I stepped back, avoiding them. My mouth curled downward in silent rejection. My guarded eyes made them nervous, filling them with regret.
They must have remembered the last time it rained–how they had fought over my umbrella, only to give it to Fiona. How I had torn my own umbrella apart in anger and walked into the downpour. How I had fallen ill afterward, burning with fever.
Mom’s hand trembled as she held the umbrella, as if it weighed a thousand pounds.
We stood frozen in awkward tension.
Then, my teacher happened to pass by. He saw them, frowned, and stepped in front of me. “As parents, if you can’t treat your children equally, the least you can do is not oppress one of them. Just because she’s the eldest, does she not even have the right to be a child?”
He didn’t know about our family’s mess yet. He thought they were doing what they had done before trying to take my umbrella for my “sister.” The last time it happened, I had shredded my umbrella and stood in the rain. Later, when I collapsed with a fever in class, it had scared him to death.
My parents stood there, speechless, caught in their own shame.
I spoke softly. “Teacher, this time they’re here to give me an umbrella.”
Understanding the situation, he hesitated, then left reluctantly.
