My parents told everyone I died at birth, but I’ve been living in our soundproof basement for 16 years. They say I’m cursed because I’m a leap year baby and can only exist on February 29th. My parents told everyone I died at birth. I only exist one day every four years.
The other 1,460 days, I disappear into a soundproof room in our basement, fed through a slot like an animal they’re too ashamed to put down. They say seeing me between birthdays will curse our family, but I know the truth. I’m the affair child, the bad luck baby. The mistake that only gets to be real every leap year.
The room became my world before I could even crawl. A leap baby, the nurse had said. How special. Mom’s eyes went wild. She’ll only exist sometimes, she whispered. That’s perfect. That’s the answer. I later found out that she was diagnosed with schizophrenia and refused to take her meds.
Dad was hammered when they brought me home. He’s always hammered, but that day he was the kind of hammered where he agrees to anything. Mom explained her plan while he nodded along. Bourbon sweating through his ores. She’s cursed. You understand? His baby. But there’s a loophole. Lee babies don’t exist except on their day. We keep her hidden.
She can’t spread the curse. The room was ready within a week. Soundproofing foam covered every inch. A slot at the bottom of the door just big enough for food trays. A small bathroom attached. A camera in the corner so they could check if I was still alive without having to see me. No windows.
No light switch I could control. just a bare bulb that turned on twice a day for meals. I learned to count by scratching marks on the wall. 1,461 scratches between each time the door opened. Between each time, mom would look at me with eyes that almost seemed sane and whisper, “Today you’re real, baby. Today you exist.
” My brothers didn’t know about me for years. Mason and Luke, born 13 months after me, on a normal day, a safe day. They got bedrooms upstairs and birthday parties every year. I watched their feet through the crack under my door, listened to them laugh at cartoons I’d never see. Mom told them the basement was dangerous. Toxic mold, she said.
One breath and you’d die. But kids don’t listen. Mason found me when he was seven and I was eight, though I’d only celebrated two birthdays. He’d kicked his ball down the stairs and chased it, ignoring mom’s shrieking warnings. He pressed his face to the slot in my door, two eyes meeting mine.
“There’s a girl in here,” he screamed. Mom dragged him away and I heard the slap echo through the house. “That’s not a girl,” she told him. “That’s an echo. A ghost. If you see it again, our whole family dies. Even she believed her lies. The worst part wasn’t the isolation. It was hearing life happen without me.
Birthday songs sung upstairs while I sat in darkness. Christmas mornings where wrapping paper rustled above my head. Mom’s good days when her medication worked and she’d make cookies. the smell drifting through the vents while I ate cold rice through my slot. Dad tried once. I could tell by his shuffling footsteps. The way he stood outside my door for hours. Linda, he slurred to mom. This ain’t right. She’s still our daughter.
Mom’s voice went sharp the way it did before her bad episodes. Your daughter, your daughter. You want the curse in our house? You want Mason and Luke to die because you’re too weak to protect them? The shuffling footsteps never came back. I taught myself to read from the books mom sometimes threw through the slot.
Always about curses, demons, protection spells. By 10, I understood schizophrenia better than most doctors. I knew mom’s patterns when the voices would come. when she’d pace above my room, muttering about the curse spreading through the floorboards. I knew dad drank more on the days she got bad.
I knew my brothers had learned to pretend I didn’t exist. February 29th, 2020, my fourth birthday. 12 years old, but only four birthdays were celebrated. Mom opened the door and I blinked in the hallway light like a mole. She decorated streamers and balloons, a cake with four candles. Today you’re real, she sang. Manic energy crackling around her. Today, the curse sleeps.
Mason and Luke hid behind dad, terrified of the basement ghost their mother sometimes acknowledged. I tried to speak but barely remembered how. When you only talk one day every four years, words feel strange in your mouth. Hi, I managed. Luke started crying. “Make it go back,” he whimpered. “It’s scary.” The hope I’d carried for 1,461 days shattered. Even on my real day, I wasn’t real to them. That’s when the seizure started. Maybe from the darkness, the malnutrition, the endless silence.
I’d convulse on my concrete floor alone, biting through my tongue with no one to help. Mom watched through the camera, taking notes. The curse is fighting back, she’d mutter. Dad would bring extra bourbon to bed.
Those nights, I started leaving messages under the door, scratched onto scraps of cardboard with my fingernails. “Please help me. I’m dying. I won’t curse you.” Mason found one once. I heard him sound out the words slowly, then mom’s footsteps, her shriek, the lighter clicking. She burned them all while explaining that demons write notes to trick children into opening doors.
Another time the state came. Someone had reported screaming from our house. Mom smiled her medication smile, showed them around. The basement door had been painted over, wallpapered, hidden behind a bookshelf. Just three of us and the boys, she chirped. The social worker noted the happy family, the clean house, the normal children. They never came back. February 28th, 2024. Tomorrow would be my fifth birthday.
16 years old with only five birthdays. I could hear mom pacing. Off her pills again, muttering about leap year curses and demon babies. Then the sound I dreamed of for 5,843 days. A key in the lock. Mason had stolen it from mom’s jewelry box. The door opened and I stumbled out, legs too weak to hold me.
Mason’s face went pale as he stared at me, his hands still gripping the stolen key. My legs buckled and I grabbed the door frame, muscles screaming after years of disuse. The hallway stretched before me like an impossible distance. Carpet soft under my bare feet after a lifetime of cold concrete.
