I lied to my father and told him I had failed the entrance exam, even though my score was in the 98.7th percentile. He just replied with two words that made my blood run cold. “Get out of the house.” I didn’t cry. I didn’t beg. I didn’t even try to explain that I was ranked among the best in the state.
Because I already knew that house was never a home. It was a trap, and I had been waiting for the right moment to walk out of it.
My cell phone screen lit up my face in the dark of my bedroom. The notification was still there, glowing in the soft light of the night. 98.7 percent. My mother would have cried with pride if she were still alive. My father, Arthur Reynolds, wouldn’t. From the living room, I heard the laughter of Carol, my stepmother, and the excited voice of the man who still had the nerve to call himself my father.
“Lily is really going to make us proud,” he was saying, his voice booming with a kind of warmth he never directed at me. “That girl deserves a huge party.”
My daughter. That is what he called Lily, his golden child, the one who could do no wrong.
He called me the burden. I took a deep breath, dialed his number, and waited. He answered, his voice dripping with annoyance. “What do you want, Diane?”
“The results are out,” I said, keeping my voice steady.
There was a short silence on the other end of the line. “And?”
I looked at the 98.7 on my screen again. I thought about the house in Pasadena, the one my mother left to me, the one Arthur was so desperate to get his hands on. Then I told the coldest lie of my life. “I didn’t make it, Dad. I failed.”
On the other end, I heard his heavy breathing, like a predator sensing a weakness. Then came his voice, hard, dry, and without an ounce of sadness. “I gave you food, schooling, a roof over your head. And this is how you repay me?”
I didn’t answer. I just listened to the silence.
“You embarrassed me,” he added. “Don’t come back. There is no place for useless people in this house.”
He hung up. I just stared at the blank screen. Not a single tear. Not one. I felt a strange sense of lightness, a clarity I hadn’t known in years. Because half a month earlier, I had walked past his study and overheard the truth behind everything. The door was ajar, just enough for me to hear the venom in Carol’s voice.
“Diane just turned eighteen, Arthur. You can finally take the house her mother left her.”
I froze in the hallway. My mom’s house. The one thing she managed to protect before she died. The deed was in my name, and I was supposed to get full control upon turning eighteen. Carol continued, her tone sharp. “Lily wants to study in Canada. That’s expensive. If we sell that house, we’re set.”
My dad sighed, a sound of resignation that made me sick. “The will is clear.”
“So what? She’s just a kid. You’re her father. Make her sign.”
There was a silence, then he said something that tore away the last bit of love I had left for him. “When she fails the exam, I’ll kick her out. She’ll realize that she’s worth nothing without me. When she’s desperate, I’ll throw her some pocket change and she’ll sign whatever I want.”
Carol laughed. I held my breath, my hand gripping the doorframe so hard my knuckles turned white. I went back to my room, closed the door, and turned on my phone’s voice recorder. The next day, I hid the phone behind a planter next to the study. I recorded everything. Their plan. The fake relinquishment of rights. The pressure. The starvation tactics. The way my own father planned to break me to steal the only thing my mother left me.
That is why I lied. That is why I accepted him kicking me out. That is why I quietly packed my clothes into a suitcase that night. I didn’t have much. Three pairs of pants. Two blouses. My documents. My birth certificate. My ID. The copy of the will. And a small wooden box with a picture of my mom. In the photo, she was hugging me in front of the house in Pasadena. There were bougainvilleas in the background. I was six years old. She was still alive. I pressed it against my chest, feeling the sharp corner of the frame.
