The Genius's Shadow
Stella was a genius with an IQ of 160. I was just an ordinary person with an IQ of 105.
From that day on, the way my mother looked at me changed.
When Stella practiced the piano, I had to be there to serve her tea. When Stella’s paintings won awards, I had to kneel on the floor and clean her paint-stained brushes. When Stella, who was always frail, got sick, my mother would grab my arm and have the doctors draw my blood.
“You’re twins,” she’d say. “Your blood is the purest. It’s worthy of her.”
I became my sister’s shadow, her personal blood bank, her servant.
Then, when I was seven, my mother took Stella abroad for an international competition and never came back. I was left all alone in that huge, empty house.
It seemed she had forgotten that while she was chasing the stars for her genius daughter, her mediocre one was only seven years old. A child who could only hug her knees in the dead of night, crying out for her mother in a house that never answered.
1
I was finalizing a storage solution for a client when my mother called. She said she was sick and needed me.
The woman’s voice on the other end was hoarse and unfamiliar, laced with an urgent sense of entitlement. But I just calmly glanced at the watch on my wrist.
“I’m sorry, I’m very busy right now. My schedule is booked through next month.”
“How about this,” I continued, my voice even. “You just hang in there. I might have some time in about six months. We can talk then.”
After I hung up, my assistant, Chloe, whispered, “Ms. Vance, was that… your mother?”
I shook my head without a second’s hesitation, rolling up the design plans. “No. Just a wrong number. A telemarketer.”
Chloe hesitated. “But she sounded really desperate. What if…”
I just smiled and said nothing.
Over the years, every person my mother sent to plead her case said the same things.
“She’s your mother. At the very least, she gave birth to you.”
“You’re twin sisters. Blood is thicker than water. There’s no grudge you can’t let go of.”
Blood is thicker than water.
That was a ridiculous idea I used to believe in, too. I thought that as twins, Stella and I would be each other’s closest allies, that we’d hold hands and grow up together.
Until that day when we were five, and my mother took us for those IQ tests.
Stella was a genius. I was painfully average.
When we got home that day, for the first time, my mother didn’t make us practice the piano together. She called me into her study alone, her expression more serious than I had ever seen it.
“Your father had high hopes for you both when he passed. I won’t let him down.”
“Nora,” she said, her voice firm, “your sister is a genius. A future great artist. She is the only light of this family.”
I nodded, still too young to understand, but filled with pride for my sister. “Yeah! Stella’s the best!”
But my mother’s expression didn’t soften. Her tone shifted. “So, from this day forward, your sole purpose in life is to be your sister’s strongest shield, her most loyal shadow.”
“Whatever she needs, you will provide. Everything for her must come before you. Your existence is to make her shine brighter. She will carry on your father’s legacy.”
I stared up at her, dumbfounded. I didn’t understand the full meaning of her words, but I saw the light in her eyes. It was a brilliant, blazing light, but it shone only on Stella. I was standing in the shadows, just outside its reach.
I instinctively reached for her hand. “Mommy,” I whispered, “what about me?”
She pulled her hand away. The coldness of her fingertips sent a shiver through me.
“You?” she said. “You just need to remember not to hold your sister back.”
After that day, everything changed. My new clothes were always Stella’s hand-me-downs. My toys were the ones she had grown tired of. The best art tutors were hired for Stella, while I was confined to my room, forbidden from making a sound that might disturb the genius at work.
Stella had delicate health—mild anemia and allergic asthma. My diet was strictly controlled. I was only allowed to eat foods that were supposed to enrich the blood, no matter how much I hated the medicinal taste. I didn’t dare ask why. I didn’t dare ask why the look in my mother’s eyes when she looked at me was increasingly like she was looking at an object. I just quietly played my part as the shadow.
One day, Stella was working day and night to finish a painting for an international competition. She collapsed with a high fever that wouldn’t break. The doctor said her anemia was severe; she needed a blood transfusion.
Without a moment’s hesitation, my mother pushed me forward.
The cold needle pierced my thin arm, and tears of pain streamed down my face. I clutched my arm and ran to find my mother, wanting her to hold me. She was just coming out of Stella’s room, and when she saw me, a smile of pure relief spread across her face.
“Nora, the doctor said your blood is perfect. Your sister is already doing so much better after the transfusion.”
Her voice was light and cheerful. She didn't seem to notice my red-rimmed eyes or my pale face.
2
From that day on, I became Stella’s personal blood bag.
