Strawberry Blood And Frozen Vows

The Q1 sales blitz deadline was hitting me like a speeding train: fifty car loans closed by New Years Eve, or I was out of a job. It was December 30th, and even pushing myself to the absolute breaking point, I was still ten contracts short.

Thats when the news alert popped up on my phone.

WESTON GROUPS HOLIDAY BONUS: ONE HUNDRED HIGH-PERFORMING EMPLOYEES RECEIVE A NEW CAR!

In a final, humiliating act of desperation, I dialed my fathers number. We hadnt spoken in five years.

"I saw the news about the Weston Group cars," I managed, my voice thin and tight. "Could they process the financing through me? I... I just need this last push to hit my numbers for the month."

The silence on the line stretched out, five years thick. Finally, that familiar, clipped sigh.

"Fine, Anna."

But before I could even breathe out, my twin sisters voice, sharp and icy, cut through the receiver.

"Don't you dare, Dad! She walked out on this family! She said she wouldn't rely on us!"

The line went dead. The silence that followed was suffocating, the vast, echoing sound of a door slamming shut.

A nurse walked into my small hospital room, dropping the final, urgent statement for my chemotherapy payment onto the table.

"Look, beds are a premium," she said, her voice completely devoid of sympathy. "If you can't cover the balance, you need to be discharged. Youre not the only one fighting cancer, and others are waiting."

...

1.

The diagnosis had devoured every cent of my savings. I was fighting cancer and my career at the same time. Now, the money was gone, the sickness wasnt, and my job was about to vanish.

I maxed out the last dollar on my credit card to settle the bill, signed the discharge papers, and stepped back out onto the street.

The cold was a physical shock. Shivering, I didn't know where to go. All I could do was replay the pathetic highlight reel of my useless life.

My father, Conrad Weston, subscribed to a brutal form of meritocracy. From the moment my sister and I were born, we were competitors. Victoria opened her eyes first. She got the formula; I was relegated to rice cereal. She crawled at six months, and Dad hired ten rotating specialists for her. I was left in a nursery, fed on a strict schedule, but mostly alone.

When we started school, she had the best tutors and scored one hundred percent on every test. If I brought home a ninety-nine, I missed dinner.

"You want it, you earn it," he would drone, his expression cold. "If you fail, it's not the system; it's you. You slacked off. Remember this, Anna: The strong take all. Its the only law that matters, in this house and in the world."

At six years old, I etched his words into my heart. I cannot slack off. I must earn that missing point. I must earn my parents' love.

I pulled all-nighters, threw myself at my schoolwork, and finally, for an entire semester, I matched Victoria: A perfect one hundred on everything.

But it wasn't enough.

She not only aced her exams, but she also clinched the National Junior Track Title for the state. That winter break, Mom and Dad took her on a lavish European tour, leaving me alone to house-sit. I survived on cold water and day-old bread, convinced it was the penance I deserved for not trying hard enough.

I set a goal. Ten years. I would get into a better college than she did. Just once, I would win a reward from them.

I became a machine. A straight-A, sleepless automaton.

Then, on the day the acceptance letters came out, I collapsed. I slept through the day in a feverish haze. When I woke up that evening, the house was silent. Empty.

The sickness gave me a strange clarity. I found our applications and slowly, tremulously, typed the access codes into the computer. My hand was shaking so badly I almost missed the key.

I opened my eyes.

I had scored one point higher. I had won.

I knelt there, sobbing uncontrollably. Ten years of grinding effort, finally justified. I had to tell them. I ran out the front door, shouting.

The neighbors nanny was locking up. She stared at me, confused.

"You didn't go? Your parents are hosting Victoria's acceptance party at the Peninsula Ballroom. Everyone in the district is there."

By the time I reached the ballroom, Victoria was basking in the spotlight, a gilded princess in a designer dress.

"Thank you all for coming to celebrate my success," she purred into the mic. "And thank you, Mom and Dad, for throwing this wonderful party."

Her celebration? I won. It was my moment.

2.

I burst through the crowd, crying, and screamed at my father.

"You lied to me! You said the strong take all! Why is she here when I beat her?!"

Conrad looked at me with profound disappointment, sighing heavily. Victoria lowered her champagne glass, a look of utter contempt on her perfect face.

"I had my Stanford acceptance months ago, Anna," she said dismissively. "The finals were just busy work. Did you really think you could win against me? And honestly, is this place for people like you? So gauche."

The thing I had sacrificed ten years of my life for, she treated as a trivial annoyance. My world didnt just collapse; it vaporized.

