My Family Didn’t Invite Me for a Siblings Trip, Until the Airline CEO Greeted Me First
My phone buzzed three times in a row, the kind of rapid vibration that meant trouble, not memes. The screen lit up beside my keyboard, but I ignored it at first. I was finishing an email to a major airline executive, double-checking numbers, tightening phrases, trying to sound like the kind of person who belonged in conversations about multi-million-dollar partnerships.
Outside my glass office door, the open-plan floor of my company hummed with low conversation and the clack of keyboards. Two junior engineers were arguing quietly about server load. Someone laughed near the espresso machine. The late afternoon light slid between the downtown high-rises, striping the carpet with gold.
“Almost done,” I muttered, rereading the last sentence of my email. My fingers hovered over the trackpad.
My phone buzzed again, insistent this time.
I glanced down. The banner at the top of the screen read, Hey, siblings only.
I didn’t open that group chat often. It had been my brother Tyler’s idea, a way to “stay close as a family” after we scattered to different cities. In reality, he mostly used it to post gym selfies and half-funny memes that always seemed to land on me. Brooke chimed in with gossip and polished photos from her influencer-lite life. Mom sprinkled in guilt-laced check-ins. I contributed the occasional thumbs-up.
The chat icon showed nine unread messages and counting.
I sighed, clicked send on my email, and picked up my phone. If I didn’t check it, they’d call. And if they called, they’d expect me to sound grateful for whatever they’d decided without me this time.
The messages loaded in a blur.
Tyler: Flights booked. Vegas trip. Let’s go.
Brooke: Finally, siblings-only vacation!!!
Brooke again, right below it: I’m so happy for you three. You deserve it. ✨
I frowned.
You three.
I scrolled.
Tyler: Just to be clear, this is for the actual siblings only. No plus ones, no extras.
My thumb paused over the glass. My heartbeat spiked in a way my Fitbit would later interpret as cardio.
Another message came in before I could fully process that one.
Brooke: Yeah, Lauren, you know what we mean. It’s a bio-kids trip. Hope you’re not offended 🥰
For a second, the office around me went fuzzy. The soft whoosh of the AC, the murmur of voices outside my door, the constant low fan of my desktop—everything blurred into static.
I stared at the word extras.
That’s what I was to them. The girl Dad met when I was three, signed a couple of adoption forms for, and then treated like some long-term houseguest he was mildly annoyed he couldn’t evict. The one they added to the Christmas card because my mom insisted, then cropped out in the framed version on the mantel.
Bio-kids trip.
My throat tightened, the way it always did when they reminded me who they thought I was in this family.
There had been other reminders over the years.
I flashed back to a night when I was twelve, sitting on the bottom step of the stairs with my suitcase beside me. Tyler and Brooke were bouncing around the foyer, dragging their matching rolling bags toward the front door. They were going to Disney World with Dad and Mom—“just the originals,” as Tyler had put it, grinning. I’d asked where I was supposed to go.
“You’re staying with Aunt Janet,” Mom had said briskly, as if it were obvious. “We don’t have room for five in the resort package, honey.”
“But I’m not five,” I’d said quietly.
They’d laughed, not cruelly, just thoughtlessly. Tyler had wrapped an arm around Brooke and shouted, “Bio kids, let’s roll!” as they tumbled out the door.
That was the first time I saw Aunt Janet’s pity.
Now, decades later, sitting in my own office with my own name etched into the glass door—Lauren Hayes, Founder & CEO—my family still saw me exactly the same way.
Extra.
I swallowed hard and forced the memories back into their box. My eyes flicked to the bottom corner of my screen.
5:12 p.m.
In eighteen minutes, I had a video call with the CEO of Skyline Air, one of the biggest airlines in the country. We were finalizing a partnership between my travel-tech company and their entire network. Six years of sleepless nights had led to this.
My family still thought I “did something with apps.”
Of course they did.
My laptop pinged with a calendar alert. Meeting with G. Mitchell in 15 minutes. I set my phone face down on the desk and rolled my shoulders back, trying to shake off the sting under my ribs.
Business first. Hurt feelings later.
I pulled up my slide deck, skimmed through the numbers I’d practically memorized. On-time rebooking rate improved by 62%. Customer satisfaction scores up eight points. Average call-center handle time cut in half. All because of the software my tiny, scrappy team had built in a cramped co-working space with secondhand desks and used monitors.
The story doesn’t end here — it continues on the next page to discover the rest 🔎👇
