Set aside for a moment the fact that I had tried to kill her. She had never wanted me. My younger sister had always been the favored child, and for reasons beyond simply my inability to consistently make proper use of the toilet. Elaine had been smarter, better-looking, better behaved, better, well, at anything and everything compared to me, not that doing so had been much of a challenge. I was an afterthought, the unseemly first attempt that hadn’t quite turned out as expected.
Sure, I was all she had left, but over the past two years, that scarcity hadn’t resulted in an increased demand that she care for me. The whole deal made no sense at all. Mother had no reason to want me, and she had given me no reason to want her.