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Come to think of it, no one in the family could out–pretend Rachel when it came to putting on airs.
She only graduated from community college but told the family she had a bachelor’s degree.
She works at a small advertising company but claims to be a designer at a top 100 firm in the country, making $400,000 a year.
One lie leads to another. To keep up the charade, she, who only makes 4,500 a month, went crazy enough to borrow 150,000 and give it to her mom, saying it was her year–end bonus.
Her mom had been bragging about it in the family group chat for over a month, always putting me down to prop Rachel up.
But I understood why Rachel did it. With a status–obsessed, sexist, and overbearing mom like Aunt Karen, she was forced to pretend just to survive!
She used to be honest before, but her life was miserable then.
The incident that left the deepest impression on me was when Rachel was in 5th grade. She got a 69% on her final exam.
I had gotten a 99%.
As soon as her mom saw her test paper, she slapped Rachel across the face twice without a word. Rachel was stunned, humiliated, but didn’t dare cry.
It didn’t stop there. Her mom grabbed her by the ear, cursing and kicking her, forcing her to kneel in the snow holding up her test paper. She wasn’t allowed to eat dinner.
Every time they saw someone, her mom would humiliate her daughter in front of them, calling her useless for not getting top scores.
Rachel used to be cheerful and outgoing. but her mom’s abuse graduálly made her
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Rachel used to be cheerful and outgoing, but her mom’s abuse gradually made her withdrawn and gloomy.
From then on, she learned to alter her grades only bringing home perfect scores.
Aunt Karen isn’t very educated, so she’s easy to fool.
When she saw the perfect test papers, she finally started treating Rachel better, buying her gifts and praising her in front of others.
Rachel became addicted to her mother’s exaggerated praise, even starting to believe she really was a genius.
In this daily self–deception that went on year after year, she could no longer accept her
true self.
When facing me, who knew the truth, she begged me not to tell anyone, saying she
would kill herself if I did.
She said that if she could land this deal with my company, she could slowly pay back the
$150,000 debt.
Her boss had said that after the layoffs, they would focus resources on developing whoever remained. If that was her, she could easily make $20,000 a month and gradually turn her fake persona into reality.
The premise was that she had to keep her job.
I wanted to help her, but I never expected this scene unfolding before me.
There were only 5 minutes left!
I strode over, snatched the scissors from my grandma’s hand, and grabbed the network
cable from Peter.
With a stern face, I said: “Just 5 minutes! In 5 minutes, I’ll be done!”
Peter cried even harder, pointing at me and shouting: “You $3,000 loser! How dare you take my things? I’ll beat you to death!”
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Aunt Karen let go of him, allowing him to charge at me with his fists flying.
My dad tried to hold Peter back, but before he could say anything, Aunt Karen yelled at
him:
“What are you doing?! Peter is just a child! His punches don’t even hurt. He’s just playing with Brynn!”
My grandma slapped my arm, cooing at Peter: “Bad Brynn! Grandma hit her! Don’t cry, Peter, don’t cry.”
She then smacked my back twice more.
It didn’t hurt much, but my parents‘ expressions darkened.
My grandma, leveraging her seniority, scolded them: “What’s with those faces? You want to hit me or something? Brynn’s just a girl, a few smacks won’t hurt her. But if my grandson cries his eyes out, how will you make it up to him?”
Aunt Karen smirked triumphantly at my parents.
My parents aren’t ones to cause a scene, so they decided not to make a fuss, given it was a holiday.
I had plugged the network cable back in and didn’t bother arguing with them. I rushed to connect to the internet and send the email.
My business partners were already raging in the group chat, tagging me frantically,
saying they wouldn’t look at any proposals after 8 PM, no matter how brilliant.
I understood their frustration at having to work on Christmas.
There were only 3 minutes left until 8 PM. I quickly sent the files to the group chat.
The internet was a bit slow, but it should be fine.
I urgently needed to use the bathroom, so I ran off.
When came out it Was already 9.DM
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When I came out, it was already 8 PM.
I thought the proposal had been sent successfully, just in time. Crisis averted.
But when I returned to my computer to check my partners‘ feedback, I was horrified.
Rachel’s proposal hadn’t been sent at all – it had been recalled.
Seeing they hadn’t received anything, my partners angrily declared they wouldn’t look at
it anymore.
I quickly tried to resend, only to find the files were gone.
I looked up to see Peter making faces at me again.
I asked him, “Did you delete my files?”
He stuck his tongue out at me: “That’s what you get for being mean to me! This’ll teach you a lesson. Take that!”
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