"Enough!"

Mom cut me off, Jade wrapped in her arms.

"Sophia Matthews, how did I ever raise a daughter as vicious as you? Your sister went missing as a child. Do you have any idea what she suffered?"

"You can't feel pain. When there's danger, protecting your sister is the least you can do. And now, just to fight her for attention, you actually have the nerve to claim you're cured!"

"Mom, don't blame my sister. It's all my fault. If they'd never found me, none of this would have happened. Then I wouldn't have come between you and your daughter."

Her tears looked so genuine. And when she lifted her hand to wipe them away, she made sure everyone caught the bandage on her finger.

Dylan didn't miss it. He caught her hand gently in his.

"What is this? How did you hurt yourself again?"

"It's nothing. I was just making soup for my sister when—"

She pulled her hand back. "Dylan, I only wanted to do something nice for her. And in the end I made a chicken soup she doesn't even like."

His face went dark in an instant.

He hauled me off the hospital bed without a word.

He pointed at the soup splattered across the floor and roared at me, low and hard:

"Drink it!"

I hit the floor. The wound in my stomach tore open, the pain boring straight through me.

I tilted my head up at him. "How am I supposed to drink it? It's all spilled!"

"Do you not have a tongue? Jade slaved over that soup for you. She cut her own finger doing it! You are going to lick every drop of it off that floor today!"

Watching Dylan lose his mind like this, I looked to my parents for help.

Dad, who hadn't said a word, gave a cold snort, his eyes freezing on me.

"About time you learned a lesson. We raised you too well, spoiled you rotten. That's the only reason you'd dare act like this."

The moment he finished, Dylan lunged forward and shoved my head down into the soup.

The spill on the floor reeked of grease. I thrashed against him, every part of me on fire.

He only stopped when he saw the fresh blood seeping from my wound, torn wider by the struggle.

Something complicated flickered through his eyes.

Then he stood and looked down at me from above.

"I'll give you two choices. One, kneel and apologize to Jade, admit you were wrong. Two, lick this soup off the floor yourself."

I raised my head out of the grease, a complete wreck, and looked at the four of them standing over me. Jade, curled into Mom's arms, flashed me a taunting little smile.

I let out a cold laugh. Then I bent down and, in that humiliation, opened my mouth and ate a piece of chicken that had landed by my foot.

Dylan clenched his fist and kicked the food container clear across the floor.

"You stubborn fool!"

Mom's fingers were shaking with rage. "You'd rather eat filth off the floor than apologize to your own sister!"

"Mom, it's all right. It's all my fault."

Jade shook her head and sobbed into Mom's arms.

I stayed sprawled on the floor, head hanging for a long time. In the end I heard Dad throw out one last line: "We spoiled you rotten, that's what we did!"

They all left. Only I was left there, wound split open, lying wretched in a mess of spilled soup and filth.

I don't know how long I held myself in that position, face to the floor.

It was the nurse, coming to check the rooms, who finally helped me up and arranged for a doctor to restitch the wound.

Once everything in the room had been dealt with, I took out my phone and dialed a number an ocean away.

“Dr. Mason, I'm cured. I don't know why, exactly, but I can feel pain now, the same as I used to.”

“You said before that you wanted to bring me on to research these rare diseases. I accept.”

“Three days from now, I can fly overseas to join you.”

After I hung up, I lay back down on the hospital bed. The wound hurt more than I could stand. The nurse saw the way my brow was knotted and the sweat beading on my face, and she kindly poured me some warm water and brought painkillers.

My eyes stung. I'd said so many times that I could feel pain again, and in the end the only person who cared was a nurse I'd never met before.

I stayed in the hospital for three days.

In those three days, not Dylan, not my parents, not one of them came to say a single word to me.

Quietly, I packed my things, planning to catch a flight that night.

But right then, one of my mother's posts came up on my feed.

She'd put up a photo.

In it were my parents, Dylan, and Jade.

And my mother's caption read: family photo.

I had already decided to leave, but seeing those two words, family photo, my chest still felt like it had been pierced by ten thousand silver needles.

The engagement between Dylan and me had been arranged six years ago.

Starting six years ago, Dylan and I took a picture with my parents every year, and back then the one standing at the center was always me.

And now, in this family photo they took every year, there was no place left for me.

I looked at my packed luggage and tapped a like on the post.

The next second, my mother's call came through.

I answered, and her gentle, coaxing voice came from the other end.

“Sophia, don't take that family photo to heart. When you're out of the hospital in a few days, we'll take a new one together, all right?”

I gripped the phone. Ever since Jade had been found again, my mother hadn't talked to me like this in a long time.

For a moment my heart wavered, but before I could say anything, she went on:

“Sophia, the research on your sister's illness has results now. Could you do us a favor and let them draw a little of your blood?”

“It's always been one vial before, but this time it might need to be six hundred milliliters.”

The words on the tip of my tongue went back down. So that was why my mother had suddenly turned gentle. She wanted something.

Whatever softness I'd felt vanished in an instant, and I couldn't stop myself from shaking all over.

“Why? Can't you draw her own? A few days ago I nearly died from losing too much blood. You take another six hundred milliliters from me, do you even care whether I live or not?”

“It's just a little of your blood. Nobody's asking for your life.”

Behind me, the door of the room was shoved open hard.

I turned to look. It was Dylan, and behind him were two doctors in white coats.

His eyes landed on my luggage, and he grabbed my wrist.

“Where do you think you're going? You already knew there was a lead on Jade's illness, didn't you? That's why you want to leave? How can you be this selfish? Jade's afraid of pain. You know perfectly well that drawing her blood puts her through agony. Can't you have a little decency?”

I looked at him and tried to pull my hand free, but he raised his hand and slapped me across the face, twice.

When I fell still, he cupped my face and coaxed:

“Sophia, this is probably the last time. This will cure your sister for sure. Don't struggle. You can't feel it anyway. I'd hate to hurt you.”

I looked at the bodyguard planted in the doorway, gave a cold laugh, and stopped fighting.

Bright red blood was drawn out of my body, and I closed my eyes, my face gone white.

Once it was done, Dylan hurried off with the two doctors.

Two hours later, at the door of the research lab jointly funded by the Henson and Matthews families, the medical doctor assigned to treat Jade came running out, his face lit up with excitement.

“Mr. Henson, we found antibodies in Miss Sophia's blood. That means her rare disease is cured! These antibodies might be able to cure Miss Jade too!”

Dylan froze. He looked up at the doctor in disbelief, but all he could see in his mind was the way I'd curled up on the floor after the knife went in.

Almost trembling, he asked back:

“What did you say? Whose illness is cured?”