TALES OF BIG SISTERs

A Different Big Sister

Chapter Three: The Oldest Always Knows

Naomi stood in the small bedroom, folding laundry in neat, methodical motions. The clothes were old, hand-me-downs that had been worn by one sibling before being passed to the next. The cycle had started with her, then Xandra, then Chelsea. Now, Maya was wearing dresses Naomi had outgrown years ago.

She didn’t mind.

Not really.

"Naomi."

She turned to see Xandra leaning against the doorframe, arms crossed. Her expression was guarded, but Naomi could see the question in her eyes before she even spoke.

"Did Mom call?"

Naomi didn’t answer right away. She folded the last shirt, placing it on the growing pile before sitting down on the bed. "No."

Xandra sighed, rubbing a hand over her face. "I figured."

Their mother worked late shifts, sometimes doubling back-to-back, leaving them to fend for themselves most nights. Naomi had stopped waiting up for her years ago. Xandra, though—Xandra still checked the phone, still looked out the window when a car passed by too late at night.

"She’ll come back when she comes back," Naomi said, standing up. "We have to deal with what’s in front of us."

Xandra scowled. "That’s your answer for everything."

"Because it’s true."

"You always act like it’s your job to fix everything," Xandra muttered.

Naomi turned to her, arms crossed. "And if I don’t, who will?"

That shut Xandra up.

Because they both knew the answer.

Naomi had been taking care of them since before she understood what it meant to be the eldest. Before their father walked out. Before their mother stopped seeing them as kids and more like responsibilities.

She had raised Xandra as much as their mother had. And Chelsea. And now Maya.

It was just what big sisters did.

A small knock sounded at the door before Chelsea poked her head in. She was only thirteen, but her eyes held the same weariness Naomi had felt at her age. "Maya wants a bedtime story."

Naomi sighed. "Tell her to wait a few minutes."

Chelsea hesitated. "She wants you."

Xandra let out a low laugh. "Of course she does. Naomi’s the favorite."

Naomi ignored the teasing, brushing past her sisters and making her way down the hall to Maya’s room. The youngest of them was already snuggled under a thin blanket, her stuffed rabbit tucked against her chest. She brightened when she saw Naomi.

"You came!"

"Of course I did," Naomi said, kneeling by the bed. "What story do you want tonight?"

Maya thought for a moment before whispering, "The one about the princess who didn’t need saving."

Naomi smiled.

She told Maya the story, her voice soft, her hands brushing the little girl’s curls until her breathing evened out and she drifted into sleep.

When Naomi stood to leave, Chelsea was in the doorway.

"You should let Xandra help more," she said quietly.

Naomi frowned. "I don’t—"

"You do everything," Chelsea cut in. "And we let you. But it’s not fair, Naomi. Not to you."

Naomi’s chest tightened, but she didn’t let it show. Instead, she smiled, brushing past Chelsea as she whispered, "Big sisters don’t get fair."

And that was the truth she had always known.

Chapter Four: The Lie That Started It All

Vera knew the moment she was born that her life would be different from her sisters’.

Not because she was special.

But because she was the third daughter.

Daria, the eldest, had been born into struggle. She never got to be a child. By the time she was four, she was already holding a baby—Tess, the second sister—rocking her to sleep while their mother, Judith, worked late shifts, and their father, Rey, served in the army, fighting wars they barely understood.

By the time Vera came along, money was no longer a problem. But love? That was another story.

And then there was the youngest, Chi.

Chi was born in the middle of everything falling apart. She never knew a time when their parents weren’t fighting—except it wasn’t fighting, not really. It was grief.

Because by the time Chi was old enough to say "Dad," Rey was already gone.

Not gone in the way people disappear, not in the way fathers walk out and leave.

Gone in the way that soldiers go, in the way that folded flags replace living, breathing men.

Gone in a way that didn’t let them be angry.

Gone in a way that left them hollow.

Vera stood at the kitchen sink, washing dishes while Tess sat at the table, lazily flipping through an old magazine.

"Chi’s asleep?" Vera asked.

Tess nodded, popping a bubble with her gum. "Yeah. Daria put her down."

Of course she did.

Daria always took care of things.

She had been the mother they needed before she even knew how to take care of herself.

Vera dried her hands on a towel and turned to her sister. "Where is she?"

Tess didn’t look up. "Smoking outside."

Vera sighed.

