“Vanessa,” I said, keeping my voice steady through sheer willpower, “this isn’t working. I need to sleep. You can’t keep having people over until two in the morning.”
She stopped mid-yawn and looked at me like I’d told her the sky was purple.
“God,” she said, rolling her eyes. “You sound just like Mom.”
Something in me twisted. “That’s not a compliment.”
Vanessa shrugged. “At least Mom is fun.”
Fun. The word stung because it was so revealing. Fun mattered. Comfort mattered. My needs only mattered when they were convenient.
The breaking point came on a day when my head felt like it was full of nails.
I’d woken with a migraine that didn’t ease. I went to work anyway because deadlines didn’t care about pain. By noon, my vision had blurred at the edges, and the office lights felt like knives. My manager took one look at my face and told me to go home.