Periodically, I was taken to the hospital to have my blood drawn, kept on reserve for her.
My mother always said, “It’s an honor for you that your blood can save your sister’s life.”
I instinctively resisted, but I never dared to say it out loud. I was terrified of hospitals, of the smell of antiseptic, of the needles. But in my mother’s eyes, my fear was just selfishness and immaturity.
One time, Stella had an asthma attack from a pollen allergy and was having nightmares. My mother dragged me out of bed and pushed me into Stella’s dark room.
“Your sister is scared. Go sleep with her. Hold her hand and help her feel safe.”
Stella’s room was filled with the scents of aromatherapy oils and paint thinner, smells that made me dizzy and nauseous. I held my nose and whispered, “Mom, the smell is making me sick…”
The door slammed shut. Her voice came from the other side, sharp and cold. “Endure it! Your sister is more important than anything!”
I sat there all night, holding her sweaty hand. She twitched and whimpered in her sleep, and my head throbbed with a splitting headache from the pungent air. The next morning, I was so unwell that I threw up at the breakfast table.
My mother didn't even look at me. She just frowned and pushed my bowl away. “Why are you so dramatic? Clean this up immediately. Don’t ruin your sister’s appetite!”
She then turned to Stella, her voice soft and sweet as she peeled an egg for her, as if Stella were a priceless treasure and I were just a disgusting mess. I swallowed back my tears and nausea, forcing it all down. It was the only way to stop my mother from looking at me with that expression of pure annoyance.
Later, from the constant blood draws, I fainted on the school stairs. A teacher brought me home. My mother stood over me, her voice filled with irritation at this disruption to her plans.
“What’s wrong with you? Sick again?”
A hand touched my forehead. My nose tingled, and I was about to give in to my weakness when I heard her mutter, “Such a nuisance. This is going to mess everything up.”
“Why is your constitution so poor? Don’t you ever think about your sister?”
I opened my eyes and saw the disgust in hers, clear as day.
The doctor said I was severely malnourished and anemic and needed to rest. In the hospital, my mother was constantly on the phone, discussing Stella’s upcoming art exhibition. When she hung up, she looked at me not with concern, but with cold calculation.
She took a deep breath. “Nora, this is a terrible time for you to get sick.”
“Your sister is going to Paris next month. This is her chance to break onto the world stage. Because of you, I have to reschedule everything.”
I opened my mouth, my voice a small whisper. “I’m sorry, Mom…”
But her expression remained frigid. “Nora.”
“I’ve had a few days to think. I can’t allow anything to happen to your sister.” She paused, her gaze finally settling on me, sharp and determined. “Stella is my masterpiece. She cannot have any flaws. For her, any sacrifice is worth it.”
I stared at her, the physical weakness in my body strangely vanishing, replaced by a hollow numbness and a creeping dread. She didn't see my fear. She continued, as if talking to herself.
“Nora, you’re a big girl now. You’ll grow up, and you’ll understand, won’t you?”
She didn’t wait for my answer. Perhaps she didn’t need one. She tucked the blanket around me, then picked up her bag and stood up.
“I can’t leave your sister home alone. I’m going back. You can handle the discharge paperwork yourself.”
Her footsteps faded down the hall until they disappeared. The room was silent, except for the sound of my own voice, hoarsely repeating the word “Mom.” I didn't understand what she meant by a masterpiece. I didn't know what sacrifice she was talking about. I just had the vague, chilling feeling that my mother had never truly seen me as her daughter.
3
I handled my own discharge and walked home, clutching the hospital bill. I hadn’t slept all night. That fear, which had kept me awake, turned into a sliver of secret joy as I pushed open the front door. I could still come home.
But the next second, I saw two enormous suitcases in the living room. My mother was packing Stella’s art supplies and medication, her movements almost frantic with a joyful urgency. Her eyes, when she looked up, were filled with a hopeful vision of the future that I had never seen before.
“Mom?” I asked, walking over cautiously.
“You’re back?” she said without looking up. “Stella’s project in Paris was moved up. We’re flying out immediately.”
I stood there, stunned. “Mom, what about me?”
She finally stopped and looked at me. Her gaze swept over my pale, sweaty face without lingering. “There’s enough food in the fridge to last you a few days. There’s some cash on the table. You’re a big girl. You can take care of yourself.”
A few days?
Panic washed over me. I grabbed her sleeve, tears streaming down my face. “Mom, don’t go! I’m scared to be alone!”