Daria never smoked when their mother was home. She never even let Chi see her with a cigarette. But late at night, when everyone else was asleep, when she thought no one was watching—Daria sat on the back steps, staring into the dark, a cigarette between her fingers, the weight of the world in her eyes.

Vera stepped out into the cool night air.

Daria didn’t turn as she approached. She exhaled a slow stream of smoke, her expression unreadable.

"You know Mom hates that," Vera murmured.

Daria let out a short laugh. "Mom hates a lot of things."

Vera sat beside her, pulling her knees to her chest. "Are you okay?"

Daria flicked ash from the cigarette. "Tired."

Vera didn’t push. She knew better.

They sat in silence for a long time, the air thick with things neither of them would say.

Finally, Daria spoke. "You ever feel like you were born into something that wasn’t yours?"

Vera turned to her. "What do you mean?"

Daria’s lips curled into something that wasn’t quite a smile. "Like maybe this isn’t supposed to be our life. That maybe we got someone else’s bad luck by mistake."

Vera thought about that. About their mother, who spent more time at work than at home. About their father, who had gone off to war and never come back. About Chi, who never got to know what a happy family felt like.

"Yeah," she admitted. "I feel like that a lot."

Daria sighed, leaning back against the steps. "Thought so."

The cigarette burned down to the filter.

Daria crushed it beneath her heel, standing up.

"Come inside," Vera said.

Daria hesitated. Then she nodded.

Because in the end, they only had each other.

And that had to be enough.

Chapter Five: The Things We Carry

Vera sat on the floor of their small bedroom, Chi’s head resting in her lap. The youngest of them was fast asleep, her tiny fingers still gripping Vera’s shirt.

She had fallen asleep waiting for their mother to come home. Again.

Vera sighed, gently stroking Chi’s dark curls. It wasn’t fair. None of it was.

At seven years old, Chi should have had bedtime stories and warm goodnights. She should have had a mother who kissed her forehead and a father who tucked her in. But instead, she had Vera.

And Vera was tired.

"You should put her in bed," Tess muttered from across the room, sprawled out on her mattress, flipping through a textbook she wasn’t really reading.

Vera exhaled. "She’ll wake up if I move her."

Tess shrugged, tapping her pen against the pages. "Then let her sleep here."

She sounded indifferent, but Vera knew better. They all had their own ways of carrying the weight of this house.

For Tess, it was pretending not to care.

For Daria, it was carrying it all alone.

And for Vera, it was this. Holding Chi just a little longer. Being the one to make sure the house didn’t crumble completely.

The front door creaked open.

A long pause. Then the shuffle of footsteps.

Judith was home.

Vera waited, listening, hoping. But there was no greeting, no call of "I’m home." Just the quiet sound of shoes being kicked off, of a purse being dropped onto the counter.

A few seconds later, the door to their mother’s room shut.

That was it.

No checking on them. No asking if they had eaten.

Tess let out a small laugh, but it was empty. "You’d think she’d at least pretend to care."

Vera didn’t answer.

Because the truth was, she wasn’t sure their mother had anything left to give.

After Rey died, something in Judith had broken.

She had spent the first year drowning in grief, the second in exhaustion. By the third, she was just a shadow, working shifts that never seemed to end, coming home only to sleep, leaving before they even woke up.

It was easier to pretend she wasn’t gone.

Because at least then, they didn’t have to deal with the fact that she was here—but she wasn’t here.

Daria walked in, silent as always.

She took one look at Chi in Vera’s lap and sighed. "Mom’s home?"

Vera nodded.

Daria didn’t say anything else. She just walked past them, grabbing a blanket off the bed and draping it over Chi’s small frame.

Tess sat up, her voice quieter now. "She didn't even look at us, did she?"

Daria didn't answer.

Because they already knew the answer.

Instead, she just sat on the edge of her bed, rubbing at her tired eyes. "Go to sleep, Vera. I’ll take care of Chi."

Vera hesitated. She wanted to argue, to insist that she had it. But Daria gave her a look—the kind that said, let me do this—so she nodded, carefully shifting Chi into her big sister’s arms.

Daria held their baby sister like she had held Tess all those years ago. Like she had held Vera.

Like a mother should have.

Vera crawled into bed, but she didn’t sleep.

None of them did.

They just lay there, in the silence of a house that wasn’t really a home anymore, carrying the weight of things they never asked for.