The Day I Stopped Being Their ATM

My name is Esteban. I’m twenty-seven years old, and this is the story of how I stopped being a human ATM and started being a man.

Those words still echo in my mind: “Eighty percent of your salary goes to your sister, and twenty percent goes to me. Simple as that.” My father spoke them with the casual authority of someone announcing the weather, a beer in his weathered hand, his bloodshot eyes daring me to challenge him.

For years, I had swallowed my rage like bitter medicine, bound by a promise to my absent mother to take care of them. But in that moment, hearing my entire life reduced to a mathematical equation that left me with nothing, something inside me finally snapped.

I looked him straight in the eye and laughed—a sound that started deep in my chest and erupted into the quiet dining room like broken glass. “No,” I said, my voice steady despite the hurricane building inside me. “I’ll keep one hundred percent and leave. And you two can pay your own bills. Simple as that.”

The House of Thin Walls

I grew up in a house with thin walls, where my father’s drunken laughter with his unemployed friends and my sister’s endless phone conversations were the soundtrack to my exhaustion. The small concrete structure on the outskirts of town had been our family home for as long as I could remember, with its cracked floors, leaking roof, and the persistent smell of cigarettes and stale beer.

My mother, Carmen, had been a nurse at the local clinic, working double shifts to keep us fed and the lights on. She was a small woman with calloused hands and tired eyes, but she had dreams bigger than our cramped house and our limited circumstances.

When I was fifteen, she got an offer to work at a private hospital in Spain. The salary was four times what she made locally, enough to send money home and still build a future for herself. I remember the night she told us, sitting at our worn kitchen table with a letter in her hands and tears in her eyes.

“It’s temporary,” she said, though we all knew that wasn’t entirely true. “Maybe two years, three at most. Esteban, you’re the eldest. You’re the man of the house now. Take care of your father and your sister.”

Like a fool, I took those words as sacred law.

She left on a Tuesday morning, dragging a single suitcase and promising to call every week. My father drove her to the bus station in his battered pickup truck, and when he came back, he opened a beer and settled into his favorite chair like a king claiming his throne.

“Well, mijo,” he said, using the affectionate term that somehow sounded hollow coming from his lips, “looks like it’s just us men now. You’ll have to step up, help out with things around here.”

At fifteen, I thought he meant temporarily. I thought he was grieving, adjusting, finding his footing as a single parent. I had no idea I was watching the birth of a parasite.

The Factory Years

When I turned eighteen and it became clear that my father had no intention of returning to work, I knew college was out of the question. While my classmates filled out university applications and dreamed of careers, I walked into Industrias Moderna, a packaging factory on the industrial side of town, and begged for a job.

The work was mind-numbing and back-breaking. Eight hours a day standing at a conveyor belt, sealing cardboard boxes that contained products I’d never be able to afford. The factory floor was loud with machinery and thick with chemical smells that clung to my clothes and hair long after my shift ended.

My starting salary was barely above minimum wage, but it was steady income. Every Friday, I would cash my paycheck and hand the entire amount to my father. He would count the bills with the practiced efficiency of a bank teller, then nod his approval.

“This is good, Esteban. This covers the rent and utilities. Your mother sends money for food and other expenses, so we’re covered.”

But there was always something that didn’t add up. My mother’s remittances should have been enough to cover everything comfortably, yet my entire salary was apparently needed just to keep the lights on and the rent paid. When I asked about it, my father would wave his hand dismissively.

“You don’t understand how expensive it is to run a household, mijo. There are always unexpected costs, repairs, emergencies. Trust me, we need every peso you bring home.”

Meanwhile, my younger sister Claudia, who was twenty at the time, worked part-time at a trendy clothing boutique in the mall. Her job was more social activity than employment—she spent her shifts chatting with friends who dropped by, trying on clothes, and planning her weekend activities.

Her paychecks, which were about half of what I made despite working fewer hours, went entirely to what she called “personal expenses.” Designer clothes, cosmetics, cover charges for the nightclubs she frequented with her friends, taxi rides home at dawn because she was too drunk to take the bus.

