Switched at Birth: Why My Parents Kept the "Fake" Daughter

The "true heiress" suddenly showed up at our door, hugging my mom's leg and sobbing that she was my parents' biological daughter. My mom was stunned. My older brother was stunned. I was stunned. My brother waved his hand dismissively, declaring he’d take us all to get a DNA test. My mom, her legs weak, immediately called my dad: "Arthur, come home quick! Our daughter might have been switched at birth!" My dad was unusually calm: "I know." "How could you possibly know?!" "Didn't you complain that she was crying too loud and told me to change her? So I swapped her for one that didn't cry." "I TOLD YOU TO CHANGE HER DIAPER!" My mom's devastated shriek nearly brought down the roof. 01 Halfway through typing up my copywriting draft, my mom walked into my room with a heavy, mournful expression. "Harper, I can't hide this from you anymore." "The truth is, you aren't your father's and my biological child. All these years, we've treated you as our own, and the thought of sending you away truly breaks my heart." "But there's nothing we can do. Your biological parents have come looking for you. They're downstairs right now." I sat quietly, watching her cry, and didn't say a word. "And there's the daughter I haven't seen since the day she was born. You don't understand, she looks exactly like me." She buried her face in her hands, weeping uncontrollably. "Now that she's back, I have no choice but to send you back to your real family. I just hope you won't hate me." I closed my laptop and said flatly, "Hand over the phone." She looked confused but handed her smartphone over. I opened her reading app and deleted her recent history: The True Heiress vs. The Fake Daughter After the True Heiress Found Me, I Went Back to the Countryside to Farm The True and Fake Heiresses Tear Each Other Apart "Weren't you still in the middle of reading The Billionaire CEO Falls for His Cleaning Lady? Why did you start reading new tropes?" My mom looked a bit guilty, her volume dropping and her words speeding up. "The author updates too slowly. I dropped it." "Well, since you're busy, I'll just be going!" "Close the door on your way out, thanks!" My mom slipped out of the room in a flash, muttering under her breath, "So stiff and boring. You can't even play along for a minute. You're exactly like your unromantic father." Seriously, whose mother treats internet soap-opera novels like the Bible and randomly tries to act out scenes from them? I sighed, opened my laptop again, and tried to get back into my writing flow. But the door flew open again. This time, it was my panicked four-year-old little brother, Leo. "Sister, it's bad! Your cover is blown! My—my—my real biological sister is back!" Leo was only four, completely corrupted by being raised by our mom. In this entire house, he was the only one who actively participated in her weird, dramatic roleplay scenarios. Coupled with his toddler-level vocabulary, they were an unstoppable force of exhaustion. I kept my face completely straight. "You're a step too late. I already exposed Mom's act. Did she not warn you?" I pinched his soft, chubby cheek and smiled wickedly. "You're done for. You aren't Mom's favorite little boy anymore. She's not going to play with you." He dodged me, trembling. "No, Harper, I'm serious! There's an actual girl downstairs. She said you aren't Mom and Dad's real daughter. She said she is." "Mom heard that and literally collapsed onto the floor! You have to come down and see!" When I went downstairs, the girl was curled up in my mom's arms, sobbing. "Mom, I finally found you! You have no idea what kind of life I've been living all these years." "Beatings and scoldings were a daily routine. Before my old bruises could even heal, they'd give me new ones." "They're incredibly sexist, too. Once they had a son, my very existence became a sin to them." My mom looked a bit dazed. She glanced awkwardly at the girl, clearly unable to get into character, and then looked up at me. "Congratulations, Mom! Your dream finally came true!" I said. "She really does look exactly like you. We don't even need a DNA test." "No, wait, Harper, come help me up. My legs feel like jelly," my mom called out, reaching for me. But the girl was incredibly sharp. She beat me to it, firmly gripping my mom's arm. "I've got you, Mom." "Call your dad and tell him to get home right now," my mom ordered. "I'll do it! I'll do it!" the girl immediately volunteered. But a second later, she looked up at me with a lonely, shattered expression. "Sister... am I even worthy of having Dad's phone number?" "Terrible acting, yet she loves the drama. Yep, Mom definitely gave birth to this one," my little brother muttered from behind me. 02 "The suspense is gone. Sis, you're