Can you walk? Mason whispered, glancing nervously at the stairs. Mom’s pacing had stopped. The sudden silence felt more dangerous than her muttering. I tried to answer, but my throat felt raw. Instead, I took a shaky step forward than another. My knees wobbled like a newborn calves.
Mason reached out to steady me, but pulled back, still afraid of the curse he’d been taught to fear. The house looked nothing like I’d imagined. All those years listening to life above me, I’d built elaborate pictures in my mind. Reality was smaller, dingier. Family photos lined the walls, three children smiling in every frame. The fourth child existed only in a locked basement, edited out of their perfect lie. A door creaked upstairs. Mason’s eyes went wide and he shoved me toward the kitchen.
Hide, he hissed. She’s coming. I stumbled behind the refrigerator just as mom’s footsteps hit the stairs. My heart hammered so loud I was sure she’d hear it. Through the gap between the fridge and wall, I watched her descend. hair wild, night gown stained with old coffee.
Mason, her voice had that sharp edge that meant the voices were talking to her again. “What are you doing up? Getting water,” he said, moving to block her view of the kitchen. Mom’s eyes narrowed. She pushed past him, nostrils flaring like she could smell my presence. Something’s wrong. The balance is off. The curse is moving.
She headed straight for the basement door. My whole body tensed. In seconds, she’d see the empty room, the open door, the missing prisoner. Mason followed her, hands shaking. The shriek that erupted when she saw the empty room rattled the windows. “No, no, no, no, no.” She spun on Mason, grabbing his shoulders. “What did you do? What did you do?” “Nothing. I didn’t. The curse will take you. It’ll take all of us. She shook him hard, his head snapping back.
Where is it? Where is the demon? Dad’s heavy footsteps thundered down the stairs. Linda, what the hell? It’s gone. The thing is gone. We’re all going to die. I pressed myself smaller behind the refrigerator, watching Dad take in the scene.
His bloodshot eyes moved from the open basement door to Mason’s terrified face to mom’s manic rage. For a moment, I thought he might actually do something. Instead, he reached for the bourbon bottle on the counter. We need to find it. Mom released Mason and started pacing. Before midnight, before the leap year begins, if it’s free on its birthday, the curse becomes permanent. Mom, please. Mason’s voice cracked. She’s not a demon. She’s just the slap echoed through the kitchen. Never call it she.
It’s a thing, a curse. A mistake that should have died 16 years ago. I bit down on my fist to keep from crying out. Every word carved deeper than the loneliness ever had. At least in the basement, I could pretend that somewhere somehow they loved me. That fear kept them away. Not hate. Mom grabbed a flashlight from the drawer.
Check everywhere. The attic, the garage, the shed. It can’t have gone far. Look at how pale and weak it is. Probably can’t even make it to the property line. She was right about that. My legs already achd from the short journey upstairs. 16 years of darkness and malnutrition had left me with the strength of a sick child. But I had something they didn’t expect. I had 16 years of listening, learning, planning.
I knew mom’s patterns better than she did. Dad took another swig of bourbon and shuffled toward the back door. I’ll check the shed. Take Luke, mom ordered. He needs to learn. This is what happens when we let our guard down. Linda, the boy’s asleep. Get him.
Dad trudged back upstairs while mom continued her frantic search, checking closets, behind furniture, under tables. Mason stood frozen in the middle of it all. Guilt written across his face. Why does mom keep switching between calling her daughter it and baby on birthdays? There’s something really strange about how she can decorate with streamers one minute, then burn messages the next. What’s driving these wild mood swings beyond just the illness? When mom disappeared into the laundry room, he darted to the refrigerator.
“Go upstairs,” he whispered to the gap where I hid. “My room, second door on the left. Hide under the bed.” I shook my head. The stairs might as well have been Mount Everest in my condition. “You have to. She’ll check here next.” He was right. Mom’s search pattern followed a predictable spiral.
Kitchen, living room, dining room, then back to kitchen for a more thorough check. I had maybe 3 minutes. I forced myself out from behind the refrigerator. Each step felt like running through quicksand. The stairs loomed before me. 15 steps to freedom or capture.
I grabbed the railing and pulled myself up, one agonizing step at a time. Halfway up, I heard Luke’s sleepy protests as Dad dragged him downstairs. Why do I have to look for ghosts? Just do what your mother says. But there’s no such thing as Luke. Mom’s voice cut through his complaint. This is life or death. The thing that lives downstairs is loose. If you see it, don’t look in its eyes. Don’t listen to its lies. Just scream for me. My hand slipped on the railing.
They were turning my baby brother into a hunter, and I was the prey. I reached the top of the stairs just as the search party headed outside. The hallway stretched before me, four doors, and a lifetime of mysteries. Which room belonged to which brother? What did a normal bedroom look like? Second door on the left, Mason’s room. I pushed it open and almost cried.
Posters covered the walls. A computer sat on a desk. Books lined shelves. All the things I’d dreamed of crammed into one beautiful space. But I couldn’t stop to marvel. Mom’s footsteps were already returning to the house. Under the bed, I found a world of forgotten treasures.
Dust bunnies, lost socks, crumpled homework. I wedged myself between boxes of old toys, trying to become invisible. The door burst open. Mom’s flashlight swept the room like a search light. I know you’re here, she sang in that two sweet voice she used during her worst episodes. I can smell the curse. 16 years of basement rot. The light passed inches from my face. I held my breath, pressing flat against the floor.