My pleas were sharp and piercing. She frowned and violently shook my hand off. I stumbled and fell to the cold floor.
“What are you crying for! There’s nothing to cry about!” she snapped. “I told you, this is for Stella’s future! Can’t you be more understanding? Stop being such a dead weight, always clinging to me! I’m tired enough as it is!”
“No one has ever helped me. I just want Stella’s life to be perfect. Why can’t you just be considerate for once?”
The zipper on the suitcase was pulled shut with a harsh screech. Stella emerged from her room in a brand-new dress, her face glowing with excitement about her trip to the city of art. She saw me on the floor and froze, a flicker of superiority in her eyes that was quickly replaced by concern.
“Nora, what’s wrong? Are you not feeling well?”
For a moment, I couldn't tell if her concern was real or just an act.
My mother grabbed the suitcases. “Stella, let’s go. We’re going to be late for our flight.”
They turned to leave, laughing and talking. My mother glanced back at me one last time, not with worry, but with a warning. “Stay home and get better. And don’t make me have to call back from overseas to deal with your messes.”
The heavy security door slammed shut in my face. A few seconds of dead silence.
Click.
The sound of the key turning in the lock from the outside. She was afraid I’d die out on the street and cause her trouble.
That night was the most terrifying of my life. I turned on every light in the house, but the brightly lit rooms were even scarier than the darkness. Every piece of furniture, every one of Stella’s paintings, felt like a wide, unblinking eye, staring at me with cold indifference.
I finally broke down and sobbed, but there was no one to answer.
The years my mother and Stella were abroad were the longest, darkest years of my life. I survived on expired food from the fridge and tap water. The fear was so deep it became a part of me, waking me from nightmares just to check if the door was still locked from the outside. It was during those years that my small mind finally understood what my mother meant by “any sacrifice is worth it.”
The house became my prison. And they became distant voices on the other end of a phone line. Their calls were always for one reason: Stella needed money for an exhibition, Stella needed inspiration.
At first, I would cry, begging her to come back. But her response was always the same cool, detached tone.
“Mom’s busy.”
“You need to be more mature.”
“Don’t cause me any trouble.”
“I had the neighbor give you the key to unlock the door.”
Gradually, I stopped crying. Tears that no one responds to are the cheapest things in the world. When she called, I learned to ask calmly, “What do you need me to do this time? How much allowance are you sending?”
Sometimes she would impatiently wire a few hundred dollars. Other times she’d yell at me for only caring about money. But with that money, I learned how to budget, how to survive. How to calculate how many days the money had to last, how much I could spend each day, how to buy the cheapest food that would fill my stomach. It was just enough to keep me alive.
But this bizarre arrangement came to an abrupt end one ordinary evening during my junior year of high school. I was holding a college admissions brochure, my fingers trembling with excitement as I dialed my mother’s number. I wanted to tell her that I had gotten into a good college, that I wanted to study interior design. I wanted to ask her if, like Stella, I could finally chase my own dream.
The phone connected, and my heart pounded in my chest. But the other end was dead silent.
4
After the call disconnected, I thought it was just a bad signal and dialed again. But all I heard was the same cold, polite automated voice: “The number you have dialed has been switched off.”
A terrible feeling washed over me. I opened my messaging app, found her familiar profile picture, and sent a message with trembling fingers. A glaring red exclamation mark appeared next to it.
She had blocked me. She had cut off every possible way I could contact her, as decisively as if she were discarding a useless pawn.
Panic seized me, and I could barely breathe. I frantically tore through the drawers in the house, searching for any money. All I found was a forgotten envelope on top of the kitchen cabinet. Inside was a thin stack of red bills. I counted them mechanically.
Three thousand yuan.
Three thousand. That was all. Three thousand yuan, tucked away in a cold envelope along with her other daughter’s brilliant future. It felt as light as air, but heavy enough to crush me.
I collapsed onto the floor, all the strength draining from my body. I refused to accept it. I searched online for “Stella Vance, rising star.” A news report with photos popped up, searing my eyes. In the photos, Stella stood under the spotlight like a princess, confident and beautiful. My mother stood behind her in an expensive suit, her makeup perfect, her smile beaming with pride.
At the end of the article was an interview with my mother.
“Mrs. Vance,” the reporter asked, “you must have sacrificed a lot to cultivate a genius painter like Stella.”