“Esteban, don’t be such a bore,” she would say when I suggested she contribute to household expenses. “I’m young. I deserve to have fun. Besides, that’s what big brothers are for, right?”

Our father always supported her position. “Your sister is a princess, Esteban. I’m not going to make her work herself to death like some common laborer. You’re young and strong. This is your responsibility.”

The division of labor in our house was clear and unchanging: I worked and paid bills, Claudia played and looked beautiful, and our father supervised both activities from his permanent position in the living room chair, surrounded by empty beer bottles and friends who seemed to have unlimited time for afternoon drinking sessions.

When I came home each evening, exhausted and smelling of industrial chemicals, I was expected to help with dinner preparation, cleaning, and any repairs the house needed. Claudia would breeze in hours later, smelling of expensive perfume and freedom, and head straight to her room without acknowledging the domestic work that kept her life comfortable.

“Oh, Esteban, don’t be such a nag,” she would say if I asked her to wash a dish or help with laundry. “That’s what you’re here for. I have more important things to do.”

The Slow Burn

For five years, this became my normal. I would wake at five-thirty, shower quickly in our tiny bathroom with its broken tiles and unreliable hot water, drink instant coffee with stale bread, and catch the first bus to the factory. I would work my eight-hour shift, take another bus home, and arrive to find my father holding court with his drinking buddies and Claudia getting ready for another night out.

My father’s friends treated me with the casual condescension reserved for servants. They would nod when I walked through the living room, sometimes asking me to bring them beers from the refrigerator or to turn up the volume on the television. I was invisible except when they needed something.

“Gustavo, your boy is a good worker,” I would overhear them saying. “Very responsible. You’re lucky to have a son who takes care of everything.”

My father would puff up with pride, as if my labor was his personal achievement. “That’s what sons are for,” he would reply. “I raised him right. He understands family obligations.”

The rage built slowly, like water behind a dam. Small indignities accumulated into larger resentments, but I pushed them down, telling myself this was temporary, that things would change, that I was being a good son and brother.

Every few months, my mother would call from Spain, her voice crackling through the poor connection. She would ask about everyone’s health, about my father’s job search, about Claudia’s studies. I learned to lie smoothly during these conversations.

“Everything’s fine, Mama. Papa is looking for work, but you know how the economy is. Claudia is doing well at school. We’re all managing fine.”

I never told her that my father had stopped looking for work after the first month, that Claudia had dropped out of her secretarial course to focus on her social life, or that I was supporting the entire household while being treated like hired help.

During her calls, my father would take the phone and report on our family’s progress with the enthusiasm of a successful patriarch. He would mention my job at the factory, but always in terms that made it sound like character-building rather than economic necessity.

“The boy is learning the value of hard work,” he would say. “It’s good for him to understand responsibility at a young age.”

He never mentioned that his own understanding of responsibility had apparently ended the day my mother’s first remittance arrived.

The Promotion Path

What my family didn’t know was that I was good at my job. Really good. While my father and sister saw me as a perpetual laborer destined for minimum wage work, I was quietly building skills and proving my value to management.

I arrived early, stayed late when needed, and never called in sick. I learned every aspect of the packaging process, from inventory management to quality control. When supervisors needed someone reliable for special projects, they called on me.

Within two years, I was promoted to line supervisor, with a modest increase in salary that I never mentioned at home. Two years after that, I became inventory manager, responsible for coordinating supplies and managing workflow. The pay increase was more substantial, but again, I kept this information to myself.

I had learned that any improvement in my circumstances would immediately become an opportunity for my family to extract more resources from me. If they knew I was making more money, they would simply increase their demands proportionally.

Instead, I continued giving them the same amount I had provided from my first paycheck, and I opened a savings account at a bank across town where I deposited the difference. Every month, I would take the bus to the other side of the city, make my deposit, and carefully hide the account statements in a sealed plastic bag at the bottom of my work locker.

By my fifth year at the factory, I had been promoted to operations manager, overseeing multiple production lines and managing a staff of forty people. My salary was now seven times what I had started with—more money than I had ever dreamed of having access to.