A spider crawled across my hand, but I didn’t dare move. Mason’s been bad, Mom continued, checking the closet, letting demons whisper in his ear. But I’ll fix him. I’ll fix everything just like I fixed your father when he tried to weaken. She moved to the window, checking the lock. You think you’re so clever, don’t you? Learning to read, writing those pathetic notes.
But you’re nothing. A mistake, a curse made flesh. And tomorrow on your birthday, I’ll make sure you never threaten my real children again. The flashlight beam swept under the bed. I squeezed my eyes shut, waiting for her shriek of discovery. Instead, Mason’s voice called from downstairs. Mom, I think I found something in the garage. She rushed out, leaving me trembling in the darkness. But I knew this was only the beginning. Mom wouldn’t stop until she found me.
And when she did, I couldn’t think about that. Not yet. Minutes passed, maybe hours. Time felt different outside my basement cell. Eventually, exhaustion 1. 16 years of broken sleep on concrete had taught me to rest anywhere, anytime. I woke to sunlight streaming through Mason’s window. My first sunrise.
The light painted everything gold, beautiful, and terrifying. I’d missed 5,844 sunrises, locked away while the world turned without me. Voices drifted from downstairs. Normal voices, breakfast voices, the family eating together while mom plotted my recapture. My stomach cramped with hunger. When had I last eaten? 2 days ago? Three. The food slot had been empty more often lately.
Mom’s way of weakening the curse. Before my birthday, I needed to move to find food, water, somewhere safer to hide, but my body wouldn’t cooperate. Every muscle screamed from the simple act of climbing stairs. How did normal people make walking look so easy? The bedroom door opened. I tensed, ready to scramble deeper under the bed.
“It’s me,” Mason whispered. He knelt down, peering into my hiding spot. “You okay?” I nodded, not trusting my voice. “Mom’s making everyone search again after breakfast.” “She says, “If we don’t find you before midnight, we’ll all be cursed forever.” He pushed a granola bar and water bottle toward me.
“I’m sorry for everything. I should have let you out years ago.” I grabbed the food with shaking hands, trying not to devour it like the animal they’d made me. The granola bar tasted like heaven. Sweet, crunchy, full of flavors I’d never experienced. She’s getting worse, Mason continued.
Dad’s already hammered and it’s only 9:00 in the morning. Luke’s so scared he won’t even come upstairs alone. He paused, studying my face in the dim light. You really do look like her. Like mom, I mean, before the sickness took over. I wanted to ask him so many questions.
What was she like before? Did she ever mention me? Did anyone ever wonder about the screams from the basement? But footsteps on the stairs cut our conversation short. Mason jumped up, kicking a dirty shirt to better hide the gap under his bed. Stay quiet. I’ll try to lead them away from the house. The door opened.
Mom stood there, hair pulled back in a greasy ponytail, eyes darting around the room. Talking to someone, Mason, just myself. She stepped closer, nostrils flaring. I smell it. The basement smell. It was here. Mom, please don’t lie to me. She grabbed his arm, nails digging in. You let it out. You invited the curse into our home. Do you want your brother to die? Do you want us all to suffer? She’s not a curse. Mason yanked free. She’s my sister, your daughter.
The slap knocked him into his desk. I have no daughter. That thing is a parasite, a demon wearing human skin. And if you can’t see that, then you’re infected, too. She stormed out, slamming the door. Mason touched his reening cheek, tears streaming down his face. I wanted to comfort him, to tell him it wasn’t his fault, but we both knew I couldn’t risk moving. The day passed in a blur of searches and shouting. Mom’s voice grew more frantic with each passing hour.
Dad’s slurred protest faded as the bourbon took hold. Luke cried constantly, begging to understand why they were hunting ghosts. I crawled out from under the bed when darkness fell again. My legs had stiffened from hours of hiding. Muscles protesting every movement. The house had gone quiet except for dad snoring from the master bedroom and the television droning in the living room.
Mom would be watching her shows, the ones about demon possessions and spiritual warfare that fed her delusions. Mason’s door creaked open. He gestured frantically for me to follow him to the bathroom. I limped after him, gripping walls for support. He turned on the faucet to mask our whispers and showed me a backpack he’d hidden behind the toilet.
Inside were clothes, a flashlight, some money, and more granola bars. He explained his plan while I changed out of the filthy basement rags into jeans and a hoodie that hung loose on my skeletal frame. He would create a distraction in the morning. Give me time to slip out the back door.
There was a bus stop three blocks away. He’d stolen enough money from dad’s wallet for a ticket anywhere. I shook my head. Running meant leaving him and Luke with mom’s rage. She’d blame them, hurt them. The curse obsession would consume her completely without me as a target.
Mason insisted it was the only way, but I saw the fear in his eyes. He knew what mom would do to him for helping me escape. We heard footsteps in the hall. Mom was doing her midnight patrol, checking locks, sprinkling salt across doorways, muttering protection prayers. Mason shoved me into the bathtub and yanked the shower curtain closed just as the bathroom door opened. Mom stood there swaying, eyes unfocused. She stared at Mason for a long moment before shuffling away.
