“Losers Stay Losers”
I learned early that some families don’t break—they rot. Quietly. Slowly. From the inside out, the way fruit looks fine until you press your thumb into it.
Mine started rotting long before the laptop incident, but that was the moment I finally smelled it.
It was the night before my final design presentation at Brighton College of Arts—a project worth 40% of my grade, the difference between graduating on time or repeating the year.
I’d spent three months on that project.
Four all-nighters.
Hundreds of sketches.
Dozens of digital mockups.
And one laptop—the only thing I’d ever bought using the money from my part-time job at the campus café.
My sister Hailey hated everything about that laptop. Not because of what it contained, but because of what it represented—a future for me. A direction. A life that wasn’t hers to sabotage.
Hailey was home from university for the weekend. She was one year older, but the age gap felt like ten. She’d been the pretty one growing up, the athletic one, the popular one, the one who smelled like expensive perfume and never got told “no” by my father.
I, on the other hand, was the quiet one.
The artsy one.
The one who learned early how to wipe tears before anyone noticed.
And my father?
He didn’t see me—not unless he was bored enough to mock someone.
“Don’t be dramatic,” he’d say whenever Hailey said something cutting. “She’s just joking. Even if it’s true.”
The words “even if it’s true” always landed the hardest.
The night before my project was due, the house was unusually loud for 11 p.m. Music thumped from Hailey’s room. She’d invited three friends over, and they were the kind of girls who laughed at everything and nothing, tossing back seltzers while shouting over each other.
I stayed in the guest room—the makeshift little workspace my mother had tried to preserve as a peace treaty between me and the rest of the family. She’d passed away three years earlier, and sometimes I felt as if the room was the last remaining proof she’d ever existed.
I saved my file for the tenth time that hour. I was exhausted but wired. Every detail mattered.
Then the door cracked open without warning.
Hailey’s silhouette filled the doorway, one hand holding a half-empty can of hard lemonade.
“What do you want?” I asked.
She stepped in, looked around the room, and squinted at my screen.
“Still working?” she asked, nodding toward the laptop.
“Yes,” I said. “Presentation’s tomorrow morning.”
She snorted. “Right. That art crap.”
My jaw tightened. “It’s graphic design.”
“Same thing,” she said, waving a hand carelessly.
It infuriated me how she spoke—like my work existed purely for her mockery.
“What do you want?” I repeated.
She smiled then. But not the pretty-for-Instagram smile—this one was slow, cold.
“You think you’re better than me now?”
My stomach dropped. “No.”
“You do,” she said. “Dad says you walk around acting like you’re above the family.”
I blinked. “He said that?”
“Of course he did.” She took a step closer. “And you know what? He’s right.”
I stared at her, confused and stunned. “Hailey, I don’t act like anything. I just try to stay out of your way.”
She laughed—sharp, cruel.
“Oh, sweetie. You exist in my way.”
Something in me stiffened. “I don’t have time for this. Please leave.”
Her eyes flicked toward my laptop.
“Busy, huh?” she said. “Good. I’d hate for you to be bored when everything falls apart.”
“What?”
But she didn’t explain.
She just walked out, closing the door quietly.
Too quietly.
If there’s anything I’ve learned, it’s that Hailey’s silence is always more dangerous than her noise.
At 2 a.m., I finally closed the laptop, stretched my aching neck, and decided to rinse my face before collapsing into bed.
The bathroom down the hall smelled like coconut shampoo and Hailey’s expensive body spray. I washed up quickly, then returned to the room—
—only to stop dead.
My laptop was gone.
My heart slammed against my ribs.
“Hailey?” I said out loud, though she wasn’t there.
I checked the bed.
The desk.
The floor.
Nothing.
A sick feeling crawled up my spine.
Something was wrong.
Very wrong.
I rushed downstairs.
The house was quiet except for a faint splash.
A splash.
My breath hitched.
“No,” I whispered.
I followed the sound to the downstairs bathroom.
When I pushed the door open, the world tilted.
Hailey stood with her sleeves rolled up.
The bathtub was filled halfway with water.
And sinking slowly, screen already dark, was my laptop.
I froze.
She turned toward me with a smile that said she’d been waiting for this moment.
“There you are,” she said casually. “Don’t worry. I only dropped it once.”
My vision blurred—not from tears, but from rage so sharp it burned behind my eyes.
