Chapter 3

Mother saw the empty pill bottles on the table and staggered toward them.

"Charles!"

She yanked the blanket away.

My face was ashen, my lips purple, dried white foam clinging to the corner of my mouth.

Stephanie let out a sharp scream and covered her mouth.

Mother's hand trembled as she reached out to feel for my breath.

Nothing.

She pressed her fingers to my cold and rigid carotid artery. She recoiled as if shocked, collapsing backward onto the floor.

Then suddenly, she lunged at me, prying at my mouth with her fingers.

"Spit it out… spit it out…"

My clenched jaw wouldn't budge. She couldn't force it open.

"Charles, spit it out! Who told you you could die? Who gave you permission to die?" she shouted as she pounded my back, just like when I choked on jelly as a child.

The dull thuds echoed through the room.

The body didn't respond. Only my head rocked weakly with each blow.

Stephanie finally snapped out of it and rushed forward, wrapping her arms around Mother's waist.

"Mom! Stop! He's already stiff! He's stiff!"

In the struggle, the laptop on the desk was knocked askew.

The A4 sheet that had been pinned beneath it slipped free, drifting to the floor—landing right in front of Mother.

Asset Allocation Statement.

Mother froze. Her eyes locked onto those lines.

Five thousand dollars from the physics competition… transferred to Stephanie's account…

Accidental death insurance… beneficiary: Mother…

Jamie… the notes can be sold…

Every word struck her like a slap across the face. At last, she understood. I had paid for this crumbling family with my life.

Mother collapsed to the ground, clutching the paper so tightly her knuckles turned white.

She stopped crying. Stopped shouting.

An eerie silence filled the room.

Only Stephanie's suppressed sobs remained.

"Thirty thousand…" Mother murmured. She lifted her head and looked at my body, her expression so complex it felt foreign to me.

Was it grief? Guilt? Or… relief?

Footsteps pounded urgently outside.

"Mom! I'm back! I saw an ambulance downstairs. Who's sick?"

Jamie burst through the door, his schoolbag still on his back. He'd skipped P.E. class and rushed home, planning to beg me not to sell my game account.

He took one look at the scene in the bedroom.

The boy who only played games, the one always scolded as useless, stood frozen in the doorway like a statue.

"Charles?"

He walked in slowly, each step unsteady, like he was walking on cotton. He saw the empty pill bottles on the table, the letter on the floor—and finally, the body on the bed.

"What are you doing? Take him to the hospital!"

Jamie shouted and rushed forward, trying to lift me onto his back.

"Don't touch him."

Mother's voice was cold as ice.

Jamie froze. "Mom? Whether he's breathing or not, we still have to try! What if—?"

"It's no use." Mother pushed herself up using the edge of the bed. In that instant, she seemed ten years older. "Look at this."

She handed him the letter.

Jamie glanced at it once, then tore it into pieces.

"I don't want the notes! I want Charles! I want my brother!"

He flung the shredded paper at Mother's face.

"You just watched him die? That 'burden' you keep talking about—now that he's dead, are you happy?"