My parents had been planning for me to prepare Belle’s wedding gift.

I looked at my mother's text message.

[I'm paying special attention to Belle as I've got nothing to worry about when it comes to you. I've loved you since you were little.]

Love?

The blue notebook crushed my heart as my heart roared with me, 'Recording my expenses to gain back the other daughter's wedding gift is what you call love?'

…

I smiled and stroked my pet chicken, Chester, when I got home.

"Chester, you're the one that loves me the most. Grandmother gave you to me, and you love me just like she did."

Belle's text messages started flowing in at that moment.

[Celine, how can you talk back to Mother and Father? They loved you so much! They bought you branded clothes when you were a child, too. All of our neighbors knew about that.]

I called her back immediately, trying my best to suppress my anger as I said, "Don't you know those branded clothes I wore were all your hand-me-downs? Whose child would always be wearing clothes too small for them?"

Belle audibly choked before she retorted, "Weren't we poor at that time? You can't just deny their love for you because of that. Listen to me: apologize to Mother now.

"By the way, Celine, I'm short of money for my wedding. Can you give me four thousand dollars?"

I laughed in anger.

While still on call, I pulled out one of her social media accounts she actively used.

Her latest post stated, [I wish to get my mother a gold bracelet. I'll have that stupid sister of mine pay for it. No one loves her anyway.]

Belle acted differently on her social media account. It turned out that was her true self, knowing she was the main beneficiary of the entire situation.

"Belle, I know the truth about the blue notebook. You've known about it for a long time ago, no? It was never a notebook to record my favorite items."

Belle panicked. "What do you mean?"

I continued, "Mother wanted me to marry someone locally. You're planning to go away with them after your wedding, but leave them to me to take care of in their older age." I could no longer hold back my tears as I growled, "How, Belle, can you be so selfish?!"

"It's not me! Mother and Father want to live with me. It's tradition for the eldest daughter to take care of the parents. I won't take this task away from you." Belle sounded so righteous and confident as she spoke.

I mockingly asked, "Tell me then, when Mother sent my ex-boyfriend onto your bed, did you two plan it together?"

Belle hung up the call abruptly as I continued to browse the posts on Belle's social media account. I took note of everything piece by piece. All of those were proof of what they had done.

I felt so numb that I could not feel the excruciating pain in my heart. I would only be torturing myself if I continue to read her posts.

I sent Belle a message.

[By the way, I won't be returning. It's now your turn to take care of them and pick up their mess.]

Belle was furious as she yelled, "What's wrong with the eldest daughter taking care of her parents at their old age?! You can't just pick on me because our parents feel sorry for me and want to live with me for a while!"

I sneered and refused to reply.

I lit up the essential aroma ointment and fell asleep.

In my dream, my late grandmother held my hand and said distressingly, "Dear Celine, don't cry. I've saved enough money for you to further your education. I love you the most."

Tears unconsciously flowed down my face.

…

Yes. Belle, down the line, felt that I was annoying her, so my parents sent me away to Grandmother.

When Grandma saw me, she didn't care if I was pretty or ugly. She just said, "Celine looks just like me."

The money for my further education all came from the money Grandmother saved little by little. The money my parents earned would be kept for Bell.

After completing my further education, I was kept locally with them, begging for them to love me. What did I get? I was ridiculed by Belle, the main beneficiary in the entire ordeal.

I was raised by Grandmother with love. Why should I be treated so unfairly?

I got up the next morning and headed straight back to the office to report to work and cancel all my leave.

My manager, Fanny, patted my shoulder and smiled with relief. "You're the most important thing to yourself. Your family doesn't support you or love you, so you have to love yourself more."

I held back my tears and nodded vehemently. I failed in my family relationships but succeeded in my career.

After working endlessly over a few nights, I got promoted.

Mother's call came out of the blue, and her words were sugar-sweet. "Celine, why didn't you come visit? I miss your cooking. Come and visit me, you know well you're the only person I like."

After hurting me so badly, Mother tried to mend my broken heart.

I sneered, "But Mother, I've taken care of you for such a long time. Didn't Belle come to take care of you?"

"What are you talking about? Isn't Belle going to get married soon? Parents will always wish their children well," she whispered softly, as if that were some intimate conversation between mother and daughter.

I did not care about it.

"Mother, I have to earn a living too. I have to go to work. Belle, on the other hand, isn't working as she's getting married soon, so it's just right that she's there to take care of you, who loves her so much."

Bang! The sound of a loud kicking in the cabinet was heard.

I smirked.

"Celine, that is your mother. You owe her! We raised you!" Father roared. He could not help but gasp, "How could you be so ungrateful—"

"What about you all scheming against me for so long?" I interrupted. "What does that mean?"

Was it my retribution?

However, Father refused to give in.

"In that case, you have to pay me back for all the money we have spent on you since you were a child! Let me remind you that I recorded the money spent clearly."

They finally revealed their ultimate objective.

My hands were shaking, and at that point, my anger seemed pathetic.

"Fine, but don't forget Grandmother partly raised me. Don't record her supply on your blue notebook. Don't go claiming things like I took care of you when Belle didn't bother showing up back then, but I owe you four hundred fifty dollars."

Slap!

The phone was snatched away, and Mother's anxious voice was heard. "My child, Father was just joking with you! How could he do this to you?"

She was a good actor, I would give her that. However, I remembered how she asked me to pay back the money when we were at the hospital earlier, so she could leave without any further worries. They would all leave together with Belle after she got married.

"Call me once you're done calculating my debt. We can sever our relationship then."

