"What are you calling for now? Your sister scraped her skin and she's in the hospital. I have to go take care of her. If it's nothing important, don't call me."
I opened my mouth, but the pain choked the words before I could get them out, and my mother hung up.
When I called back, her phone wouldn't connect at all.
I lay there on the ground, out of hope, unable to hold on any longer, and let my eyes fall shut.
Right before they closed, I saw a few young people rushing toward me from a car.
When I woke again, I was in a hospital.
A passing car had brought me in. By sheer luck, I'd survived.
My parents didn't come to see me until the next day.
They'd spent the whole of yesterday beside Jade, together with Dylan.
My mother looked at how pale and weak I was, and there was no ache in her face. She only sighed.
"You really are lucky. Even taking a knife, you can't feel a thing."
"You've got it so much better than your sister. She'd faint from the pain of a little scrape."
"If only that little scrape of hers could've landed on you instead."
I closed my eyes and laid my hand over the wound on my stomach.
The doctor had stitched it. The anesthetic had worn off, and the pain came in waves, hammering at my nerves.
But for a moment I couldn't tell which hurt more, the wound or the place in my chest.
I gave a bitter laugh. Just as I was about to say my rare disease was gone, Jade appeared in the doorway of my room, a food container in her hands and her eyes red.
The second my mother saw her, worry flooded her face.
"Oh, my poor baby, does the wound still hurt? You're not well, why are you out of bed?"
"Mom, my wound's almost healed. Yesterday I owe it to my sister for taking the knife for me, or that man would've stabbed me instead."
Jade lifted the container as she spoke. "So I made a soup just for her. To thank her."
Dylan gave her a doting, admiring smile.
"She can't even feel pain. Taking a knife for you is the least she could do, and you went and made her soup on top of it."
Jade smiled, then opened the container, scooped up a spoonful of soup, and brought it to my lips.
As it neared, I felt the heat rising off it.
She pushed the soup straight to my mouth. I flinched from the burn, and suddenly Jade jerked hard, and the whole bowl fell to the floor.
The scalding soup splashed across her calf. She screamed and stumbled back a few steps.
The next second, Dylan's palm came down hard across my face.
"Sophia Matthews!"
He stared at me through gritted teeth. "What do you think you're doing! Do you have any idea how much pain Jade's in from being burned like that!"
"Jade made you soup out of the goodness of her heart and brought it all the way here, and you ungrateful thing actually dared to repay her like this!"
My cheek stung and burned. I held it and looked over at Jade. She was hunched over, sobbing, the picture of someone wronged.
"I didn't. The soup was too hot just now, I never touched her, I—"
"Liar! You can't feel pain at all. You knocked that soup over on purpose to get back at Jade!"
"Dylan, I told you, my illness is gone. I can feel pain now—"
Looking at the disgust on his face, my tears fell before I could stop them, my voice thick and breaking. "Yesterday, when you shoved me toward that kidnapper, when the knife went into me, I felt it hurt—"
