My name is Linda Wells, and the night my sister introduced me as “the disappointment,” something inside me cracked loud enough for only my heart to hear. She said it casually, like describing furniture that had never mattered. Everyone laughed, even my mother.
No one noticed me stiffen.
No one cared that I did. That was the moment I realized I could vanish from that room, from that family, from that entire version of my life, and not a single person would pause their conversation.
People assume I joined the Coast Guard because I wanted adventure. They picture recruitment posters and clean uniforms and smiling faces on sunny docks.
I joined because I needed somewhere that measured me by what I could do, not by what my mother told people I was.
I joined because in my family, Elena’s dreams were framed and hung on walls, and mine were quietly folded and put away. In our house, there were two categories of daughter. The one who made people lean in, and the one who made people glance away.
Elena was the first category—light in a room, learned early how to laugh at the right time, how to make adults feel interesting, how to turn her face toward cameras like she’d been born with a spotlight attached.
I was the second category. The one my mother described in careful phrases: “Linda’s stable,” “Linda’s fine,” “Linda’s doing her own thing.” Words meant to signal I wasn’t a problem, while quietly confirming I wasn’t a prize either.
I didn’t start out angry. That’s the part people never understand.
I started out hopeful.
When we were little, Elena and I shared a bathroom with a cracked mirror. She’d hum while brushing her hair, the sound light and unbothered. I’d watch her in the mirror, the way she smiled at herself without needing permission.
Even then, I knew she belonged to our mother more than I did.
Our mother liked order. Polished countertops.
Coordinated outfits. Dinner parties that looked like magazine spreads.
She liked compliments because compliments were proof.
And Elena was proof. The first time my mother introduced me as “Elena’s older sister” instead of her daughter, I was thirteen. We were at a fundraiser, the kind where people wore too much perfume and pretended they didn’t care who was watching.
My mother’s hand settled on Elena’s shoulder.
The story doesn’t end here –
it continues on the next page.
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