It was a national holiday. My little sister wanted to lie down across the entire back seat to sleep, so my mother told me to get in the trunk. I obeyed, folding my thin, frail body into a painfully contorted position. “Don’t crush the luggage,” my mother said, her voice flat. Then she slammed the trunk shut. The suffocating heat of the enclosed space and the lurching of the car triggered my asthma. I fumbled in my pocket for my inhaler, only to find the canister was empty. An image flashed in my mind: my sister handing me the inhaler earlier that day, a knowing, malicious smile on her face. As my vision blurred, I heard my mother’s voice, cold and distant. “We’ll just drop her off at my cousin’s place. Give her a little extra money. I’m so sick of looking at her.” Tears streamed down my face, but I was smiling. Don’t worry, Mom. You won’t have to be sick of me for much longer. 1. In the final moments of consciousness, they say hearing is the last sense to go. I heard my mother finally mention me, her voice, which had been so warm a moment before, turning to ice. “We were supposed to have a nice, relaxing trip, and now we have to make this stupid detour to my cousin’s…” She clicked her tongue, the sound full of irritation. The mere thought of me was enough to ruin her mood. Today was a holiday. The whole family was going on a trip to the capital, and my mother had told me to pack a bag. I was surprised, and so happy. I thought, for a moment, that I was finally being included, that I was finally a part of the family. I never imagined she was planning on throwing me away, like a piece of trash. In the dark, stuffy trunk, the only sound was my own ragged, desperate breathing. Cold sweat poured down my face. My chest felt like it was being crushed. Suffocation and despair washed over me in a final, crushing wave. At the very end, I curled into a ball, like an infant in the womb, and instinctively whispered the name I had spent my entire life hoping would answer me. Mom… Mom… I died. My soul drifted out of the dark trunk. I floated past my sister in the back seat, sleeping peacefully under a pink, hand-knitted blanket my mother had made for her. My mother was texting my great-aunt, who was being evasive, leaving her messages on read. She typed again, her patience wearing thin. [Cici is very capable. She can handle all the housework, you won’t have to worry about a thing. She’s not very bright, not cut out for school, so you don’t need to waste money on that.] She was like a desperate salesperson trying to offload defective merchandise. I reached out, wanting to smooth the worried frown from her brow, to tell her, Mom, don’t worry. I’m dead now. The baby you tried to abort, the stain you could never wash away, the landmine you were always trying to avoid, is finally gone from your life. The car soon arrived at my great-aunt’s house. Only my mother got out. “Oh, I was starting to think you weren’t coming! Shouldn’t you be enjoying the holiday?” “Auntie, we talked about this. Cici isn’t used to the city. I don’t have a choice…” My mother didn’t give her a chance to refuse, pulling a thick wad of cash from her purse. To my surprise, my great-aunt didn’t take it. She glanced at the money, her face a mask of conflict, but then shook her head. “You know how it is here. I don’t make the decisions in this house.” My mother knew it was a lost cause. Her frown deepened. “Where’s Cici? I’ve hardly ever seen the poor girl. Let her come out and say hello.” My great-aunt was trying to ease the tension. My mother turned and looked toward the trunk. Is she going to find me? What will she do when she finds out I’m dead? A sliver of dark anticipation bloomed in my chest. “Don’t take this the wrong way,” my great-aunt said, her voice dropping, “but if you hadn’t been so foolish back then, none of this would be happening. You have to pay for the mistakes you make when you’re young.” The comment struck a nerve. My mother’s face went cold. “We’re leaving,” she snapped, turning and getting back in the car without another word. 2. My mother hated me. She was the only person from her village to ever go to college, but she got pregnant during her freshman year. She was young, naive, and completely infatuated with my father, a man ten years her senior. She dropped out of school, cut ties with her family, and threw herself into a life she would come to regret forever. A year later, she showed up on my grandmother’s doorstep and left me there. She went back to school, got a respectable job in the city, and started a new family. She had a wealthy husband and a beautiful daughter. She was a success story, a happy, fulfilled woman. She never went back to the small, gossipy village that remembered her as a cautionary tale. Until I was fourteen. At my grandmother’s funeral. The woman I had only ever seen in photographs appeared before me. She was so young, she didn’t look old enough to be my mother. She went through the motions of the funeral with a cold, detached air, gave me an address, and said, “Come find me here.” Then she was gone. It was my first time in the city. I was like a stray dog, lost and scared. The apartment building had a security code. It was the first of many barriers I would never be able to cross. On the other side of that door was my mother, her husband, and her other daughter. I waited outside for a long time. It was nearly a hundred degrees. I was dizzy with the heat, sweat pouring down my face. As my consciousness began to drift, I thought of my grandmother. Whenever the other kids in the village called me a bastard, I would hide in the wheat fields, watching the waves of gold and green, and wait for her to find me. She would hold me, muttering angrily, “What’s so great about your mother anyway?” But then she would see my tears and soften. “It’s