My mother transferred $5,000 into my account every month for spending money, and all our relatives said she gave too much.

But only I knew the truth. I couldn't touch a single cent of it without permission.

Textbook fees had to be itemized. Topping up my meal card required a screenshot of the balance. Even buying a $0.50 gel pen meant I had to bring the empty ink refill home, set it on the desk for her inspection.

If I was a second too slow, she'd lay into me.

"Blowing my hard-earned money again! How did I end up with such a wasteful brat!"

Then I got my acceptance letter from Weston University and needed to pay $1,200 in tuition and fees. I begged her to transfer the money first. All she said was:

"Without an official payment receipt from the school, how do I know you're not faking it to steal my money and funnel it to your deadbeat father?"

That night I sat on the living room floor, staring at what she'd posted on social media.

A single mother willing to bleed herself dry to put her daughter through college.

I laughed out loud.

……

At eleven o'clock at night, my mother's social media updated right on schedule.

A grid of photos, front and center: a screenshot showing a $5,000 transfer to her daughter.

The caption was a single line:

I'd sell everything I own to give my child the best. Mom will always be your rock.

The comments piled up fast.

"Lily Fox, you're incredible! Five thousand a month for spending money? You're not raising a daughter, you're raising a princess!"

"And the kid delivered too. Weston University! Lily, your life is made!"

Aunt Diane Mercer was the first to hit like, comment right behind it: "I've always said it. That girl getting into Weston is all because of you, Lily, holding it down on your own. All that sacrifice. It really wasn't easy."

Vanessa Mercer jumped in too: "Wow, Queenie Pruitt, you're so lucky to have a mom like that!"

I sat on the floor, my back pressed against the edge of the bed, staring at that post. My fingers curled tighter, one knuckle at a time.

Five thousand.

Five thousand a month in spending money.

I looked down at the stack of crumpled draft paper on the desk. In the corner, half a gel pen lay pinned under the pile. The ink had run dry, so I'd switched to another one to keep writing.

Fifty cents each. Three a month at most, and even those had to be reported in advance.

Empty refills couldn't be thrown away. They had to be returned and logged.

If one went missing, next week's meal money got docked.

That was the truth behind my $5,000 a month.

While I sat there in a daze, four voice messages from my mother had already slammed in, one after another.

"I'm talking to you! Why aren't you answering, you money pit!"

The next second, the phone rang.

I took a deep breath and picked up.

"Queenie." Her voice was savage.

"Where's yesterday's pen refill?"

I froze. "What?"

"Don't 'what' me!" She let out a sharp laugh.

"I'm asking where you put the empty refill from the gel pen you used up yesterday. I went through your desk and couldn't find it. You filled seven pages of draft paper last night. There's no way you didn't go through a refill."

My throat went dry. "I was doing so many practice problems, I tossed it without thinking. I forgot."

"Tossed it?"

Her voice shot up a full octave.

"Tossed it? A fifty-cent refill, and you just toss it? Queenie, I swear, you're exactly like your deadbeat father. Wasteful down to the bone!"

I gripped the phone so hard my knuckles ached. The pressure in my chest kept building with nowhere to go.

"It's one pen refill, Mom. I really just forgot."

"Forgot!" Her voice climbed even higher, high enough that I had to pull the phone away from my ear.

"You can forget everything except how to spend my money! Do you have any idea how much you blow on pen refills alone in a month? How many times have I told you? Used refills get saved. They get logged. They get shown to me. Is your memory that bad, or are you doing this on purpose?"

"Fine. You want to throw things away? Then you can forget about dinner money next week. Consider it your reimbursement to me."

The line went dead. Nothing left but the flat, mechanical hum of the dial tone.

I sat there. Didn't move.

Outside, the dorm building lights were still on. The girl next door was laughing into her phone. Her voice drifted through the wall, faint but clear enough to make out.

Mom, stop worrying. I'm fine. Everything's great.

I looked down at the post Lily had just made on social media.

"I'd sell everything I own to give my kids the best."

Then I checked my balance. Sixteen dollars and thirty cents. Scraped together from recycling cans and bottles last week.

To the rest of the world, I was the lucky daughter who got five thousand dollars a month in allowance, lovingly raised by a generous mother.

Only I knew the truth. That five thousand wasn't money. It was a chain around my neck. Every time I pulled against it, it tore skin.

Buy a pen? File a report. Use up a refill? Log it. Even a fifty-cent replacement cartridge had to be kept after it ran dry, flattened out, and photographed for her inspection.

One second too slow, and I'd get screamed at.

One cartridge short, and next week's dinner money was gone.

I stared at the ceiling and slowly started to laugh.

My mother liked to say my face was the biggest regret of her life. Because I looked too much like my father. The man who gambled away every cent she had and skipped town with another woman.

This life of "five thousand dollars a month in spending money." When was it ever going to end?

Third period that afternoon was study hall. I had my head down, working through calculus problems.

The homeroom teacher pushed open the classroom door and walked in. She scanned the room once, and her eyes landed directly on me.

"Queenie, you still owe fifty dollars for the practice exam packet. This is the third reminder. Can I get a straight answer today?"

