THE REGRET THAT BOUND HER

CHAPTER 2

Emily's POV

I was five years old when my world ended the first time.

My mother died during childbirth. My father, they said, died of grief; his heart simply stopped three days later, as though it had decided there was nothing left worth beating for. Their deaths left a scar so deep I stopped expecting it to fully heal. I only learned to walk around it.

“Welcome to your new home, Emily,” Aunt Rachael said.I blinked and found myself standing outside a two-storey house with a black roof and freshly painted cream walls.

The drive had been long.

I hadn’t noticed it end.The neighbourhood was quiet and neat. Houses lined both sides of the street in different shapes and sizes. To the left, a hillside sloped down toward a rushing stream. Children played hide-and-seek in the hollow of an unfinished building on the right, their shrieks carrying over the treetops.

Something about the noise made my chest ache.

This is home now.

You have to let it be home.

When I opened the car door, Aunt Rachael reached out her hand. I took a breath and placed mine in it.

Inside, the house had four bedrooms. Three bathrooms; one each for Uncle John, and their two children, Stephanie and Wendy. I was given my own room, which felt like more generosity than I knew how to accept.

“Let me show you your room!” Stephanie’s enthusiasm could have filled the whole street.

“Wait. What about her things?” Aunt Rachael called after us.

“Got it!” Wendy was already hauling my box up the stairs, struggling with the weight and red in the face. The sight of him made me laugh for the first time in weeks. The tension in my chest loosened, just a little.

Upstairs, Wendy helped me unpack while I sat on the edge of the bed, letting my eyes move around the room. The walls were pale yellow. A window looked out onto the garden.

It was a good room. But the moment I sat still enough to think, the thought of my mother arrived, and the good in the room dimmed.

Aunt Rachael came in and drew me onto her lap. I let her.

“I know you’re nervous,” she said, stroking my hair. “But you’ll love it here. And if you need anything, anything at all, you come to us. We’re your family now.”

“Okay,” I said, in the small, careful voice I’d been using since the funerals.She kissed my head and left.

Stephanie immediately declared she would be spending every evening in my room. Wendy claimed she snored and that I’d be better off next door with him.

“I do not snore!”

“Shall I show Emily the video from last Thursday?”

Stephanie’s outrage was so complete, so perfectly dramatic, that I laughed again, properly this time—the kind that sneaks up on you and takes over before you can stop it. For a moment, I forgot I was grieving.

• • •

The days blurred. Aunt Rachael and Uncle John were patient with me in those early weeks. They didn’t push. They didn’t pretend the loss hadn’t happened. They just made space for me inside their lives and let me fill it at my own pace.

At night, I slept beside Stephanie, listening to her low, rambling voice until it carried me under. On the harder nights, Wendy sat with me in the dark and didn’t say anything at all. They became my anchors.

Still, the questions came.

Why did they want another child?

Didn’t they think one was enough?

Didn’t they know what it would cost?

I never asked out loud.

But the questions stayed, woven into the silence of every night that passed without my parents’ voices in it.

• • •

Years went by, and I grew into a teenager who treasured sleep the way other people treasure gold fiercely, and with great resentment toward anyone who disturbed it. Saturday mornings were sacred.

So when I felt two firm hands shaking me awake, I did not take it well.

“Mhmm. What is it?” I growled into the pillow.

“Morning, sleeping beauty. Lunch is ready.

”I sat bolt upright. Wendy was grinning at me from the foot of the bed, entirely too pleased with himself.

Lunch?

How long did I sleep?

“Just freshen up and come down. Everyone’s waiting.” He was already halfway out the door.Everyone.

What does ‘everyone’ mean?Why is everyone waiting?

I dragged myself to the bathroom, barely remembered to brush my teeth, pulled on a black sleeveless crop top and a brown mini skirt, and descended the stairs with all the enthusiasm of someone approaching a sentencing.

At the dining table, all eyes turned to me. Uncle John cleared his throat.I was starting high school. The same one as Stephanie and Wendy.My stomach dropped.

I wasn’t going to cry.

I’d promised myself that, but the tears came anyway. I wiped them quickly with the back of my hand.

Aunt Rachael reached across the table and covered my hand with hers.“You’re going to love it there,” she said, her eyes steady on mine. “We think this is the right step. You need to move forward, sweetheart.”

Something in her voice settled me.“Alright,” I said. “I’ll do it. I’ll start fresh.”

Stephanie and Wendy exchanged a grin.

Uncle John gave my shoulder a gentle pat.“That’s my girl,” he said.

I smiled. For the first time since I’d arrived, I actually meant it.