The Comeback Duo
At eight, we were poking an anthill when the director brought a wealthy couple—the Hestons, one of the nation’s richest families. They claimed Chloe was their long-lost daughter, but she threw a fit. "Without Vivian, I’d have been bullied to death!" she wailed. "If you don’t adopt her too, I’m not leaving!"
I dropped my stick, wiped my face, and smiled sweetly. "I’m the best-behaved child here. Adopting me is your best deal!"
The director’s face twitched as if he’d swallowed rotten garbage.
Bullied? Best-behaved? Do you hear yourselves?
Desperate to be rid of us, he made a choice that would haunt his ancestors.
…
"That's right, Mr. and Mrs. Heston!" he gushed. "Chloe and Vivian are our two sweetest girls. They're inseparable. Why don't you just take them both?"
The couple hesitated. "Well, raising another child isn't a problem," Mrs. Heston said slowly, "it's just… we already have an adopted daughter at home…"
Chloe and I shot each other a look.
A fake heiress?
Oh, hell no. I couldn't let Chloe walk into that lion's den alone. What if this girl was some two-faced, scheming witch? Chloe wouldn't stand a chance.
"Sir, ma'am," I pleaded, my eyes wide with fake concern. "Chloe is very sensitive. A new environment all alone could lead to depression… or even suicide. If you take me with her, I promise I'll take good care of her!"
The couple flinched. Chloe immediately started bawling on cue.
"That's right!" she howled. "If you say no, I'll hang myself from your front gate tonight! Waaah!"
They caved instantly. Mrs. Heston looked at me. "We can take you, but you'll have to get along with your new sister at home…"
"I'll be the best big sister ever! Don't you worry, Mom!"
The director looked like he was about to burst into tears of joy. "Wonderful! Congratulations, Mr. and Mrs. Heston, on your two lovely new daughters!"
As they were led away to handle the paperwork, I grabbed Chloe's hand. "Chloe, you're a real one! You didn't forget our pact to get rich together!"
She rolled her eyes. "I was just worried you'd get beaten to death for that mouth of yours after I left."
I cackled. "Love you, girl! That fake heiress didn't even show up today. Bet she doesn't want you back. If she's one of those manipulative types, I'll handle her."
Our strength at St. Jude's had always been our teamwork. I'd verbally eviscerate our enemies until they were seeing red, and she'd knock them flat the second they lunged. When it came to mind games, Chloe was a rookie.
She squeezed my hand back, her eyes shining with gratitude. "Vivian, our future of fabulous wealth is all on you now!"
"Don't worry," I declared. "I've got this."
When the Hestons returned, they smiled seeing us holding hands. "It's so wonderful that you girls are so close. That puts our minds at ease."
In the car, Mrs. Heston told us about the family. We learned that besides the fake heiress, Isabelle Heston, Chloe also had a biological older brother who was two years her senior. He was the reason she'd gotten lost when she was three.
The fact that the culprit himself hadn't bothered to show up spoke volumes. Clearly, he wasn't thrilled about his long-lost sister's return.
Sure enough, as soon as we stepped out of the car, we saw a sullen-faced teenage boy standing at the entrance to the mansion, arms crossed. When Chloe and I held hands and called out "big brother!" in unison, Leo Heston's face cracked.
"You adopted another one?"
He only relaxed after being told that I, the other adoptee, had no inheritance rights. "I'm warning you two," he snarled, "don't you dare bully my sister, or you'll have me to deal with!"
I immediately ducked behind Chloe, my voice trembling. "Chloe, why is he playing favorites? If he'd been this protective of you back then, he wouldn't have let you get lost and suffer in an orphanage for all those years…"
The subtext was clear: You moron. You show zero remorse for losing your own sister, and now you're threatening her to protect the impostor? Are you for real?
Mr. and Mrs. Heston's faces darkened.
Leo looked like he was about to explode, but I quickly pinched Chloe's side. She got the message and covered her face, bursting into tears. "If my brother doesn't like me, I should just go back to St. Jude's! Vivian, let's go!"
Mr. Heston snapped. He slapped Leo hard across the face. "You brat! Is this how you welcome your sister home? Get out of the way!"
Leo clutched his cheek, glaring at us, but didn't dare say another word.
Chloe and I exchanged a triumphant look. Round one: victory.
But the moment we stepped inside, we saw Isabelle, the fake heiress, standing on a stool, sobbing as she tried to loop a rope over the chandelier.
Oh, great. The pity party has already started.
Before anyone could react, I barked, "Hey! No indoor swinging!"
Chloe executed a perfect slide tackle, knocking the stool and Isabelle clean over. Before Isabelle could even get the noose around her neck, she was sent sprawling on the floor.
