For years, my family ignored my success, planning to steal my money for my golden sister. So, I gave my overlooked brother a free house at his graduation. My dad’s reaction: “That money was for her loans!
Chapter 1: The Fever and the Phantom Debt
For an entire decade, my flesh and blood treated my burgeoning digital empire like an embarrassing parlor trick, all while hemorrhaging every spare cent they possessed into the bottomless pit of my older sister’s medical pedigree. It was a masterclass in blind devotion. I am Alysia Thompson, thirty-four years old, and my chronicle begins wrapped in a cocoon of heavy down blankets inside my penthouse apartment in Fort Worth, Texas. I was battling a vicious strain of the flu, the kind that leaves your joints feeling like shattered glass and your skin radiating a dry, miserable heat.
It was day four of my self-imposed quarantine when my phone vibrated against the mahogany nightstand. The screen illuminated the darkened room, flashing a glossy, overly-curated portrait of my mother, Alyssa. I let it trill once, a metallic hum against the wood, before swiping the screen.
“Hello?” I rasped, my throat feeling as though I’d swallowed a handful of crushed gravel.
