Chapter 11
Everything changed the moment her adoptive parents had a son of their own. From then on, the warmth they’d once shown her vanished. What replaced it was daily violence and cruelty. They beat her, screamed at her, treated her like she was less than human.”
The family was poor, barely scraping by. Their son–mentally disabled–was their only hope for continuing the family line. But with no prospects for marriage, they grew desperate.§
When my sister turned thirteen, they locked a chain around her ankle. Her entire world shrank to a radius of thirty feet. That was all the freedom she had.
And on the day she officially became an adult, they forced her into a nightmare–marriage to their disabled son.” Two years passed. She didn’t conceive.
Her adoptive mother, frustrated and furious, made a new demand–an even more twisted one. From then on, my sister was expected to shoulder everything: cooking, cleaning, laundry, fieldwork. She was ordered to wait on her husband, serve her adoptive father and endure every insult her adoptive mother hurled at her.
They told her she had brought this on herself. That she was the reason their son’s mind never developed. That she was a curse, a jinx, abandoned by her birth parents because she was bad luck. That she was nothing more than a filthy girl, used and discarded by men.
It was endless–years of degradation and abuse. No kindness, no escape.
Until one night, something in her snapped.§
She waited until the world was asleep, crept out to the yard, picked up a hoe–and brought it down.”
Again and again.
She cleaned the blood, scrubbed the floor and burned what she could. Then she fled.
Somewhere along the way, she crossed paths with the hotel manager.
And suddenly, it all made sense–why, in my previous life, I’d collapsed after drinking a glass of water at that hotel. She hadn’t just wanted to hurt me. She wanted to frame me for the murder of her adoptive family too.”
She hadn’t just set me up. She planned to make sure no one would ever believe I was innocent.”
With a heavy heart, I left the police station. My parents were hollowed out by guilt. They hired the best lawyer they could find to defend her.
Even though I never pressed charges, the charges already filed were severe. She was convicted of premeditated murder and sentenced to death.
The entire ordeal shattered my family. My mother collapsed from grief and my father’s health spiraled downward. Neither of them could forgive themselves.
As for the hotel manager, his part in the plot didn’t go unnoticed. He was fired on the spot and soon pulled into a criminal investigation.
And me?!
I went home and told Sean I wanted a divorce.
He stared at me like I was speaking a foreign language. He didn’t understand. To him, this was just a misunderstanding.
He admitted his reaction back then hadn’t been ideal–but any man, he said, would’ve reacted the same way under those circumstances. So why couldn’t I let it go?
Because I couldn’t forget.
I couldn’t forget the way he looked at me that day, like I was a stranger. I couldn’t forgive the fact that the man I trusted most didn’t even ask me what happened before turning away.”
I couldn’t live with someone who never truly believed in me.§
After everything, I took my parents on a trip, hoping that fresh air and distance would ease their pain. I told myself that time could heal all wounds.
(The End)
