They Forgot Me at a Rest Stop, I Forgot Them Forever – After failing to win over my family ninety-nine times, the system finally admitted it had chosen the wrong person. As compensation, it gave me a life-changing settlement. With that kind of support, I no longer had to beg for scraps of affection just to survive. So that very night, I packed my things and prepared to leave. Just then, my parents, my brother, and the girl they had raised in my place came home. My brother, Ethan Bennett, glanced at the suitcase by my side and frowned. “Really, Claire? We forgot you at a rest stop over New Year’s, and now you’re making a scene and running away?” I ignored him. I simply held out the papers to my parents. “Sign them.” “You’re cutting ties with us over something this small?” Ethan’s voice rose sharply. My mother looked stunned too, but she still forced a patient smile as she reached for my hand. “Claire, we didn’t leave you behind on purpose. We’ve always traveled as a family of four. We just… didn’t react fast enough. It won’t happen again.” I lowered my eyes and let out a quiet, humorless laugh. I remembered the year I had first been brought back to the Bennett estate. One morning, I woke up and found the house empty. Even the two dogs were gone.
The butler told me they had flown out for a holiday. That time, my mother had given me the exact same explanation. Apparently, she had forgotten that by now I had already been back for almost three years. And still, their first instinct never included me. I had no interest in arguing. I held the papers out to her again. “Sign them.” She froze for a second, then finally lost her patience and pulled her hand away. “Good God, Claire, why must you be so difficult?” Before I could answer, the papers were taken out of my hand. My father uncapped his fountain pen with a hard snap and signed his name in a fury. “You’re ruining the whole family’s peace over nothing.” He threw the pages down in front of me. “Take them and go.” The papers fluttered to the floor at my feet. I stared at them, my nose stinging. The truth was, when they found me and brought me home at fifteen, I really had hoped for a real home. That hope died the day my parents told me Audrey’s biological parents were gone, that she had no one else, and that it would be too cruel to send her away. What they all conveniently forgot was this: Audrey’s mother was the nanny who switched us as babies and changed the course of my life.
My childhood had been hard. By six, I had already learned what it meant to be unwanted, passed from one cold place to another, always trying to survive on other people’s patience. And after all that, they still expected me to live under the same roof as the daughter of the woman who had stolen my place. That was the moment I knew we would never be a real family. But I needed support for college, so I stayed. At first, I kept my distance and planned to endure it quietly until I could leave for school. Then, not long after, I was bound to a system that ordered me to win over my family and earn a hundred affection points within three years. I had no choice but to humble myself and please them. Every single time, I failed. And every time I failed, everything was reset and I was forced to start over. After the ninety-ninth failure, the system finally told me the truth. It had chosen the wrong person. I nearly lost my mind. “Do you have any idea how exhausting senior year was? I went through it ninety-nine times. Ninety-nine. And every time I failed your stupid mission, you reset everything, so I never even got to go to college!” I was shaking with rage. “How exactly are you planning to pay me back for the life you wasted?” The system sounded painfully meek. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.
What if I compensate you with enough support to live freely from now on? Would that make it right?” Well. That changed things. I had stayed with the Bennetts because I needed help in the first place. Now that I had enough to stand on my own, there was no reason to remain. I bent down and picked up the severance papers. It was only a single thin sheet, as flimsy as the DNA we shared. There was nothing here worth holding on to. Without another glance back, I walked out. For the first time in a very long time, I was free. I stayed at a hotel for the night. The next day, when school started back up, I went straight to my guidance counselor and applied for on-campus housing. It was the home stretch of twelfth grade, and with finals and college applications looming, living on campus would be safer and more convenient. By the time I finished the paperwork and stepped back out, Ethan was waiting by the exit, looking like a thundercloud. I walked right past him. He caught up in a few long strides and blocked my path. “Are you serious?” I knew he meant the housing transfer, and I couldn’t help frowning a little in confusion. Ever since I had been brought back to the Bennetts, Ethan had treated me like an intruder, convinced I was some ticking time bomb set to destroy Audrey’s perfect life.
If I left, he should have been the first one celebrating. So why did he look so angry? I let out a tired breath. “What do you think? You all signed the papers.” He stared at me so hard it looked like he might crack a molar. “Fine. Just don’t come crying when you regret this.” I watched him storm off and almost laughed. I honestly had no idea what I was supposed to regret. The dorm room was cramped and packed with eight girls, but it was safe, it was on campus, and it saved me the daily commute. Even after going through senior year ninety-nine times, I still didn’t dare relax. I studied every day, grinding through practice tests until the numbers blurred. On the first mock exam, I ranked first in the entire grade. When Ethan came to find me, I was explaining the final math problem to the girl sitting next to me. The moment he realized I had no intention of acknowledging him, he did what he always did and dragged me out by force. The second we reached the hallway, he started in on me. “Do you have any idea how upset Audrey was after seeing your score? You came in first.” He glared at me like I had committed some kind of crime. “Next time, you’d better stay out of the spotlight.