We waited until her bedroom door clicked shut before I climbed out of the tub. Mason handed me the backpack, but I pushed it back. Not yet. Not until I knew they’d be safe. The next morning brought chaos. Mom had barely slept. Her hair matted with sweat, fingernails bloody from scratching at invisible bugs she claimed the curse had sent.
She made Dad and the boys search every room again while she performed cleansing rituals with burning sage that filled the house with smoke. I hid in the attic crawl space Mason had shown me, watching through cracks in the floorboards as mom grew more unhinged.
She accused Dad of hiding me through his bourbon bottles against the wall. She grabbed Luke and shook him until he admitted he’d seen something move in the shadows. Just his imagination, he sobbed. But mom took it as proof I was still in the house. She started tearing apart Mason’s room.
Convinced he was harboring me, ripped posters off walls, dumped drawers, slashed his mattress open with a kitchen knife. Mason tried to stop her and she backhanded him so hard he fell into his bookshelf. Books crashed down around him while mom shrieked about demon sympathizers and contamination. Dad finally intervened, grabbing mom’s wrists as she raised the knife again. She turned on him, spitting curses, saying he doomed them all by creating me with another woman. That was news to me.
I’d always assumed I was theirs, just born wrong somehow. But mom’s ranting revealed the truth. Dad’s affair. The other woman who died in childbirth, the baby he brought home in a drunken stuber, convincing his schizophrenic wife to hide his shame. The revelation sent Dad stumbling for more bourbon.
Mom collapsed on Mason’s destroyed bed, sobbing and pulling at her hair. Luke huddled in the corner and Mason sat among his ruined belongings with dead eyes. This was my fault. My existence had poisoned everything. That night, I made my decision. If I stayed hidden, mom would destroy them all searching for me.
If I ran, she’d blame them for letting me escape. Mom’s really going for mother of the year with her. I can smell the curse tracking skills. Nothing says loving parent like turning your house into a horror movie where your daughter plays the monster and your youngest son gets cast as the tiny ghost hunter.
But if she caught me, if she could perform whatever ritual she believed would break the curse, maybe she’d calm down. Maybe they could have some peace. I crept down from the attic while everyone slept. My legs had grown slightly stronger from two days of movement. Those stairs still challenged me. I made my way to the kitchen, planning to eat something before revealing myself in the morning. Let mom find me with food. Prove her theory that the curse made me steal from them.
But mom was already there, sitting in darkness at the kitchen table. She didn’t move when I entered, didn’t even look up. I froze in the doorway, waiting for her shriek of discovery. Instead, she spoke in the calm voice that meant her medication was working.
She asked if I was hungry, asked if I wanted some milk and cookies like she used to make for Mason and Luke. The normaly of it terrified me more than her ranting. I approached slowly, ready to bolt if she lunged, but she just pushed a plate across the table and poured milk into a glass. We sat in silence while I ate.
Her watching me with sad eyes that looked almost sane. She told me she knew I wasn’t really a demon. The voices lied sometimes, she said. But I was still dangerous, still cursed. Not my fault, but dads. His sin had marked me, made me wrong. The only way to protect Mason and Luke was to keep me contained.
She was sorry about the basement, but what choice did she have? I wanted to argue, to make her see reason. But I recognized this mood. The calm before her mind shattered again. If I played along, maybe she’d just lock me back up without hurting the others. I nodded and agreed that I understood. Yes, I would go back downstairs. Yes, I would stay quiet.
Yes, I knew she was protecting everyone. Mom smiled and reached across the table to touch my face. Her hand was ice cold. She said, “Tomorrow was my birthday, my fifth real birthday. Special things happened on fives. The curse would be strongest, but also most vulnerable.
” She had a plan to fix everything, to make me clean so I could live upstairs like a real daughter. Warning bells screamed in my head. I asked what kind of plan. Mom’s smile widened. She’d been reading, researching. There were ways to break curses, old ways, blood ways. It would hurt, but only for a moment.
Then I’d be free and we could be a real family. I jerked away from her touch. Mom’s eyes flashed dangerous for a second before returning to false calm. She said I was scared. That was natural. But didn’t I want to be normal? Didn’t I want to stop hurting everyone? Tomorrow at midnight when February 29th began, she would save me. Save us all.
She stood and gestured toward the basement door. “Time to go back,” she said. “Just one more day. I could do one more day, couldn’t I?” For Mason and Luke, I knew running would trigger her completely, so I walked to the basement door, each step heavier than the last.
Mom followed close behind, humming a lullaby, I remembered from the vents. The door stood open, waiting. The darkness below seemed to breathe. At the top of the stairs, I turned back. Mom held a hammer in her hand, pulled from somewhere while my back was turned. Not to hurt me, she promised just to fix the lock dad had broken.
Keep me safe until tomorrow night. I was her special girl, her leapy year baby. Everything would be better after tomorrow. I descended into the familiar darkness. The door slammed shut and I heard her hammering boards across it.
No more food slot, no more light switch, just darkness until she came for me tomorrow with whatever ritual she’d planned. Blood ways, she’d said. Old ways. But I wasn’t the same girl who’d lived in this darkness for 16 years. Two days of freedom had changed me. My eyes had seen sunlight. My legs had climbed stairs. My mind had tasted hope. I wouldn’t wait passively for whatever horror mom planned.
The basement had a small window painted black and boarded over. I’d never tried to break through it before, accepting my prison. Now I attacked it with desperate strength, using the toilet tank lid to smash at the boards. Splinters flew and my hands bled, but I kept hammering.
