Chapter 10 - Why Victoria Needed to Control Everything
I expected Marianne to hate Victoria.
She didn’t.
“She was terrified of becoming our mother.”
I had barely known anything about their childhood.
Their mother had been unreliable, financially reckless, and sometimes disappeared for days.
Victoria was six years older.
She practically raised Marianne.
By adulthood, my mother had built her entire life around preventing chaos.
Schedules.
Money.
Perfect dinners.
Perfect children.
Perfect appearances.
Suddenly, memories clicked into place.
Mom panicking whenever I missed school.
Taking over every financial problem.
Treating mistakes like emergencies.
Judging mothers she considered irresponsible.
When Marianne struggled after giving birth, Mom did not simply see a scared twenty-one-year-old sister.
She saw their childhood happening again.
And she decided she would stop it.
Even if that meant taking control of my life before I could ever choose anything myself.
“She loved you,” Marianne said.
“I know.”
“That’s what makes it complicated.”
Mom had saved me from genuine instability.
Then she turned that rescue into permission to erase another woman.
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For the first time, I understood her motive.
Understanding it made the betrayal sadder, not smaller.
