Years blurred past like a rain on a window. Jessie grew taller, quieter_ her sorrow sharpening into a slow- burning anger tucked deep inside her. In the shelter of her room, she learned to listen more than she spoke. Time taught her patience, and questions left unspoken began to slowly piece together their own answers.
One afternoon, nearly sixteen and raw with curiosity, she stumbled across an envelope. She hadn't meant to pry, but the forgotten packet, pressed flat beneath the stack of neatly folded scarves, seemed to call out to her restless hands. She hesitated, then slid it open. Inside was a single sheet of finely textured paper, folded carefully, the handwriting precise. Heart thundering, she sat on the edge of the bed and began to read.
HELENA,
By now you know I have left. I cannot remain in a house that brings me only daughters while I long for a son to carry my name. I have made the choice to begin again with someone who understands this need and can give me what I want. There is nothing you have done or could have done differently. A man deserves a son. I owe my legacy that much. Our time together is done. Take care of the girls as you wish.
PROSPER.
Jessie read the words again and again, numbness spreading through her chest. There was no apology _ just a cold dismissal of her mother, herself and her sisters. It was so clear now: her mother's bitterness was not about daily struggles, but about this deep, cutting abandonment.
That evening, as she watched her mother quietly arranging books on the shelf, she saw her differently. The woman's strength, the sharp edges and distant looks_ these were shields against a wound that went deeper than Jessie had ever realized. Yet in her mother's small, habitual acts_ setting a plate for her, smoothing a stray hair _ there was an undercurrent of love. She saw now that her mother had loved deeply, and that love had been spurned for a reason so unfair, it left scars on them both.
In that moment, Jessie's resentment softened, replaced by understanding. Her mother had not been cold for the sake of it; she was surviving her own heartbreak, every single day.
That night, she sat alone in her room, the letter sprawled open before her. Her feelings tangled inside her_ anger for what her father had done, sympathy for her mother's silent strength, and a raw ache at how kindness and trust had brought nothing but hurt. She stared at her reflection in the window, tears prickling in her eyes, but her spirit began to harden. She refused to let herself become a victim of another person's selfishness. Her mother's kindness, she realized, had been used against her. She'd paid a terrible price for giving too much and demanding too little.
A cold clarity came over her as she picked up her journal and wrote at the top of a new page, in bold, deliberate letters:
THE RULE OF FOUR.
I will never let a man break me. I will never let love make me small or desperate. Four times, I will love. Four times, I will walk away. I will let them feel what my mother felt_ what I felt. They will know the sting of being chosen last, of being left behind after they have given their all.
She closed her journal, the rule etched deep into her mind_ a shield forged from her mother's suffering and her own resolve. The world had taught her what it meant to be discarded. Now she would teach the world how it felt to suffer in return.