But my life at home remained exactly the same. I slept in the same small room with the squeaky single bed and the broken window that let in street noise and morning light. Claudia occupied the largest bedroom, which now featured a new television, sound system, and furniture that I had unknowingly purchased through my contributions to “household expenses.”

My father’s daily routine never varied: wake up around noon, spend the afternoon drinking with friends, watch television until late, fall asleep in his chair, and repeat the cycle the next day. When he needed another beer from the refrigerator, he would call out “Esteban, bring me a cold one,” without looking away from whatever program was playing.

Like a trained dog, I would comply, handing him the bottle and returning to whatever household task I had been performing. The thank-you was always perfunctory, delivered with the assumption that my service was both expected and deserved.

The Discovery

The beginning of the end came on a Friday afternoon when I made a crucial mistake. I had been reviewing quarterly production reports in my office, and I had printed out my pay stub to check some figures related to a budget meeting the following week.

In my haste to leave work and catch the early bus home, I left the printed document on my desk, clearly visible to anyone who entered my small office.

I came home that evening to find Claudia waiting for me in my room, holding the paper in her manicured hand like a prosecutor presenting evidence of a crime. Her eyes blazed with a mixture of shock and absolute fury.

“Is this what they pay you?” she demanded, waving the pay stub in front of my face. “Esteban, you’re earning a fortune and giving us scraps! How dare you hold out on your own family!”

I tried to maintain the calm tone I had perfected over years of managing workplace conflicts. “Claudia, that money is mine. I’ve been paying for everything in this house since I was eighteen. You and Papa don’t contribute anything. What more do you want from me?”

She laughed as if my words were the height of absurdity. “Yours? This is a family, Esteban. What you earn belongs to all of us. That’s how families work. I’m going to tell Papa about this right now.”

“You don’t understand—” I began, but she was already marching out of my room, the pay stub clutched in her fist like a weapon she couldn’t wait to use.

The Confrontation

That evening, my father summoned me to the dining room with the formal tone he reserved for serious disciplinary matters. He sat in his usual chair at the head of our small table, his face flushed red with alcohol and indignation. Claudia stood beside him with her arms crossed, wearing the triumphant expression of someone who had finally caught their enemy in an act of betrayal.

The pay stub lay on the table between us like evidence in a courtroom trial.

“What’s this about you making so much money?” my father demanded, his voice slurred but full of authority. “Do you think you can fool your own family? Do you think we’re idiots?”

I took a deep breath, trying to summon the patience that had carried me through years of similar conversations. “Papa, that’s my money. I’ve been paying the bills for this house for almost ten years. Claudia doesn’t contribute anything to household expenses. You spend your days drinking instead of working. Don’t you think I deserve to keep some of my earnings for myself?”

He let out a harsh laugh that filled the small dining room with its bitterness. “Deserve? Let me explain how this works, Esteban. Your sister wants to study at the most prestigious private university in the capital. That’s going to cost serious money—tuition, books, housing, living expenses. And I have my own needs, my own expenses that you clearly don’t understand or appreciate.”

He leaned forward, his bloodshot eyes boring into mine with an intensity that might have intimidated me when I was eighteen but now just made me tired.

“So here’s what’s going to happen from now on. Eighty percent of your salary will go to Claudia for her education and personal needs. Twenty percent will go to me for my expenses and for managing this household. That leaves you with enough for your basic necessities. It’s simple mathematics.”

I stared at him, struggling to process the sheer audacity of what he had just proposed. Eighty percent for Claudia, twenty percent for him, and zero percent for me. The person who had been supporting the entire household for nearly a decade would now be working for free while his sister attended private university and his father continued his daily drinking routine.

The rage that I had been suppressing for years erupted from somewhere deep in my chest, but instead of coming out as anger, it emerged as laughter. Hysterical, uncontrollable laughter that echoed off the walls of our small dining room and seemed to go on forever.

“What the hell are you laughing at?” my father demanded, his voice rising to match the volume of my laughter.

“I’m laughing,” I said, wiping tears from my eyes, “because I’m finally done. Done supporting two parasites who have convinced themselves they’re entitled to everything I work for. Done listening to your drunken lectures about family responsibility. Done pretending that what we have here is a family instead of an elaborate scam designed to extract money from the only person stupid enough to keep paying.”

