Everyone received a Christmas gift except me.
It was Christmas Eve at my parents’ house in Toledo, Ohio—the same living room where I had spent most of my childhood holidays quietly hoping for the kind of attention that never seemed to come naturally in our family. The tree glittered with gold ribbons and shiny ornaments, the fireplace crackled warmly, and my mother already had her phone positioned perfectly to capture photos for social media.
My name is Allison Fletcher. I’m twenty-nine and work in corporate compliance for a regional banking company operating across several Midwestern states. The job is stable, demanding, and pays well—the type of career my parents once claimed they wanted me to have. But in our household, achievement never mattered as much as being the favorite child.
That title belonged to my younger brother Tyler and my older sister Melissa.
