Chapter 3
The day I left, the Linwood family was livelier than usual.
Mia had set up her phone stand in the living room early that morning. As soon as I walked out, she immediately blocked the camera. "No peeking. There's a Thanksgiving surprise encore tonight."
Mom told her to tone it down a bit, saying she'd gotten me really worked up yesterday.
Mia said, "Relax. Hazel never holds a grudge for more than two days. She's always been like that. When she was a kid and threatened to run away, she'd barely make it to the end of the block before getting hungry and coming back.
"It's the same now. Where could she go?"
I pulled my suitcase to the door.
Ryan thought I was moving in ahead of schedule and reached out to take it.
"I've got it," I said.
"Still mad? Alright, suit yourself," he said.
Mom tried to smooth things over. "Girls get emotional before the wedding. Let her be."
Mia shouted after me, "Hazel, be back by six. We've got a big surprise waiting for you."
"Go easy on her, don't make her cry again," Mom said.
"Making her cry is the best part," Mia snickered.
I hit the elevator button, her laughter echoing behind me.
"She can't help but come back," Mia said confidently.
Yeah, I could never bring myself to leave before.
Mom was biased, Dad was stubborn, Mia was having fun, and Ryan was trying to fit in with my family.
I always found reasons for everyone else, but never once defended my own feelings.
The taxi driver asked if I was heading to the airport or the train station.
On my phone, a message popped up from my colleague in Rivergate. My desk was all set, and they wanted to know if I was up for grabbing a bite together tonight.
"The train station," I said.
Mom's message popped up right after, telling me to pick up two boxes of Dad's favorite pecan pies on my way back.
Mia added: [Hazel, make it five boxes. Ryan wants some too.]
I didn't reply.
While I waited for my train, I deleted them one by one from my contacts.
I hesitated for a moment and listened to Ryan's last voice message.
"Come on, be good. That's enough. Make sure you come home early tonight. Mia's been prepping all day. If you don't go along with it, what a buzzkill," he said.
It turned out that my sadness was nothing but a buzzkill for them.
I turned off my phone, got up, and headed to the ticket gate.
Back then, I had no clue Mia's big surprise wasn't only the phone stand; she'd also picked up a bald cap and neon green hair spray.
Dinner was already laid out, everyone waiting for me to show up.
Ryan put his money on seven, Mom guessed seven-thirty, and Dad said eight.
Mia had the whole routine mapped out. She'd slip a hood over my head, spray-paint me, and snap photos of me crying out of fury. She'd laugh about it for an entire year.
It wasn't until their calls kept going unanswered that they finally pushed open my bedroom door.
The bed was made, and half the closet was cleared out.
The ring I left for Ryan was there as well, inside.
And the wedding planner told him the engagement party had been canceled two days ago.
While they were still betting on how long I'd stay gone, Mia had already uploaded the haircut video online.
The headline put my humiliation front and center, and the caption was all her smugness. [Thanksgiving prank on my sister. She went from zero to meltdown in three seconds.]
She watched the view count shoot up, grinning from ear to ear. "This one must go viral."
She was right.
The video really did blow up.
By the time the views passed 100,000, the comments section wasn't full of the laughs Mia had been hoping for.
[You call this a prank? Cutting someone's hair is straight-up bullying.]
[I get the one who did it laughing, but why is the whole family joining in?]
[Her boyfriend was betting on whether she'd cry? What kind of twisted game is that?]
[Hazel, run. This family is suffocating.]
My coworker sent me the link, and I sat in my apartment in Rivergate, watching that so-called Thanksgiving reunion from the outside for the first time.
In the video, I kept my head down, tears streaming down one after another. The camera kept shaking because the person filming couldn't stop laughing.
The comments kept rolling in.
[She's literally in tears, and you guys are still laughing?]
[Can't take a joke? It's a classic bully excuse.]
Even through a screen, total strangers could see how much I was hurting.
I opened up my chat with Mia and sent her one final demand. [Delete every single video of me you've ever posted.]
Then I blocked her again.
Those days at the Rivergate Branch were packed with work. I was busy with handovers and getting up to speed on the projects.
As for the mess back home, I only pieced it together later from Mom's patchy stories.
First, they went to the property management office, trying to find out where I'd gone.
The staff told them I'd already registered that I wouldn't be living there anymore. My parking lease was canceled, and my access card was shut off.
Then Ryan rushed over to my office, but the security guard stopped him at the door.
"Hazel? She wrapped up the handover yesterday," the guard told him.
He tracked down one of my coworkers and, introducing himself as my fiancé, started asking about my transfer.
"She suddenly said she wanted to leave as soon as possible two nights ago and finished the handover yesterday. Didn't you know?" my coworker said.
Two nights ago was the exact moment he sent Mia that 60 dollars.
But they still thought I was being dramatic.
It wasn't until the video got roasted online that Mia clung to her phone, begging her parents to help her explain.
Dad told her to delete it, annoyed that she'd aired our family's dirty laundry for everyone to see.
"Didn't you all think it was funny before? Why is it suddenly all my fault now?" Mia protested.
She turned to Ryan for help, but he told her to delete it too.
"Why should I? It's not like I'm profiting from this. And what do those people online know? They don't know Hazel," Mia protested.
Their argument didn't surprise me at all.
Back then, whenever I told them not to film me, all they ever did was laugh at me. Now, even Ryan started asking if I'd ever told her not to record me before.
Mia shrugged. "So what if she did? She never really got upset about it anyway."
"Delete them all," Ryan said.
"Oh, so now you're suddenly Mr. Nice Guy?"
"Mia, delete them."
Mia got flustered and started blurting out all the secrets. "The dress prank? That was your idea. Cutting her hair? You told me to do it. And when she freaked out over cockroaches, you helped me buy fake ones.
"Every time, you were the one telling me what she was scared of, what mattered to her most.
"And now you want to act all sorry? Wasn't it you who wanted to see her cry, to watch her lose it?"
Mom finally turned to Ryan. "Is that true?"