The room went completely silent except for the sound of my father’s heavy breathing and the distant noise of traffic outside our thin walls.

“You know what, Papa?” I continued, my voice now steady and calm in a way that felt foreign to my own ears. “You’re right about one thing. It is simple. I’m keeping one hundred percent of my salary, and I’m leaving. You and Claudia can figure out how to pay your own bills. It’s that simple.”

The Liberation

My father’s face cycled through a range of emotions—shock, disbelief, rage, and finally something that might have been fear. “You don’t make the decisions in this house, Esteban! You have obligations to this family! You can’t just walk away from your responsibilities!”

“Watch me,” I said, standing up from the table with more confidence than I had felt in years.

I walked to my room and began throwing clothes into a duffle bag I had bought years earlier but never had occasion to use. My possessions were few—work clothes, a couple of books, some personal documents, and the few items of value I had managed to purchase for myself over the years.

My father followed me, shouting protests and threats, trying to block the doorway with his body as if he could physically prevent me from leaving. But I wasn’t the scared teenager who had started working at the factory anymore. I was a grown man who managed forty employees and made decisions that affected million-peso budgets. I gently but firmly moved him aside and continued packing.

Claudia appeared in the hallway, her face streaked with tears that I couldn’t tell were genuine or performed for effect. “Esteban, you can’t be serious about this. We’re your family. You can’t just abandon us.”

“I’m not abandoning you,” I replied, zipping up my bag and slinging it over my shoulder. “I’m stopping the subsidy. There’s a difference. You’re both adults with the ability to work and support yourselves. You’ve just chosen not to because it was easier to live off my labor.”

“But where will you go?” she asked, her voice small and uncertain for the first time in years.

“That’s not your concern anymore,” I said, walking past both of them toward the front door. “Just like where my money goes isn’t your concern anymore.”

I walked out of that house without looking back, feeling lighter with every step despite the weight of the bag on my shoulder. For the first time in nearly ten years, I was walking toward a future that belonged entirely to me.

The New Life

I had been secretly looking at apartments for months, knowing that this confrontation was inevitable once my family discovered my real income. Using my savings, I rented a modest but comfortable one-bedroom apartment in a better part of town, furnished it with care, and began the process of building a life that reflected my actual circumstances rather than the fiction I had been maintaining at home.

The apartment had reliable electricity, hot water that worked consistently, and neighbors who didn’t know anything about my family history or obligations. I could come home from work, prepare dinner for one person, and eat it in peace while reading a book or watching television programs of my own choosing.

The silence was initially jarring. After years of living with my father’s loud friends and Claudia’s phone conversations, the quiet of my own space felt almost unnatural. But gradually, I began to appreciate the luxury of controlling my own environment, of being able to think without constant interruption.

My work performance improved dramatically once I was no longer carrying the emotional weight of supporting people who didn’t appreciate my sacrifice. I arrived at the office each morning refreshed instead of resentful, and I found myself taking on additional projects and responsibilities that further enhanced my value to the company.

Within six months of leaving home, I was promoted again, this time to regional operations manager with oversight of three different facilities. The salary increase was substantial, and for the first time in my adult life, I was able to enjoy the fruits of my own labor.

The Inevitable Call

The call came three months after I left, on a Tuesday evening while I was preparing dinner in my own kitchen. Claudia’s name appeared on my phone screen, and I almost didn’t answer. But curiosity about how their new financial reality was treating them won out over my desire to maintain complete separation.

“Esteban,” her voice was small and shaky, completely different from the confident tone I was accustomed to hearing. “Please, you have to help us. We’re going to be evicted. We don’t have the money for rent, and the landlord is refusing to give us any more extensions.”

I stirred the pasta I was cooking and waited for her to continue, saying nothing.

“Papa can’t find work, and my salary isn’t enough to cover everything. We’ve used up all of Mama’s remittances just buying food and paying utilities. We don’t know what else to do.”

A dry laugh escaped my lips. “What does your eviction have to do with me? I don’t live there anymore. I’m not responsible for your housing situation.”

