I was born without the ability to cry.
When I was eight, my father was killed in a car accident. His blood ran along the road until it pooled at my feet. I stood there, expressionless, while my younger sister had already thrown herself into our mother's arms, sobbing like her world was ending.
The look in my mother's eyes shifted from shock to disgust：
“You're a cold-blooded animal. Heartless, no matter how much anyone gives you.”
The next day, she sent me to live with my grandmother in the countryside.
Twelve full years. Not a single phone call. Not a single visit.
The day Grandma Hayward died, my mother finally showed up.
But the way she looked at me was the way you'd look at a stranger：
“Pack your things. You're coming back with me.”
I followed her to the car. In the rearview mirror, Grandma's old house shrank smaller and smaller until it disappeared.
We drove for a long time before my mother broke the silence：
“Your sister's health isn't great. When you get back, go easy on her.”
I stared out the window and said nothing.
She sighed, the same disappointment from twelve years ago threaded through her voice：
“You really haven't changed. Still that same cold-blooded look.”
She had decided long ago that I was born heartless. It never once occurred to her that the reason I couldn't cry was because I had no tear glands.
A doctor had explained it: at first, the condition only caused dry eyes and light sensitivity. Left untreated, it would gradually lead to blindness.
By now, my vision was already blurring. The world was slipping away from me, a little more each day.
——
The overcast sky should have been easy on the eyes, but even opening mine a fraction wider sent sharp stabs of pain through them.
I quietly put on the sunglasses Grandma had bought me.
My mother glanced over and frowned but didn't say anything.
After a long stretch of silence, I finally spoke：
“What's wrong with Gwendolen Hayward?”
The moment I mentioned her, my mother's whole face softened with tenderness：
“Oh, nothing serious. She's just been studying so hard lately that her eyesight went bad. I took her to several different clinics before we finally got her fitted for the right pair of glasses.”
I didn't respond. A dull pressure settled in my chest and wouldn't move.
Within three years of arriving at Grandma's house, my eyes had already developed severe light sensitivity. I could barely keep them open on a normal day.
Grandma was frantic. She called my mother specifically to tell her about my condition, hoping she would bring me back to the city to see a doctor.
Every time, my mother cursed her out and said I was faking it.
She had driven Gwendolen from clinic to clinic without a single complaint, attentive to every detail. But she let me suffer through the pain, year after year, without lifting a finger.
The tightness in my chest was suffocating. I didn't want to talk anymore. I closed my eyes and leaned back against the seat.
Some time later the car stopped, and we were back at the house I remembered.
I followed my mother inside and headed instinctively toward my old room.
The moment I pushed open the door, I froze.
The room that had once been mine had been turned into Gwendolen's walk-in closet.
Everything that had belonged to me, every last trace, had been cleared out. As if I had never lived in this house at all.
A raw ache spread through my chest, and my eyes flared with a sudden, biting dryness. I reached up and rubbed them, but it didn't help at all.
Laughter drifted in from the living room. My mother and Gwendolen sat together, chatting about college plans and going away to school.
Every word out of my mother's mouth was worry, reluctance to let go. Gwendolen had never been far from home, she said. She couldn't bear it.
I stood off to the side, listening. I had lived with Grandma in the countryside for twelve years, just the two of us, and my mother had never once said she worried about me. Yet a brief separation from Gwendolen was already more than she could stand.
When the conversation turned to college, my mother glanced my way：
“Oh, right, Thelma Hayward. You should be starting college too, shouldn't you? How were your SAT scores? Have you decided where you want to go?”
