No Turning Back

At two in the morning, my sister, Paige Boyce, paid men to smash up my barbecue stand. I fought to make them stop, ignoring the embers that scorched blisters into my skin as they landed. It was the first time in my life I'd ever raised my voice at her. "After Mom and Dad died in that plane crash, this stand paid for four years of your college education and helped you become a flight attendant for Golden Crest Airlines," I said. "Are you really going to destroy the only thing keeping us alive?" Something flickered in her eyes, a flash of reluctance, but she steeled herself and scoffed. "I've told you a hundred times to get rid of this dump of a stand, and you never listen. Do you want my boyfriend's parents to see what an embarrassing family I have and decide I'm not good enough for their son?" I looked around at the wreckage. The vegetables and cuts of meat I'd hand-picked at the market that afternoon, spent hours threading onto skewers myself, were buried under ash and grime. My eyes stung, tears threatening to spill. I didn't have the heart to argue with her. Hands shaking, I started picking up whatever skewers were still salvageable, one by one. That was when a black card appeared in front of my face. "The day after tomorrow, I'm bringing Paige to meet my parents," the voice said. "This should be enough to buy yourself a real shop, so you don't embarrass her in front of everyone." I recognized that voice instantly and looked up slowly. The hand holding the black card belonged to Charlie Anton, the boyfriend I'd been secretly dating for five years. Chapter 1 Charlie Anton probably hadn't expected Paige's older sister to be me. The black card in his hand hit the ground with a clatter. I stared at Charlie, too stunned to even notice another ember rolling against my foot. The last time we'd spoken was a month ago. Over the phone, he'd growled at me, barely holding back his anger. "We got into the same university at the same time. We were supposed to graduate, get good jobs, and build a future together. "Instead, you dropped out to support your sister and turned down the respectable job I found you, for five years of running a food stall. "Your nails are stained with grease that won't wash out, and you reek of barbecue smoke no matter what you do. How am I supposed to get my parents to accept you like this?" I'd just wrenched myself free from a drunk customer's groping hands when he called. Choking back tears, I stubbornly shot back. "After Mom and Dad died, my sister was the only family I had left," I said. "And I don't see anything shameful about raising someone that successful with my own two hands. "If you think I'm too embarrassing to introduce to your parents, then just say so and break up with me..." He hung up before I even finished, and after that, he never contacted me again. In the month since, I'd thrown myself into work, saving up for the designer bag Paige had been eyeing, and for a small gift to apologize to Charlie with. Staying busy was the only thing that kept my longing for him from swallowing me whole. Today, I'd finally saved enough. On the little table behind me sat the handbag Paige had wanted for so long, and the diamond ring Charlie had once mentioned, the kind of limited-edition ring the brand restricted to a one-time purchase per customer. So why had the two of them shown up together, only to tell me they'd reached the point of meeting his parents? Maybe it was the alcohol, but Charlie just stood there, his eyes dark and unreadable, watching me. No panic. No explanation. Paige bent down, scooped the black card off the ground with a smug little smile, and tucked it into my pocket. "See how thoughtful my boyfriend is? I don't need your money anymore, and I don't need you either. Just show up clean and presentable to the family dinner in three days. Don't embarrass me." The card in my pocket burned against me like a live coal. She had no idea. This wasn't the first time Charlie had put a black card in my hands. Chapter 2 The year I graduated high school, after finishing my college applications and SATs, I rushed home with my acceptance letter to Sterling Aviation University, eager to share the news with my parents. Instead, I got the call that they'd died in a plane crash. Back then, Charlie Anton, wealthy second-generation heir that he was, had once held out a black card to me too. "Rachel, put away your pride and come to Sterling Aviation University with me." I hesitated for a long time, but in the end I pushed the card away. "Forget it, Charlie. I have to set an example for my sister, who's still in middle school. I can't just take your money when I haven't earned it. If my choice bothers you, we can break up." He pulled me into his arms, his eyes full of tenderness. "I won't, Rachel. Even if you turn into some wrinkled, rough-around-the-edges woman someday, I'll never leave you." But now, the same black card I'd once refused for Paige's sake had been shoved back into my pocket by her own hands. I'd hoped for a future with Charlie, and instead he'd fallen for my sister. His encouragement and her helplessness had once pulled me through my grief quickly. Now the two of them were handing that old grief right back to me. I sniffled and set aside the skewers that were still salvageable. Paige hadn't even noticed the burns on my skin. Before she looped her arm through Charlie's and walked away, she turned back one more time to needle me. "Think it over carefully. You can either come live a good life with me, or spend the rest of your life stuck in this filthy