My mother smiled for the camera, a perfect blend of gentleness and determination. “Yes,” she said. “For my daughter’s artistic dream, I would give anything. Just a few days ago, to help her find more inspiration for her work, I bought her a replica of Van Gogh’s sketchbook.”
My eyes were glued to a line of small print at the bottom of the article.
“The sketchbook was reportedly sold at a Sotheby’s auction in Paris for three hundred thousand euros, equivalent to nearly three million yuan.”
Three million.
Three thousand.
In that moment, a hysterical laugh escaped my lips. She left one daughter three thousand yuan to live on, while spending three million on an “inspirational” sketchbook for the other. My survival, it turned out, was worth exactly one-thousandth of their dream.
All the bitterness, the anger, the despair, finally broke through the last of my defenses. But I didn’t cry out. I bit my lip until I tasted blood. The tears were ice-cold, dripping onto the phone screen, blurring my mother’s triumphant smile.
That was the moment I started to hate her.
5
After that, the hardest period of my life began. Three thousand yuan was a drop in the ocean in a city with a soaring cost of living. My budgeting became even more ruthless. I skipped breakfast, ate two plain steamed buns for lunch, and had a pack of instant noodles for dinner, occasionally splurging on a sausage. Even so, the money dwindled with alarming speed.
To save for tuition and living expenses, I started working odd jobs. As an underage worker, I was often bullied, my wages docked, and my labor exploited. I washed dishes in restaurants until the grease and detergent made my hands white and wrinkled. I handed out flyers, standing for hours in the scorching sun and freezing wind until my legs went numb.
Once, I was working as a promoter at a supermarket while running a high fever. I collapsed next to a shelf. When I woke up, I was on a makeshift bed in the supermarket’s storage room. The manager, a kind-looking woman in her forties, brought me a bowl of hot congee.
She looked at me, her expression a mix of pity and concern, and sighed. “Child, your health is your most important asset. What are you working yourself to death for?”
I didn’t say anything. I just took the bowl and ate, gulping it down. Salty tears mixed with the warm rice porridge. I ate quickly, forcefully, swallowing down all my hatred and bitterness along with this stranger’s kindness.
I made a silent vow to myself, and to the distant figure of my mother: “One day, I will make you regret this.”
That manager, Mrs. Wong, became my employer. She ran a small cleaning and organizing company. She saw that I was a quick and diligent worker and took me under her wing.
“Nora, I can tell you’re a girl with a good head on your shoulders,” she said as she taught me how to sort and organize. “A girl with a skill will never go hungry.”
She was the first and only person in my life to show me motherly warmth. She would save meals for me, make me brown sugar ginger tea when I had my period, and watch with pride, as if I were her own child, as I transformed cluttered rooms into orderly spaces.
In those newly organized spaces, for the first time, I found my own sense of worth and joy. Not as someone’s shadow, someone’s blood bag, or someone’s emotional punching bag. But as me, Nora Vance, an individual.
I enrolled in a continuing education program at a local university, majoring in interior design. I took classes during the day and worked with Mrs. Wong on nights and weekends. Life was still a struggle, but for the first time, there was a light in my heart.
After graduation, I left my hometown for a major city. The words “mother” and “sister” had lost all meaning to me. In my mind, they had died a long time ago. The wounds they inflicted were too deep, and the warmth I received from Mrs. Wong and other strangers was too comforting. The resentment and bitterness had been pushed into a corner by my busy life and hopes for the future.
If she hadn’t suddenly called me, I probably would have never revisited that dark, damp corner of my past.
My phone, sitting on the table, wouldn’t stop vibrating. It was the same unknown number, calling again and again. My assistant, Chloe, glanced at my phone and immediately understood. She didn’t ask why I wasn’t answering, or why my face had suddenly gone pale. She just squeezed my hand and, with practiced ease, switched my phone to silent.
“Ms. Vance, these telemarketers are so annoying. Come on, let’s ignore them. My treat. There’s a new pour-over coffee place downstairs that’s supposed to be amazing!”
She steered me out of the office. In the coffee shop, I listened to her chatter about gossip and TV shows. The cheerful music and the rich aroma of coffee filled the air, and the anger that had started to rise in me slowly subsided.
The calls stopped for a few days. Everything was calm.
Until a week later, when I took on a project organizing a high-end villa. As I led my team through the gate, I happened to look up. My eyes swept over the gardeners trimming the lawns.
And then, my breath and my gaze both froze.
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