2: 2
2
The day the SAT scores came out, Earl sat squarely in the middle of the room.
Mom stood beside him, fists clenched, eyes locked on the computer screen.
Dad held up his phone and hit record, not wanting to miss the thrilling moment.
"Take it easy, our boy. You worked so hard, of course you got in."
He typed the last digit and pressed enter. One line, then another...
"Five-fifty. Over the admissions cutoff. Thank God." Mom threw her arms around Earl and kissed him, tears streaming down her face.
Earl marched into my room like a general home from war.
He tilted his head and glanced at my score page, saw it was blank, and grinned like he'd stumbled on the joke of the century.
He yelled toward the living room. "Mom, come look at this! Dani got a zero."
Mom, still holding a green bean she'd just snapped off, glanced at the screen and smacked me hard across the back.
"You little wretch, are you trying to send me to an early grave?" Dad said nothing in the living room.
If either of them had looked a second longer, they'd have seen the line of text under the blank score:
*Congratulations. You placed in the top 50 statewide in the humanities track. Your exact score will not be released at this time...*
I didn't lift my head. This time, I wasn't going to be stupid enough to tell them my score.
I stood at the hotel entrance for a full three hours and more.
The heels rubbed my skin raw until blood seeped through, and my feet burned and swelled until, in the end, I couldn't feel them at all.
Inside, Mom beamed as she pulled Earl from table to table to toast the teachers.
"Thank you, teachers, for everything you did for Earl. Without you, he wouldn't be where he is today."
Earl's homeroom teacher gave his shoulder a token pat, then turned to Mom.
"Say, where's his sister, Daniela? Her scores must be out by now too, aren't they?"
Mom mumbled something about not being able to find my score yet.
His math teacher sighed. "Daniela has a real gift for this. She won gold at the academic olympiad, she could've had guaranteed admission to a top university, and she gave it up. Such a shame."
...
The teachers went back and forth, and not one of them said a word about Earl.
Watching the party his parents had thrown for him get upstaged by me, Earl's face went from red to white — and something in him finally broke.
Nothing anyone said could keep him at his own party. He covered his face and bolted out through the hotel lobby.
Mom couldn't let herself blow up in front of the teachers, so she chased me out to the entrance and screamed in my face.
"Daniela, today is your brother's day. Why do you always have to steal it from him?"
"Your grandmother was right. You're a curse on him! I should never have gone soft. I should've aborted you back when I had the chance!"
I froze where I stood, forcing myself upright.
I hadn't had a drop of water all day, and now the burning in my stomach rose up with a rush of something I couldn't name.
"Then do it. You should have just beaten me to death back then!"
I clenched my fists and screamed it back, nails sinking deep into my palms.
My sudden shout startled her. She stumbled back a step and dropped hard to the ground.
Before, no matter how much Mom protected Earl.
It hurt, but I'd never once talked back to her face.
The moment I disobeyed, she'd start to cry.
And every time she cried, I gave in.
After long enough, I stopped fighting at all.
Dad came stumbling out after her and brought his hand down across my face, hard.
"Crack—"
It was the first time he'd ever hit me.
I didn't dodge, and I didn't cry. I just turned my face back, slowly, and stared him dead in the eye.
Earl was still sniveling. He pointed toward Mom.
"Dad, all she did was say a few words to Dani, and Dani tried to beat her to death."
Looking at that mouth of his, twisting everything upside down, I felt the blood run backward in my veins, so furious my fingertips spasmed.
I lunged and clamped ten fingers around his throat like an iron vise.
"Earl, you say one more word out of that mouth, and I swear to God I'll finish you right here."
Earl clawed at my hands, face going purple, and wailed at Dad.
"Dad, help, my sister's trying to kill me!"
Mom had been collapsed on the ground, crying. In an instant she came at me like a raging lioness.
She grabbed at the leg of my pants, nails almost tearing my skin, and threw her head back and shrieked at me.
"Let go, let go of him! Do you want to kill your brother?"
I let go, and Earl slid down to the ground like a heap of mud.
Both hands at his throat, mouth wide, gasping for air.
"Hah... hah..."
Mom snatched Earl into her arms. "My boy, my boy! Open your eyes, look at Mommy."
She sobbed, and over her shoulder she shot me a look that could have cut.