little stall. "If you insist on being stubborn about it, don't blame me for not calling you my sister anymore." Through all of it, Charlie never said a word. He just followed Paige out of my sight. My stubborn resolve finally broke, and tears rolled down in fat drops. Hands shaking, I pulled out my phone and dialed a number. "About opening a shop together in Rivermont, I'm in." The voice on the other end lit up, delighted. "That's great! I've scoped out a storefront. All we're missing now is a partner. "With the recipe you've spent years perfecting, we can make this place a hit in Rivermont—no, we can take it nationwide. When can you get here? I'll book your flight right now..." We agreed I'd arrive in three days. I took a deep breath and started cleaning up the wreckage. It was a long while before I was sure the men who'd trashed the place weren't coming back. Only then did Cathy Reynolds, the crepe vendor who set up her cart beside mine every day, dare to come help. She helped me right the toppled tables and chairs, muttering furiously the whole time. "How did Paige turn out like this? I remember when she was in middle school, she'd finish her homework right here and help you wait on customers. You always doted on her, telling her to just sit and relax. "You're out here every day in that same old apron, reeking of smoke, while she walks around looking clean as a little princess who doesn't belong in this world. "You were only eighteen back then. You were still a girl who needed her parents to dote on her too." She kept going, taking my side the whole time, but all I could do was manage a bitter, wordless smile. I wheeled the cart back to the building where I rented my apartment. I hadn't expected to find Charlie waiting there. He seemed to have been standing there a long while. The moment he saw me, he stepped forward to check my injuries. "You're hurt. I'm taking you to the hospital right now." When I didn't move, his hand froze. "Don't worry, I got Paige home safe. I didn't know she was your sister. You two don't even live together." I sidestepped him and got off the cart. The searing, needling pain from my scalded skin spread through me the moment I moved. Of course he didn't know. To avoid being seen together, he'd always met me by the lake every summer break during college. And after Paige graduated, she'd been too disgusted by how cramped my rental was to keep living there, and moved out on her own. The two of them had never once been in the same room as me. How could they possibly know each other? Watching my back as I walked away, Charlie let out a sigh. "Rachel, we hadn't spoken in a month. I thought that meant we were over." Chapter 3 My steps faltered, a thick bitterness rising in my chest. The ring I'd never gotten to give him was still hanging on the barbecue cart. In my spare moments, I'd turned it over and over in my mind, trying to figure out how to apologize to him, how to humble myself before him. Turns out, as far as he was concerned, we'd already broken up a month ago. He stepped closer, caught my arm, and pulled me tightly into his chest. "Rachel, I really wish you didn't have to be so tough all the time. I wish, just once, you'd cling to me and refuse to let go..." My eyes filled with tears in an instant. After my parents died, I'd been a girl fending for herself in the night market alone. Drunk men. Jealous women who splashed water on me out of spite. City inspectors who were always looking for a reason to move me along. Vendors who fought dirty to compete with me. A sister who got bullied by her classmates. Teachers' reminders and warnings. A sister going through her teenage years. From eighteen to twenty-eight, I'd long since forgotten what it even looked like to be soft, to lean on someone. I was just about to push him away when a trembling voice cut through from behind us. "What... what are you two doing?" I turned around slowly and saw Paige staring at us, wrapped in each other's arms, disbelief written across her face. She stormed forward and wrenched us apart, then slapped me hard across the face. "Rachel, you actually tried to seduce my boyfriend. Do you even deserve to be my sister?" I clutched my cheek, scrambling to explain. "I... I wasn't... Charlie and I..." I looked over at Charlie, desperate for him to step in and set the record straight. But his eyes just stayed fixed on me, and he said nothing. Paige followed my gaze, then warily pulled him behind her. "So that's it. All this time I thought you turned down every small-time vendor who chased after you because your standards were too high, and it turns out you had your sights set on a man way out of your league. "Look at yourself. High school education, nothing to your name, and you think you're good enough for Charlie? If you're that desperate for a man, I can put out a public ad for you..." "Enough!" Charlie yanked her arm, his voice low and sharp. "You can't talk to your sister like that." Rather than back down, Paige only burned hotter. "Oh, really? Used to dating flight attendants as glamorous as us, and now you've developed a taste for greasy, washed-up women like her? "Charlie, want me to strip her down so you can get a good look at all the grease stains and burn scars covering her?" The slap cracked through the air. My whole body was shaking, but I couldn't hold back. I struck her hard across the face. Her tirade cut off instantly. She stared at me, a look in her eyes I'd never seen from her before. Lights flicked on window by window in the shabby building around us. Someone shoved a window open