All Chapters of Not My Family: Chapter 1 - Chapter 8

8 Chapters

Chapter 1

The moment those words left my mouth, the room fell silent.For a split second, Mom's expression froze, and then tears began rolling down her cheeks.“It’s because your father and I are useless… We just wanted to earn some extra money and take some pressure off you. We never thought we’d get scammed…”Normally, I would have rushed to comfort her. However, for some reason, I couldn’t stop thinking about the Reddit post I’d read earlier that day.“Mom, how much do you owe?”Something flickered in her eyes. She lowered her head and twisted her fingers together.“Six… Sixty thousand dollars…”Sixty thousand. That was more than everything I owned. Yet strangely, I felt relieved. The number was different from the fifty thousand mentioned in the post.“Harper.” Mom looked up, her eyes red. “The fifty thousand you have in your savings account… could you transfer it to me tonight?”I froze. I’d never told anyone how much money I had saved."Mom, how do you know how much money is in my

Chapter 2

[There’s no way. With how gullible she is, I’m probably just overthinking it. Still, her father and I have always been good at playing our parts, but this time, our daughter didn’t transfer the money right away.]The comments section was filled with people praying that the daughter would finally wake up and see what was happening.I stared at the screen, my fingers slowly tightening around my phone. Then, another update appeared.[When my daughter asked how much debt we owed, I added another ten thousand dollars on the spot. Now we've got my son's wedding covered too!]My breathing hitched. Fifty thousand plus ten thousand was exactly sixty thousand dollars.As I scrolled back to the top, one comment had been upvoted to the top of the thread.[Check out the OP's profile. That's where the real drama is.]My finger hovered over the screen, but for some reason, I couldn’t bring myself to tap it.Just then, there was a knock on my bedroom door, and Mom walked in with a smile.“You

Chapter 3

[My daughter earned thirty dollars in overtime bonus today, and it’s perfect! I can use it to buy my son something extra for dinner!][My daughter has a fever, so she can’t clean my son's room today. Now I have to take care of her too. What a nuisance!][I secretly checked that ungrateful girl's savings account today. She actually managed to save fifty thousand dollars behind our backs! Perfect. My son needs money to get married!]Every post came with screenshots of bank transfers. Whenever I sent Mom five hundred dollars, she would transfer four hundred and fifty dollars to my brother. When I sent her one thousand two hundred dollars, she transferred one thousand five hundred dollars to him. And if she came up short, she’d simply ask me for more.For three years, I had worked tirelessly, trying to heal the wounds my brother's departure had left on our parents. Never did it cross my mind that the three of them had been working together the entire time to scam me out of my money.

Chapter 4

The next morning, I was practically dragged to the bank by my parents.Along the way, Mom kept pressing me impatiently. “Harper, hasn’t the money from your friend come through yet?”“I’ve asked. They said to wait a little bit longer.” I gave a perfunctory answer while my mind was thinking of a way to excuse myself later.“That’s all you say!” Dad snapped, glaring at me. “We’ve been waiting since yesterday. What exactly have you gotten? What kind of friends do you even have? Don’t tell me they’re not willing to lend you the money and you’re just being played!”I swallowed my anger. “They’re in a tough spot, too.”His face darkened instantly, his tone sharp and intimidating. “They’re in a tough spot? What about us?”Then suddenly, he held out his hand and said, “Show me the chat records.”“Dad–” I frowned. “Dad! If you don’t trust me, I can just stop asking for money!”“How dare you talk to me like that?”He lunged for my phone, and I instinctively pulled back, trying to protect

Chapter 5

She opened her mouth, but no words came out for a long moment.My gaze shifted away from her and landed on the two people standing behind her.“So you’re not drowning in debt and getting chased for sixty thousand dollars? You’re just here helping Will with picking out a house?”Dad was the first to react, and his face darkened instantly. “Have you been following us?” he asked.I ignored him and looked at the logo on Will’s shirt instead.“That brand costs over a thousand dollars a piece, right? Whose money did you use for that?”His face flushed red, and he instinctively stepped back.Dad straightened up, completely unashamed. “He’s the family’s only son! What’s wrong with spending a bit of your money?”I snickered. “So you faked cutting ties and faked the debt just to squeeze money out of me to get him a house?”While Mom turned her face away, refusing to look at me, Dad pointed at me and snapped, “So what if we lied? If we didn’t, would you hand the money over? Hurry up an

Chapter 6

The entire room fell into silence. Within seconds, people began gathering around us.Dad reached out to help Mom up, still cursing under his breath, “Why are you even begging an ungrateful daughter like her?”Mom swayed slightly. Then, she broke out in heart-wrenching sobs as she looked up at me.“Harper, please help Will! He gave up his university spot for you back then. Now that you’ve made something of yourself, how can you forget that kindness?”Murmurs immediately spread through the crowd. People pointed at me, whispering among themselves.“So the brother sacrificed his education? That’s huge. How could the sister be so ungrateful?”“She got educated and forgot her roots. That’s pretty cold.”My fingers trembled in anger, and a chill ran down my spine. Back then, Will had been completely uninterested in studying. He couldn’t even get into a vocational school, let alone a university. I, on the other hand, had started later than others and worked myself to the bone just to

Chapter 7

I went back to my place, contacted the landlord to terminate my lease, and quickly found a small one-bedroom apartment near my old place. As for whether my parents got kicked out by their landlord afterward, that was no longer my concern.After the incident at the real estate office, I thought they would finally stop. Yet, to my surprise, they took it further. Half a month later, on my day off, I just wanted to sleep in, but my phone kept vibrating nonstop. It was an unknown number, so I rejected it, only for it to ring again.This time, I answered on speaker.“Hello, is this Miss Harper Grey? We’re calling from a TV program called Family Forever. Your mother contacted us and said you’ve been influenced to cut ties with your parents. We’d like to invite you onto our show to have a proper conversation with your family.”“I’m not going.”“Miss Grey, we’d like to help you reunite with your family–”“There’s no need for that.”With that, I hung up and couldn’t fall back asleep again

Chapter 8

The comments were more heated than the last time. Almost instantly, the post hit close to a thousand replies.[Wow! I knew there’d be a twist!][What kind of toxic family would team up to scam their own daughter?][Oh my god, I’ve seen this post before! I’m so glad she found out the truth!][To everyone who was blaming the sister earlier, how’s that face feeling now?]A few bystanders who had witnessed everything at the real estate office also came forward to testify for me. Within days, Will was fired from his job, and his salary for that month was withheld, too. The moment he stepped out of the company, he received a breakup message from his girlfriend.It also didn’t take long for the landlord to kick him out, saying he didn’t want someone like that living in his property and ruining the place. So, the three of them ended up crammed into a cheap motel room, surviving on instant noodles split into three meals a day.When Will went out looking for work, employers would immediat

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