Chapter 4

In the pitch-black storage room, the only thing I could hear was the wind moaning through the cracks in the walls.

My fever had shot up to a terrifying level, and my consciousness was starting to fade.

All the pain and resentment I'd been forced to swallow for more than ten years suddenly became painfully clear, right here at the edge of death.

I remembered when I was ten, I aced my class and came out on top.

I ran home clutching my certificate, excited to show it to Dad.

But he tossed it straight into the trash without a second glance. "What's the point of you doing well? You're an outsider in this family. You think you'll ever get to inherit the Foster family business?

"If you've got so much free time, go help Emily with her piano pieces."

I remembered when I was fifteen, suffering from a raging bout of appendicitis, writhing in agony on my bed.

But Mom was so fed up with my cries in the middle of the night, worried I'd disturb Emily's sleep, that she locked me away in the basement.

It wasn't until the next morning that the maid found me passed out and rushed me to the hospital.

Back then, I thought their favoritism was because I wasn't their real daughter.

But it wasn't until I was on the brink of death that I realized blood meant nothing when it came to prejudice.

The blood from my nose had crusted on my face.

My breathing grew weaker and weaker, each inhale feeling like I was swallowing shards of glass.

My chest was wheezing, rasping like a busted bellows trying to suck in air.

Suddenly, the storage room door was kicked open.

Frank stormed in, carrying a thick wooden stick, with Susan following close behind.

They'd come to give me a piece of their mind and force me to get up and make dinner.

But when Susan saw the pool of blood beneath me and my face bruised and discolored, she finally realized something was seriously wrong.

"F-Frank, she's breathing out more than she's breathing in," Susan stammered, her voice shaking.

Frank paused, then stepped forward and prodded my arm with the stick. "Hey, quit pretending to be dead."

I didn't move.

My eyes were half-open, pupils unfocused, staring at them with a cold gaze.

Frank finally panicked.

He dropped the stick, reached out to feel for my breath, then snatched his hand back like he'd touched a live wire. "Damn it. Mr. Foster never said she was dying or anything.

"If she croaks in our house, how the hell are we supposed to explain it to the cops?"

Susan was so freaked out that she collapsed onto the floor. "So what now? Shouldn't we rush her to the hospital or something?"

"Hospital, my ass," Frank roared. "You think that's free? And what if they turn around and blame us for beating her?

"Just say she died from being sick. Lock the door, and nobody says a damn thing about this."

They bolted out of there, and the iron lock slammed shut with a heavy, final click.

Despair wrapped around me, suffocating me in the pitch-black room.

No longer struggling, I waited quietly for my final sentence.

Just then, the phone I'd tossed into the corner suddenly lit up.

The screen flashed with the name "Dad."

With the last bit of strength I had, I crawled over like a bug and pressed the answer button.

"Claire, what are you throwing a tantrum for now?" Dad's voice was cold and harsh. "Your mom said you called this afternoon pretending to be sick. You think that's funny?

"Yeah, the sticks are tough, but those are your birth parents. Who do you think you are to complain?"

I tried to speak, but no sound came out. My throat was thick with bloody froth, the metallic tang overwhelming.

"Tomorrow's Emily's piano recital. I was going to bring you back so you could see the gap between you and Emily for yourself," he said. "But since you're acting like this, you can stay out there and think things over.

"Without my say-so, your birth parents wouldn't dare let you come back."

As I listened to his holier-than-thou tone, tears finally slid down, mingling with the blood smeared across my face.

This was my father.

He still had no clue that the so-called birth parents he sent to punish me were next door, figuring out how to deal with my dead body.

"Dad," I whispered, my voice barely a breath. "I'm dying."

Dad paused for a second, then his anger flared up. "You ungrateful girl, how dare you say something like that? I swear, you're a lost cause."

The line went dead with a harsh beep. He hung up on me in a fit of rage. That was the last sound I ever heard in this world.

My hand went limp, the phone clattering to the floor, its screen going dark for good.

At that moment, I felt my body turn light as air.

It was as if I'd finally broken free from some heavy shackles. The pain disappeared, and the cold faded away.

I slowly opened my eyes and realized I was floating in midair, suspended above the pitch-black storage room.

On the floor below, there was a gaunt corpse, face smeared with blood and grime.

That was my body. I was dead.

*****

Meanwhile, thousands of miles away at the Foster residence, Mom was busy preparing Emily's recital outfit when she got a call from the local police station.

"Hello, is this Richard Foster's wife?" the officer asked. "This is the Willowreek Police Station. Your daughter, Claire Foster, has been confirmed dead."