Chapter 3

I stared coldly at the two crumpled slips and picked one at random.

A faint, offhand smile touched my mother's face.

"Go on, open it and see."

Under their steady urging, I slowly unfolded the paper.

"All right, you didn't win—"

Before I even had it fully open, my mother rushed to announce that I'd lost.

Too bad for her.

This time I'd grabbed the slip with writing on it.

"That's impossible. How is that possible!"

She snatched the slip and checked it over and over, her hands shaking.

"Something must have gone wrong somewhere."

She hurried to open the other crumpled slip in her hand.

The paper was blank.

My father, who'd been sitting calm on the sofa, panicked too. He shot to his feet, pulled off his heavy glasses, and inspected it again and again, his brow furrowed so tight it could have crushed a fly.

The two of them exchanged a look, both starting to speak and stopping.

My sister fell apart. She'd never once lost a drawing, and this time she'd lost on the biggest prize of all.

She wailed and threw a fit.

"I said it wasn't fair, it isn't fair, why did she get to pick first?

"If I'd gone first, I definitely would have won. I won't have it, I won't, the BMW is mine, it's mine."

The living room was all crying and shouting, one big uproar.

I had no interest in watching them perform any longer.

I only said, coldly, "A bet's a bet. Keep your promise."

"No!" My mother's voice went sharp.

"You broke the rules just now. This round doesn't count."

"Four of us, eight eyes watching. What rule did I break?" I demanded.

"The slips always get tossed onto the table first, then you grab. You grabbed straight out of my hand—that's a violation, obviously." She twisted the logic to suit her.

"Right, right, exactly, this round can't stand."

Having found their excuse, my father and mother fell instantly into step with each other.

"Even if grabbing it from your hand is against the rules, you're the ones who handed it to me. How is that on me?" I shot back.

"Wrong!

"I was about to put it on the table. Before I could, you grabbed it early. Clearly you're the one who didn't play fair."

My mother said it with full conviction.

To favor my sister, they could find even an angle as twisted as that.

"I won't accept this. How can you be so biased? You go back on your word. I hate you!"

"You little wretch!"

Crack. My father's hand cut across my face.

"Who taught you to talk to your parents like that?"

I held my burning cheek, tears rolling down in fat drops.

Seeing me struck, my sister stopped her crying at once and gave me a taunting little smile.

She was warning me: don't even think about fighting her for it.

"How could you hit the child?

"Come here, let me look."

My mother came at me with fake concern.

I dodged her.

Her raised hand met empty air. She put on an apology. "All right, all right, Mom and Dad were wrong, it was our fault.

"For fairness' sake, let's do this round over. You still go first. That's fine now, isn't it?"