Upstairs, mom was singing loud enough to cover the noise. Or maybe she wanted me to escape. Maybe this was part of her plan, letting the curse flee so she could hunt it properly. I didn’t care about her twisted logic anymore. I just needed out. The first board cracked and pulled loose. Moonlight leaked through.
The first natural light to touch my prison in 16 years. I worked faster, ignoring the pain in my hands. Another board came free. The opening was small, but so was I. After years of malnutrition, I heard footsteps above. Multiple sets. Mom had woken the others, was telling them tomorrow’s plan. Mason’s voice rose in protest. A slap silenced him. Dad’s slurred words joined in, trying to calm everyone. Luke was crying again. The last board wouldn’t budge.
I threw my whole body against it, felt it crack, but hold. Above, the footsteps moved toward the basement door. Mom was coming to check on me to make sure her sacrifice hadn’t escaped. One final desperate shove, and the board splintered. I squeezed through the opening, skin tearing on broken wood and glass. The backyard spread before me, vast and terrifying. I’d never been outside at night. Never felt grass under my feet or wind on my face.
The basement door rattled. Mom’s shriek of rage echoed through the house when she found the empty room. I ran or tried to. My legs gave out after 10 steps and I crawled across the lawn heading for the fence. Behind me, the back door burst open. Mom stood silhouetted in the doorway, hair wild, night gown billowing. She held something in her hands, the knife from Mason’s room. She wasn’t chasing me, though.
Instead, she called out in that sweet voice, telling me to come back. The ritual wouldn’t work if I was scared. I needed to trust her. She was my mother. She loved me. I reached the fence and tried to climb. My weak arms could barely pull me up. Mom was walking across the yard now, still talking.
About curses and love and sacrifice, about making hard choices to protect the ones who mattered. about February 29th and the magic of leap years. Mason appeared in the doorway behind her. He saw the knife and started running. Mom turned at his footsteps and raised the blade, not at him, at herself, pressed it to her own throat.
She said, “If I didn’t come back, she’d have to take my place.” The curse demanded blood. If not mine, then hers. And after her, Mason, then Luke, then Dad, until the debt was paid. I let go of the fence and turned to face her. Mason had stopped moving, hands raised like he was approaching a wild animal, which wasn’t far from the truth.
Dad stumbled outside, bourbon bottle in hand, trying to process the scene. Luke peered from behind him, eyes wide with terror. “Mom smiled at me, her special girl. Her leap year baby. Come inside, she said. Let her fix everything. One small ritual and we’d be a normal family. She’d take her medication.
Dad would stop drinking. The boys would have their sister. All I had to do was trust her. I took a step toward her, then another. Mason shook his head frantically, but what choice did I have? Mom’s hand was steady on the knife. She would do it. The voices in her head would make sure of that. But as I got closer, I saw something in her eyes. Not madness, fear. She was terrified of me, of what I represented. Not a curse or demon, but proof of dad’s betrayal.
Evidence of her failure as a wife. A living reminder that her perfect family was a lie. I stopped just out of reach. Mom’s smile faltered. She pressed the knife harder against her throat, a bead of blood appearing. Last chance, she said. Come willingly or watch her die. Watch them all die.
The curse would take everyone I’d tried to protect. That’s when Luke did something unexpected. He walked past Dad, past Mason, right up to mom, took her free hand in his small one, told her I wasn’t scary anymore. He’d been wrong before. I was just a girl, his sister.
Couldn’t we keep her? Mom looked down at him, confusion replacing certainty. The knife wavered. Luke kept talking in his little boy voice about how lonely I must have been, how brave I was to survive, how he wanted to show me his toys and games, how we could all be together now. The knife fell from mom’s hand. She collapsed to her knees, pulling Luke against her, sobbing. The madness broke like a fever, leaving her shaking and lost. Dad finally moved, kicking the knife away and helping her to her feet.
Mason ran to me, wrapping his jacket around my shoulders. We stood there in the backyard, a broken family in the moonlight. Mom clung to Dad and Luke, whispering apologies that made no sense. I leaned against Mason, legs too weak to stand alone.
Nobody spoke about tomorrow, about my birthday, about what came next. Dad half carried mom inside while Luke held her hand. Mason helped me follow, supporting most of my weight. The house felt different now, still a prison, but the locks were breaking. The walls were crumbling. The secrets were spilling out like blood from wounds.
Mom sat at the kitchen table where she’d fed me cookies hours ago. Dad poured her medication into his palm, watched her swallow each med. She kept looking at me with bewildered eyes like she was seeing me for the first time. Not a curse or demon, just a broken girl she’d helped break further. Mason made sandwiches nobody ate.
Lou brought down one of his stuffed animals and placed it in my lap. A small gesture that meant everything. Dad opened a new bottle but put it down untouched. We sat in silence as the clock ticked toward midnight. Toward February 29th toward my fifth real birthday. Mom finally spoke, voice raw from crying. She asked my name.
In 16 years, she’d never given me one. I was always it or the thing or the curse. I didn’t have an answer. How do you name yourself when you’ve never existed? Mason suggested we figure it out tomorrow.
Mom’s medication working means she’s calm enough to offer cookies, but she’s still talking about blood ways to break curses. That’s a really strange mix of normal mom behavior and dangerous thinking that makes me wonder what’s actually going on in her mind right now. On my birthday, my real birthday where I got to exist. Mom nodded slowly. Medication already softening her edges.
