3: 3
I looked down at the needle marks on the back of my hand, where they'd drawn my blood, and the tears just kept falling.
Even dead, when I remembered that thick needle, I was still so afraid.
Mom stood beside the bed, and when she couldn't get me to stir no matter how she pushed, her temper flared.
She slapped the blanket hard.
"To think I gave birth to a curse like you! Sabrina's got one foot through death's door and you're still lying there playing dead!"
I kept crying, looking up at her.
I wasn't playing dead. I really was dead.
But Mom couldn't hear me. She deliberately took out my favorite gelatin cup.
"Since you don't want it, I'll just give it to Sabrina."
I still didn't move, and in her fury Mom kicked the bed.
My pale little hand, stained red with blood, slipped out from under the blanket, but she didn't see it at all.
Instead she turned and peeled open my favorite gelatin cup for Sabrina.
Sabrina made loud smacking sounds on purpose, eating and talking at the same time.
"Dr. Fox, you really are the best mom in the whole world. You even carry big sister Norma's favorite gelatin cups around with you. I wish you were my mom."
Then Sabrina suddenly burst into tears. "Sabrina never had a mom. Daddy's always so busy with work he ignores me, there's only Grandma. I really do envy big sister Norma."
Mom held her close, her heart aching. "I wish you were my daughter too."
Sabrina looked up at her, eyes glimmering. "You don't mind that Sabrina has a heart condition...?"
Mom smiled softly. "Then it must be fate that brought us together. I can be the one to treat you."
"You're smart and pretty, lively and sweet. A well-behaved daughter like you is exactly what I'd want."
Sabrina threw her arms around her. "Can I call you Mommy?"
Mom froze for a second. "You can."
"Mommy!"
"Mm."
"Mommy! Mommy! Mommy!"
Sabrina called out over and over, and Mom answered every single time, not missing one.
That shrill little voice stabbed straight into my heart.
I was already dead, and yet I clutched my chest in pain, the tears never stopping.
So Mom really didn't love me. She loved Sabrina.
When Sabrina finished the gelatin, she sweetly told Mom she could go to the bathroom by herself.
Mom smiled, comforted, then turned her head and saw the mound of my blanket, and all her anger came rushing back.
"Norma! How long are you going to keep giving me the silent treatment!"
I didn't answer, and her voice went low with disgust and held-back rage.
"If you weren't my own child, I really wouldn't want to be dragging a simpleton around for the rest of my life."
The moment she said it, Mom went stiff.
Then she laughed again.
"You're a simpleton. You can't even understand what I'm saying."
"Everyone calls me a genius, and I've always been healthy, and yet I gave birth to a sickly child like you."
"If all you had was a heart condition, I could treat you."
"But you're a simpleton! What am I supposed to do with that!"
Mom's eyes were red, utterly hopeless.
She was crying.
The scalding tears fell onto the white blanket.
I reached out to catch them, and I found that they tasted bitter.
Mom once told me a fairy tale, that if a person is happy, her tears are sweet.
But Mom's tears were bitter.
I had made her sad.
