Chapter 5: The Testimony
The courtroom was packed. When I took the stand, I didn't look at my parents. I looked at the jury. I told them about the years of belittlement, the "tradition" of being treated like a second-class citizen in my own family home, and the night my daughter was discarded like refuse.
I brought out the proof: the hidden audio recordings I had managed to pull from my old phone—the ones where my mother discussed "getting rid of the problem" before the party.
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The courtroom went deathly silent as the audio played over the speakers. My mother’s voice, cold and clinical, echoed through the room. "She’s just a distraction. We have a reputation to maintain. If she’s not gone by seven, we’ll make sure she stays gone."
My father, the man who had always sat behind a newspaper, finally broke. He looked at me, then at his wife, and started to sob. He wasn't crying for me; he was crying for his assets. He started shouting, trying to pin the entire operation on my mother, desperate to save his own skin. It was the final, ugly nail in the coffin of their legacy.