Dad agreed, words slightly slurred, but sincere. Luke said he had a book of baby names in his room. The clock struck midnight. February 29th began. My fifth birthday. I waited for mom to remember her ritual, her blood ways, but she just stared at her hands folded on the table. The voices were quiet, she said. For the first time in years, they were quiet.
We stayed up until dawn, not talking much, just existing in the same space. A family gathered around a table, pretending to be normal. When sunlight finally came through the windows, it found us all asleep where we sat. Mom’s head on dad’s shoulder. Luke curled in her lap, Mason and I leaning against each other. I woke to the smell of pancakes. Dad was at the stove, sober for once, trying to remember how to cook.
Mom sat where we’d left her, but her eyes were clear. She watched me with something like wonder, like she was seeing a miracle instead of a mistake. Luke bounced into the kitchen with his name book. He’d marked pages with sticky notes, collected possibilities. Emma, he suggested, or Sophia, or Lily. Pretty names for a pretty sister.
Mom flinched at the word sister, but didn’t correct him. Mason brought down clothes from the donation bag in the garage. Real clothes that almost fit. He helped me to the bathroom, stood guard while I took my first real shower. Hot water felt like magic on my skin. Soap smelled like freedom.
When I came back downstairs, mom had set five places at the table. Five plates, five forks, five cups, a place for everyone, including me. She met my eyes and nodded toward a chair, my chair, at her table. In her kitchen, we ate pancakes and careful silence. Dad kept refilling coffee cups.
Luke chattered about school and friends and normal things. Mason watched mom for signs of breaking, but she just sat there, occasionally looking at me like I was a puzzle she couldn’t solve. After breakfast, she asked if I wanted to see my birth certificate, the real one, not the death certificate they’d filed.
She’d kept it hidden all these years, proof I existed, even when she pretended I didn’t. She brought out a small box from her room, hands shaking slightly. Inside were documents, photos, a hospital bracelet. Evidence of my first day of life before the basement became my world. The birth certificate had a name I’d never heard. Grace.
My mother had named me Grace before she died, before dad brought me home to his wife. Mom touched the paper gently. She said, “Grace was a good name, a strong name. Maybe I could keep it. Maybe we could start over. She looked at dad when she said it and he nodded. Mason squeezed my hand under the table.
Luke asked if grace meant I was graceful because I walked funny. The normaly of his question made everyone laugh. Broken, careful laughter, but laughter nonetheless. Mom smiled and for a moment I saw who she might have been without the sickness, who she could maybe be again with help. The day passed strangely. Mom took her medication every 4 hours. Dad didn’t touch alcohol. And my brothers taught me things.
How to use a computer, how to play video games, how to exist in spaces that weren’t underground. My legs grew stronger with each hour of movement. But as evening approached, mom grew restless. The voices were whispering again, she said, reminding her of things, of dangers, of curses. She kept looking at me with growing fear. Medication fighting a losing battle against 16 years of delusion. Dad noticed first. He suggested, “Mom, go rest, take extra pills, but she shook her head.
The 29th was almost over. Tomorrow, I would disappear again. That’s how it worked. Leap year babies only existed on their day. She had to put me back before midnight or the curse would spread.” Mason tried reasoning with her. Luke held her hand. Dad begged her to remember the progress we’d made, but the sickness was stronger than logic. She stood up, swaying slightly, and said it was time. Time to go back downstairs. Time to be safe.
Time to protect the real family from the fake daughter. I could have run. My legs were strong enough now. But I saw the knife lock behind her. Saw her fingers twitch toward it. Saw my family tense with fear. So I stood up too, nodded, said, “Okay, I understood. One more night in the basement. We could talk tomorrow.” Mom’s face crumpled with relief. She hadn’t wanted to force me. She wasn’t a monster, she said, just a mother protecting her children.
I was special, different. I needed special care. The basement was for my own good, our own good. I walked toward the door, each step measured. Mason grabbed my arm, shaking his head, but I whispered that it was okay. One night, let her calm down. Let the medication work. Tomorrow, we’d try again. He let go reluctantly.
At the basement door, I turned back. Mom stood there ringing her hands. Dad beside her looking defeated. Luke was crying again. Mason’s fists were clenched. My family, my broken, beautiful family. I told Mom I forgave her for the basement, for the darkness, for the years of being nothing. I understood she was sick. That the voices lied to her. That she did what she thought was right.
Her face crumbled and she rushed forward, pulling me into the first hug of my life. She smelled like soap and sadness. Her arms were burned thin around me. She whispered apologies into my hair. Sorry, sorry, sorry. Over and over. When she pulled back, her eyes were clear. The real her, not the sick her. She touched my face gently and said, “No, no more basement.
No more hiding. I was her daughter, Grace. I belonged upstairs. The clock chimed 11:30, 30 minutes left of February 29th of my birthday, of my existence, according to her delusion. Mom looked at the clock, then at me. The voices screamed in her head. I could see it in her eyes, but she turned away from the basement door. We went to the living room instead.
All five of us sat together on the couch like a real family. Mom held my hand on one side, Mason on the other, Dad put his arm around mom, Luke curled up against my other side. We watched the clock, waiting. 11:45. Mom’s grip tightened. The voices were getting louder. She whispered, telling her horrible things. What would happen when midnight came? How the curse would consume us all? how she’d failed to protect her real children from the imposttor. 11:50 Mom was shaking now.