I said nothing else. There was nothing else I could say anyway.

After hanging up the call, I thought back to the time when I was a child, and I had felt so sad when Mother was always abused by Father.

How did things get to this point?

I felt so sorry for Mother, yet she transferred the pain to me and gave her heart to Belle.

I heard that Mother did not manage to get Belle to visit and take care of her in the end.

She instead went on to hire a nurse to take care of her. Of course, the money spent was recorded in my blue notebook again.

I laughed bitterly.

That was who Mother was to me. All she would do was to calculate the money spent and get me to repay them.

From this moment onward, I just wanted to wait for them to settle the debt they claimed I owed, and sever our relationship completely. I did not want to be blackmailed by them again.

A few days later, I returned home and realized my chicken ​​was missing. I could hardly stand straight; fear and panic filled every cell in my body.

I was trembling when I was planning to check the surveillance. Suddenly, I remembered something.

The only person except me who knew the password to my house's main door was Mother.

I saw this coming, I did, but fury still took me entirely. They were petty enough to even involve a chicken!

I immediately rang Mother's phone, my hands trembling. My heart was filled with hatred.

"Mother, where's my chicken?"

My voice sounded coarse as my heart ached, unable to raise my voice any more than that. The call was silent at the other end of the call.

Mother then complained and accused me, "Not only do you not call me regularly, but you also refused to care for me and made me have to hire a caregiver. But now you're calling me just to ask for your chicken?

"I killed your chicken and cooked it for your sister. I heard that chicken meat is good for pregnant women."

I could hear Belle's coquettish voice in the background, "Mother loves me so much. I just casually mentioned my craving for chicken meat to her, and she got it for me almost immediately…

"Celine, you're just plain selfish!"

I felt as if I was torn into halves. It was like my whole body was stabbed by a knife and I bled openly.

"Grandmother left that chicken for me!"

My mother merely said, "It's just a chicken. Your grandmother is dead, so why would you be mad at Belle? Do you have to be mad at her just because of a chicken?"

Same old story all over again. I was always blamed for being calculative and got compared to Belle. It was as if I was completely wrong to be calculative with her.

'Am I not your child too?'

I picked up a knife in a daze and dashed toward Mother's house.

The moment I opened the door, I saw Father holding a piece of meat, feeding it to Belle, while Mother was wiping her sweat at the side. My ex-boyfriend, Simon Gray, was beside her with a doting look on his face.

I stared at the meat in the boiling pot miserably. It seemed I was the only one affected by this.

"You killed Chester and enjoyed eating the meat?" I wiped my sweat as I waved the knife aimlessly.

"It's just a chicken, you goon! What's wrong with just pampering your sister a little?" My mother stepped forward and took away my knife, her expression ugly. Frankly, she looked as wicked as when she drugged me that one fateful day.

Simon tried to persuade me, too. "That's right, it's just a chicken. How much compensation do you want? I'll pay you. Why are you holding a knife anyway? Belle was right: you've been behaving like this since you were little.

"Although I'm in love with your sister, we can still be friends."

They were all united as a team as if I had committed a heinous crime.

At that moment, Mother took out the blue notebook and said she wanted to settle the debt I owed for all those years. "Everything you owe us is stated here. Now, your aunt's child has leukemia. If you are willing to donate your bone marrow, I will write off the debt here completely."

"Donate bone marrow? I owe you debt?"

I grabbed the blue notebook and read out the contents loudly.

"In 2018, when I was fifteen years old, Grandmother sewed the torn pants Belle had thrown out. However, you wrote here that you spent seventy-five dollars to buy pants for me.

"In 2019, I had a fever and fainted. You were too busy rushing Belle to the hospital due to her allergy reaction. I almost died back then. However, you wrote that you spent four hundred fifty dollars for me on my medical treatment and hospitalization. But the hospitalization fee was earned by myself.

"In 2020, I won first place in the Mathematical Olympiad. You bought Belle her first puppy, but you wrote that you spent a hundred fifty dollars for me, for the puppy."

"The latest entry? I risked being fired from my job to take care of you when you were sick and hospitalized, and you wrote that I owed you four hundred fifty dollars."

As I read on, my heart chilled when I saw Mother's indifferent reaction and silence from Father.

I roared from the bottom of my heart, and the image of myself when I was little seemed to stand behind me and yell with me, "What had I done to you to deserve this? Are you trying to kill me? You're so disgusting! You're making up false debts against me!"

Mother trembled with fear in her eyes. However, she continued to deny, "I didn't! I'm just short of money; I didn't mean to plot against you."

"What about a notebook for money you spent on Belle?!" I yelled. "Do you have a notebook to plan for my wedding gift, or a notebook to record my favorite things?!" I asked clearly.

I was so tired that I even doubted myself. They were my parents. What if I misunderstood them? Had they ever thought of me and loved me sincerely?

Alas, all I saw through my tears were two guilty faces. Their silence explained it all.

Although Mother gave birth to both of us, I was the unfavored child. I was even the one who was abandoned and tortured.

Mother wanted to come over and hold my arm to comfort me, but her facial expression looked guilty. "Celine, stop acting like this. You had never made me worried since you were a child. I only kept a notebook for Belle because I tend to forget things about her.

"You should help your sister since you're a capable woman."

I shook off Mother's hand. From the corner of my eyes, I saw some little red dots on Belle's neck.

I quietly turned off the micro surveillance camera on my sleeve and laughed softly. "Belle, you wanted to make me sad by feasting on my chicken… but you may not know you're actually allergic to chicken meat."