My mother, Bethany, came over, trying to physically pull me away. But I was stubborn. I had dreamed of a moment like this my entire life. I wanted to stay.

Then I saw the massive tiered cake. Driven by a raw, hungry impulse I didn't recognize, I rushed the table, grabbed a fistful of frosting and cake, and shoved it into my mouth. I was crying and choking at the same time.

The onlookers stared, utterly horrified, as if watching a wild animal.

Conrad strode over and slapped me across the face. The shock cleared my tears instantly.

"Crying is useless! If you're incompetent, you go back and work harder!" he hissed. "Don't put on a pathetic show for pity. Do you think this madness will make us coddle you?"

That was the spark. Victorias face was pure, unadulterated venom. She swept the remaining cake to the floor.

"I have tolerated you for too long, Anna. What is your purpose?" she shrieked. "You consume resources and produce nothing but mediocrity. This is not a sustainable model. A dog has loyalty, a business asset has valuewhat is yourcontribution? Honestly, we'd all be happier if you weren't even here."

Her words pressed me into the polished floor, suffocating me. I shrieked back, tears streaming.

"I may be useless, but Im still your daughter!"

The noise died. The silence returned, crushing. In the dead stillness, my father spoke the four words that ended my life with them.

"A worthless waste."

The words detonated in my skull. I was numb. "I tried! I worked so hard! How am I worthless?! If I had your tutors, Victoria's resources, I could have been better!"

Victoria charged forward and shoved me. I fell backward onto the cake-smeared floor.

"I earned my resources! You don't deserve anything I have!"

Conrad watched with cold eyes. Mom was consoling Victoria. No one looked at my pathetic form on the floor. I scrambled up, wiping the sticky frosting from my skirt, utterly humiliated.

"Fine! I don't belong here!" I screamed, running for the exit. "I will never bother you again! I will never ask you for anything, ever!"

...

3.

The icy wind of that long-ago night now seemed to be blowing straight through me again. I will never ask you for anything, ever. What a pathetic, empty promise. Now, I was sick, dying, unable to afford treatment, and I had broken that vow in a desperate plea for ten lousy car loans.

But reality offered no space for sentiment. A notification popped up from my bank supervisor.

TO ALL: The Year-End Push is not a goalit is the floor! Everyone must carry their weight. No retreat! Well see who's standing and whos kneeling in the next ten hours!

A fitting epitaph.

Worthless or not, I wanted to live. I hadn't actually lived yet.

In a last-ditch effort, I called my Uncle FranklinDad's older brother, a reliable, quiet presence.

"Ten cars?" Uncle Frank said, his voice surprisingly warm. "No problem, Anna. The kids need their holiday cars anyway. I'll even set one aside for you. It's been too many years since you've come home for the holidays."

My nose stung. I choked back a sob. "Thank you, Uncle Frank. But I don't need the car."

I didn't even have a moment to dry my tears before a new number flashed on my screen. It was Victoria. My elite sister.

"Anna, don't cheat. If you have such dignity, then use it," she sneered. "Uncle Frank is Dad's brother. You're a low-level loan officer. How could you possibly have accessed him? You're a worthless waste; you can't even keep your word."

She paused, a triumphant inhale. "Luckily, he called Dad, and I answered. I assured him you're doing just fine and need no charity. He agreed not to use you for his volume. Did you really think money grows on trees just because you're used to being a liability?"

The phone clicked off. The last pinprick of light had been extinguished.

I wandered the streets of Chicago. Tomorrow was Christmas Eve, the city was bright with lights, tinsel, and forced good cheer. Everyone looked happy, unburdened. Why couldnt I be one of them?

I grabbed a startled man walking by. "Are you looking to buy a new car? Car loan?"

He yanked his arm away, staring at me like a madwoman. "Get lost, psycho!"

Eventually, I found myself outside the wrought-iron gates of the Weston estate. Should I beg? Should I swallow my pride, apologize, and promise to work harder if they just paid for my treatment?

I typed the old security code into the keypad. Nothing. They had changed it.

Screw them.

I used the last reserves of my strength to hoist myself over the tall brick wall. Let them all suffer.

Inside, the courtyard was a riot of cheerful red and green lights and scarlet ribbons. So festive. I remembered every Christmas Eve, locked in that small nursery, reflecting on all the ways I had failed to be better than Victoria. I had never once had Christmas dinner with them.

Before I died, I was going to have a proper meal.

4.

I crept to the kitchen. It was stocked like a five-star pantry.

I ripped open a container of high-end strawberries and stuffed them in my mouth, then cherries, then plums. Then I spotted it: a massive platter of Conrad's famous Holiday Roulade, which he only made for special occasions. The highest accolade in the Weston house. I had never once tasted it.

