They Called Me an ATM, Now My Account is Closed

§01

The notification on my phone screen was a punch to the gut: RENT DUE.

I stared at the three digits in my bank account, a stark reminder of how close to the edge I lived.

Just enough for rent, utilities, and maybe, if I stretched it, instant noodles for the rest of the month.

The city outside my window hummed with a life I felt completely disconnected from.

My apartment, a cramped railroad-style unit in a pre-war walk-up called The Bradbury Arms, was my sanctuary and my prison.

It was the price of freedom, the cost of putting three hundred miles between me and my family.

Just as I transferred the last of my money, my phone buzzed again.

Not a notification this time, but a call.

The screen lit up with a name that sent a familiar chill down my spine: Mom.

I let it ring, my heart pounding a frantic rhythm against my ribs.

I knew this wasn't a "how are you" call.

It never was.

The ringing stopped, replaced moments later by a text.

"Maeve, I know you're there. Pick up. It's an emergency."

Against my better judgment, I called back.

"What is it, Mom?" I asked, my voice tight.

Her voice came through the speaker, strained and desperate. "Maeve, honey, I need you to do something for me. Can you wire home twenty thousand dollars in the next few days?"

The number hung in the air, so absurd, so astronomical, that I almost laughed.

Twenty thousand dollars.

I looked around my tiny apartment, at the peeling paint and the secondhand furniture.

"What happened?" I managed to say, my throat suddenly dry. "Why do you need that much money?"

She hesitated, a telltale sign of a story being constructed.

"I'll explain later. I'm… I'm in the hospital. I need it for medical bills."

"You should have enough to cover it with your job, shouldn't you?"

"I… I can't work for a while now, and you know your father…"

The lie was so flimsy, so insulting.

"You have a job," she pressed on, her voice gaining a sharp edge. "You should be able to get a loan. Can you get it together in the next couple of days?"

My head was spinning.

I was drowning in my own crippling student loans, living paycheck to paycheck on a salary that barely scraped by in this city.

In my family, love wasn't a gift; it was a debt I was born with, and the bills were always coming due.

And she was asking for twenty thousand.

I quickly ended the call. "I'll see what I can do."

Another lie.

§02

My thumbs flew across the screen, straight into the family group chat.

"Mom, are you serious? Tricking me into a twenty-thousand-dollar loan to send Spencer to Europe?"

The message landed like a bomb in the silent chat.

A moment later, her reply came, not with shame, but with fury.

"What are you doing? Are you trying to embarrass me in front of everyone?"

A few minutes later, a private message from her popped up.

"I was desperate, okay? The admissions consultant has been asking for the money for weeks."

Then, another. "I've thought about it, and you're right, the interest on a loan is too high. Why don't you just borrow the money from your coworkers in the city?"

I didn't even bother to reply.

My phone rang almost immediately. It was Leah.

"Don't send them a dime, Maeve," she said, her voice a low, weary hum. "It's for Spencer. Again."

"I know," I said, the anger in my voice cracking. "She tried to lie to me. Said she was in the hospital."

There was a heavy sigh on the other end of the line. "Of course she did."

"This is insane, Leah. Twenty thousand dollars? For what? So he can post pictures of his new sneakers from Paris?"

"I know," she repeated, the two words carrying the weight of a thousand similar battles. "It's insane."

For a moment, we were just silent, united in our shared exhaustion.

This was our life, a constant war of attrition against the bottomless pit of our brother's wants and our parents' enablement.

"We can't do it this time," I said, my voice hardening. "We just can't."

"We won't," Leah affirmed. "I'm with you, Maeve. This time, we say no. Together."

Her words were a lifeline. Together.

Maybe this time would be different.

§03

Leah and I had been a team for as long as I could remember.

She went to a vocational school right after middle school, starting work the moment she turned eighteen, her paychecks vanishing into the family account.

It was her sacrifice that paid for my high school, my shot at college, my chance at a different life.

My brother, Spencer, got a different kind of investment.

After he failed his high school entrance exams, my mother moved heaven and earth, borrowing from everyone she knew to enroll him in a cushy, expensive private high school in the city.

He didn't gain knowledge there, but he did gain an insatiable appetite for luxury.

He ruined a classmate's designer sneakers on purpose, and my mother, head bowed, paid for them with the money Leah and I sent home.

Download the Novellia app, Search 【 745297 】reads the whole book.

MotoNovel

App Store

Google Play

Novellia

App Store

Google Play