Rue was just a young girl, barely adult, but she had already experienced more hardship than most adults. Her life was filled with chaos and turmoil, with her parents separating and her sister having to take care of her. Rue often felt like she was invisible, lost in the shuffle of her dysfunctional family. her disabilitie didn't make it any better

Rue... what are you doing? diana

asked, pulling on Rue's hand.

"Why do you have so much trouble not staying on your feet?" Rachael continued. "You need a cane! You don't have to be so stubborn about it! I know Mom wants me to take care of you, but you have to let me take care of you! You know ?"

There was an urgency to her voice, an anger, which made Rue look into her older sister's eyes. They looked so tired and worried. Like they'd seen too much of pain already. Like they'd seen too much of death itself. And that thought was enough to make Rue feel terrible for pushing away all of her efforts to help her.

Even now as a teenager, she still felt like a failure at being good enough for Diana or the rest of her family. But when she saw how tired diana looked... she knew that diana would never say anything like that if it weren't true. So she swallowed down her self pity and tried her best to smile. "Okay... okay, okay. I'm sorry…" she said sheepishly. She took one more step forward and leaned her weight against diana. "...but you can't force me to use a cane…"

Diana gave Rue a hug and whispered something reassuring. But there was no way Rue could ignore it. Something about that hug reminded her of what happened when she was little... the way diana hugged her after she'd done something wrong. She'd been such a brat back then. She'd pushed everything out from her mind, put all her energy into making sure that the things she'd done weren't

forgotten. That she wasn't ignored or abandoned. "I need to tell you something" Diana whispered again, and her face fell into her hands. She started mumbling to herself. A string of words through sobs

"mom wants you back"

The words sent a chill through Rue. Her heart dropped and she quickly pulled herself out of diana's arms. "Mom?" she asked weakly. "But… what does she want?"

"She wants..." diana choked, before looking up at Rue, her dark brown eyes filled with tears. "...she wants you back..."