“Don’t,” she snapped. “You agreed she’s been spoiled.”
He said nothing. Didn’t move.
I slowly set the bags down, my pulse hammering in my ears. “So you both decided the right punishment was destroying her property? Because she didn’t sweep fast enough?”
Rachel’s smirk held. “It’s just a machine. She’ll get over it.”
Lily’s sobs tore something open inside me. I walked over, knelt beside her, and placed my hand on her back. Her body shook beneath my touch. The blue water shimmered, mocking in its calm. At the bottom, the machine sat like a grave marker for her hard work.
I looked up at Rachel. “You think this will teach her something?”
“Yes,” she said, arms crossed. “Respect.”
“Perfect,” I replied, standing tall. “Then you’ll understand when I teach you both how it feels to lose something that matters.”
Her smile faltered.
That night, I lay awake, staring at the ceiling fan as it sliced through the dark—slow, steady, and unrelenting. The scene replayed in my mind: Rachel’s sneer, Mark’s silence, Lily’s heartbreak. Each image stoked the fire burning in my chest.