Charlotte met Mia with a warmth that felt theatrical, pulling her into an embrace and showering her with the kind of glowing compliments only a favored child receives. I stood a few feet back, my duffle bag feeling heavier by the second, waiting for the invisible barrier to break so I could actually enter my own home.
It was a surreal dynamic; as the eldest daughter, I should have held some seniority, yet here I was being treated like an uninvited guest. Mia soaked in the glory with practiced ease. I wasn't jealous of the attention. I had long ago realized that their version of "love" came with too many strings but a quiet sadness settled in my chest when I looked at my sister. I had tried to mend our relationship so many times over the years, reaching out only to be met with her sharp tongue or cold indifference.
Eventually, Charlotte's gaze slid to me. The warmth vanished, replaced by a wave of clinical judgment.
"Welcome, Everly," she said, her voice dropping several degrees. Without waiting for a response, she turned and opened the massive doors to the main house. Her attitude didn't shock me; it was the same script she'd been following since I was a child.
Stepping into the foyer, the air felt thin and over-conditioned. I scanned the area, desperate to find my father, but instead, I found my mother. She was perched elegantly on a velvet sofa in the center of the hall, her cold stare already pinned on me like a specimen in a jar.
I took a breath and started toward her to offer a formal greeting, but my luck ran out halfway across the polished marble. My shoelace caught, and I stumbled, nearly tripping in front of her and the gathered staff.
A few muffled snickers echoed through the hall. I straightened up immediately, my face burning, while my mother's expression turned from cold to murderous.
She stood up, but she didn't move toward me. She walked right past me as if I were a piece of furniture, heading straight for Mia. She pulled her into a long hug, the two of them whispering quietly in a display of intimacy that was clearly meant to exclude me. It was a deliberate suffocating tactic, a reminder of exactly where I stood.
Finally, my mother turned her head toward me, her voice sharp and brittle.
"Go upstairs to your room," she commanded. "Change into something presentable before we go to see your father. I don't want to see you in those clothes again for as long as you are under this roof."
I didn't argue. There was no point in fighting a war that had been lost a decade ago. I turned and started the long climb up the grand staircase toward my room, the silence of the house following me like a ghost.