Free What Brings Me to You by Loralee Abercrombie

obviously were the man and lady of the house and didn't really look like her at all. The whole family looked familiar - like those fake photos in frames you buy, but also slightly off. There was something not quite right about the man's smile, the hand holding seemed forced. Something in the eyes of the boys that put me on edge.  Like they were posing for an advertisement for anti-depressants.
                  "So, are these your cousins or something?"
                  "God, don't be dense, Teddy.” I wasn't trying to be intentionally obtuse but my brain couldn't reconcile her standing here among all this opulence and these pictures from which she'd been so clearly omitted.
                  "I'm sorry, I just don't understand..."
                  "Okay look, that's my mother, her husband, Paul, and my brothers Adam and Caleb."
                  "So where are you?"
                  "Right here in front of you."
                  "No, smart ass I mean in the photos."  Please say you were sick that day.
                  "I don't take family photos."
                  "Why? Are you a vampire or something?"
                  She gave an exasperated sigh, "No, God. Okay, my mother is my mother but Paul is not my father. Adam and Caleb are my half siblings."
                  "Oh.. so… they were married before?  But you're the youngest, you said."
                  Another sigh like she was dealing with a five-year old. "Look, my mother stepped out on Paul when Caleb was four. She got knocked up. Begged Paul to take her back and he agreed. Never told him the guy she slept with was black. He never asked. I guess he assumed she'd sleep with someone who looked just like him, so naturally, the baby would look just like him and they could forget the whole thing. They could assimilate me into their little nuclear family, and Paul could forget that my mother lied. When I was born this color," she held up her forearm, "everything changed.”
                  "Why didn't he leave her then?"
                  "Denial. Guilt. Love. To punish her. I don't know."
                  "So why aren't you in any of the pictures?"
                  "Isn't it obvious? I don't exist. Not to Paul, anyway." Oh my God! I was horrified and she saw it. "Don't! Don't feel sorry for me, that isn’t why I told you." Her eyes, those brown portals to her real feelings told me different, but I couldn’t call her on it then because, frankly I couldn’t even process what she’d told me.
                  "What does your mom do?"
                  "What she can. Paul keeps pretty close tabs on her. She's not really allowed to work, you know...since. He watches her money pretty close. She gives me things every now and then on the sly. We both learned pretty early on not to rock the boat too much."
                  "Why?" She didn't make eye contact and started fiddling with that knot in her cover up, "Charley! Why? Does he hit you?"
                  She laughed ruefully, "If he did he'd have to acknowledge I exist."
                  "Does he hit your mom?" She was quiet for an uncomfortable beat before answering. The fire that was in her seemed to extinguish.
                  "Not anymore, now that, as far as he knows, she pretty much ignores me too."
                  "Jesus."
                  "It's really not that bad."
                  "Christ, Charley! Yes! It is that fucking bad! Why didn't you ever tell someone?!"
                  "I'm telling you now."
                  "No goddamnit! I mean someone who can do something about it!"
                  "Like who?"
                  "I dunno. Child services or something?"
                  "And tell