Dad bought a new electric scooter.
My brother climbed onto the back seat, and my sister was lifted onto the footboard.
I ran behind them, grinning so hard my teeth showed.
Dad went around and around, but never once stopped to give me a turn.
When I could not keep up anymore, I went to ask Mom to speak for me.
Then I heard her talking about me.
“We only had her so we could use the cord blood for her sister, but who knew her sister had been misdiagnosed?”
“Oh, what a waste—all that suffering for nothing!”
I had just turned six that day, and the words I wanted to say stayed trapped behind my lips, so I never asked for a ride again.
For years afterward, I ran the road from home to school.
Then the provincial team recruited me, and I was interviewed.
Dad wheeled out that same electric scooter.
“It’s all thanks to me training her with this thing, because how else could she run so fast?”