I gorged myself until I was sick and gagging. I ate every single bite.

Then, I crept to the window of the living room. Inside, it was a perfectly framed picture of a happy familya holiday commercial.

I picked up a heavy paving stone, ready to hurl it through the glass and give them a surprise.

Then I heard Moms voice. "Do you think Anna might be in some kind of trouble?"

My father looked older, his face slightly softer in the holiday light. "If you're worried about her, Bethany, just call her yourself."

A tiny, flickering candle of hope flared inside me. I waited for my own phone to ring, imagining what she might say.

But Victoria instantly clamped her hand over Mom's arm.

"Trouble? No. She's just looking for a shortcut. A handout. If you help her now, it's completely unfair to me."

Mom immediately dropped her hand, and Dad wrapped her in a hug. "Alright, alright, I won't call her," he soothed.

Conrad sighed, completely dismissive. "If she were in real trouble, shed be here. But she's weak; she's always been too weak. I spoiled her a little when she was younger because she was frail, and that's how she became so incompetent. She's probably just drifting, chasing shortcuts and avoiding work. If she ever comes back, I'll have to properly educate her."

Listening to them, a profound, soul-deep weariness settled over me.

The paving stone felt impossibly heavy. I tried to lift it, but my arms wouldn't obey. The window glass reflected my own facegaunt, pale, and completely defeated.

I was too tired to fight. I was the scrap, the off-cut. I didn't want to struggle anymore. Bye-bye, world.

I dropped the stone and curled up in the corner of the wall to wait for death.

A scrawny stray cat, meowing piteously, wandered toward me. I gathered it into my arms, hugging it close for warmth. It immediately went quiet. Dad hated these "filthy animals." At least now, my dying wouldn't interrupt their perfect family evening.

See? I was useful for something after all.

My body, already a ragged piece of cloth from the cancer and chemo, was quickly failing under the bitter cold. Death came faster than I expected.

Slipping out of my ruined shell, I felt light. Free.

I floated, holding the little cat, and drifted into the house. Dad was already talking about next years business plan: strive, strive, strive.

Dead is good. I never have to strive again.

I spent the night floating over the guest bed, resting. It was truly comfortable.

Just before dawn, I heard the maids shriek.

"There's someone sitting by the wall! She's frozen! I think... I think it's the second Miss!"

All three of them rushed into the courtyard, stopping a few feet away from my body. The night's drizzle and the sudden drop in temperature had left a delicate layer of frost on my hair.

Conrad frowned. "Help her inside."

5.

Victoria immediately stopped the maid.

"It's a pathetic stunt, Dad! She's not a child! If she was cold, shed walk in!" Victoria spat, her voice ringing with certainty. "She's waiting for your pity so she can ask for the car loans again. She's all about manipulation and shortcuts."

Mom looked at my body, a flicker of worry in her eyes. "Victoria, it's freezing out here."

Victoria stamped her foot and pulled her arm from Moms grasp. "Are you serious? You think the Chicago weather will actually kill her? Look! Shes fine! She even has the audacity to play with a filthy cat!"

Conrad finally noticed the stray cat clutched to my chest and grimaced in disgust. They turned to walk back inside.

Then the kitchen staff ran over, holding the phone I had dropped last night.

"The holiday food is ruined! Someone got into the kitchen and made a huge mess!"

Conrad grabbed the phone, his face contorted in rage. "Worthless waste, even now!"

Mom chimed in, "We never starved her! Why does she act like a ghoul? And whats on her mouth? Is that strawberry jam?"

That was the blood I threw up before I died, Mom.

They all stared at my face, a slow, dawning realization spreading through them.

Suddenly, my phone buzzed violently. It was my supervisor's voice, booming through the speaker.

"Anna Weston! Did you not see the team message?! Six a.m. sharp for the Year-End Sales Report! Where are you?! You've been bottom of the ladder for a year, and now you're late?!"

The accusation broke my father. He let out a yell and threw the phone with all his might. It struck my head and clattered into my lap.

"I am ruined because of you! You have humiliated me for the last time!"

The phone vibrated endlessly. Conrad pointed at the maid. "Get that disgusting animal out of her hands! Get the phone! They're both filthy!"

The maid, terrified of the cat, gingerly poked it with a long broom handle. Her face instantly went pale.

"It's... hard. Its a dead cat."

A sudden, murderous rage consumed my father. He rushed forward and violently kicked my body.

"I said, stop playing with dead things!"

My frozen body, rigid as a column of ice, toppled over with a sickening thud.