“But Esteban, we have nowhere else to turn! You’re making good money now, we know that. You could help us get caught up on the rent and maybe help us find a smaller place we can afford.”

“Your salary isn’t enough?” I asked, my voice deliberately cold. “That’s interesting, Claudia. When you were spending your entire paycheck on clothes and nightclubs, you never seemed concerned about contributing to rent. Now suddenly you understand that housing costs money?”

Before she could respond, I heard shuffling sounds and my father’s voice taking over the call.

“Esteban, listen to me carefully,” he said, trying to summon the authoritative tone that had once made me obey without question. “You think you can just walk away from your family obligations? We gave you a home, food, we raised you, we made you who you are today.”

“Let me get this straight, Papa,” I said, turning off the burner under my pasta and giving the conversation my full attention. “For almost ten years, I paid for that home. I bought the food. I covered the utilities, the repairs, your beer money, and Claudia’s party fund. What exactly did you contribute to my upbringing besides teaching me what not to become?”

“Don’t you dare speak to me like that! You have money now, good money. You could solve this problem easily. Your sister deserves a chance at education, at a better life.”

“A better life?” I laughed, the sound harsh even to my own ears. “The better life you wanted me to finance while working myself to death? The private university you expected me to pay for with eighty percent of my salary? That better life?”

There was a pause, and I could hear them whispering to each other in the background.

“Esteban,” Claudia’s voice returned, now openly sobbing, “we’re your family. We love you. Doesn’t that mean anything?”

“Family?” I said, the word feeling strange in my mouth after months of not using it. “A real family doesn’t treat one member like a cash machine while mocking them for being tired from work. A real family doesn’t plan to take eighty percent of someone’s income while contributing nothing themselves. You’re not my family, Claudia. You’re people I used to support who are now learning what it’s like to support yourselves.”

I hung up the phone and turned it off, then returned to preparing my dinner. The pasta was perfectly cooked, and I ate it slowly while reading a book I had purchased with my own money, in my own apartment, surrounded by the kind of peace I hadn’t experienced since childhood.

The Mother’s Call

A month later, my phone rang with an international number that I recognized immediately. My mother’s voice came through the connection, carrying the weight of disappointment and accusation across thousands of miles.

“Esteban, I’ve been talking to your father and sister. I’m very disappointed in you. How could you abandon your family when they need you most?”

I had been expecting this call since the day I left home, knowing that eventually my father would present his version of events to my mother and that she would feel compelled to intervene.

“Mama, let me tell you what actually happened,” I said, and then I told her everything. The years of supporting the entire household while being treated like a servant. The drinking, the parties, the complete lack of contribution from either my father or sister. The final demand for eighty percent of my salary to fund Claudia’s private university education while I received nothing.

My mother listened without interrupting, but I could tell from her occasional sighs and the long pauses that she was struggling to reconcile my account with the version she had been given.

“But they’re your family,” she said finally. “Family takes care of each other. That’s what family means.”

“You’re right, Mama. Family does take care of each other. But what I was doing wasn’t taking care of family—it was enabling two adults to avoid taking responsibility for their own lives. Papa hasn’t worked a single day since you started sending money from Spain. Claudia treats her part-time job like a hobby while expecting me to fund her lifestyle. That’s not family. That’s exploitation.”

“Esteban, you’re being too harsh. Your father is getting older, and it’s hard for him to find work. Your sister is young and deserves opportunities.”

“Papa is fifty-two years old, Mama. That’s not too old to work. And Claudia is twenty-three—old enough to understand that opportunities have to be earned, not simply handed to you by someone else’s sacrifice.”

The conversation continued for another twenty minutes, with my mother alternating between defending them and acknowledging the validity of my complaints. But ultimately, she couldn’t overcome the basic assumption that had governed our family for years: that my role was to sacrifice for everyone else’s benefit.

“If you won’t help them, then I’ll send extra money,” she said finally. “But I want you to know that I think you’re making a mistake. Family is the most important thing, and you’re throwing yours away over money.”

“I’m not throwing them away, Mama. I’m giving them the chance to become adults instead of dependents. If you want to support them, that’s your choice. But I’m done.”

