Motherly love transfer

My daughter treated me like her worst enemy.

I enrolled her in piano lessons, and she accused me of wanting to parade her on stage for others' amusement.

She wanted to meet a guy she met online, but I forbade it. She screamed that I was violating her freedom.

She won first place in a national piano competition, her future bright, but in a public interview, she claimed I only saw her as a money-making machine.

Later, when I had a heart attack, she flushed my medication down the toilet, saying I deserved to die.

Reborn, I sold the expensive piano and stopped paying for her lessons.

I watched her fall from grace, unmoved.

And then, she regretted everything.

1

I woke up to a text from her piano teacher.

"Mrs. Miller, Claire’s tuition for next semester is due. It's $4,800, same as usual.”

"Also, has she been preoccupied lately? She's been on her phone during lessons and hasn't practiced. Her assignments haven't been done for two weeks."

"At this rate, she won't even qualify for the national competition, let alone win."

"Please talk to her. Her future is at stake."

Staring at the familiar words, my breath hitched. Last time, I’d received this same message.

I’d asked Claire what was going on, and she told me she’d met a guy online, ten years older than her, and they were planning to meet.

She was a minor. This online relationship was a recipe for disaster. I refused to let her throw herself into the fire.

She’d thrown a tantrum, threatened to kill herself if I didn’t let her see him, and smashed her nearly brand-new piano with a wrench. The piano, a $10,000 gift for her sixteenth birthday.

Of course, I hadn't relented.

I paid a fortune to repair the piano, made her delete the dating app, paid her tuition, and supervised her practice every day.

Through sheer force of will, she won the national competition six months later, impressing the judges and securing a scholarship to a prestigious music school. Her future seemed limitless.

I’d watched my daughter, crowned with victory, feeling immensely proud.

Then, in the post-competition interview, she’d tearfully accused me of unspeakable cruelty.

She said I was the person she hated most.

That piano lessons were just a way for me to exploit her talent.

That I’d driven away her father and grandmother, keeping her from her loved ones.

That I’d forbidden her from true love, forcing her to break up on pain of death.

That I was poor and desperate, pinning all my hopes on her becoming my cash cow.

Her voice cracked with emotion, moving the reporters to tears.

Watching the interview on TV, rage and shock triggered a heart attack.

Claire was right beside me. As I struggled to breathe, she’d calmly flushed my medication down the drain, her face a mask of malice and triumphant revenge.

“Don’t bother. You should have died a long time ago.”

Those were the last words I heard.

My spirit floated above, watching her call 911, feigning grief as paramedics took my body away for futile resuscitati...