Chapter 1The Night Before the SATs

Just like Nana always cursed, I was finally gone. Yet, late that night, she opened my journal, whispering into the dark. "Harper... you should come back as a boy next time. Just be a boy. Girls are born to suffer these things." "Boys have it good."

* * *

My body was found the next morning.

The scene was packed with onlookers. Nana, on her early morning grocery run, stopped at the edge of the crowd to gossip. When she heard a young girl had passed away, she shook her head. "Weak. If the girl in my house dared to jump, I’d break her legs myself."

I watched her walk away, muttering under her breath. "Waste of money feeding them all those years. Just for nothing." "Early morning too. Couldn't she have done it somewhere else?"

A little later, I saw Nana coming back. She had the freshest bacon, the best eggs, and a box of glazed donuts—Mason’s favorite. I didn't need to count. I knew there were exactly eight inside. None for Pop-Pop. None for Nana. None for me. All for Mason.

I followed Nana home. Usually, she heads straight for the kitchen, but today she stomped toward my room. "Just because it's the SATs today doesn't mean you get to sleep in! If you don't want to go to college, get out and flip burgers!"

She shoved the door open and slapped the light switch. The bed was empty. The sheets were thrown back. She started cursing again. "Damn kid left without saying a word. No manners."

Yeah. I was the damn kid. And I was gone. Only my wandering soul was left to watch them.

The family found out I was gone during breakfast. A neighbor recognized me and brought the cops to the door. I watched Nana panic, trying to explain. "You guys made a mistake. That brat has a test today, she left early."

But when they saw the photos—my broken form, the face still recognizable—all three of them froze. Pop-Pop’s eyes bugged out. He turned on Nana, screaming. "Are you blind?! A whole person goes missing and you don't know?!"

Nana, who never liked me, collapsed on the floor. She finally realized the "girl" she gossiped about was me. "How was I supposed to know she'd actually do it? How dare she? We spent so much money on her and she hasn't paid back a cent! How dare she jump?"

Nana made a move to get up, raising a trembling hand as if to slap my body in the photo. The officer and Mason held her back.

"We found a journal and a pen on the roof. Only her prints. Handwriting matches," the officer said. "This is an old building, no cameras. It looks like a fall from the seventh floor, but there are some scuff marks on the roof. We aren't ruling out foul play. Investigation is ongoing."

My journal... I didn't want them to see it. But I couldn't stop them.

Nana couldn't read well, but Mason and Pop-Pop were reading. Mason went silent, his eyes turning red. Pop-Pop read two pages and immediately raised his hand to hit Nana. "Why are you always telling her to go die?!"

Nana didn't understand, dodging the blow while the cops tried to separate them. Pop-Pop was screaming, his old bones shaking as he tried to kick her. "Do you have no shame?! She was a child! You pushed her to this!"

Nana was angry and confused. "What did she write? Mason, what did your sister write?" Mason didn't speak. He just kept turning the pages.

Pop-Pop was an accountant. Nana barely finished middle school. She suffered from feeling inferior, so she never won an argument against him. But my notebook was full of words. How could she think it was only about her cursing me?

I wrote about how she didn't love me. How everything good went to Mason. I had nothing. I wrote about her hitting me, screaming at me. I wrote about begging Pop-Pop for help, but he just looked annoyed that I woke him from his nap and slapped me for being loud. I wrote about how Mason already had everything, yet still fought me for scraps. Even a bag of chips—he’d take them to share with friends rather than leave me a single crumb.

"Mason! What did she write? Is it all lies? Blaming everything on me? That wretched girl doesn't let us have peace even when she's gone! I should have strangled her at birth!" "Nana!" Mason's voice trembled. "I need to call Dad."

Oh. I wrote about Dad and Mom too. But they divorced eight hundred years ago. Mom had a new family. Would she even come back?