Reborn and Relentless: She's Going Down

My sister-in-law, Sabrina Linskey, never hides her hatred for me. Yet, on my daughter Elena Satchwell's birthday, she does something I can never imagine.

She gives Elena a dress, claiming she had sewn it by hand. She calls it a blessing for Elena's health and safety.

I let her ease the dress onto Elena, relief washing over me as I convince myself that Sabrina finally understands the importance of upholding peace in the family. But Elena's skin begins to fester, until even the lightest touch makes her flinch in pain.

That's when I realize Elena's fate has been swapped with Sabrina's son's. Mom and Dad, along with my brother, know all about it.

Elena, beyond saying, eventually dies. I, too, am killed the moment I uncover the truth.

But when I open my eyes again, I return to the day Sabrina arrives with that dress for Elena's birthday.

"Elena, look what I brought you!"

The instant my sister-in-law, Sabrina Linskey, pulled out that clumsily stitched little dress, I knew that I had been reborn.

In my past life, Sabrina never hid her contempt for me. Yet she had appeared on my doorstep, wanting to celebrate my daughter Elena Satchwell's birthday. And not only that; she had brought a dress she had sewn with her own hands, eager to slip it onto Elena herself.

Sabrina's sudden warmth had caught me off guard.

Ever since her marriage, she had made no secret of her disdain for me. To her, every sister-in-law alive was nothing but a schemer, clawing for the family inheritance. She didn't think my child was even worth a mention.

At the time, Elena wrinkled her nose at the dress and called it ugly. But I couldn't bring myself to embarrass Sabrina. More than that, I didn't want to waste the chance to ease the strain in the family. So, I let her put it on Elena.

Little did I know that the dress was never meant to be a token of peace. It was the shroud of Elena's doom.

Sabrina's son, Alex Reid, had fallen ill with a strange disease. But she refused to believe the doctors and called them liars who wanted to swindle her money. As Alex's strength ebbed day by day, her desperation curdled into something dark. She resolved to trade his dying breath for Elena's life.

In my past life, after Elena slipped into that dress, it wasn't long before her skin began to fester. Blisters swelled at the faintest touch. Her flesh came away in broad strips, raw and bleeding.

I rushed her to the hospital, but even the doctors were powerless. All I could do was hold her, watching as she drew her last, shuddering breath in my arms.

At Elena's funeral, I heard Mom whisper how much her heart ached for Elena.

But Sabrina, chin tilted with smug triumph, said, "Elena was just your granddaughter. You still have Alex, who's healthy and strong. He'll be the one to look after you when you're old.

"Elena's gone, but so what? Even if she were alive, she'd just end up in someone else's family after she grew up. She was unlucky, that's all. What else could she expect, being born a girl? Her life was too fragile to carry her through. She was meant to be sacrificed for Alex. And Alex is her cousin, so dying for him hardly counts as a loss, does it?

"Your second child's a daughter, and your third's a useless son. In the end, isn't it Jerome and Alex you'll have to rely on?"

In that instant, everything snapped. I lunged at Sabrina, clawing and kicking until my older brother, Jerome Reid, brought something down on my head. I died on the spot.

Afterward, they staged the scene to look like I had taken my own life. They told my husband, Herman Satchwell, that I had been so consumed by grief over Elena's passing that I couldn't bear to go on.

Herman couldn't bear the blow. Grief drove him mad, and before long, he died in a car crash. His parents were overseas at the time. Stricken with sorrow, they turned away from everything he left behind.

In the end, the Reids inherited all that was previously mine. Their lives, greased by that money, glided on without a hitch.

A single dress had ruined my family.

Now, standing beside Sabrina, I saw the hatred in her eyes. It was sharp and unmistakable.