But all my efforts turned out to be a joke.
Mom wasn’t poor. She had money—money carefully saved for my younger brother’s wedding fund, for the down payment on his house.
She just never had money for me.
I suddenly remembered two years ago, after a minor surgery. I craved homemade chicken soup, and she promised to send it. A single free-range chicken cost more than $40, and shipping was another $10 or so. She kept sighing about the expense, saying she didn’t have the money.
Back then, I didn’t think twice. I went out, bought three chickens myself, and transferred her about $300.
It wasn’t poverty. It was indifference.
She wasn’t poor—she just didn’t love me.
And my younger brother, the one I’d spoiled since childhood, wasn’t any better. Always sweet-talking, always coaxing. If I hadn’t come back this time, I might never have heard his real thoughts.
He didn’t care that I might be dying of cancer.
He only cared that my illness might cost him his wedding fund.
I had loved him for over twenty years. Yet I mattered less than his marriage.
Their indifference left me cold, hollow, like I had never truly belonged to this family.
Not my parents’ daughter.
Not my brother’s sister.
I stood before the dark, silent door, then turned away. I booked a hotel and dragged my suitcase downstairs. The neighborhood was hushed, the night heavy, and for the first time, I felt a strange sense of relief—relief that I wasn’t the one who was sick.
In the hotel, my thoughts turned to the money I had sent home over the years. In the early days, when I earned less, it was around $15,000 a year. Later, when the company prospered, I sent at least $30,000 annually.
Most transfers had gone through PayPal or Venmo—money I’d never see again. But there was one sum I still had a chance of reclaiming.
When I first started working, my mother had wanted to open a savings card for me. Her ID had expired, so she used mine instead. Every month, I deposited money into that card. I wasn’t sure whether she had touched it. I wanted to call customer service, but since the card was linked to her phone number, I was afraid she would be alerted.
So the next morning, as soon as the bank opened, I went in with my ID. The teller checked the account: the balance was about $120,000. Untouched.
I don’t know if she had trusted me completely, or simply forgotten the card wasn’t under her name.
I took a steadying breath.
“I lost this card,” I told the teller. “Please report it lost and issue me a replacement.”
Half an hour later, it was done. Report filed. New card in hand. Balance transferred.
I went out for breakfast, ate calmly, and then headed home.
It was Saturday. My mom had just set breakfast on the table. Dad was eating, and my brother’s door was still shut.
When I pushed the door open, they both looked up, startled. Their eyes flicked toward each other nervously before landing on me.
“Maria, why are you back?” Mom asked, her tone gentle, her face warm—the same mother I had always believed in.
I swallowed down the sting of last night’s memory and forced myself to sound casual.
“I was on a business trip and thought I’d stop by. Where’s Aaron? Still sleeping?”
Relief washed over them at my words.
“You know him,” Mom sighed, almost fondly. “Played games until midnight, won’t wake before noon on weekends. He never listens, and I worry myself sick.”
I smiled faintly.
Once, I had taken those complaints at face value, thinking Mom was exasperated, that she longed for him to change.
Now I knew the truth: behind every sigh, behind every complaint, lay nothing but boundless indulgence.
