Born to Suffer So My Brother Learns Chapter 06
That night, Dad finally made up his mind.
After contacting the funeral home, he came with two staff members. Using a key borrowed from the nurse, he quietly opened the door to the hospital room.
Mom jolted awake instantly. She lunged forward desperately and spread her arms wide to shield me.
“What do you think you’re doing? Don’t you dare touch Helena!”
Dad stood in the doorway, his voice hoarse. “Rosanna, wake up. Helena is dead. She died at your hands. If you keep stopping us, she won’t even be able to rest in peace.”
“No!” Mom’s hair was a wild, tangled mess. “She’s my daughter! I’m staying with her! No one is allowed to take her away!”
Dad shot a look at the two staff members, who immediately stepped forward, each grabbing one of Mom’s arms.
Mom kicked and clawed with everything she had, her wails echoing through the entire building.
“Let me go! Let me go! Helena! Helena-”
But she was outnumbered. All she could do was watch helplessly as they carried me out of the hospital room.
Dad accompanied me to the cemetery and laid me to rest with his own hands.
He knew I didn’t like crowded occasions, so my funeral had no rites, no music, no wreaths. There was only a small headstone with the words “Beloved Daughter, Helena Blanchard” carved into it.
At that moment, back at the hospital, Mom’s frantic outburst in the hospital room finally caught the attention of a nurse. She opened the door to let her out.
Mom charged out of the hospital like a woman possessed. One of her shoes slipped off as she ran, but she didn’t bother to pick it up. With one foot bare, she stumbled and staggered away.
The cemetery was on the outskirts of town.
She had no car, so she ran the entire distance instead.
When my small, fresh grave finally appeared before her eyes, her legs gave way beneath her and she collapsed straight to her knees.
“Helena! I was wrong! Please come back!”
She threw herself in front of my grave and frantically clawed at the fresh soil with both hands.
Her nails split and cracked, blood seeping out. Yet, as if she couldn’t feel any pain at all, she dug more and more wildly, shouting, “Helena, come out! Come out and look at me! I’ll never scold you again! I’m begging you!”
At some point, Dad had appeared behind her. He watched all of this coldly and said, “You can drop the act.”
Mom’s hands froze mid-motion.
Dad continued hoarsely, “I was away on business all year round and left both kids in your care. When Irwin loaded up on two dollars’ worth of game coins, you made Helena strip naked and livestream to pay off the debt.
“When Irwin got caught stealing, you made Helena kneel in public and slap herself to beg for forgiveness. When
Irwin wouldn’t stop drinking soda, you filled a soda bottle with pesticide and put it in the most conspicuous spot in the living room.
“It was clearly Irwin who did something wrong every time, so why did you make Helena pay for all of it? Can you even call yourself a mother?”
Mom jolted violently.
She looked at Dad, her mouth opening and closing. Yet, not a single word came out.
Her tears burst forth like a breached dam, and she sprawled before my headstone, wailing uncontrollably.
Mom knelt before my grave from dawn till dusk while memories cut into her heart like knives.
She finally recalled with piercing clarity why she’d turned out this way.
I was the good kid growing up.
I’d burst through the door after school and throw myself into Mom’s arms before I’d even put my backpack down. I’d look up at her with a smile and cry, “Mommy, I’m home!”
If I ever got a treat, I’d never eat it myself. I’d always pop the first bite into Mom’s mouth, my eyes crinkling up with a smile.
“Mommy, you eat it. You work the hardest in this family.”
When she scolded me, hit me, or punished me, I never cried or threw a tantrum. Instead, I would just hold onto her leg and whisper, “Mommy, it doesn’t hurt. I’m okay.”
I was desperate for her love, and I also treasured Mom too much. That was why I was so scared of making her angry, terrified she’d abandon me, or that she wouldn’t like me anymore. So, I bent over backwards to be good, to listen, and to win her approval.
Irwin, on the other hand, had been rebellious ever since he was a kid. He’d talk back, cause trouble, steal things, and blow money on game coins. He never owned up to his mistakes, and even when he did, he never changed.
Mom always said, “Boys have their dignity-you can’t bruise their egos. Besides, he’s still young and doesn’t know any better. I can’t come down too hard on him, or he’ll hold a grudge against me.”
As a result, every mistake was pinned on me. Every punishment fell on my shoulders. And every lesson was taught through my suffering.
Mom took it for granted that I was good, that I’d obey, and that I’d never leave. She was convinced that no matter what she did to me, I’d love her just the same.
Thus, she acted without restraint or limits. And so, with her own hands, she drove me- the person who loved her the most-straight into my death.
“I was wrong. Helena, I really know I was wrong now.”
Mom lay sprawled over my headstone, weeping with gut-wrenching grief. She raised her hand and slapped her own face savagely.
“I shouldn’t have used you as a teaching prop, or played favorites, or hurt you. I thought you’d never get angry and that you’d always forgive me. I was wrong. I was really wrong.”
Her face swelled up terribly. Blood from the corner of her mouth, mixed with tears and dirt, was smeared across her face in a muddy mess.
But what good was any of it?
When I was alive, if she had given me just one hug, things would never have come to this.
Irwin stood far off by the side of the road, watching Mom fall apart without a trace of sympathy on his face.
He slowly crouched down and covered his face with his hands. Tears began to stream through his fingers.
He was the one who never knew any better, and yet I was the one who paid with my life.
The guilt was going to haunt him forever.