Do you hear me?” My fingers curled slightly at my side. This wasn’t new. Ethan had told me before that I was never allowed to outperform Audrey. The reason was simple enough. If I, the girl who had grown up with nothing, turned out to be better than Audrey, the daughter who had been raised in wealth and privilege, people would compare us. They would whisper that the girl raised as a Bennett couldn’t even keep up with the real one. She would be embarrassed. She would cry. And Ethan couldn’t stand that. He had always doted on Audrey to a ridiculous degree. He had even held himself back a year in school just so they could be in the same class and he could keep an eye on her. Back then, for the sake of the system’s affection points, I had no choice but to say yes. But that was over now. I didn’t owe him obedience anymore. I let out a cold laugh and looked him straight in the eye. “If Audrey feels bad because she didn’t score well, what does that have to do with me?” “If she wants people to see her as capable, she should earn it instead of asking me to play dumb.” He clearly hadn’t expected me to push back in public. His eyes widened with outrage. “Claire, what the hell is that supposed to mean? Audrey’s been judged and whispered about ever since you came back.
People have spent years talking behind her back, saying she took your place. She’s suffered enough already, and now you’re standing here mocking her?” His voice sharpened. “If you’d never come back, she wouldn’t have had to go through any of that.” The words hung in the air, toxic and raw. He stiffened for half a second. I laughed. The sound was low, but it carried cleanly through the hallway, edged with pure mockery. “That’s exactly why I cut ties with you.” I looked at him with deliberate coolness. “We’re nothing to each other now, Ethan. You don’t get to order me around.” His face turned dark with fury. Through clenched teeth, he spat, “If you don’t do what I said, don’t ever expect to come back to the Bennett estate.” I waved him off without a second thought. “As if I’d want to.” That pathetic threat didn’t stop me from taking first place again on the second mock exam. This time, Ethan didn’t come looking for me. Instead, he sent out invitations to Audrey’s birthday party to the entire senior class. Everyone got one except me. Audrey and I shared the same birthday. But every single year, when the Bennetts hosted a party, I was somehow forgotten.
After my ninety-second failed attempt, even the system had started to crack. It finally threw in the towel. “Forget the affection points. If you can just get them to throw you one birthday party, I’ll count that as a success.” So I became a broken record. I dropped hints, I left calendars open, I practically begged. And every time, they still forgot. The invitation cards only ever had Audrey’s name on them. When it came time to cut the cake, only Audrey was called to the front. The system had gone from impatient to genuinely unnerved. “How are you failing at something this basic? Are these people even your family?” By then, I had already failed ninety-nine times. They had managed to overlook me for years across every restart. I had been too tired to do anything but laugh bitterly. Ethan probably thought I still cared. He probably thought I was crying into my pillow over a missed invitation. He was probably counting on the spectacle to get under my skin. But I didn’t need any of it anymore. A birthday could be spent alone just fine. So I went out, treated myself to a proper meal, bought myself a new pair of shoes, and only then headed back to school. When I got to the dorm building, I saw them waiting there.
My parents. Ethan. Audrey. Ethan’s eyes dropped to my shoes, and his brows pulled together at once. “Those look new. Didn’t we pause your allowance? Where did you get the m0ney?” I hadn’t touched the card the Bennetts gave me since I left, so that was the moment I learned they had frozen it. Fine by me. They only gave me a small monthly allowance anyway. My parents always said I needed to learn how to manage m0ney because I had grown up differently from Audrey. But I knew the truth. They were afraid that if I got more than Audrey, she would feel neglected. That was why I couldn’t understand why they were here now. If Audrey’s feelings were the only ones that had ever mattered to them, then why had they bothered showing up at all? The evening wind cut across the courtyard, and when I spoke, my voice sounded just as cold. “Mr. Bennett. Mrs. Bennett. We severed ties already.” I looked at them without expression. “Where my m0ney came from is none of your business.” I turned to leave. Then Audrey suddenly spoke up behind me, her voice bright with fake innocence. “Claire, those shoes are beautiful.” She tilted her head and smiled softly. “Did someone buy them for you?”