Chapter 4

Dad and Grandpa went to get the luggage. They found my coat.

Grandpa held up the coat, looking confused. "If Chloe rode with someone else, why is her coat in your car?"

Dad frowned, also seeming incredulous.

"Jennifer, when you made Chloe get out of the car, you didn't give her a coat?"

Mom panicked, her eyes shifting. "I... I forgot."

"And Chloe too. She's old enough-she should know to put on her own coat."

Hearing Mom's complaint, I felt wronged and hugged myself.

Mom kicked me out of the car.

She didn't give me any chance to resist.

The bone-chilling cold seemed to return.

In this warm, heated room, my body kept shivering.

"What?"

"On the highway, you kicked Chloe out of the car?"

Grandpa's voice immediately rose in accusation.

Grandma clutched her chest. "Are you insane? In weather ten degrees below zero, leaving a six-year-old child alone on the highway-how could you do such a thing!"

"What if... what if something happened..."

Mom immediately cut off Grandma.

"There won't be a 'what if.' I told her to walk in the emergency lane. There's no danger!"

Mom seemed to be trying to comfort Grandma. She even opened her phone. "Look, Chloe's GPS is still moving. Nothing will happen."

But my grandparents didn't believe her. They insisted on going to the highway to find me.

I shook my head crying, my heart aching.

"Chloe's already back. Please don't fight..."

Sam suddenly ran out. He looked like he'd discovered something new.

"Mom, look what I found!"

I looked at what he was holding and wanted to snatch it away in fear.

But Mom grabbed it first. She seemed to have found powerful evidence to turn things around.

She pointed at the thing in her hand and questioned my grandparents.

"What is this? You're such good grandparents to Chloe! Spoiling her so she won't amount to anything!"

"Thank goodness I raised Sam myself. Look how excellent he is-first in his grade, perfect math scores. When it was time to move up, every school fought to have him!"

"What about Chloe? She's useless! A waste that you spoiled!"

Her words stabbed into my heart one by one.

In the picture of our family that I'd drawn, Sam and I held hands while my parents held ours.

We all had big smiles on our faces. I'd titled it "A Happy Family."

"What future is there in drawing? I want them to get into NYU! To have a good future!"

She was about to tear up the family portrait.

I rushed over begging. "Don't! Mom, don't!"

"I'll be good. I'll study hard. I'll never draw again."

The next second, Mom ruthlessly tore the picture to shreds anyway.

Her face twisted as she yelled at my grandparents.

"Do you know how much pressure there is in society now? Degrees are so devalued, and you still spoil her. What will she do when she enters society?"

My grandparents' faces went pale.

They looked at my father. He adjusted his glasses.

"I also believe Chloe should focus on her studies, not waste her limited energy on meaningless things."

His words broke me completely.

Through my tears, I felt myself slowly floating upward.

Mom, Dad, I wasn't the child you wanted.

Please don't be angry. Sam will become your pride...

The doorbell rang suddenly. Mom went to answer it, muttering, "That must be Chloe. I told her to walk three thousand steps, but I bet she barely took one!"

But outside stood two officers in uniform.

They held a bloodstained camera and a photo from the accident.

"Excuse me," one of them asked. "What is your relationship to the child holding this camera?"