Dad tried to soo her, but she pulled away. The medication wasn’t working anymore. 16 years of delusion were stronger than a few pills. She stood up, pacing. We all watched her, tense, waiting for the break. 11:55 Mom stopped pacing. Looked at me with wild eyes. Said she was sorry. So sorry, but she couldn’t risk it. Couldn’t risk them. Started moving toward the kitchen, toward the knives. Mason jumped up to stop her. Dad followed.
Luke clung to me, terrified. I sat frozen, watching my family fracture again. Mom screaming about curses and protection. Dad begging her to remember her pills. Mason blocking her path to the kitchen. 11:58. Mom broke free and ran. Not to the kitchen, to the front door, threw it open, and stumbled into the night.
We all followed, calling her name. She stood in the middle of the street, arms spread wide, looking at the sky. 11:59 Mom turned back to us. Her face was peaceful now. She said the voices had told her the truth. The only way to break the curse was to remove herself. She was the poison, not me.
Her sickness had stolen 16 years from an innocent child, had turned her family into prisoners. The curse was her, and she could end it. The clock began to chime midnight. Mom smiled at me, called me Grace, said she loved me. Then she turned and ran, not down the street, straight across, toward the highway at the end of our neighborhood. Dad sprinted after her, surprisingly fast for a hammered. Mason grabbed Luke and me, holding us back.
We heard the screech of breaks, dad’s shout, then silence. March 1st arrived. I still existed. The curse was broken, but at a cost none of us had imagined. We stood in the doorway of our broken home, waiting for sirens, waiting for dad to come back, waiting for mom, but knowing somehow that only one would return. Mason held us tighter.
Luke buried his face in my shoulder. I stared at the empty street and wondered if this was freedom or just another kind of prison. If surviving meant others had to fall, if love could exist without sacrifice. The sirens came eventually. Dad came back eventually, supported by paramedics. Mom didn’t come back. The leap year baby had survived her fifth birthday, but the family that had hidden her away was gone.
In its place stood something new, fragile, uncertain, but real. We went inside to wait for the police to answer questions to figure out what came next. Five chairs around the table, but only four people now. The empty seat stared at us, accusing. Mom’s final gift, her last protection.
She’d removed herself from the equation, leaving us to solve for whatever came next. The police arrived within minutes, their questions careful and routine. Dad explained the basics while Mason kept Luke and me in the living room. The officers took notes, made calls, arranged for someone to drive dad to the hospital.
standard procedure for what they classified as a mental health crisis ending in tragedy. Child services showed up the next morning. A tired-l looking woman with kind eyes who sat at our kitchen table asking gentle questions. Dad had sobered up enough to answer coherently. Mason spoke for all of us when needed. Luke clung to my hand throughout the interview.
The woman examined my birth certificate. The death certificate mom had filed. The medical records dad produced from a hidden folder. She made phone calls, consulted supervisors, typed endless notes on her laptop.
By afternoon, she’d arranged for emergency custody papers, medical evaluations, and trauma counseling referrals. Grace is quite the name for someone who spent 16 years fed through a slot. Moms showing real growth between the medication doses and midnight deadline pressure cooker. The next weeks blurred together in a haze of appointments and adjustments. Doctors marveled at my physical condition after 16 years of confinement. Malnutrition had stunted my growth, left my bones brittle and muscles weak. Physical therapy three times a week.
Nutritionist consultations, blood tests revealing vitamin deficiencies that would take months to correct. Dad threw out every bottle in the house. Not dramatically, just quietly bagging them up one morning while we ate breakfast.
He started attending meetings at the community center, coming home with coffee on his breath instead of bourbon. His hands shook for days, but he pushed through. Mason returned to school, but struggled to focus. Teachers sent notes home about his dropping grades, his withdrawn behavior. He’d sit in my room after dinner, helping me with the educational assessment tests the state required.
16 years of self-eing had left strange gaps in my knowledge. I could analyze complex literature, but had never seen basic math. Luke surprised everyone by adapting fastest. He brought friends over to meet his new sister, explaining matterof factly that I’d been sick, but was better now.
Kids accepted the lie easier than adults would have. He taught me playground games in the backyard, patient when my coordination failed. The house felt different without mom. Her absence was a physical thing, a mom-shaped hole in every room. Dad packed her belongings slowly, one box at a time. Some days he’d stop midfold, staring at a dress or photograph, lost in memories of who she’d been before the sickness took hold.
I found her medication bottles hidden throughout the house, behind books, inside shoe boxes, tucked under bathroom sinks. Evidence of her struggle to stay well, to fight the voices that ultimately won. Dad flushed them all, jaw tight with old anger and fresh grief. Physical recovery came slowly. First walking to the mailbox without stopping, then around the block.
Mason or dad always beside me, ready to catch me when my legs gave out. Neighbors stared sometimes recognizing dad and the boys, but puzzled by the pale girl who moved like an elderly woman. The story we told was simple. I’d been ill, hospitalized for years, finally well enough to come home. People accepted it because the alternative was too horrible to consider. The nice family in the yellow house couldn’t have kept a child in the basement.
