27

Nico's point of View - Age 16

I remembered that day like it happened five seconds ago.

The sun was out. Bright and warm. The kind of warmth that usually made me sleepy during long car rides.

My twin sister, Noelle, sat beside me in the backseat, leg crossed and head against the window with her earbuds in, blasting something heavy and loud. Mom was in the front, her hair tied up in that messy ponytail.

she always wore when she didn't have meetings. Her perfume still filled the car something sweet with a citrus bite. I didn't know the name, but I always knew it was her.

  we were supposed to be going shopping. A family day, Mom called it. something we rarely got anymore since our dad started training Noelle more seriously. I wasn't even sure he remembered my name sometimes.

I kept watching mom through the rearview mirror. Her smile, her eyes, the way she hummed to the song on the radio. That's the last image I have of her alive.

  Then everything spun.

The tires screamed against the asphalt. A loud, sickening crunch. Glass shattered like a million tiny bells crashing around us. I remembered the sound of my sister's screaming. over and over and over.

"Mom! Mom please!"

My ears rang like someone was blowing a whistle inches from my brain. I sat frozen, unable to move, unable to understand what just happened.

Noelle's voice cracked as she crawled over the shattered glass, bleeding from her forehead and arms, trying to get to Mom.

  I turned.

Mom's head was titled unnaturally. Blood stained her blouse. The steering wheel had crushed inwards, smoke rising from the airbag, but she wasn't moving. Not blinking. not breathing.

I think I whispered her name. once. twice. But I couldn't feel my lips.

Noelle was already outside the car by then, screaming for help. people ran. sirens echoed.

The scent of fuel and burning plastic filled my lungs.

  I still hadn't moved.

I sat there until a firefighter yanked my door open and dragged me out, yelling things I couldn't hear. I remember my knees giving way when my shoes touched the ground.

  Everything Blurred.

The hospital lights were too white. Too cold.

  My fingers wouldn't stop shaking, even when the nurses cleaned the tiny cuts on my arms and hands. I kept turning to look for Noelle, but she wasn't in the same room.

  "Where's my sister?"

No one answered. A lady in scrubs pressed something cool against my cheek and muttered gently, but it felt like static. My brain was underwater.

Eventually, they let us sit together in a small private room with plastics chairs and warm juice boxes that tasted like nothing.

Noelle sat across from me, arms wrapped around her legs, chin on her knees.

Her eyes were bloodshot and hollow, her knuckles red from how hard she'd gripped the bedsheets.

  "She's really gone," she said.

I nodded slowly. I didn't know what else to say.

"I should've sat in the front."

  "Noelle-"

  "Don't."

I shut up. Her voice didn't shake. That scared me more than the accident.

When our dad finally walked in, everything broke again.

  He didn't run. He didn't cry.

He stood in the doorway, tall and unmoved. His Sharp suit barely had a wrinkle.

His eyes swept over us like we were a spreadsheet. Not kids who just lost their mother.

  "She's dead," he said.

  I looked away.

  Noelle didn't.

Her vige was small. "it wasn't her fault. That guy ran the red light."

Dad didn't respond. He stared at the IV pole next to me like it offended him.

  "I'll speak to the lawyer. Get the insurance. you two, get some rest. when you're discharged, we start training again."

  "Training?" I said, mouth dry. "Mom just-"

  "She would'v wanted us to keep going."

  Noelle Said nothing.

  I watched her eyes. They changed in that moment. Hardened like glass.

  When Dad turned and walked out, she followed him without hesitation. No goodbye. No glance back..

  And I sat there again.

  Alone.

  We buried Mom a week later.

  Noelle didn't cry. she stood beside Dad In black, quiet, unreadable.

  I held a white rose in my hand so tightly that the throns pierced my palm.

  when the priest asked if anyone wanted to say something, I stepped forward.

  Noelle didn't.

  I said what I could.

  she said nothing.

  That night, I knocked on her door. it was slightly open. I saw her at the window, looking out into the garden where Mom used to plant sunflowers.

  "I miss her," I whispered.

  "Noelle?"

  "I'm training tomorrow," she said. Her tone was flat. Mechanical.

  I took a step back.

  "she's dead, Nico. Get over it."

  She shut the door.

  And just like that, the sister I grew up with vanished.

  The following weeks were a blur of bruises, drills and drills.

  Noelle trained harder than anyone. every hit, every kick, every block- perfect. Dad praised her. smiled even.

  Me?

  I was a ghost in our house. Forgotten. overlooked.

  "She's the better one," Dad said once to our instructor, thinking I couldn't hear.

  "Noelle has discipline. Nico's too soft."

  soft.

  like Mom.

  I wore that word like a scar.

  And every time Noelle knocked me down during sparring, she didn't help up.

  she just walked away.

  I started staying out late. Riding the dirt bike.

  Mom got me for my fifteenth birthday. The only thing that still smelled like her- lavender air freshener and old leather.

The nights were quite. peaceful. my escape.

  It was there, under the city lights and the hum of engines, that I started building the version of myself Dad didn't want.

Not soft.

Not cruel.

Just mine.

But nothing erased that day.

I still remember it like it happened five seconds ago.