It's a miracle they didn't drink it sooner!" "Guardian? Me? Hell no! Chloe is 18. In the old days, she'd have two kids by now. She doesn't need a guardian!" I had heard those exact words before. A few days after the scores came out, I was walking home from a tutoring session. I had $100 in my pocket and a frozen durian fruit a parent had given me. It smelled awful, but it was expensive. I wanted my parents to taste it. Aunt Helen intercepted me downstairs. "Chloe," she smiled, her wrinkles bunching up. "That tutoring gig with the Vance boy? I talked them up. $200 an hour." $200? I hesitated. "It's at my house. I'll pick you up. It's safe." She looked down at the frozen fruit in my hand with disgust. "You do this, and you can buy fresh fruit for your parents. Not this frozen garbage." I don't know if it was the money or the shame of the fruit, but I went with her. I walked into the bedroom at Aunt Helen's house. Inside, a boy with bleached blond hair grinned at me. The door locked behind me. That summer night was a blur of neon lights and pain. Like being torn apart by wild dogs. When I woke up, Aunt Helen stuffed five $100 bills into my pocket. "I got you an extra hundred. Keep your mouth shut." She looked at my pale face and shrugged. "You're 18. You'd have to face this stuff eventually. He's rich. You should count yourself lucky. In the old days, girls your age were already mothers." Back in the present, the policewoman returned with a medical report. She looked troubled. "Chloe... did you know your father had pancreatic cancer? Late stage." 4 The local news cycle shifted fast. First, it was "Greedy Aunts Drive Genius's Parents to Suicide." Then, it became "Selfless Love: Dying Father and Paralyzed Mother Sacrifice Themselves to Not Burden Daughter." The photo on the screen was old. Dad looked young and strong; Mom was sitting next to him, smiling shyly. Comments flooded in. 【Omg, tears. The dad knew he had cancer and didn't want to drag his daughter down.】 【This is true parental love. They drank the poison so she could fly free.】 【Am I the only one worried about the girl? She's barely 18 and totally alone.】 Soon, Vance Corp contacted the school. They wanted to go through with the condo donation and cover my tuition. But I had to show up to the ceremony. My teacher sounded nervous. "Chloe, the money is significant. What do you think?" I was silent for a long time. "I'll go." The police issued a statement: Suicide. The stone in my chest settled. That night, I sat on the hard wooden bed where Mom used to lie. The memory of that muddy night came back. I had run home from Aunt Helen's house. Mom was in a rage. "Where were you?! Out whoring with Brian next door?!" I tried to turn her over. Her bedsores smelled like rot. It was the smell of poverty, a reminder that I couldn't fight the rich. "Are you deaf?!" She screamed. I cleaned her up. "Mrs. Miller is a bitch! She doesn't want you to study!" "Chloe, listen to me..." Suddenly, she stopped. Her withered hand grabbed my arm like a claw. "Chloe." "What is that on your neck?" Dad came home and found Mom trying to slap me, dragging herself half off the bed. He rushed over. "What are you doing?!" Mom was gasping for air, tears streaming down her face. "Ask her! Ask your daughter what she did! Oh god..." They interrogated me. Who was it? I didn't dare say. But Mom's tears were hot on my hand. The landline rang. I walked past the urns on the table, past the empty pesticide bottle. It was Aunt Helen. Her voice was hushed, frantic. "Chloe, tell me. Where is Jared Vance? His mother is looking for him. He's missing! Tell me where he is!"
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