The youngest sister was hurtful and awful towards the MC, but at the same time I honestly can't fault her too much when her whole life everyone else in their family shunned and treated MC horribly. She's still just a kid who is easily influenced by her surroundings. She's starting to realise that her oldest sister was the only one who truly cared about her in that house, but she's been taught to ignore those things and do whatever she can to be accepted by her other family, not realising how toxic/abusive they really are.
Like, we see here that their family isn't good only to Leticia. You're only accepted and given love if you prove yourself useful and act the same as most of the family. Some kids' defense mechanism in abusive families with siblings is to focus on protecting themself first, and I can't blame that too much on the kid. They're in a shitty situation that they can't control. That is why I believe that the youngest sibling deserves to be given another chance, though I'm not sure if the author will go that route, sadly. After all, it's much easier to portray the whole family to be villains without any redemption.
Fyi, I'm the sibling who was thrown into trouble often by a younger sibling when I was younger. I wasn't aware of this until these recent years as she confessed and apologised to me. I didn't blame her, bc I'm aware of what our parents are like + I always was the one to tell them to stop fighting or willingly went ahead and made my parents' frustrations focus on me to protect the youngest of my siblings, so I know some of it has to do with my personality as well. Honestly, before we talked, I was completely prepared and had already accepted if my sibling wanted to go no contact with the whole family, including me. I honestly thought she had some trauma/resentment from our childhood that was partially caused by me (I was a menace), and was just glad that wasn't the case. She and our relationship started getting better after she moved out with her gf and lived away from our parents.
This was something we couldn't have talked about before our late teens, as I never realised how bad my parents were until my exchange year. I had two different host families in the span of 8 months, and I just remember thinking "so this is what a family is supposed to be like" at some point.
So, that's why I don't blame the youngest. She's still a kid and has time to change and learn to be better, but she needs to get out of that house first.
The youngest sister was hurtful and awful towards the MC, but at the same time I honestly can't fault her too much when her whole life everyone else in their family shunned and treated MC horribly. She's still just a kid who is easily influenced by her surroundings. She's starting to realise that her oldest sister was the only one who truly cared about her in that house, but she's been taught to ignore those things and do whatever she can to be accepted by her other family, not realising how toxic/abusive they really are.
Like, we see here that their family isn't good only to Leticia. You're only accepted and given love if you prove yourself useful and act the same as most of the family. Some kids' defense mechanism in abusive families with siblings is to focus on protecting themself first, and I can't blame that too much on the kid. They're in a shitty situation that they can't control. That is why I believe that the youngest sibling deserves to be given another chance, though I'm not sure if the author will go that route, sadly. After all, it's much easier to portray the whole family to be villains without any redemption.
Fyi, I'm the sibling who was thrown into trouble often by a younger sibling when I was younger. I wasn't aware of this until these recent years as she confessed and apologised to me. I didn't blame her, bc I'm aware of what our parents are like + I always was the one to tell them to stop fighting or willingly went ahead and made my parents' frustrations focus on me to protect the youngest of my siblings, so I know some of it has to do with my personality as well. Honestly, before we talked, I was completely prepared and had already accepted if my sibling wanted to go no contact with the whole family, including me. I honestly thought she had some trauma/resentment from our childhood that was partially caused by me (I was a menace), and was just glad that wasn't the case. She and our relationship started getting better after she moved out with her gf and lived away from our parents.
This was something we couldn't have talked about before our late teens, as I never realised how bad my parents were until my exchange year. I had two different host families in the span of 8 months, and I just remember thinking "so this is what a family is supposed to be like" at some point.
So, that's why I don't blame the youngest. She's still a kid and has time to change and learn to be better, but she needs to get out of that house first.