Protect the apartment transaction.
Protect myself from making a decision while shaken and furious.
I scrolled through my phone.
Dad’s number appeared.
I passed it.
Aparecieron las mamás.
Yo también lo pasé.
Then Emily’s.
Yo tampoco la he llamado.
Eso fue difícil de una manera diferente.
Emily had been the reason Dad gave for his demand.
Tuition.
College.
Family obligation.
For years, those words had been enough to open my wallet before I stopped to ask whether anyone else was being asked to sacrifice the same way.
Ya le había pagado el seguro de su coche.
Her laptop.
Two semesters of tuition.
The spring-break emergencies.
I had helped because she was my sister.
But helping someone and surrendering control of everything you have built are not the same thing.
Dad had erased that distinction.
Mom had erased it too.
The moment I said no, they treated the boundary itself as the offense.
