When I got home, the house was empty.

I rushed into Brielle's room. Her coat was hanging on the rack, still tucked inside its dust bag.

I examined it the way the sales associate had taught me. The lettering on the inner label was raised. The fabric felt soft and smooth, with a faint scent of cashmere. All the labels were still attached, including the authenticity tag from the store.

I realized that Brielle's coat was brand new and genuine, with a style slightly different from mine.

I stood frozen, my mind going blank.

Why? Why did Brielle get the latest authentic coat while mine was a secondhand counterfeit?

Could Mom have been scammed only on my coat? Was it really just a coincidence?

Just as my thoughts began to spiral, I heard the front door open. Mom and Brielle walked in, chatting and laughing, their arms loaded with shopping bags.

Noticing the coat in my hands, Brielle walked over with a smile and hooked her arm through mine. "Aria, Mom filled me in about your coat," she said.

"She works so hard for every dollar. She scrimped and saved for a long time just to get us matching coats. Even if someone else tried yours on, it'll be fine once it's washed. It's the holiday season. Let's not blow this out of proportion. Stop putting Mom through more trouble."

For some reason, Brielle's words sent a surge of irritation through me. She made it sound like I was being difficult.

Before I could say anything, Mom popped a candied chestnut into my mouth and said, "Exactly. If those hairs really bother you so much, I can drop it off at the dry cleaner's. Don't be upset over something so small. I'll be more careful next time."

As Mom comforted me with such tenderness, I suddenly felt like a terrible person.

How could I ever suspect her? She probably just didn't know any better, and someone had slipped a knockoff in with the real merchandise without her realizing it.

"It's fine, Mom," I said. "Don't worry about the dry cleaner's. I'll handle it myself."

I swallowed the chestnut and forced the doubt churning inside me back down. Maybe it really was just a coincidence.

…

That night, Mom asked me to help free up some space on her phone. She said it had been lagging so badly that she couldn't save any new photos.

I took her phone and opened the gallery, planning to delete the blurry landscape photos.

As I scrolled through, I saw many selfies from Mom's trips, hundreds of them featuring Brielle. There were even destinations I didn't know they'd visited. Why had they traveled together without me?

Just as I was about to set the phone down, a message from a group chat popped up. Before I knew it, I had tapped on it.

It was an ordinary bargain-hunting group chat. I scrolled back and stopped on a series of voice messages Mom had sent three days earlier.

"Oh wow, today is my lucky day! I found a coat in a recycling bin in the villa district!

"It's a bit dirty and smells off, but it looks like a designer piece. Once I steam it at home, it'll be perfect for my younger daughter."

Immediately after, someone in the group chimed in. "I know that coat. It came from the belongings of the coal mogul's mother that were cleared out after she passed away. I didn't even dare touch it.

"A dead person wore that. Who knows what kind of germs are on it? How could you let your daughter wear that?"

Mom replied, "It's fine! My younger daughter is as tough as nails. Even when I gave her expired milk before, she was perfectly okay.

"The money I saved can go toward that Max Mara coat for my oldest daughter. She needs to look good at her job, so she can't wear something cheap.

"Besides, Aria is easy to trick. She believes whatever I tell her."

Mom's smug voice rang in my ears, each word landing like a blow.

So Mom hadn't been tricked into buying that coat. In her eyes, I was only worthy of garbage. For the first time in my 20 years, I truly understood that.

Still, I refused to accept it. I kept going through Mom's phone, hoping to find some proof that she treated Brielle and me the same.

I opened Mom and Brielle's chat. It was clean, filled with nothing but casual small talk. There wasn't a single record of a money transfer. But that was exactly what made it feel off.

I pulled up Mom's transaction history. Sure enough, I saw transfer after transfer sent to Brielle. They ranged from a few hundred dollars to tens of thousands, sent every single month without fail.

As for me, the moment I turned 18 years old, Mom cut off my allowance under the guise of teaching me to be independent.

I had put myself through college on student loans and part-time jobs. Even when I was at my lowest, I couldn't turn to my parents for money.

I had actually envied Brielle back then for how she managed to keep up with school while still enjoying such a comfortable life.

Every time I asked how she made so much money, she would give me a strange smile. I thought she was simply being stingy and didn't want to tell me. It turned out she had been laughing at me for being completely in the dark.

The most recent transaction was a transfer of 12 thousand dollars to a personal shopper. The note read, "Coat for Brielle—must be the latest style and nicely packaged."

I could no longer hold back my tears.

If Mom could find a coat in the trash and lie to me about it being new, what else had she done?

My mind drifted back to my middle school years, when I was still growing. Every morning and night, Mom would warm up a cup of milk for Brielle and me.

After drinking hers, Brielle would always say it tasted sweet and rich. She looked glowing and healthy from it.

But every time I drank mine, it tasted strange. The milk was slightly sour, with mysterious sediment at the bottom of the cup and sometimes even bits that looked like curd.

At that time, I didn't understand. All I knew was that it tasted awful.

