But another feeling whispered beneath the happiness: When the real children come, will they still want you?
She tried to bury the thought, but it stayed.
Then the babies came.
Two girls. Bianca and Linda.
The house changed again, but this time with brightness—baby powder, crying, laughter after crying, visitors bringing gifts and advice. Chica watched Helen carry the twins. She watched Thomas look at them with pride.
And still, Thomas did not forget her.
Even in those exhausting newborn days, he still asked about her school. He still made sure she ate. He still spoke to her warmly. One evening, Chica stood at the doorway and watched him rocking one of the babies gently.
He looked up, saw her standing there, and stretched out his free hand.
“Come,” he said softly. “You too.”
Chica walked closer, afraid the moment might break.
Thomas placed his hand on her head, the way he always did, like a blessing.
“You are my first,” he told her, as if answering a fear he had seen in her eyes. “Nothing will change that.”
Chica only nodded, but her heart held the words tightly.
For a time, the house felt complete.
Not perfect. No life is. But complete.
People would visit and see Bianca and Linda in their matching things, then see Chica moving through the home with quiet confidence, and assume she had always belonged there. She never corrected them. She didn’t need to.
For that season of her life, she was happy.
She was loved.
She was a daughter.
In the beginning, it truly seemed like nothing would change.
The babies grew. The house stayed busy and warm. Helen tried, in her own way, to include Chica. She was not as soft as Thomas, but she was not cruel either. She could be strict, but there was still space for Chica in the home.
Then one day, everything broke.
Thomas died in a car accident.
It was sudden. Brutal. No warning. No goodbye. Just one ordinary day split open by terrible news.
At first it reached the house as confusion—phone calls, broken sentences, panic, neighbors rushing in. Then the truth landed fully. Thomas was gone.
By the time they got to him, there was nothing left to bargain with.
The house that had once felt alive became frighteningly still.
Helen stopped moving like herself. Sometimes she cried until her body shook. Sometimes she sat in silence for hours. Sometimes she snapped at little things and then cried again, as if grief had broken the inside of her and she no longer knew how to carry it.
Visitors came with food, prayers, and condolences. They filled the sitting room for days. They called Thomas a good man. They told Helen to be strong for her children.
Chica listened with a numb face.
Inside her, something had collapsed. Thomas had not only been a father. He had been the person who made the world feel safe.
When he was alive, Chica believed the worst part of her life was behind her.
Now she was no longer sure.
After the burial, the visitors slowly disappeared, and the house changed.
At first, Bianca and Linda were simply grieving children. They cried for their father, clung to their mother, demanded more attention than before. Helen was too broken to correct everything.
Then another thing entered the house: knowledge.
Chica didn’t know exactly how Bianca and Linda found out she was not their blood sister. She only felt the change before it was ever said clearly. It began with looks, whispers that stopped when she entered, coldness where there had once been childish closeness.
Then one afternoon in the kitchen, she heard Bianca say it.
“She’s not our real sister.”
Linda answered, “Mommy said she is not.”
Chica froze in the doorway. Her heart started pounding in her throat.
Bianca saw her and did not look away. Instead, she lifted her chin, as if she had been waiting for Chica to hear it.
From that day on, the balance in the house started to crumble.
Bianca and Linda stopped treating her like family. At first it looked like childish attitude. Then it became something harder.
If Chica reminded them of something their mother said, they snapped, “You are not our mother.”
If she tried to correct them gently, Bianca would say, “You are not our sister.”
Linda would add, “You are just the one they picked from outside.”
They started excluding her on purpose. They used visitors as cover, becoming sweet and charming when people were around, then dropping their masks the moment the guests left.
Chica tried to survive by becoming smaller. She cleaned without being asked. She spoke softly. She avoided arguments. She made herself useful, hoping invisibility would protect her.
It didn’t.
The house that had once been her refuge became a place of tension and fear.
One night, Bianca and Linda came home late and found the gate locked. Chica had fallen asleep after a long day of work. They began banging and shouting her name into the compound.
“Chica! Open this gate now!”
Their voices tore through the night. Neighbors peeped through windows. Dogs barked. Helen came storming out, anger already decided before a single question had been asked.
When Chica finally opened the gate, Helen didn’t ask what happened.
“Did I not tell you to wait by the gate?” she snapped. “You went to sleep while my children were outside?”
Chica tried to explain. “Ma, I slept off. I didn’t mean to—”
But the apology changed nothing.
Bianca pushed past her so hard she nearly stumbled. Linda hissed, “Next time you will sleep outside too.”
Later that same night, after Chica had been insulted, ordered to bring food, wash plates, and clean the kitchen again, she stood alone at the sink and quietly hummed to herself, trying not to fall apart.
Hold on. It will be all right.
That small song became the only comfort she had.
The next morning, things got worse.
Helen gave her money for the market. Chica placed it carefully near the bucket while washing clothes and stepped away briefly to fetch more water.
When she returned, the money was gone.