Forty students. Forty pairs of eyes. Every single one swiveled toward me.

The blood rushed to my face all at once, but I forced myself to nod.

"I'll figure it out today, ma'am."

"Good. Have it on my desk before the end of class."

She turned and left. The stares didn't.

Someone in the front row muttered under their breath. "She can't come up with fifty bucks?"

Another voice followed, quick and sharp. "Doesn't her mom give her five grand a month? Who knows where it all goes."

I dropped my head and fixed my eyes on the half-finished integral on my scratch paper. My ears burned so hot they felt like they might catch fire.

The second the bell rang, I ran to the far end of the hallway and dialed.

No answer.

I sent a message. Mom, the teacher's asking for the materials fee. Fifty dollars. Can you transfer it first?

Sent. No reply.

I stood in the hallway, watching the sun beat down on the track field through the window, my palms slowly going damp with sweat.

Nearly half an hour passed before the phone finally rang.

"What is it?" Her voice was lazy, like she'd just woken up from a nap.

"The fifty-dollar materials fee. The teacher keeps asking. Can you just send it?"

"Fifty dollars?" Her pitch shot up instantly.

"Queenie, I give you five thousand a month and that's not enough? Now you're coming to me with your hand out for more?"

I swallowed the anger down. "It's a school fee. Collected from everyone. It's not part of the living allowance."

"Collected from everyone, so it has to be paid?" She cut me off. "How do I know your teacher isn't just skimming money on the side? I'm telling you right now, without an official receipt stamped by the school, you're not getting a cent. Go ask your teacher for one. When I see it, I'll transfer the money."

I froze for a moment. My voice dropped to almost nothing. "Mom. It's fifty dollars. Not five hundred."

"Doesn't matter how much it is. Rules are rules."

The line went dead. Clean. Final.

I stood in the hallway, phone in my hand, and for a long moment I had no idea where to go.

I forced myself back into the classroom, found the homeroom teacher, and stammered out the words.

"Ma'am, my mom asked if she could get… a receipt with the school's official stamp?"

The teacher looked up, her expression blank for a second before her brows knitted together.

"A receipt? For a materials fee?"

I opened my mouth. Nothing came out.

A few classmates who'd been crowded around the teacher's desk went quiet.

Then the whispers crept in.

"Wow, she needs a receipt for fifty bucks? Does she think the teacher's scamming her?"

"Her mom gives her five grand a month and she's making this big a deal over fifty dollars. Either her mom's insanely cheap, or the money never actually reaches her."

"She probably blew it all herself. Why else would this be happening?"

I stood there and let every word slice through me.

The teacher went to the administrative office, got the stamp, and came back. She pressed the receipt into my hand. There was something in her eyes, a flicker of pity she almost managed to hide.

I took a photo of the receipt and sent it to my mother.

Less than thirty seconds later, fifty dollars landed in my account.

I kept my head down, paid the fee, turned around, and walked out. That was when I opened Brody Abbott's social media.

His latest post was from noon today.

In the photo, he was hugging a pair of brand-new limited-edition sneakers, grinning at his reflection in the mirror like he'd won the lottery.

The price tag on the box was perfectly visible.

$500.

The caption was short: "Mom bought these for me. Love you ️"

I stared at that photo for a long time.

Five hundred dollars' worth of sneakers. No invoice. No receipt. No official stamp. Bought without a second thought.

Fifty dollars for a materials fee, and I had to stand in front of my entire class for half an hour. Had to beg for a receipt, beg for a stamp, had to grind my dignity into the floor before she'd transfer the money.

I gripped my phone, tilted my head back, and shoved that breath down hard.

Something was pushing up behind my eyes. I didn't let it out.

A draft blew through the hallway. Cold.

Back in my dorm, I pulled up Brody's profile and scrolled from the top.

Two weeks ago, Mom bought him the latest gaming console. $450.

Last Thursday, a screenshot of a $2,500 transfer appeared in one of his posts. The memo was spelled out in full: "For my baby boy's gaming fund. Enjoy every penny."

Twenty-five hundred dollars.

For video games.

I set my phone down and looked at the text notification showing my meal card balance.

$2.13.

That was all the money I had for the week.

Right then, my phone buzzed.

A text from an unknown number. The header read: Weston University Admissions Office.

My heart stopped. I opened it.

"Ms. Pruitt, your tuition and fees remain unpaid. The payment portal for this enrollment cycle will close tomorrow at 10:00 PM. If payment is not completed by the deadline, your admission will be revoked. Please remit the full amount of $1,300 before the cutoff. No extensions will be granted."

I stared at those words. A low ringing filled my skull.

Thirteen hundred dollars.

I turned the phone over in my hands three times, making sure it wasn't a scam. Checked the sender against the number listed on the admissions office website. Confirmed the deadline was tomorrow night at ten.

Then I set the phone down on the desk, slowly.

My hands started to shake.

$2.13 on my meal card. Nothing in my wallet. Nothing in my bank account. Even the little bit I'd scraped together last month from selling recyclables, money I'd been saving for exactly this kind of emergency, Mom had taken all of it last week. Said she'd hold onto it for me.

I took a deep breath and sent my mother a message.