Page 67 of Little Miss Fortune

You were always so lucky.

‘How could you possibly be failing so badly?’

‘I am not like you, Fuko,’ she snaps at me. ‘I don’t have the skills and the motivation to just keep going. Dad keeps saying it, that I should be more like you.’

‘He’s never said it.’

‘He always has. Even now when he was having a go at you, who do you think he was comparing you to? Me. You were always the perfect child, the one that does all her homework and cleans the house.’

‘Why did you not say something sooner? We could have found you a tutor. Why did you wait weeks before your results day to tell me this?’

‘Because I couldn’t tell anyone. Not Dad, not my perfect sister. I thought maybe now, you would...’ She doesn’t finish her sentence.

‘This is so irresponsible, Hanako. How could you just throw away your future like this? I just don’t understand.’

‘No, of course you wouldn’t.’ She stands up and leaves, slamming the door behind her.

Anger and disbelief are churning in my head. I have failed her. She is not going to get into uni because I was too preoccupied with finding a job to notice her struggling. Dad is going to lose his mind when he finds out on the results day, which is two weeks away.

If only Mum were here.

CHAPTER 24

Screws fall out all the time and land on Fuko

Sunday mornings are usually my house-cleaning days, but this new-found freedom (desperate unemployment) allows me to clean the bathrooms on a Thursday morning when Dad’s away.

Yesterday’s dinner was icy. Not a single word was uttered. Hannah went out; Dad put the telly on, and I reopened my old job-tracking spreadsheet. August is not a good month for vacancies. Or maybe it is, but I’m just not a good person for a job.

There are many things on my mind, but Toby’s face forces me to defrost the freezer to give it a proper clean. I scrub the toilets viciously, remembering him grabbing my hand and asking me to be honest with him about my feelings. I unpin, wash, dry, and iron the curtains, thinking about the way his eyes rounded when I told him he makes me do bad things. The house is completely spotless by the time Father is back.

‘Trying to win some points?’ he asks humourlessly, seeing the organised kitchen drawers.

‘Had a lot on my mind.’

Dad gets the fish out the fridge and starts chopping it for today’s dinner.

‘Did Hanako help at all?’ he asks.

‘Um...’ I try to find words, suddenly aware that he changed the topic. ‘I haven’t seen her today.’

He tuts and shakes his head. ‘I swear, that girl...’

‘What?’ I ask, tensing my eyebrows.

‘All she does is play video games, go out, and do god knows what at the modelling shoots.’

‘So?’ I’m defensive on her behalf. ‘She’s 18, just finished her exams. She’s allowed to have fun before uni.’

My stomach stings. She might not get into uni, but that’s not important now. I hear it, I hear what Hanako meant. I know what Dad is going to say.

‘When you were her age—’

‘Dad, stop. Hannah and I are different. I thought doing everything right would get me far, and what do I have? Fired from my job, friends who are angry with me, and...’

And Toby. Toby will never speak to me again.

‘Why are they angry?’