Part 2
There are moments in life when rage comes like fire.
Mine came like ice.
Chloe’s words stayed in my ear long after she hung up.doom
“At least now they’ll actually look at me.”
I stood in my childhood kitchen with my phone still pressed to my face, my butchered hair hanging in uneven clumps around my jaw, and something inside me became very, very quiet.
My mother was still talking.doom
Something about hats.
Something about photographers.
Something about how I should “stop being difficult” because the wedding was already stressful enough and Chloe had “waited her whole life for this day.”
My father finally looked up from his coffee.
His eyes traveled over my ruined hair, and his mouth twisted with disgust, not at what they had done, but at how badly I was reacting to it.
“Put on a hat, Harper,” he said. “Your sister is marrying a billionaire. Don’t embarrass this family more than you already have.”
That was when I understood.
They were not sorry.
They were not afraid.
They were not even ashamed.
They honestly believed my body was a family asset they had the right to alter if my appearance interfered with Chloe’s spotlight.
I looked at my mother.
“You came into my room while I was unconscious.”
She exhaled sharply. “You took a sleeping pill. Don’t make it sound sinister.”
“You cut off twenty inches of my hair.”
“For heaven’s sake, hair grows back.”
I looked at my father.