cooked." Leo's tiny hands gripped the hem of my shirt tightly. "Sister, can I give myself custody to you? Take me with you when you leave." My dad rushed back after one phone call. My older brother, Declan, emergency-canceled his business trip and raced home too. Compared to my mom's frantic panic, my dad was remarkably chill. "Nobody needs to say anything. I already know about this." "How could you possibly know?!" everyone yelled in unison. My dad looked at my mom with a mysterious glint in his eye. "You know perfectly well. It was your decision back then. How could you have forgotten?" My mom was even more bewildered. "My decision?" "Yeah. Back in the hospital, you complained our daughter was crying too loud, ruining your sleep, and you told me to change her. So, I picked out one that didn't cry." Declan swallowed hard. "Mom, you actually said that?" My mom stared blankly for a few seconds before screaming in absolute horror, "I TOLD YOU TO CHANGE HER DIAPER!" Well, whether this woman—who introduced herself as Chloe Jenkins—was actually my parents' biological child was still technically unconfirmed, but the odds were at least 80 percent. After all, her face was a carbon copy of my mom's in her twenties. It was pretty obvious I wasn't the biological one. Once she realized her position was secure, Chloe began her performance. She dropped to her knees solemnly, crying beautiful, delicate tears. "Mom, Dad, I'm begging you, please don't blame my sister. Even though she stole my life and enjoyed my privileges for all these years, it ultimately wasn't her fault. Please don't kick her out, okay?" "I don't even have to call you Mom and Dad. I don't even have to live in the main house. Just let me stay here as a maid! As long as I can serve you and see you every day, I'll be completely satisfied!" My dad, a man who takes everything completely literally, nodded. "Is that so? Alright, we have a storage room we can clear out for you. It's a bit small, but it's easy to keep clean. Right, I'll go print out our family's schedule and the maid's daily requirements for you." Chloe's face instantly drained of color. She looked at my mom pleadingly. My mom pinched my dad hard. "Shut up! I'll deal with you later." I started packing my things to leave, but my mom tearfully blocked the door. "It's not like we don't have enough rooms in this house. Don't leave. You don't even know where your biological parents are, where would you go?" "She's right, sister, you can't go back!" Chloe exaggeratedly grabbed my arm. "The suffering I endured... I could never let you go through it again. My adoptive parents, they aren't even human. Just pretend you aren't their child. Whatever you do, don't contact them." But whenever no one else was looking, Chloe would stare at me with pure venom. "Why are you so oblivious? Don't you know this isn't your house?" "You've been leeching off my family for over twenty years. Isn't that enough? What gives you the right to stand here so confidently?" "If I'm leaving, I'll leave after the official DNA test results come back," I replied simply. I initially didn't want to engage with her, but she haunted me like a ghost. She constantly tried to provoke me, hoping I'd leave out of shame. I was getting really annoyed. She was full of petty little tricks. Whenever I got a package delivered, she'd put on her passive-aggressive "innocent victim" act. "Wow, Sister, your taste is so good. This coat must be so expensive. Unlike me... I don't even know how to spend money. I haven't bought new clothes in years." My mom felt terrible and bought her several expensive outfits. Chloe didn't even try them on; she immediately returned them for cash. Then, she looked at my parents with tear-filled eyes and said, "Mom, Dad, it's so hard for you to make money. I don't need anything. Just being by your side is happiness enough for me." 03 To showcase her extreme frugality, she saved the leftover chicken bones from dinner, insisting on using them to make soup for us the next morning. She purposely stood at the top of the stairs to provoke me, and the moment my mom stepped out of her room, Chloe grabbed my hand, yanked herself backward, and faked a fall down the stairs. Then she wailed at the top of her lungs, "Sister, why did you push me?!" "I know you hate that I came back and stole Mom and Dad's attention! But I'm innocent! I just missed my parents! I just wanted to be with them! Is that a crime?!" I didn't even have the energy to roll my eyes. I turned to go back to my room. "Harper, stop right there!" my mom yelled sharply. "Turn around and apologize to Chloe! Ask for her forgiveness!" "I've fed you, housed you, and raised you all this time. Even after finding out you aren't my flesh and blood, I didn't kick you out. Do you have