"Aah!" she cried out in pain. The whole family rushed to help her up. Seeing the rope and the toppled stool, they surrounded her in a panic.
"Isabelle, honey, what on earth are you doing?"
Isabelle looked up at us, her eyes swimming with tears. "It's all my fault," she sobbed to Chloe. "I've stolen your identity for so many years and made you suffer. Let me pay for my sins with my life!" She turned to her parents. "Please, don't blame Mom, Dad, or Leo. Just… promise me you'll take good care of them in my place."
Mrs. Heston hugged her tightly. "Don't be silly, sweetie. In our hearts, you'll always be our daughter!"
Leo glared at us. "This has nothing to do with you, Isabelle. Let's see who dares to blame you!"
Isabelle buried her face in Mrs. Heston's shoulder and shot me a look of pure, triumphant provocation over her arm.
Yep, a Grade-A, certified witch. Trying to drive a wedge between us? Not on my watch.
I unleashed my signature weapon. "So, you must be the adopted sister, Isabelle. So sorry about that, my mistake! I honestly thought someone was breaking the rules and trying to swing from the lights!"
I tilted my head. "Wait a minute, were you trying to hang yourself? Honey, nobody uses a crystal chandelier for that. And that knot? A slipknot. It would've come undone the second you put any weight on it. You wouldn't have died, but you might've brought the whole fixture down on someone's head!"
Chloe, scrambling up from the floor, chimed in. "Yeah, super dangerous! Good thing I was here to… uh… lend a foot."
Everyone looked up at the chandelier. They saw I was right. Mr. Heston's face turned grim. "This is ridiculous! What if you had hurt your sister?"
Seeing her plan fail, Isabelle looked at me and sniffled, "I'm sorry, sister. I just wanted to atone…"
"You've got the wrong girl, sweetie. I'm your adopted sister. She's the sister you need to apologize to." I pushed Chloe forward. "Go on. Try again."
Leo puffed out his chest, stepping in front of Isabelle. "Dad! Isabelle was just trying to make things right! It was Chloe and Vivian who deliberately made her fall! They have no manners!"
That did it. He could insult me all day, but nobody insults my best friend.
"Leo, I know you want to play the hero, but you can't just spew garbage from your mouth," I snapped. "You want to talk about manners? Chloe grew up in an orphanage because you lost her. You're the one who ruined her life, and you have the audacity to criticize her upbringing?"
"This girl stole Chloe's identity, her family, her entire life! How is she supposed to have 'manners'?"
"Your logic is so ass-backwards. I bet a dung beetle could crack open your skull and think he'd hit the jackpot!"
My verbal barrage stunned the room into silence. Only Chloe was moved, squeezing my hand with tears in her eyes. "You're the best, Vivian! I love you!"
When Leo finally processed what I'd said, his face turned purple with rage. "How dare you talk to me like that?!"
"Oh, I'm just getting started with you! Now it's her turn!" I jabbed a finger at Isabelle. "And you! Who are you trying to fool with this damsel-in-distress act? You're more full of crap than a landfill!"
"Weren't you supposed to be sick in bed? You seemed to have plenty of energy for your little suicide performance just now!"
"Let me guess, the only thing you're 'sick' of is the fact that Chloe's back, and you can't be the one and only princess anymore, right?"
I'd hit a nerve. Isabelle looked panicked and tried to argue, but I cut her off. "Faking sick, faking suicide, trying to manipulate everyone… did my best friend ever once ask you to 'atone' for anything? We're all supposed to be princesses here, so why are you the only one acting like a psycho?"
Isabelle's face went pale. All she could sputter was, "You… you… you!"
I scoffed. "You what? If you have a stutter, go see a doctor. If you've got a problem with your brain, try reading a book!"
Realizing she couldn't win a war of words, Isabelle switched back to her weak, innocent persona. "I'm sorry, Chloe. It's my fault. I was just so scared you'd hate me." She turned to me. "Vivian, you can yell at me all you want. Just please, don't take your anger out on Mom, Dad, and Leo."
Here we go again. This girl had no new tricks. I was done with her. I turned to the stunned Hestons. "I hear we'll be in the same class as our sister from now on?"
They nodded dumbly.
"Great. We can help her out at school. So, where are our rooms?"
Mrs. Heston quickly led us upstairs. Isabelle followed, red-eyed, and pushed open her own bedroom door with a grand, magnanimous gesture. "If you don't mind, sister, you can have my room. It was always meant to be yours…"
Leo charged in front of us again, foaming at the mouth. "Isabelle, this is the princess room Mom decorated just for you! These uncultured brats don't deserve it!"
Seeing the storm brewing in my eyes, Mrs. Heston shot him a warning look. She turned to Chloe with a gentle smile. "Chloe, dear, you can have any room in the house. Think of it as our way of making up for lost time."
