Chapter 4
I let it ring twice before answering.
Dad stood beside me, close enough to hear.
“You found the note,” Mia said.
My eyes fixed on the red words. “Why did you put it in my dress bag?”
“I wanted you to know.”
“Know what?”
“That getting into college doesn’t make you better than me.”
“I never said it did.”
“You didn’t have to. David put your acceptance letter on the fridge for a month.”
“Your art show pictures were up there too.”
“That was different.”
I could hear traffic behind her. Vanessa must have been driving.
“Mia, did you withdraw me?”
“You should be thanking me for the dress. That new one looked better.”
“Answer me.”
A car horn sounded. Then Mia said, “You always land on your feet. Someone would’ve fixed it.”
My chest went cold.
Dad held out his hand for the phone. I shook my head.
“Did you send that message?” I asked.
“I didn’t think they’d notice so fast.”
There it was.
Dad heard it. I saw it in his face.
“Mia,” he said, “we’re going to tell the university what you did.”
She laughed nervously. “You recorded that, didn’t you?”
“No,” I said.
“Then I never said it.”
The call ended.
For a moment, I stood holding my phone against my ear.
Dad reached for the acceptance letter. “We still have the account records.”
“She’ll deny everything.”
“Maybe. We’ll tell the truth anyway.”
The next morning, Dad’s older sister, Aunt Renee, came over. She had never trusted Vanessa, though she had tried not to say so around me.
She brought bagels, sat at the kitchen table, and listened without interrupting while I explained everything.
When I finished, she took my hand.
“I wish you’d told me it was this bad.”
“I thought you’d tell Dad.”
“I probably would have. I’m sorry I didn’t give you a safer place to talk.”
Dad heard her. He didn’t argue.
Together, we wrote down what had happened while it was fresh. I took photos of the dress, the note, and my email account activity. Dad saved the messages from Ms. Carter.
Then Aunt Renee asked a question I hadn’t considered.
“What else has Mia had access to?”
I thought about the missing cash from my desk last spring. The headphones I found in Mia’s closet. The time she signed me up for a weekend shift by replying to a message on my phone while I was in the shower.
Each incident had ended the same way.
Mia denied it. Vanessa called it a misunderstanding. Dad asked us both to move on.
“I let it happen,” he said quietly.
“You didn’t cut the dress,” I told him.
“No. But I kept telling you not to make trouble when you asked for help.”
His honesty made me want to cry again.
On Monday morning, Dad and I went to the university admissions office. Aunt Renee drove separately in case we needed anything from home.
A woman named Ms. Patel met us in a small room overlooking the campus. I showed her the account records and the note. I told her what Mia had said on the phone.
Ms. Patel listened carefully.
“The withdrawal has been stopped,” she said. “Your scholarship remains assigned to you while we investigate.”
I finally breathed.
She opened my file. “I also want to ask about a separate request.”
“What request?”
“Last month, someone asked us to send all future notices to a different email address.”
She showed it to me.
The address used my name with a single extra letter. At a glance, it looked like mine.
“That’s not my account.”
Ms. Patel nodded. “We were unable to make that change because the request did not pass verification. But I wanted you to see it.”
Mia hadn’t acted on a sudden impulse Thursday night. She had been trying for weeks.
On our way out, Dad stopped beside a row of benches.
“I need to tell you something,” he said.
The fear in his voice made my stomach drop.
“Last month, Vanessa said you were thinking of staying home for a year.”
I stared at him. “I never said that.”
“She told me not to pressure you.”
“And you believed her?”
“I asked you about it at dinner. You said you were excited for college, so I thought she had misunderstood.”
I remembered that dinner. Dad had asked whether I was nervous about moving away. I had talked for ten minutes about the dorm and my classes.
“Why didn’t you tell her she was wrong?”
“I did. She said you’d changed your mind again.”
We stood there while students walked past us carrying backpacks and coffee.
“I don’t think Mia planned this alone,” I said.
Dad didn’t answer immediately.
Then he said, “Neither do I.”
That afternoon, Vanessa came to the house while I was in the kitchen. She arrived with Mia and two empty suitcases, saying they needed more clothes.
Dad let them in. Aunt Renee stayed beside me.
Mia avoided my eyes as she walked upstairs.
Vanessa stopped at the bottom step. “I heard you went to the university.”
“Yes,” Dad said.
“You’re making Mia’s life difficult.”
“Aaliyah nearly lost her scholarship.”
Vanessa looked at me. “Mia says you were unhappy about leaving home.”
“I never said that.”
“She’s confused. Both girls are upset.”
Aunt Renee stood. “Aaliyah has answered you.”
Vanessa’s gaze moved to her. “This is a family matter.”
“It is,” Dad said. “That’s why Renee is here.”
Mia returned carrying a suitcase. As she passed me, she whispered, “You think you’ve won?”
Dad turned. “What did you say?”
“Nothing.”
Vanessa put a hand on Mia’s back and steered her toward the door.
After they left, I went upstairs to check my room. Nothing obvious was missing.
May you like
Then I noticed the bottom drawer of my desk was open.
The folder holding my mother’s letters was gone.