and yelled down at us, annoyed. "What's all this racket? Some of us are trying to sleep!" Paige pointed at me, glaring up at the heads poking out from the windows one after another, her voice sharp with accusation. "Rachel's lived here for ten years, you all know her. Well, I just caught her red-handed trying to seduce my fiancé. Tell me, shouldn't I be furious?" Their contemptuous stares crawled over me like snakes' tongues. "I always said there was no way a young thing like her was holding up a whole household on her own. Guess it was never anything but trading on her looks." "Just the other day I offered to introduce her to my son, who has cerebral palsy, and she turned me down flat. Doesn't even know her own worth. A toad dreaming of marrying a prince." "Stealing her own sister's man? How low can you get?" I watched the same old neighbors who used to treat me so politely now hurling insults at me, and a cold, hollow feeling spread through my whole body. I could barely stay on my feet. Charlie finally couldn't stand to listen anymore. His face darkened, and he grabbed Paige's arm and pulled her away. "Are you done making a scene? Don't forget, we need your sister to show up at the family dinner the day after tomorrow." Chapter 4 I don't remember how I got home, or how I ended up lying on my narrow bed. Alone at last, the tears I could no longer hold back slid down my face. That was when the phone rang. I answered numbly, and heard a voice I couldn't believe. "Is... is that Rachie? "It has to be her. Ask her again." The voices coming through were unmistakably my parents, the same parents who'd died in a plane crash. I confirmed it in a small voice, my own heartbeat pounding so loud I could hear it. "Dad? Mom?" Hearing me answer, the voice on the other end finally settled, tinged with guilt. "Rachie, our family went bankrupt out of nowhere back then, and we were buried in debt. Your mother and I had no choice but to fake our deaths and leave the country. "But don't worry, we've gotten back on our feet these past ten years, and we're on our way to Willen City right now." Something in me snapped. Tears streaming down my face, I screamed at them. "Do you have any idea what the last ten years have been like for me? Do you know how helpless I felt when our creditors seized the house and forced it into foreclosure? "Paige used to hide in my arms, telling me she was scared, and I was scared too. Do you have any idea... I gave up my education, I gave up my dreams... I gave up Charlie..." My father let out an awkward little laugh. "There wasn't anything your mother and I could do. But we always knew you'd take good care of your sister. I hear you turned Paige into a real success, a flight attendant. You didn't let us down." A long silence followed, and every ounce of strength drained out of me. It was just like when I was a child, when they'd been too busy with their business to bother with us and left Paige in my care. In their eyes, Paige had always been the one who needed protecting and looking after, while I was the one who could stand on my own two feet, no help required. I shook my aching head. "Paige's engagement dinner is the day after tomorrow. I'll send you the address. Come." Their laughter came bright and cheerful through the phone. "Our little Paige is getting married? That's wonderful... really, that's just wonderful..." I couldn't bear to listen anymore. I'd barely hung up, still nowhere close to settling my tangled emotions, when I heard someone jimmying the lock at my door. Before I could react, a few men from my floor, the type who never seemed to have anywhere to be, sauntered in with leering grins. "We saw everything that happened to you today." "Who knew someone so prim and proper was actually so desperate for men." "Come on, let us boys show you a good time." The blood drained from my face. I bolted up and locked myself in the bathroom, hands shaking as I called Charlie. The instant the call connected, I grabbed onto it like a lifeline. "Charlie, someone's trying to hurt me. Please, come now." It was the first time in ten years I'd ever asked him for help. His voice went taut. "Rachel, don't be scared. I'm coming right now." Just as a flicker of relief settled over me, I heard Paige's mocking voice cut in. "She's lived there alone for ten years without anything happening to her. How could something suddenly happen the same day we had a fight? "She's just trying every trick in the book to seduce you. Charlie, if you go to her now, we're through." Charlie went quiet for a long moment, then sighed. "Paige has a point. Rachel, whatever was between us is in the past now. We shouldn't keep dragging it out." I listened to the call end without mercy, right as the bathroom door burst open behind me. I sank into a thick, suffocating despair. … Three days later, at the family dinner, Charlie's father didn't show up. Charlie's mother, Mrs. Anton, cast a scornful glance at Paige, dressed to the nines, before she turned her complaints on her son. "That illegitimate son of your father's found some partner and is off starting a business, and your father's so excited about it he rushed off to Rivermont. "And you, insisting on being some pilot, could only land yourself a flight attendant who's not even fit to be seen. You're an embarrassment to your father." Paige's usually haughty expression twisted with humiliation, and Charlie could only offer an awkward, forced smile. That was when the door to the private dining room opened. They looked at whoever had just walked in, and every one of them froze.