The Comments Called Me Ruined and I Called Bluff Chapter 05
The living room fell so silent that I could hear our heartbeats.
Both Cyrus and Sadie were staring directly at me.
One sat on the couch, while the other crouched on the rug.
Their eyes held the exact same expression—sheer disbelief, mixed with a desperate fear that this wasn’t real.
Looking at them, my nose suddenly stung with tears.
Three years. My brother had learned to become cold, and my sister had learned to act.
The imposter had forced them to become this way.
“It’s me,” I finally spoke, my voice sounding much calmer than I expected. “I’m back.”
Sadie’s tears spilled over instantly.
She tossed the nail polish brush aside and threw herself forward, wrapping her arms around my waist with so much force it felt like she might snap me in half. “Nicole! I knew it! I knew you’d come back!”
She choked on her sobs, her voice cracking under the weight of her tears. “That one was horrible, she bullied me every single day, she wouldn’t even let me enter your room, she said I didn’t belong here…”
“I know.” I patted her head gently, “It’s okay now.”
“She completely replaced your whole wardrobe too! And she threw away all the succulents you used to grow! She said they were an eyesore!”
“She threw the succulents away?”
“All of them! I managed to secretly rescue three pots! I’ve been keeping them on my bedroom windowsill!”
I looked down at her tear-streaked face, my heart aching yet feeling incredibly warm.
Even in an environment like that, Sadie had still remembered to save a few of my plants.
Cyrus didn’t move. He just sat there on the couch, watching us.
His throat tightened, yet he stayed silent.
Sadie cried for a long time before she finally looked up, her face covered in tears and her makeup completely ruined like a messy little cat. “Nicole, is it really you? Not that imposter pretending to be you?”
“Why would I pretend to be myself?”
“What if she got smarter!”
“If she were smart, she wouldn’t have thrown away my plants.”
Sadie let out a watery laugh, then burst into even louder tears.
I sighed, pulling a tissue from the box on the coffee table and handing it to her. “Alright, that’s enough crying. If I took a photo of your face right now, it would make a perfect meme.”
“Don’t you dare!” She snatched the tissue to wipe her face, “You’re so mean, Nicole!”
Despite complaining, she snuggled even closer into my arms.
Cyrus finally stood up.
He walked over and stopped right in front of me. He stared at me for a few seconds.
Then he reached out and gently ruffled my hair.
He only said two words, “Welcome back.”
His voice sounded a little raspy.
The second the words left his mouth, he turned around and headed upstairs, his pace much faster than usual.
Sadie rested her chin on my lap and looked up, “Is Cyrus going upstairs to cry?”
“He doesn’t cry.”
“Yes, he does!” Sadie insisted confidently, “He thinks I don’t know, but during the first year the imposter was here, I got up in the middle of the night to use the bathroom and heard him in the study…”
She paused, her voice suddenly dropping to a whisper. “He was on the phone. I don’t know who he was talking to, but he said one thing.”
“What did he say?”
“He said, ‘My sister is gone.'”
I froze.
“The way his voice sounded… I’ve never heard him like that before.” Sadie lowered her head, burying her face against my lap, “So I knew that no matter what, Cyrus was waiting for you to come back, just like I was.”
I stroked her hair, remaining silent for a long moment.
Birds chirped outside the window.
The sunlight streamed through the glass, spilling over the rug in a warm, gentle glow.
Three years.
I was finally home.