absolutely zero gratitude?!" "I didn't let you stay here so you could bully Chloe!" "This is crossing the line. You will give her a sincere apology right now, or I swear, I don't care how much your father objects, I will throw you out!" My mom's aggressive defense made Chloe gleeful. She tilted her chin up at me, her eyes practically glowing with triumph. I sighed, utterly exhausted. "Mom. Chloe is new here, so she doesn't know. But surely you haven't forgotten that we have security cameras covering every inch of this house?" "Want to go check the footage together?" My mom groaned and slapped her forehead. "Ugh, I forgot!" She quickly turned back to a pale, panicked Chloe to console her. "It's fine, it's fine! We'll try a different trope next time. Let's switch up your character arc, too. Make her a little dumber. I'm not really feeling this current vibe." "When you first arrived, you had that fragile, broken, innocent-flower aesthetic going. That was great. I prefer that genre anyway." My mom was speaking in a casual, collaborative tone, but it absolutely terrified Chloe. "Mom, what are you talking about? Do you think I'm acting? Do you think I framed my sister?!" "No, no, I didn't mean it like that." "If you didn't, then why didn't you stop her if you knew there were cameras?! Why did you let me look like a clown?! In your eyes, am I just some monkey in a circus?!" Chloe's hysterical, self-righteous screaming completely bewildered my mom. "Wait, so was I supposed to mean it like that? Or not?" my mom asked tentatively, watching Chloe's face carefully. Chloe suffered a total mental breakdown and ran back to her room, wailing. "Wow, high maintenance," my mom muttered. "She's no fun at all. Clumsy, stupid, and a terrible actress. I'll just have your dad forge a fake DNA test and send her away." Me: ? Her and my dad really were a match made in heaven. Speak of the devil, my dad walked in. "Meeting, meeting! Emergency family meeting." "Are the DNA results back?" Declan hurried down the stairs. "It's over. We already had enough weirdos in this family. Add one more, and I'm going to be driven insane," Leo sighed like a grumpy old man. When Chloe came back downstairs, her eyes were completely red and swollen. "Since the results are out, what are you going to do? From what I know, Harper has quite a bit of real estate and savings under her name—gifts for her birthdays and coming-of-age from you all. I don't mind if she continues to live here, but she needs to return the things that belong to me." "And her engagement to the Vance family heir should be voided. Have you talked to the Vance family about this yet? Are they willing to cancel, or just swap the bride?" "Hold on a second," my dad interrupted her magical barrage of demands. "Take a look at these results first." She took the envelope suspiciously, pulled out the report, and her face drained of color. "H-how is this possible?" 04 "How is it possible that I'm not your daughter?!" "I explicitly overheard my adoptive parents saying they purposely swapped the babies! They wanted their own child to live a life of luxury. They hated rich people, which is why they abused me!" Her shrieks were sharp and hoarse, carrying the genuine despair of a shattered dream. It was actually quite believable. My mom quietly shuffled over to me and whispered, "When did you call your dad to rig this? Why didn't I know?" I looked at her like she was an idiot. "How could I have done it? I've been with you this whole time. Besides, he couldn't forge a medical document in just a few minutes." My mom nodded slowly. "True." "Is this the legendary telepathy of marriage?" "Someone must have swapped the hair samples!" Chloe glared at me, her eyes burning with pure hatred. "It was you, wasn't it?! You couldn't bear to give up this life of wealth and luxury, and you didn't want to give my fiancé back! So you swapped our hair! You shameless thief! You're just as disgusting as your biological parents! You don't want to work for anything, you just want to steal the fruits of others' labor! You cheap, disgusting snake!" She raised her hand and swung hard at my face. But someone stepped in and blocked her arm. Whoever it was either had incredible strength or Chloe was just too fragile, because she stumbled backward and collapsed onto the floor. The person who stopped her was none other than my nominal fiancé, Preston Vance. My dad glared at him with intense displeasure. "What are you doing here?" Preston smiled politely. "Arthur, didn't you invite me over?" He played the part of the refined, humble gentleman perfectly, but my dad had always hated him. Rumor had it that my mom dated Preston's dad, Richard Vance, back in their youth. They broke up over a misunderstanding, and Richard was so devastated that he relentlessly