All Chapters of The Daughter They Left Behind Is Done Waiting.: Chapter 1 - Chapter 10

“Emma, why are you just standing there?”My brother Noah’s impatient voice came from the doorway. He leaned against the frame with one hand.“Mia hasn’t been feeling well. She can’t be out in the wind too long at the beach.”“I couldn’t find that white windbreaker in your suitcase. Where did you put it?”He spoke as if the jacket had belonged to Mia all along. But I had worked shifts at a coffee shop for a month to buy it with my own money.“In the zippered pocket,” I said quietly.Noah nodded and turned to leave, then stopped halfway down the hall.“While we’re gone, give the whole house a good cleaning.”“Especially Mia’s room. You know she’s allergic to dust.”He didn’t bother hiding the distaste in his voice. I could have been the unpaid help instead of his sister.Mom came out of her bedroom carrying Mia’s sun hat.“Your brother’s right, Emma.”“You’ve graduated. It’s not like you have anything else to do.”“Make sure the house is clean by the time we get back.”She paused, then a

In the days before I left, I got up on time, did the chores, and read through my enrollment information.Every so often, they posted more vacation photos on Instagram.Not one of them asked how I was doing at home.Then one evening, Luke called.I watched his name flash across my screen for several seconds before answering.Waves crashed in the background, nearly drowned out by other voices.Luke sounded irritated.“Emma, did you put your Grandma’s silver charm bracelet in the zippered pocket of your suitcase?”I went still.Grandma had left the bracelet to me before she died. A tiny forget-me-not charm hung from it.She had been the only person in my family who never made me feel second to Mia. I had worn it every day since her funeral.I had taken it off only because I was afraid the salt water might ruin it, then tucked it into the safest pocket in my suitcase.“Yes.” My grip tightened around my phone. “Why?”Luke sighed.“Mia thought the suitcase was too heavy, so she took some thi

Luke’s POVIt was six in the evening when Luke returned from Hawaii with Mia and the rest of her family.Noah came through the door first, dragging two large suitcases behind him.“Finally. I’m exhausted.”He dropped the bags in the entryway and called upstairs.“Emma, come help us. Mia’s thirsty, so bring her a glass of water too.”The house remained silent.Emma’s mother frowned.“Wasn’t she supposed to look at apartments today? Why hasn’t she answered any of my messages?”Mia sank onto the couch and spoke in a small voice. “Do you think she’s still mad at me? This is all my fault. I lost Grandma’s bracelet.”Emma’s father patted her shoulder.“Don’t worry about it. She’s always had a mind of her own. She’ll come back once she’s done sulking.”Luke set the shopping bag on the coffee table.Inside was a pearl necklace he had bought in Hawaii. He had assumed that if he gave it to Emma and took her out to dinner, she would forgive him like she always did.She had always been so easy to

Luke’s POVThe house sank into a gloom unlike anything they had known before.Emma’s mother kept wandering to the empty storage room. Her father stopped insisting that Emma was only throwing a tantrum, and Noah never mentioned the apartment again.Luke had no time to wait for them to understand what they had done.The moment the bracelet arrived from the hotel, he booked a flight to London.Emma’s mother told him to convince her daughter to come home. Noah gave him a bank card and repeatedly warned that England was expensive and Emma would eventually need their help.Luke said nothing.He closed his hand around the tiny forget-me-not charm and told himself that if he could just see Emma, he could still make things right.He would apologize. He would place the bracelet back in her hands and tell her that she was the only person he had ever truly loved.He would even stay in England if that was what it took for her to trust him again.Luke didn’t sleep during the ten-hour flight.He kept

Emma’s POVThree years later, I returned to Seattle with my research team.Wildfires had contaminated the drinking water in parts of the city. The local government planned to test our improved portable filtration system at several temporary shelters, and I was in charge of the field data and project presentation.As the plane landed, I looked out at the familiar skyline and felt none of the turmoil I had expected.The past three years had been good to me.I had completed most of my undergraduate coursework and become one of the youngest project leads in the lab. The device I had once built from secondhand parts had gone through dozens of redesigns and was now providing clean drinking water to communities in Africa.I was no longer the girl who slept in a storage room and measured every word before she spoke.Before returning, I had wondered whether being here would reopen old wounds.But when our car passed the coffee shop where I had worked to buy my white windbreaker, all I remembere