2: 2
I turned and went back to my room.
Room was a generous word for it. Really it was just a corner someone had walled off on the balcony.
My phone buzzed. Rodney had posted something in the family group chat.
Photo after photo, dozens of them.
All Millicent.
Millicent asleep on the plane with a line of drool at her mouth, Millicent halfway through her makeup, glaring at him not to shoot.
My eyes drifted, without my meaning them to, toward the photo on my nightstand.
It was from the first day of freshman year, me feeding a stray cat by the back gate of campus. Rodney had caught it without me noticing.
I'll always remember he was holding that same photo the day he confessed to me.
"I'm a landscape photographer. I never shoot people."
"But from now on, I'll shoot portraits for you, and only you."
Except after he met Millicent, he photographed me less and less.
Even though the camera he still used was the one I'd saved up for a long time to buy him right out of college.
I asked him once whether it was because I was too dull, not as cute or sweet-tongued as Millicent.
At first he corrected me seriously. "I'm only good to her because of you."
Later she was the one who said it: "Blanche, you're so uptight. You should learn from Milly, loosen up a little."
But I'd told him. I'd told him clearly.
Before I turned ten, I was fearless too. Afraid of nothing.
I knew how to be playful, how to coax people, how to charm.
It was after Millicent came that I changed.
The time I scored a perfect mark, my mother snatched my report card and tore it in half.
"What are you doing, bringing this home to rub it in Milly's face?"
I stood my ground. "There are plenty of people in this world who do well in school. Does that mean she can't go on living?"
That was the first time my mother slapped me.
"How can you be so vicious? She has no parents to look after her. For her to be doing this well is already a lot."
"Do you really have to compete with her?"
That night I cried half the night on the couch.
Millicent lifted her chin at me, smug, before she went into her room.
I knew that if I fought her, our parents would only dislike me more.
So all I could do was go quieter and quieter.
I thought that way I could win back the parents who had doted on me before I was ten.
But in the end they said it about me anyway:
"Doesn't fit in."
"Bad temperament."
Until I met Rodney.
I felt like I'd found the self I'd been before ten again.
In front of him, I could cry, I could laugh.
I could ask for things the way I had as a child.
I worked up the courage to bring him home to meet my parents.
They liked him a lot, and because of him they even started treating me a little better.
But the more often he came to the house,
the closer he got with Millicent.
Somewhere along the way,
I became the invisible one at home again.
The four of them would be talking and laughing in the living room, and the moment I walked in,
they'd all fall silent at once.
As if my existence itself was the awkward thing.
I tagged Rodney in the group chat. "Do you still remember what you said the day you confessed to me?"
A second ago the four of them had been trading comments on the photos.
Now it went dead quiet.
See. I really am the one who ruins the mood.
Rodney sent me a private message.
"Are you upset?"
"How could I not remember? I said I'd shoot portraits for you."
"But when I shoot Milly, that's for you too. She's your sister."
I took the photo out of the frame and tore it, piece by piece.
For my sake, he was good to her.
For my sake, my father was good to her.
Everyone had their reasons.
The only person no one ever asked about was me.
Fine. Then from now on, I'll be good to myself.
The living room door slammed shut.
Along with my mother's voice: "Don't call her. Every single day it's some drama with her."
"Like the world owes her something."
My father called out, "We're leaving."
Soon the footsteps faded past the door.
A moment later Rodney sent another message:
"Blanche, your parents just called us. They're really unhappy."
"You've put Milly in a terrible mood too."
"When they get there, give them a call and apologize. Don't let this spoil the wedding."
I let out a short laugh.
If the people who worked under me at my company could see me like this,
their jaws would hit the floor.
Ms. Donaldson, decisive and ruthless, the one who never wavers, could actually be this indecisive, letting herself be pushed around this far.
But I knew it was because I still cared.
The moment I stopped caring, I'd turn back into the Blanche Donaldson everyone knew at work.
I slid my finger across the screen and blocked Rodney without a second's hesitation.
