By the time my wedding day arrived, my parents were across town in my sister Vicki’s brand-new kitchen, cutting into frosted cupcakes and toasting her housewarming.

Lucky meant my parents were leaving me behind.

Lucky meant they were choosing her.

When I was six or seven, the unfairness started to feel sharp. I’d stand in the doorway watching my parents pack the car and Vicki climb in with her little suitcase, and I’d feel like an extra piece of furniture they didn’t want to move. My mom would smile and say, “You’ll have fun with Grandma and Grandpa.” Like fun was the same as being wanted.

The hardest part wasn’t even my parents. It was Vicki.

I didn’t hate her when we were little. I wanted to love her. I wanted a normal sister relationship—sharing clothes, whispering secrets, ganging up on our parents. Instead, our relationship became a competition I didn’t agree to enter.

Vicki knew she was favored, and she moved through our house like it was her stage. She competed with me for everything: grades, attention, even tiny accomplishments that shouldn’t have belonged to either of us. If I got an A, she needed an A-plus. If I got complimented for a drawing, she’d announce she was taking an art class. If I laughed with my dad, she’d suddenly need him for something. She didn’t just want to win. She wanted me to know I’d lost.

One year in middle school, I found a group of girls through art class. It wasn’t dramatic. Just a little circle of people who made room for me, who laughed at my jokes, who didn’t make me feel like I was always in the way. I introduced Vicki to them once because she was hovering nearby and I felt guilty. She didn’t have many friends. She came off intense, over-eager, like she was trying to force closeness with people who hadn’t offered it.

She also couldn’t read a room to save her life.