insisted our families arrange a marriage for our kids. My dad hated the idea, but out of deference to my mom, he reluctantly agreed. When my older brother Declan was born, my dad was so thrilled he set off fireworks for three days straight. But the following year, I was born. Ever since then, my dad had been secretly pulling petty tricks, trying to make my mom annoyed with Richard Vance so she'd break the engagement. He never succeeded. As time went on, Preston grew up, and my dad's hatred transferred directly onto the son. So, I highly doubted my dad would willingly invite Preston over for something like this. Preston, being a master manipulator, immediately explained: "A few days ago, Arthur invited me over to discuss the engagement. He said there was a mix-up at birth in your family and wanted to ask if we should discuss dissolving the engagement, or simply swapping the bride." "I happened to be out of town on business, and I just got back today, so I rushed right over." "Hmph! The DNA results come out today, and you miraculously show up today. Who do you think you're fooling?!" my dad grumbled. Clearly, Preston had seen right through my dad's carefully laid trap and outmaneuvered him. I couldn't help but marvel at Preston—he was an even sneakier fox than his father. Chloe immediately threw herself at him. "Preston! I'm your true fiancée! I'm the real flesh and blood of the Sterling family!" "Are you here to fight for justice for me?!" Preston maintained his gentle, warm smile. "You can eat the wrong food, but you shouldn't say the wrong words." With a swift, smooth motion, he turned the tables, grabbed her by the arm, and firmly deposited her back onto the floor where she'd been sitting. Then he obediently walked over and stood right next to me. "Harper, it's too chaotic here. Want to come stay at my place for a few days to get some peace and quiet?" My dad was the first to jump up. "I can hear the gears turning in your head from across the room! Why should she go to your house?! The DNA results are out! Why are you stirring the pot? If you're going to take someone, take the fake one! What gives you the right to hit on my daughter?!" "I don't believe it! I demand a retest!" Chloe shrieked from the floor, furious that she was being ignored. 05 Declan also looked confused. "But Dad, Chloe really does look exactly like Mom. Could there have been a mistake? Why don't we just do it again to be sure?" My mom spoke up, totally deadpan. "That's not necessary. I have a very common face. It makes sense that she looks like me." My dad feigned hesitation, glancing shiftily at Preston. "I guess doing it one more time wouldn't hurt." Great. After all that drama, we were right back where we started. My dad cleared his throat and looked at Preston seriously. "Right now, our daughter's identity is in question. Are you planning to stay engaged to the Sterling family's true heiress, whoever she is, or are you staying engaged to Harper? Take a stance." Watching my dad rub his hands together, practically vibrating with excitement to use Preston's answer to drive a wedge between him and my mom, made me want to facepalm. Time and place, Dad! All he cared about was macho posturing! Predictably, Preston drooped his head like a wilted flower. "Harper, look. Your dad doesn't care about you at all. The second there's a tiny possibility you aren't his biological daughter, he tosses you aside without a second thought. He didn't even consider how Eleanor would feel about it." "I guess I'm just not as ruthless as him. Call me useless, but I can't even think straight right now. I'm just terrified that Eleanor won't be able to handle the stress and that it'll ruin her health." "Harper, Eleanor, please don't misunderstand Arthur. I'm sure he didn't mean it maliciously." My mom was instantly moved. "You're a good boy, Preston. I always knew you had a good heart." She furiously slapped away my dad's hand when he tried to grab her arm. "Get away from me!" "You'll never change, you petty, jealous old man!" "How many times do I have to tell you? I have absolutely nothing going on with Richard Vance! We are just friends! But you refuse to believe it, and you constantly try to sabotage Harper's engagement! What kind of father are you?!" "Eleanor, please don't yell at Arthur. It's my fault for being a disappointment and not earning his approval," Preston said softly. His pitiful act only made my mom's heart ache for him more. My dad ground his teeth in pure rage but didn't dare talk back to her. Seeing my mom's anger escalating, I quickly grabbed her. "Mom! The most important thing right now is to go redo the DNA test!" Afraid Preston would cause more trouble, I shot him a dirty look. "And you, knock it off. Unless you're planning on feeding us your