“What is wrong with you?” My voice came out strangled.
Her eyebrows rose in mock innocence. “What? You left it lying around. Could’ve slipped right out of my hands.”
“You stole it!”
“Oh, relax.” She flicked wet hair off her forehead. “It’s just a computer.”
“MY computer,” I said, voice shaking. “My project—my entire semester—was on that!”
She stepped out of the bathroom, brushing past me.
“Well,” she said, “guess you’ll have to deal with reality now.”
I followed her, fury overwhelming every instinct.
“Why would you do this?” I demanded.
She paused at the bottom of the staircase. There was no hesitation this time—just truth, ugly and naked.
“Because,” she said, “I’m tired of hearing Dad talk about how you’re ‘finally doing something with your life.’ It’s annoying. You’re annoying.”
My lungs stung.
“You’re jealous?” I whispered.
She smirked. “Don’t flatter yourself.”
Then she went upstairs.
But I couldn’t move.
My feet felt cemented.
My chest felt hollow.
My project—months of work—was gone.
I sank to the bathroom floor, staring at the bathtub as if staring long enough would reverse time.
When Dad came downstairs at 2:40 for a late-night snack, he found me sitting on the tiles.
“What’s your problem?” he grunted.
I opened my mouth. Nothing came out.
He glanced past me, saw the water, the laptop half-submerged like a drowned animal.
“Hailey did it,” I whispered finally.
He stared at me for a beat—expression unreadable.
Then he laughed.
Actually laughed. Like a joke had just landed perfectly.
“Oh, come on,” he said. “You can’t be serious.”
“She threw it in the tub!” I cried. “On purpose!”
He kept laughing, louder now.
“You know,” he said between chuckles, “you’ve always been dramatic. Hailey’s just messing with you. And you—” He pointed a finger at me. “—you let her. You always let her.”
“It was malicious,” I said. “She wanted me to fail.”
“Well”—he shrugged—“losers stay losers.”
The words cracked something in me.
Before I could respond, he opened the fridge and grabbed leftover pizza. He didn’t even look at me again.
Reality hit me like cold water.
He wasn’t going to help.
He wasn’t going to comfort me.
He wasn’t going to care.
I was completely, devastatingly alone.
I didn’t sleep that night.
I couldn’t.
At 4 a.m., I took the laptop out of the tub, wrapped it in towels, tried everything—hairdryer, rice, careful disassembly with tools I barely knew how to use.
Nothing worked.
The screen stayed black.
The keyboard stayed dead.
My semester… gone.
At 7:02 a.m., I emailed my professor, explaining what happened, attaching a few loose files I’d saved in the cloud weeks earlier, begging for any form of mercy.
At 7:20 a.m., I packed a backpack, opened the front door, and walked to campus.
Not because I believed things would work out.
But because I couldn’t sit in that house another second.
By the time I reached the design building, my nerves were in shreds. Students filed inside with their poster boards, laptops, prototypes. Everyone looked bright, prepared, nervous—but in a hopeful way.
I felt like an intruder among them.
When Professor Monroe called my name, I stepped forward with nothing but a printed sheet of sketches.
She looked at me expectantly. “Your presentation?”
I swallowed. “I don’t have it.”
Her expression drifted into concern. “Did something happen?”
“My laptop was destroyed,” I said. “Right before I could back it up.”
“Destroyed how?”
My jaw tensed.
I didn’t want to bring my family drama into the room.
I didn’t want to sound unprofessional.
But she waited.
So I answered truthfully.
“It was thrown into a bathtub of water,” I said. “While I was out of the room.”
Her eyes widened just slightly. “By whom?”
“My sister,” I whispered. “On purpose.”
A murmur spread through the classroom.
Professor Monroe didn’t join it.
Instead, she stood straighter. “You spent months on this project.”
“I know.”
“And you’re telling me you were sabotaged at the last minute.”
“Yes.”
She nodded once.
Slow.
Measured.
“Take a seat,” she said. “We’ll talk after class.”
My stomach loosened with relief I didn’t dare show.
After everyone else presented, she gestured me into her office.
“Sit,” she said kindly.
I lowered myself into the chair.
She took in my tired eyes, my trembling hands.
“How often does your sister do things like this?”
My throat tightened. “Often.”
“And your father?”
“Encourages it,” I whispered. “Or laughs.”
