Chapter 1

1

My mom was the ultimate bleeding heart.

She felt bad for old man Peabody down the road, the one who never married, so she decided I should be his wife.

She took pity on a homeless woman, who was clearly mentally not there, and forced my brother to marry her.

In the end, my brother and I were both miserable, and eventually died because of her schemes.

My mom, though? She got an award for being the most wonderful woman in town.

Then, I woke up, and I was eighteen again.

I decided to treat my mom the way she always treated me. She lost it.

......

I blinked, and suddenly I was eighteen again.

It was the day my brother, Mikey, lost his legs!

I was stuck at home with a sprained ankle.

Mikey was going to get hurt in less than half an hour. No way I could make it there in time.

I hobbled out of bed and grabbed the phone, dialing my Uncle Joe. I begged him to go rescue my brother.

If Uncle Joe didn't go, Mikey might miss his only chance to be saved.

After I hung up, I paced the room, my stomach in knots. I wanted to be there, right now.

Just then, I heard a motorcycle pull up outside.

It was Mr. Henderson, our neighbor!

I limped and stumbled over to his house, wincing with every step, and pleaded with him to take me to Miller's farm, south of town. "Mr. Henderson, please, you gotta take me! I know something bad is going to happen to Mikey!"

I was thinking about Mikey's last days in bed. A tear rolled down my cheek.

"Whoa, easy there, honey," Mr. Henderson said, looking alarmed. He helped me sit down. "I'll take you, I'll take you right now!"

He fished his keys out of his pocket, helped me onto the back of his bike, and we sped off toward the south side.

When we got there, it was chaos.

Luckily, Mikey was out of the wreckage!

But he was lying on the ground, white as a sheet, eyes closed.

I rushed to him, dropped to my knees, and touched his face with a trembling hand.

His breathing was shallow, but I could feel a faint pulse.

His legs were swollen from being trapped, but not as bad as I remembered.

Tears welled up in my eyes.

Thank God, Mikey's legs could be saved! My brother wasn't going to be disabled!

Last time, my saintly mom saw the building was about to collapse.

She dropped her hammer and told my brother to rescue a little kid who was playing inside.

The kid made it out, but the building collapsed. Both Mikey and the boy were trapped inside.

The boy's parents were losing their minds, screaming and begging people to save their son.

The rescue effort was split in two, but everyone could have been saved.

But my mom decided it was more important to save the kid first.

"My son is older, stronger," she declared. "He does physical labor. He can hold on longer. Everyone, focus on the little boy!"

The boy was eventually pulled out of the rubble with just a few scratches, shielded by a table.

Mikey, his legs pinned, waited and waited. Finally, they had to amputate.

He became a cripple. Confined to a bed.