The Card with Zero Balance

My SAT scores came out. I'd placed in the top ten of the entire city.

Our class president organized a graduation trip to the Smoky Mountains. It worked out to about 3,000 dollars a person.

It was the first time in my life I'd ever really wanted to go out and see the world.

So I carefully took out the bank card I'd kept in pristine condition all these years.

It was the "future fund" card my parents had given my sister and me in front of the whole family back when I started middle school.

"100,000 dollars each. We won't play favorites!

"Girls need to be raised well. Once you're in college and you have this money, you won't be tempted by all the materialism out there."

My sister took her card and immediately went out and bought the newest phone and a designer bag.

I hid mine away.

Ever since I was little, my parents had told me how hard they worked for their money, and how much of it they'd spent on me when I was sick all the time as a child.

I felt for them, so I never once touched the money on that card.

All three years of high school, I only ate from the cheapest cafeteria stall and wore my sister's cast-off clothes.

Even when my period cramps had me doubled over in pain, I couldn't bring myself to buy a box of painkillers.

But today, I wanted to indulge myself, just once.

Just 3,000 dollars. I'd keep the remaining 97,000 dollars for four years of college tuition.

I walked to the ATM on the corner, my heart light with excitement, and slid the card in. I typed in my birthday as the password.

The screen changed, and I pressed "Check Balance."

I expected to see a comforting string of numbers. Instead, the screen flashed: [Available Balance: 0.00 dollars].

I froze. Thinking my eyes were playing tricks on me, I rubbed them hard. It still read zero.

Flustered, I yanked the card out, moved to a different machine, and tried again.

I typed in the password again and checked the balance: [Available Balance: 0.00 dollars].

How could this be?

In six years, I hadn't touched this card once.

Had someone stolen from it?

100,000 dollars! That was my parents' hard-earned money!

Panic broke me into a cold sweat. I yanked the card free and rushed straight into the bank lobby next door.

"Excuse me, could you check the transaction history on this card for me?" I handed my card and ID to the teller.

"I need to know when the hundred thousand dollars was transferred out. I think it might have been stolen!"

The teller took the card and typed away at her computer for a moment.

Then she looked up at me with a strange expression.

"Miss, are you sure you've got the right card?"

"No, this is right!" I said urgently. "My parents gave me this card six years ago. There's a hundred thousand dollars in it!"

The teller sighed and turned her screen toward me. "See for yourself."

"Since this account was opened six years ago, there hasn't been a single deposit into it, aside from the ten-dollar processing fee paid when it was set up.

"And that ten dollars was withdrawn the very next day. Which means for the last six years, this has been an empty card."

In that moment, my mind went completely blank.

My sister's card had money in it. Why was mine empty?

In a daze, I thought back to the winter of my junior year of high school.

The old down jacket I'd inherited from my sister had a huge hole in it, and the cold wind cut straight through.

I was so cold I couldn't stand it, so I asked my mom to buy me a padded coat.

Instead, she snapped at me for wanting to waste money, saying the jacket could still be patched up and worn.

It stung, because my sister asked them for spending money all the time.

Fifty dollars, hundred dollars, they'd hand it over to her without blinking.

So why couldn't I have the same?

But I didn't dare talk back. I just went back to my room, planning to take 200 dollars out with my card.

Seeing that, my mom's expression changed, and she scoffed.

"Let me remind you, that 100,000 dollars on the card is for your entire college tuition and living expenses.

"If you spend it now just because you want to indulge yourself, and later you can't afford tuition and can't go to college, don't come crying to us. I'm not giving you one more cent."