Chloe glanced at Isabelle's frilly, pink nightmare of a room with disgust. She then pointed to a much larger room down the hall with better light. "We'll take that one! It's big enough for me and Vivian."
Leo nearly lost his mind. "Are you serious? That's Mom and Dad's bedroom!"
I smiled sweetly at Mrs. Heston. "Mom, you did say any room. You wouldn't go back on your word, would you?"
Her smile was strained, but she nodded.
"Perfect! We're exhausted from the trip. You guys should get some rest, too!"
With that, I pulled Chloe into the room and slammed the door, leaving the petrified family standing in the hallway.
The next few weeks were a blur of shopping. After eight years of scraping by, we were finally living the dream of swiping a credit card without looking at the price tag. We had carloads of designer bags and boxes delivered, transforming ourselves into a pair of bona fide heiresses. Every time Isabelle made a snide remark about our spending, I would shut her down with a verbal smackdown.
When insults failed, she resorted to petty tricks.
Day one, she "accidentally" dropped a vase from the top of the stairs, aiming for our heads. Chloe caught it with one hand without even breaking stride.
Day two, she "accidentally" knocked a tureen of hot soup toward Chloe at the dinner table. Chloe deftly redirected it, sending it splashing all over Isabelle, who shrieked in pain.
Day three, she snuck her own diamond necklace under our pillow and then brought the whole family in to "catch us in the act." I simply played the footage from the hidden camera I'd installed, showing her planting it herself. Cornered, she tearfully claimed she had just wanted to "give us a surprise."
After failing at both verbal and physical warfare, Isabelle finally backed off. But we knew she was just biding her time.
Sure enough, a month later at the assembly of our new elite private school, she stood before the entire student body with red-rimmed eyes. "These are my new sisters," she announced. "My parents recently brought them home from an orphanage. Please take good care of them!"
In one sentence, she had painted us as the charity cases, the fake heiresses. The students looked at her with pity. "Wow, the Hestons can just adopt kids whenever they feel like it?" "Poor Isabelle, now she has to share her parents' love…"
I smiled and nudged Chloe to pull out the DNA test results. "That's a funny way of putting it, Isabelle," I said, my voice dripping with sarcasm. "You've been squatting in my best friend's home for eight years, and you're the one playing the victim?"
"And for the record, you're just as adopted as I am, so maybe drop the 'poor little princess' act?"
I addressed the stunned crowd. "Hi everyone! I'm Vivian, the best friend of the real Heston heiress, Chloe. And yes, I was also adopted by the Hestons. Not because they're rolling in cash, but because they were afraid certain people," I said, pointedly looking at Isabelle, "might try to bully Chloe. They wanted me here to protect her. Just like I'm doing right now."
The auditorium went silent. Then all eyes turned to Isabelle, filled with scorn.
"Wait, so she was the fake one all along?"
A group of girls who clearly disliked Isabelle started to jeer. "Of course! She always acted like she was royalty. Turns out she's just a wannabe."
The laughter was like a slap across Isabelle's face. She looked like she was about to burst into tears. From that day on, she was branded the school's resident two-faced fake.
To salvage her reputation, she threw herself into piano and ballet lessons, hoping to outshine us with her grace and poise.
In response, I started taking stand-up comedy and improv classes.
Chloe signed up for kickboxing and Tai Chi, honing her natural talents to a razor's edge.
Isabelle's dream of overshadowing us never materialized. At every school festival, my comedy routine and Chloe's finale—breaking a cement block on her chest—completely eclipsed her boring performances. I became a campus celebrity for my wit, while Chloe became the school's unofficial protector. With us around, bullying and fights practically vanished.
By the time we were sixteen, the two little devils from St. Jude's had somehow grown into well-adjusted, surprisingly popular young women. Mr. and Mrs. Heston adored us and were planning a press conference to officially introduce us to the world.
"It's time Chloe got some shares in the company for her eighteenth birthday," we overheard Mr. Heston telling his wife. "She's our biological daughter, after all. And the company has taken a hit from Preston Corp lately. We need a strategic marriage to stabilize things. Luckily, the Preston heir isn't opposed to meeting. We'll see which of the girls he connects with…"
Isabelle, who was listening from the shadows, clenched her fists. A venomous smile crossed her face.
For the next two years, Isabelle and Leo did a complete 180. They not only stopped antagonizing us but actively tried to be friendly. Leo even offered to mentor Chloe in the family business after she started college. Isabelle transformed into a sweet, doting little sister.
On our eighteenth birthday, they showered us with gifts and well-wishes. Just before the party, they announced they had a surprise for us: a private fireworks show from a nearby hilltop.
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