passive-aggressive tea for dinner, stop talking." Just as we were all getting ready to head to the hospital together, my dad suddenly said, "There's no need to go. I am absolutely certain Harper is our child." He shot Preston a dirty look. "Little bastard. You didn't fall for the trap." Preston, whether to placate him or purposefully poke the bear, lowered his voice and apologized gently: "I'm so sorry, Arthur. It's entirely my fault that your attempt to frame me failed. Please accept my sincere apologies." My dad choked on his own breath, coughing violently and glaring daggers at Preston. "What is actually going on here?!" My mom, impatient as always, couldn't take it anymore. "Are you joking around or not? Did you actually swap the babies back then?" "It makes sense. No normal person would mistake 'change her diaper' for 'swap her with another human child'." Chloe cried even harder. "It's not true! I am your child! Mom, Dad, how can you refuse to acknowledge me?" "I was wondering why you disappeared for a few days! Turns out you were busy directing your own little scam to extort some rich folks! You little brat, I'll beat you to death!" "You think you deserve to be a rich man's daughter?! Know your place!" "And you dared to spread rumors that we stole a baby?! Do you have any idea that human trafficking is a felony?! I'm going to kill you!" 06 Out of nowhere, a rough, disheveled couple burst into the house. The man marched right up and grabbed Chloe, trying to drag her outside. But the woman was staring at me with a very strange look in her eyes. Her eyes were brimming with tears, and the way she stared at me gave me full-body goosebumps. Preston stepped smoothly in front of me, blocking her line of sight. My mom kept hitting my dad's shoulder. "Stop stalling! What is actually going on?!" "Eleanor, allow me to guess..." Preston started. "Shut up!" my dad barked, cutting Preston off furiously. "You little punk! You steal my wife's attention, you steal my daughter, and now you want to steal my big dramatic reveal?! Do you have a death wish?!" Sensing Preston's threat to his spotlight, my dad finally spat out the truth. It turned out that while we were waiting for the test results over the past few days, he had been doing his own investigating. He tracked down the hospital records from that year, and combined with the DNA results, he finally pieced together the truth. Chloe's parents really did intend to swap the babies. On that point, Chloe hadn't lied. But what they didn't know was... The night Chloe stayed with my mom, she cried constantly, waking my mom up dozens of times. Eventually, my exhausted, half-asleep mom snapped and yelled: "Arthur Sterling, go change her! Cry, cry, cry, she's so loud!" My dad, who worshipped the ground my mom walked on, was already getting annoyed looking at the screaming infant. So he picked up Chloe and took her to the nursery to drop her off. That night, there were only five newborns on that floor. My dad simply picked the quietest, most pleasing-looking baby and brought her back. And that baby was me. So, my dad unknowingly swapped back his own biological daughter! Mrs. Jenkins collapsed onto the floor. "No... that's impossible! The world couldn't possibly be that coincidental." Mr. Jenkins was frozen too. He stared blankly at his own hands, then at Chloe, who was covered in bruises, muttering to himself: "All these years... the kid I was beating was my own child?" "No, that's not true! You're lying!" "You just think I'm ruined because of how I was raised, so you're doing this on purpose, aren't you?!" Chloe screamed. "I knew it! How could a rich family's front door be so easy to walk through? You don't even have an alarm on!" Mrs. Jenkins snapped out of her daze, her expression hardening. "Right. You're right, honey. It has to be a lie." "Arthur, how can you be so absolutely sure Harper is your biological daughter? Just based on one DNA test?" Preston asked, also genuinely puzzled. "Hmph!" My dad looked around the room smugly. "One DNA test might make a mistake, but all of them wouldn't be wrong at the same time!" My dad reached into his coat and tossed a massive stack of DNA reports onto the table. I picked them up and looked. There was a test for me and Mom, me and Declan, me and Leo, Chloe and my Mom, Chloe and my Dad, Chloe and Leo, Chloe and Declan... Every single result explicitly proved that I was the Sterling family's biological child. Chloe's face went ghost white, and she suddenly fainted, collapsing onto the floor. After the chaos died down, my dad called the police. It turned out that during his investigation, he accidentally discovered the Jenkins parents were prime suspects in an active human trafficking ring. After they thought they had successfully swapped their baby