That only happened in horror movies. Summer arrived with challenges. The sun hurt my eyes, burned my pale skin within minutes. We bought sunglasses, long sleeves, industrial strength sunscreen. I learned to exist in daylight through careful increments. Building tolerance like a vampire in reverse. Dad found a job at a warehouse. Early morning shifts that paid enough to cover basics.
He came home tired but sober, pride replacing the shame that had lived in his eyes for years. Mason got a part-time job at the grocery store, saving for college he’d once assumed was impossible. I started online school, laptop provided by the state. The screen hurt my eyes at first. The rapid flow of information overwhelming after years of silence, but learning became my substance. Each completed lesson proved that I was more than the ghost in the basement. The house slowly transformed.
Dad painted over the water stains on the ceiling. Mason fixed the broken steps. Luke helped me decorate my room, the first real bedroom I’d ever had. We hung posters, arranged stuffed animals he’d outgrown, created a space that belonged to grace instead of the nameless girl who’d lived below. Some nights were harder than others.
I’d wake screaming from nightmares of walls closing in, of endless darkness. Dad would find me huddled in the corner, counting scratches on imaginary walls. He’d sit with me until dawn, not speaking, just existing in the same space until the panic passed. Mason struggled with guilt that ate at him like acid. He’d known for 9 years could have freed me anytime. The weight of those lost years bent his shoulders, aged his face. No amount of reassurance eased his burden.
Some wounds don’t heal clean. Luke had nightmares, too. The basement door featured prominently mom’s wild eyes. the knife pressed to her throat. He’d crawl into my bed after bad dreams, needing proof I still existed. We’d lie awake inventing stories about normal families, boring lives, mothers who took their pills. Fall brought new challenges.
School registration for next year, immunization records that didn’t exist, social security number that had been flagged as deceased. Dad spent hours on phone calls, filling out forms, proving I was alive to bureaucrats who moved at glacial pace. The basement remained sealed. Dad had boarded it shut the day after mom died, declaring it off limits.
But I could feel it breathing beneath us, containing 16 years of scratched walls and darkness. Some days the urge to go down there overwhelmed me, to count the marks, to remember, to prove it had been real. Mason caught me at the door once, hammer in hand. He didn’t ask why, just took the tool away and suggested we go for a walk instead.
We made it three blocks before my legs gave out. But it was progress. Everything was progress when you started from nothing. Dad joined a grief support group at the community center. He never talked about what was said there. But he came home lighter somehow. The deep lines around his eyes softened. He started cooking again, remembering recipes from before mom got sick, before everything went wrong. Winter arrived with new fears.
The darkness came early, stayed late, too familiar, too much like the basement. We strung lights everywhere, kept lamps burning in every room. The electric bill tripled, but dad paid it without complaint. Light was medicine now. I turned 17 in December. My first birthday that wasn’t on February 29th. Dad made a cake. Mason hung streamers. Luke invited his friends. A normal party for a girl who’d never been normal. When they sang Happy Birthday, I cried for everything I’d missed and everything still ahead.
The therapist said trauma recovery wasn’t linear. Good days and bad days were normal. Healing happened in spirals, not straight lines. She taught me coping strategies, grounding techniques, ways to exist in a world that still felt too big and bright and loud. Mason graduated high school with honors nobody expected.
Dad cried at the ceremony, pride overwhelming the grief for once. Luke performed in the winter concert, voice clear and strong. I sat between them in the auditorium, marveling at the ordinariness of it all. Christmas came with careful joy. We decorated a small tree, hung stockings, attempted normal. Dad stayed sober through the family gatherings mom had always hosted. Relatives asked about her in hushed tones.
The story was heart attack, sudden, tragic, easier than the truth. January brought college applications for Mason. He decided on engineering, practical, and promising. He worked on essays at the kitchen table, asking my opinion on word choices. I helped where I could. Proud of the brother who’d risked everything to free me. My physical therapy graduated to gym membership. Treadmills and weight machines building strength in measured increments.
Other members avoided the skeletal girl who moved so carefully. I didn’t mind. Invisibility felt safer than scrutiny. Dad met someone at his grief group, a widow named Vicki who’ lost her husband to cancer. She came for dinner one night, nervous and kind.
Luke chattered through the meal while Mason and I watched Dad smile in ways we’d forgotten he could. February approached with familiar dread. My body remembered even if my mind tried to forget. The 28th came with phantom walls closing in, darkness pressing against my eyes. Dad found me in the bathroom at 3:00 a.m. scratching at the tiles, counting to 1,461. But February 29th didn’t come.
Wasn’t a leap year. The first March 1st in four years where I didn’t have to exist. Where I could just be. Dad made pancakes anyway. A new tradition. Celebrating ordinary days because we’d lost too many of them. Spring returned with genuine progress. I passed my GED on the first try.
Mason got accepted to State University with partial scholarship. Luke made the baseball team. Dad and Vicki grew closer, careful and slow. Life accumulated in small victories. The basement door remained sealed. Sometimes I forgot it was there. Other times it pulled at me like gravity. But I stayed upstairs where light lived, where family gathered, where grace was learning to exist every day instead of just on leap years.
One year after mom died, we held a small memorial. Not for the woman who’d locked me away, but for the mother she’d been before sickness stole her mind. Dad shared stories of their early years. Mason remembered bedtime songs. Luke talked about cookies and hugs. I listened. Learning about the stranger who’d shaped my life through absence. Pizza on the floor just hits different when you’ve spent 16 years eating through a slot. Grace is out here truly living her best life now.