Chapter 31
I sighed and said to Belinda, “Mom, I already told you last time. That 1,500 dollars was all my savings. I don’t have any money now. Besides, the company isn’t doing very well. I need a lot of money to keep my research going…” “If it weren’t for you, we wouldn’t have to go through such hardships! Terry had a promising future, but he lost it all because of you! If it weren’t for you, he wouldn’t be so poor that he couldn’t even provide for his parents and children! You’re such an ungrateful brat…” Belinda’s voice was sharp and angry, laced with sobs.
I hurriedly moved my phone away, not wanting to hear her insults anymore. After all, I’d already heard those words thousands of times. As long as my parents couldn’t get money from me, they would bring up these old stories to morally blackmail me.
I was born in a very poor mountain area, where both my parents were illiterate. Their only source of income was their small farmland. And they favored boys over girls. They had given birth to at least ten daughters, but they kept only the eldest and sold all the others. Terry Larson and I were fraternal twins, me being the youngest, with over ten years separating me from my oldest sister. Because the Larson family was poor, my oldest sister also had a bad marriage and didn’t have much money to support the family. When I was six years old, my parents planned to send me away in exchange for money. It was Terry who held me tightly in his arms and refused to let anyone take
me away.
Terry’s academic performance was quite average. But I was intelligent and excellent in my studies. In junior high school, Terry dropped out of school and left home to work in the city in order to support me in studying. My parents strongly opposed my continuing my studies, but Terry steadfastly defended me and worked to earn money to support my education. The most frequently spoken sentence by Terry was-“Katrina, you must study hard, strive to succeed, and walk out of the mountains. No matter how difficult it is, I will support you until you finish college.”
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