Love Left Unexpressed

The first gunshot was a flat, ugly pop.

It wasn't like the movies. It just sounded wrong.

I looked up from my SAT prep book, but my sister Sarah didn't even flinch.

My heart hammered against my ribs.

I knew this sound.

I knew this exact moment.

In my last life, this was when I grabbed Sarah, screaming for her to run.

The second shot came, closer.

I dragged her under the table, promising to protect her.

The shooter found us anyway.

I felt the searing pain in my shoulder.

But my focus was on Sarah, bleeding from a bullet to her abdomen.

I called my mother, Dr. Olivia Vance, the world-renowned neurosurgeon.

"Liam? What is it? I' m busy," her voice was clipped.

"Mom, it' s Sarah! She' s been shot! At the school library, there' s a shooter!" I yelled.

"Don' t be ridiculous, Liam. Stop trying to get attention with these sick jokes. I' m on my way to the beach with Ethan."

"It' s not a joke! Mom, please! She' s bleeding, she needs a doctor, she needs you!"

But the line went dead. She had hung up on me.

Sarah died in my arms, waiting for an ambulance that came too late.

My family never forgave me.

They looked through me, not at me.

Olivia painted me as the monster.

"He was jealous of her," she' d said. "He probably distracted her, kept her from hiding properly."

They believed her.

They always believed her.

They ostracized me, the son who failed to save the perfect daughter.

A few weeks later, my mother found me in the kitchen.

Her eyes were hollow, dead.