The phone rang, a tinny, anxious sound. It was her. My mom. Again. I knew what she wanted before I even answered. She’d been calling more frequently lately, her voice thinner, more strained with each passing week. My stomach clenched. I took a deep breath, letting it ring twice more, trying to steel myself.
“Hello?” My voice was tight, betraying the exhaustion I felt right down to my bones.
“Sweetheart, I… I need to ask you something,” she began, her usual cheerful facade already cracking. “The car needs major repairs. And rent is due. I just don’t know what to do.”
A little girl walking up a staircase | Source: Midjourney
My eyes drifted around my small apartment, the one I’d worked two jobs to afford. The one where I meticulously budgeted every penny, bought generics, and skipped vacations. This isn’t fair. The thought burned, hot and acrid, in my throat.
I remembered the conversation from three years ago. The one where she tearfully admitted her retirement fund was gone. Not dwindled, not invested poorly, but gone. Emptied. Because of my sister. My older sister. The one who had always been Mom’s favorite, her special little bird, too delicate for the harsh realities of life.
My sister, who bounced from one “brilliant business idea” to the next. The artisan candle company that never sold a single wick. The organic dog food startup that ended with a mountain of rotting kibble. The “wellness retreat” that folded before it even opened. Each failure, each new whim, came with an urgent plea for seed money. And Mom, without fail, had opened her purse. Again. And again. And again.
I’d watched it happen. I’d warned her. Mom, she’s taking advantage. You need to save for yourself. My words fell on deaf ears, or perhaps, simply on a mother’s heart that couldn’t say no to her struggling child. I, on the other hand, was the “responsible one.” The one who always had her head screwed on straight. The one who never asked for a handout. So, of course, I didn’t need help.
While I was working full-time through college, scraping by on student loans and ramen, my sister was being gifted a new car for her 30th birthday – because her old one was “unreliable” for her very important new consulting gig (which lasted three months). While I was carefully saving for a down payment, she was taking trips to Bali, claiming it was for “spiritual enrichment” crucial to her next venture. And Mom paid for it all. Every single time.
A man leaning against a wall | Source: Midjourney
My sister’s apartment in the trendy part of town, her designer clothes, her elaborate brunches – all funded by Mom’s dwindling nest egg. While Mom was supposedly “downsizing,” she was secretly pulling money from her investments to keep my sister afloat, or more accurately, to keep her living a life she couldn’t afford. The stories started small: just a loan for her rent, she’ll pay me back. Then: she needs a new laptop for her work, it’s an investment. Then: she had a medical emergency, a minor surgery, nothing serious, but the bills piled up.
The medical emergency was the one that truly drained the last significant chunk. Six figures, Mom admitted to me in a hushed, tearful confession. Six figures that were meant for her golden years, for security, for peace of mind. Gone. For my sister. Who, by the way, seemed perfectly fine afterwards, tanned and rested, telling everyone how she’d “overcome a health challenge” and was ready to conquer the world.
And now Mom was asking me. The responsible one. The one who had received nothing but the occasional birthday card and a lifetime of being told to “be patient with your sister.” The one who had to work herself to the bone because Mom couldn’t, wouldn’t, say no.
“Sweetheart? Are you there?” Mom’s voice trembled, pulling me back from the bitter tide of memory.
I closed my eyes. This is it. I can’t do it anymore. The words felt like sandpaper in my throat, but they were true. I literally cannot afford to save her when she threw away her own future, and mine by proxy, on someone else.
An amused woman on the phone | Source: Midjourney
“Mom,” I started, my voice strained. “I… I can’t. I really can’t. I don’t have anything extra to give you. I’m barely making ends meet myself.” I felt a pang of guilt, a familiar ache. But it was quickly overshadowed by a surge of righteous anger. Why should I suffer because of her choices?
A heavy silence stretched between us. I heard a sniffle, then a soft sob. “Oh,” she whispered, her voice barely audible. “I understand. I just… I didn’t know who else to ask.”
My chest tightened. I wanted to soften my stance, to offer some small comfort, but the resentment was a wall I couldn’t climb over. “I’m sorry, Mom. I truly am.”
We ended the call shortly after. I felt terrible, a knot of grief and anger twisting inside me. I had finally said no. I had drawn a boundary. It felt liberating and devastating all at once. She made her bed. She let my sister take everything. And now she has to lie in it.
A week later, I got a call from an unknown number. It was a social worker. My mom was in the hospital. Heart attack. Not severe, but she was frail. And confused. They’d found a crumpled piece of paper in her purse with my name and number.
I rushed to the hospital. My sister wasn’t there. Of course not. She was probably on one of her “healing retreats” or “business trips” she claimed were vital.
A man standing with folded arms | Source: Midjourney
Mom was pale, hooked up to monitors. She looked so small, so utterly broken. I sat by her bed, holding her hand. After a while, her eyes fluttered open. She looked at me, a flicker of recognition, then a cloud of sadness.
“Oh, darling,” she whispered, her voice hoarse. “I’m so sorry.”
“Sorry for what, Mom?” I asked, my voice cracking. For spending your retirement? For enabling her? For leaving me to pick up the pieces?
She squeezed my hand, her grip surprisingly strong. “I couldn’t tell you. I wanted to protect you.” A single tear rolled down her cheek. “Your sister… she was diagnosed five years ago. A very rare, aggressive form of cancer. She didn’t want anyone to know. Not even you. She didn’t want pity. She didn’t want to be a burden.”
My blood ran cold. The words hung in the air, heavy, impossible.
“The treatments… they were experimental. And ruinously expensive. She begged me not to tell you. She said she wanted you to remember her as she was, living life to the fullest. The ‘businesses’… they were just a front. To explain the money, to give her something to focus on, to give her hope. The ‘trips’… they were to clinics, to specialists. And the ‘medical emergency’ was the last, desperate attempt at a cure. The six figures… that was the final, devastating, failed treatment.”
My world tilted. The air left my lungs. EVERY SINGLE THING I THOUGHT I KNEW WAS A LIE. My sister wasn’t selfish, she wasn’t frivolous, she wasn’t a taker. She was dying. She had been dying for five years, silently, bravely, while I seethed with resentment over her perceived luxuries. And Mom… Mom hadn’t been an enabler. She had been a heartbroken mother, desperately trying to save her child, sacrificing everything she had, even her relationship with her other daughter, to keep her secret and give her a chance.
A smiling little girl standing in a garden | Source: Midjourney
“She passed away last month, sweetheart,” Mom whispered, her eyes filling with unshed tears. “A week before I called you about the car.”
The world spun. My sister. Gone. All those calls, all those snide thoughts, all those judgments. My refusal to help my mom, thinking she had chosen a life of frivolity for my sister, thinking she had betrayed my future.
I pulled my hand from hers, bringing my own hands up to cover my face. OH MY GOD. WHAT HAVE I DONE? The shame, the regret, the searing, soul-crushing realization of my own ignorance and harsh judgment. I wasn’t just angry at my sister, or at my mom. I was a monster. And now, it was too late to tell her I loved her. Too late to ask for forgiveness. Too late to do anything but live with the crushing weight of a truth I had been too blind, too selfish, to see.
