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791words2026-01-26 09:11

I Died of Cancer While My Brother Cared for His beloved "Sister"—Then He Lost His Mind after I died
As I lay dying of cancer,my brother Ethan was tending to Sophie Reed,his so-called sister,who had caught a small cold.
Days later, the entire family finally learned of my death.

I thought they'd be glad.
After all, hadn’t they always told me—
“Why don’t you just die out there and save us the trouble?!”
But what I didn’t expect…
was that my brother went insane first.
Thunder rumbled outside. I peered out the window.

Rain was coming.
I lowered my eyes to my cancer-ravaged body, a flicker of despair igniting within me. Ethan wouldn't make it in time.
When I realized the truth,
the last flicker of my desire to live faded—

snuffed out like the rain that poured endlessly outside,
and like the phone calls that were never answered.
In the end,
I still died on a rainy day.
But my soul, unwilling to let go,
drifted back home.
At that moment,
my brother was busy taking care of another girl—
his so-called ‘little sister’, Sophie Reed.
She’d been caught in the rain,
curled up in bed now, shivering delicately,
her doe eyes gazing up at him with practiced vulnerability.
He looked at her with gentle affection in his eyes,
softly urging her to sit up and take her medicine.
She obeyed, drank the warm liquid, and soon fell asleep.
My brother sat by her bedside, staring blankly out at the rainstorm.
I didn’t know who he was thinking about,
but a shadow passed across his face—something bitter, something buried.
I floated closer,
an instinct long gone compelling me to smooth out the furrow between his brows…
But before I could reach him,
he suddenly clenched his jaw and—
spat out my name.
I flinched in mid-air, stunned.
He, unaware of the ghost watching him, unlocked his phone.
On the screen:
a dozen missed calls. From me.
He glanced at them for just a second—
then scoffed, turned his head, and locked the screen with a disgusted sigh.
“How many times did I tell you to come home earlier?
Now you’re calling in the middle of the night again.
What the hell do you want?”
He sighed heavily."Lily,why don't you just die out there?"
My heart sank,a bitter ache spreading through my chest.
So my brother… really does hate me this much.
I drifted in front of him, forcing a smile that no longer reached anywhere—not even my own heart.
“Brother,” I whispered,
“Just as you wished, I’m asleep now. Forever.”
“You must be so happy, right?
The sister you despised the most…
is finally dead.”
He seemed uneasy—his fingers clenched tightly around his phone, brows furrowed, lost in thought.
Just as he stood up, the girl in the bed—Sophie Reed—reached out weakly, tugging at his sleeve with delicate fingers.
Her voice was soft, full of practiced innocence.
“Are you going to look for Lily, brother?”
He said nothing.
Sophie offered a wan smile, eyes watery with tenderness.
“It’s okay… go ahead. She’s still not home this late—what if something happened to her?”
“I’m just… a little sick. I’ll be fine.”
He paused, then sat back down on the edge of the bed.
Lit a cigarette.
Took a slow drag.
“What danger could she possibly be in?”
“Even if something did happen… she brought it on herself.”
“She has no one to blame but herself.”
I stared at his face for a long time.
Same brows.
Same eyes.
Same voice that used to call me by my nickname when I scraped my knee.
And yet—
he felt like a stranger.
But I shouldn't have expected anything else.
No one knew better than I did.
My brother hates me.
Just because…
I “killed” that dog.
The one we raised together as children.
The one that wagged its tail more for him than it ever did for me.
The one that never barked even when I cried beside it.
But I didn't kill Buddy!!!
Buddy was a puppy a neighbor had given Ethan,who raised it with care.
Initially, I was fond of Buddy, but when he began leaving droppings in my room every day, my affection turned to annoyance. Ethan would cleaned it up,but I grew resentful and distanced myself from the dog.
Not long after, my parents introduced a girl they had taken in, announcing that she would be my sister. I was adamantly opposed to this sudden change. I objected,argued with them,fought with Ethan,and stormed out.
When I returned,I opened the door to Buddy's gruesome corpse,lying in a pool of blood, with Ethan's gift to me—a pocketknife from my 18th birthday—stuck in its belly.
I froze,stunned,unable to move,until Ethan walked in.