Whenever I told Mom about it, she would glare at me and slam her utensils down on the table. "Brielle drinks hers just fine. Why do you always have to be so difficult? It's only a few dollars a carton. Who do you think you are, having standards? You're just being picky! If you don't want it, then don't drink it!"

Brielle would chime in from the side, smiling as she licked the milk from the corner of her mouth. "Aria, are you pretending to be sick because you don't want to go to school? This milk tastes perfectly fine to me. Mom specifically bought the high-calcium one."

After that, I often suffered from diarrhea. The worst episode left me so dehydrated that I was rushed to the hospital in the middle of the night for an IV.

When the doctor asked if I had eaten something bad, Mom spoke up before I could. "Absolutely not! My daughter just has a weak stomach. She wouldn't gain weight even if she ate the finest food in the world. It's just the way she is."

Back then, as I lay in the hospital bed watching Mom bustle around, guilt overwhelmed me. I felt that my poor health was a burden on my family and that I was wasting their money.

But now…

With trembling fingers, I typed the word "milk" into the search bar of Mom and Brielle's chat. The screen shifted, and a flood of results appeared. They spanned several years.

The latest message was from last month.

"I bought another crate of milk from the supermarket clearance section for only ten dollars," Mom wrote. "The ones with red caps are expired—give those to Aria. She can handle it. The blue caps are still good, so keep those for yourself to make yogurt."

My stomach turned as I stared at those words.

It wasn't that I had a weak stomach—my own mom had been feeding me spoiled milk for years.

I didn't know how I had made it out of the house. Only when the biting cold left my limbs stiff did I realize that I had wandered all the way to the riverbank.

I was wearing the padded jacket Mom had given me last year. When I ran my hand over it, the stuffing inside felt lumpy and matted. I didn't need to guess that Brielle's jacket was warm and soft.

Just then, my phone chimed with a text message from Mom. "Why did you run off to play without saying a word? We're visiting your grandma early tomorrow morning. Don't stay out too late."

She added, "I've washed and pressed your coat again, so remember to wear it tomorrow. It's a token of my love. Don't let our relatives think that I'm treating you poorly."

A token of love? She just wanted me to wear a dead woman's clothes to keep up her act of being "fair".

I lowered my gaze, hiding the hatred burning in my eyes. "Got it, Mom," I replied.

…

The next day, when we arrived at Grandma's house, the place was packed with relatives.

As soon as we walked through the door, Mom shouted, "Come take a look! I bought these new coats for both my daughters. They're exactly the same and cost me tens of thousands of dollars. I've always treated them equally."

Brielle wore her authentic coat, the soft sheen of the cashmere making her look radiant.

My eldest aunt, Jessica Donovan, ran her fingers along Brielle's cuff and praised her. "Oh, Brielle is getting prettier every day. You can tell this coat is expensive just by looking at it. It gives her such a polished look!"

When Aunt Jessica turned and saw me, her smile faltered. She pressed her lips together, showing mild distaste.

"What's wrong with Aria? Why does such a nice coat look so wrinkled on her?" she asked.

My second aunt, Eleanor Donovan, spoke up while snacking. "You're right. She looks like a mess and can't even stand up straight. They're wearing the exact same coat, yet Brielle looks like a princess while Aria looks like…"

She didn't finish her sentence, but I knew whatever word she had in mind wouldn't be a compliment.

Instead of defending me, Mom sided with them. "Well, Aria just doesn't have the luck for nice things. She was born to work hard and can't pull them off. The coat is fine—it's her who's the problem."

As she spoke, she looked me up and down with a mocking expression. Brielle deliberately moved a few steps away, as if she were afraid my bad luck would rub off on her.

The floor heating warmed the room, but a deep chill settled in my heart.

Aunt Eleanor leaned in at some point and frowned as she sniffed my coat. "Aria, did this coat get damp or something? Why does it smell earthy? There's also a… strange, foul odor."

A few nearby relatives sniffed the air and quickly covered their noses. "Yeah, why does it smell like mold?"

Mom's expression changed, and she immediately started explaining loudly, "Eleanor, you don't know what you're talking about! That's the smell of pure wool. It's completely natural!

"The more expensive the wool, the stronger the smell. Brielle's coat has it too, but she covered it with perfume."

At that moment, my nephew, Liam Anderson, who had been playing on the floor, ran over and hugged my leg. Because he was short, his eyes level with the open pocket of my coat.

"Aunt Aria, what's that white thing in your pocket?" he asked.

I paused. I hadn't dared to look closely at the coat since I'd brought it home, so I had no idea that anything was in the pocket.

Mom clearly panicked more than I did. She lunged forward and reached for the pocket. "Oh, it's probably just a packet of desiccant. Let me throw that away for you."

I stepped aside, dodging her hand. Driven by impulse, I reached into the slightly frayed pocket.

With the whole room watching, I pulled the items out and held them up. It was a flattened white carnation and a crumpled memorial card.