She breathed out slowly. “I suspected you were dealing with something at home.”
“Why?”
“You’re talented,” she said simply. “But you never take up space. You apologize for existing before you even open your mouth.”
Tears pricked my eyes.
She leaned forward. “Here’s what’s going to happen. You’ll get an extension. Two weeks. You can redo the project.”
I blinked. “Seriously?”
“Dead serious,” she said. “You’ve never asked for help before. That tells me this isn’t habitual—it’s crisis.”
My breath wavered.
“Thank you,” I whispered. “You don’t know what this means.”
Her voice softened. “Actually, I think I do.”
For the first time in hours, maybe days, I felt hope flicker.
A tiny flame—but real.
When I got home that afternoon, Hailey was in the kitchen eating yogurt and scrolling through her phone. Dad watched TV with his feet on the coffee table.
Neither looked up when I entered.
“Laptop still dead?” Hailey asked casually.
I didn’t respond.
Dad smirked. “Bet next time you’ll keep a better grip on it, huh?”
I stared at them—really stared.
Something inside me clicked into place.
The rot was too deep.
Too old.
Too comfortable.
And I would not spend another year drowning in their poison.
I went upstairs, grabbed my backpack, stuffed clothes into it, added my sketchbooks, passport, chargers, toothbrush.
When I came down, Hailey frowned. “Where are you going?”
“Away,” I said simply.
She snorted. “Oh, come on. Don’t be a baby.”
I looked at her unemotionally. “You’re twenty-one, Hailey. Not eight. You know what you did.”
Dad barked a laugh. “Look at her, trying to talk big.”
I met his gaze. “Professor Monroe gave me an extension.”
The amusement drained from his face.
“She said sabotage counts as grounds for academic consideration.”
Hailey’s jaw tightened. “You told her?”
I nodded. “Yes.”
Dad scoffed. “So what? Going to tell everyone your family’s abusive?”
“Yes,” I said. “If they ask.”
They both stared at me.
It felt powerful.
Strange.
Exhilarating.
“You two can keep hating me,” I said. “Keep laughing. Keep calling me a loser.”
I shouldered my bag.
“But one day,” I added, “you’re going to realize I wasn’t the problem. You were.”
And then I walked out.
For the first time in years, Dad didn’t have a comeback.
I spent the next two weeks living with a classmate who insisted I take her spare room. For free.
“You deserve one good thing,” she’d said when I tried to pay.
Day by day, the project rebuilt itself.
At first, it felt like picking through ruins.
But slowly, sketches turned into drafts.
Drafts into digital concepts.
Concepts into something real.
Better than the original.
Stronger.
Sharper.
Mine.
When I presented it two weeks later, Professor Monroe nodded, impressed. Several classmates clapped. One even whispered, “Damn, you’re good.”
I didn’t cry, though I wanted to.
After class, Professor Monroe pulled me aside again.
“This,” she said, tapping the project, “is the work of someone who finally stopped apologizing.”
I laughed softly. “Still working on that part.”
“You’ll get there,” she said.
“You already have.”
That night, I blocked Dad’s number.
Then Hailey’s.
Two days later, I received a string of emails from Dad, each angrier than the last.
Ungrateful girl.
Don’t bother coming home for holidays.
Do you think you can make it in the real world without us?
Hailey is devastated.
Good riddance.
I didn’t answer a single one.
I deleted them all.
Sometimes cutting out family feels like ripping off a limb.
But sometimes it feels like removing a tumor.
For me, it was both.
Six months later, I graduated.
Professor Monroe hugged me.
My classmates cheered.
I got an internship offer from a design agency in London.
I felt weightless.
At the ceremony, while everyone else posed with their families, I took a photo alone—cap crooked, smile genuine, sunlight behind me.
Not a single part of me wished Dad or Hailey were there.
Two years later, I was working full-time in the UK, living in a tiny flat with mismatched furniture and plants I adored. My work hung in real storefronts. My paycheck paid for my life—not my father’s contempt.
Every now and then, their memory flickered across my mind.
But it didn’t hurt anymore.
Because I won.
Not in the family competition they tried to trap me in.
But in the life I built in spite of them.
The life where I proved Dad wrong.
Losers don’t stay losers.
Not when they walk away.
Not when they choose themselves.
Not when they finally understand that the people who laugh at their pain were never worth impressing in the first place.