okay, Cici. When you’re a little older, your mom will come back for you.” I had looked forward to that day with all my heart. I never knew it would cost my grandmother her life. My mother did come for me. She arrived with her young daughter in tow, the smile on her face vanishing the second she saw me. That was the first time I felt the full force of her malice. She made no effort to hide her disgust. My very existence was a boomerang, returning to strike her down, to remind her of the past she had tried so desperately to bury. I was the living, breathing proof that her carefully constructed life was a lie. And then, her precious daughter started accusing me of bullying her. My mother finally snapped. She decided to get rid of me. “Alright, don’t be angry. We’ll just send her to a boarding school,” my stepfather said, his voice casual as he drove. “Ava wants to go to the theme park in the capital. You should book the tickets, look up some guides. Don’t waste your energy on this. We’re on vacation.” At the mention of a theme park, my sister, Ava, woke up immediately. She started chattering excitedly about what rides she wanted to go on, even offering to use her allowance to buy my mother a magic wand. They laughed together, a happy, perfect family. They had already forgotten about me in the trunk. Around noon, we finally arrived at the theme park. My mother checked us into a hotel. A princess-themed suite that cost over a thousand dollars a night. She didn’t even blink, because Ava liked it. Then she transferred a thousand dollars to Ava’s account. “Sweetie,” she cooed into the phone, “go check out the gift shops at the entrance. Buy whatever you like.” My mother never held back when it came to her daughter. She gave her anything she wanted, raised her like a princess. Ava lived in a pink, lace-filled room full of toys, while I slept in a storage closet. My world was a three-foot-wide cot, surrounded by Ava’s cast-off toys, surrounded by the love my mother showered on her. Just like now. I stubbornly followed my mother, wanting to reach out with my ghostly hand and secretly, gently, hold hers. But then Ava squeezed between us, passing right through my soul, and wrapped her arms around my mother’s waist with a natural, easy affection I had never known. 3. I ate lunch with my mother. At home, there were only ever three chairs at the dinner table. I always sat on a small stool in the corner, eating my food quickly and silently. Ava would deliberately put spoiled food on my plate. I would eat it without complaint. I would look at my mother, hoping she would praise me for being good, for not wasting food. But her gaze was always full of disgust, as if she were looking at a filthy stray dog. Then she would turn and put a piece of meat in Ava’s bowl, telling her to eat up. I was a rat in the shadows, watching a life I could never have. Now, pretending I was still alive, I sat beside her, fulfilling my pathetic childhood dream of eating at the same table as my mother. Suddenly, her phone buzzed. It was a message from my great-aunt. [The Miller family in the village is willing to take Cici in.] She hesitated, then added: [But you know they have that simple-minded son. They’re probably looking for a child bride for him.] “Oh, right! Isn’t Cici still in the trunk?” My stepfather finally remembered me, slapping the table. My mother froze, a flicker of confusion on her face. Then she remembered, and her brow furrowed in annoyance. “What’s the rush? It’s not like she’s going to die.” She scoffed, the sound laced with the irritation of having her good mood spoiled. [Thanks, Auntie. It’s fine, Cici’s old enough. I’m just giving her a place to stay. What happens after that is her own business. I’m not getting involved.] After sending the message, she visibly relaxed. “It’s pretty hot today. Do you think Cici will be okay in the trunk?” my stepfather asked, a hint of unease in his voice. “She grew up in that village without air conditioning and she survived, didn’t she? Besides, it’s not completely airtight. It’s only been a few hours. What’s the worst that can happen?” she said, smiling as she served Ava more food. Ava hated hearing my name. She quickly distracted my stepfather with a story. The three of them were soon laughing again, and I was forgotten. A dull, delayed ache spread through my chest. My mother didn’t care about me. I shook my head, trying to comfort myself. It’s okay. I don’t want to ruin her good mood. And I haven’t seen a big city theme park before. I want to ride the roller coaster with my mother. I followed Ava from ride to ride. I watched my mother smile at her, and I pretended she was smiling at me. Deep in my soul, something began to crumble. In the afternoon, my stepfather’s phone rang. It was an unknown number. [Hello, is this Mr. Evans? I think there might be something rotting in your car. It’s a hot day, and the smell is starting to bother people. You might want to come check it out.] My stepfather was confused, but my mother snatched the phone from his hand and hung up. “It’s probably just Cici, trying to get attention,” she said with a cold smirk. “What a nuisance. Just ignore her.” “If someone calls to tell me to come pick up her body, I’d still think it was a hassle.” The words were spoken so casually. But they hit me like a physical blow, a knife twisting in my gut. I drifted away from my mother, and saw the crowd gathered around my stepfather’s car. They were holding their noses, pointing at the trunk. “What on earth is in there? That smell is not right. It’s like something died.” The man leading the group seemed to be a vlogger, a camera hanging around his neck. His face was lit with a grim excitement. “You guys don’t think… there’s a body in there, do you?” he whispered.
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