Claire stared at the IV taped to her arm.
“You knew I might die.”
“Claire, don’t be dramatic. You’re talking now.”
“Dad didn’t come either?”
“Your father was with Evan.”
Something inside Claire went completely quiet. For years, she had accepted forgotten birthdays, canceled dinners, school events missed because Evan had practice, and family vacations scheduled around his football calendar. Her younger brother had always been the center of the Bennett household. Claire had told herself it was because his athletic career demanded more attention. She was older, responsible, independent. She didn’t need as much. But lying in a hospital bed with twenty-seven stitches across her abdomen, she finally understood the truth. Her parents had not accidentally forgotten to choose her. They had chosen Evan again and again.
Five days later, Claire began making phone calls. She contacted her landlord, resigned from her job at a regional insurance company, and called her closest college friend, Rachel Monroe, who lived in Seattle. Then she asked Melissa for a sheet of hospital stationery.
One week after the emergency, Patricia and Daniel Bennett finally arrived at Room 614 carrying supermarket flowers. They opened the door and stopped. The bed was empty. The closet had been cleared. Claire’s charger was gone. On the bedside table sat only one folded note.
Patricia unfolded it.
“Mom and Dad, I survived the night you decided Evan’s football game mattered more than whether I lived.”
Daniel slowly lowered the flowers onto the table.
“Where is she?”
Patricia continued reading.
“Dr. Cole told you I might die. You still didn’t come. I called afterward because part of me wanted to believe there had been a misunderstanding. There wasn’t.”
Her fingers began trembling. Daniel took the letter from her.
“Please don’t call my apartment. I no longer live there. Don’t go to my office. I resigned yesterday. I have removed both of you from my emergency contacts, financial documents, insurance information, and medical authorization forms.”
Patricia stared at him.
“She resigned?”