for a rich one, they had a twisted epiphany: why not use this as a business model to get rich? The two "geniuses" got so excited by the prospect that they actually started doing it. As for why Chloe looked so much like my mom? It was because before she came to claim her "true" identity, she purposely got plastic surgery to mimic my mom's face. According to Chloe herself, she only altered about forty percent of her features. She had originally worried that blood ties alone wouldn't be enough to overcome two decades of emotional attachment, so she wanted a familiar face to stack the deck in her favor. She just never expected to run into someone like my dad, who completely ignored logic and ruined her entire plan by pure accident. 07 After Mr. and Mrs. Jenkins were escorted to the police station for questioning, Chloe didn't stay idle. She started showing up around me constantly—or, more accurately, she started showing up around Preston. "Preston, I am so, so sorry. I never imagined my parents were people like that. I didn't want to hurt Harper, and I honestly had no idea what the truth was. Can you please forgive me?" Preston completely ignored her and leaned in close to me, trying to earn points. "Do you think she has some kind of mental illness? Why is she apologizing to me?" "Is it really that hard to understand? Without that excuse, how else is she supposed to get close to you?" I smirked. Preston, who knew me too well, saw my smile and immediately waved his hands defensively. "Hey, don't smile at me like that! This has absolutely nothing to do with me. Don't you dare take your anger out on me." "This private club is members-only, and the buy-in is at least a million dollars. You didn't bring her in, so how exactly did she get past security?" I took a sip of my tea and stared him down. He looked even more aggrieved. "Obviously, someone behind the scenes is backing her up and giving her full access to my itinerary." "I have no idea why Arthur hates me so much that he'd actually aid a woman who tried to ruin your life." Here we go again with the passive-aggressive victim act. "Are you saying she used my dad's membership card to get in?" "I wouldn't dare say that," he muttered, sounding incredibly bitter. Losing my patience, I kicked him lightly under the table. To my surprise, his face flushed slightly, and his voice went soft. "Why don't you go ask Arthur yourself?" I thought about it and realized it was actually pretty strange. Even though my dad had been aggressively taking his marital frustrations out on Preston lately, he was still feeling incredibly guilty that his petty rivalry had been fully exposed to my mom during the DNA fiasco. But before I could even find my dad to confront him, I was kidnapped. When I woke up, the ground beneath me was swaying. I seemed to be on a boat. My hands and feet were tied tightly behind my back with thick rope. I could barely move. "Drive the boat out to the middle of the ocean. We'll throw her overboard there. Nobody will ever find her." The voice was distinctly familiar. I wiggled closer to the door, trying to hear better. The door pushed open. As expected, it was a familiar face: Mr. Jenkins. "So Chloe's actual target these past few days was me. And here I thought she was after Preston." "Even if you kill me, Chloe can't possibly replace me and become the Sterling heiress. I really don't understand. Did you guys go through all this trouble just to commit a felony?" "Trying to trick me into talking, huh?" My heart sank. I didn't expect him to be so sharp. He instantly saw through my tactic. Then again, you don't run a human trafficking ring for years without getting caught unless you have some brains. I was racking my brain, trying to figure out a way to save myself, when he suddenly started gloating. "You think I'm stupid? You think I'm going to tell you that Chloe and I split up? That she went to seduce your father while I came to kill you and make you disappear? When you go missing, your parents will definitely fight. Then Chloe just has to bat her eyelashes, drag your dad down with her, and force him to drop the charges." "When that happens, everything your family owns will belong to us. Won't the goal of swapping the babies finally be complete?" "Bob, why are you talking so much to her? We're in the middle of the ocean. Just do it!" Mrs. Jenkins walked in, her face twisted into a vicious sneer. "If things hadn't gone wrong, you should have been the one suffering all those years of abuse, not my precious Chloe! Whenever I think about that, I want to slice you into a thousand pieces! Today is your lucky day. I'll make it quick!" She shoved a sharp knife into Mr. Jenkins' hands. "Wait!" Fear pushed my brain into overdrive.

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