After I hung up, I realized that I felt sadder about disappointing my mother than I did about cutting ties with my father and sister. She had worked hard to support all of us, and in her mind, I was abandoning the very people she had been trying to help through her sacrifice.

But I also knew that continuing to subsidize their lifestyle would have eventually destroyed me, financially and emotionally. Sometimes choosing your own wellbeing means disappointing people you love.

The Consequences

Over the following months, I learned through mutual acquaintances what had happened to my father and sister after their financial support system collapsed.

My father, faced with actual eviction rather than the idle threat he had always assumed it was, finally found employment driving a taxi. The work was hard—twelve-hour shifts in traffic and heat, dealing with difficult customers, competing with other drivers for the best fares. His drinking was curtailed by necessity, since he couldn’t afford to lose his job by showing up intoxicated.

Claudia had to abandon her dreams of private university and her part-time schedule at the boutique. She found full-time work at a call center, spending eight hours a day handling customer service calls while wearing a headset in a cramped cubicle. Her entire salary now went to covering rent and utilities for the smaller apartment they had been forced to move to after being evicted from the family home.

The parties stopped. The designer clothes ended. The late-night taxi rides home became bus rides on a strict schedule that accommodated her work hours.

According to the mutual friends who occasionally updated me on their situation, both of them complained bitterly about the unfairness of having to work so hard just to maintain basic living standards. They apparently still viewed themselves as victims of my selfishness rather than as adults who were finally taking responsibility for their own lives.

But they were surviving. More than surviving—they were learning skills and developing work habits that would serve them well in the long run, even if they couldn’t appreciate the lesson at the time.

The New Trajectory

Meanwhile, my own life continued to improve in ways that went far beyond financial security. Without the constant drain of supporting people who didn’t appreciate my efforts, I had energy for personal growth and professional development.

I enrolled in night classes to complete the university degree I had never been able to pursue, studying business administration with a focus on operations management. The coursework was challenging after so many years away from academic work, but I found that my practical experience in managing people and processes gave me advantages that traditional students lacked.

My performance at work continued to excel, and within eighteen months of leaving home, I was promoted again—this time to district manager, overseeing operations across an entire region. The salary increase put me in a income bracket I had never imagined reaching, and for the first time in my life, I was able to think about long-term financial planning rather than just covering immediate expenses.

I bought a car, took vacations, invested in mutual funds, and began looking at real estate options for purchasing my own home. These were milestones that most people my age had achieved years earlier, but for me, they represented freedoms I had never been able to contemplate while supporting three adults on one salary.

More importantly, I began developing relationships that were based on mutual respect rather than financial dependence. I made friends through work and school who saw me as an equal rather than as a provider. I started dating women who were interested in me as a person rather than as a source of financial security.

The transformation was gradual but profound. I began to understand what it felt like to make decisions based on my own interests and values rather than on other people’s demands and expectations.

The Reflection

Two years after leaving home, I can honestly say that I have no regrets about the choice I made. The guilt and uncertainty that plagued me during the first few months gradually gave way to a sense of peace and self-respect that I had never experienced before.

I still think about my family occasionally, usually when I see other families that seem to function on principles of mutual support and genuine affection. I wonder sometimes if things could have been different if I had set boundaries earlier, if I had insisted on respect as a condition of my financial support.

But I also know that the dynamic we had developed was too deeply entrenched to be changed through gradual reform. My father and sister had learned to see me as a resource to be managed rather than as a person deserving of consideration. That fundamental perspective wouldn’t have changed just because I asked them to treat me better.

The decision to leave completely was extreme, but it was also necessary. It forced all of us to confront the reality of our situation without the comfortable fiction that I would always be there to solve everyone’s problems.

My father learned that he was capable of working and supporting himself, even if the work was more difficult than he had wanted to accept. Claudia learned that maintaining a lifestyle requires earning the money to pay for it. These were lessons they needed to learn, even if they resented me for forcing the education upon them.

The Present Day

Today, I live in a house I purchased with my own money, in a neighborhood I chose because I like the tree-lined streets and the quiet atmosphere. I have a career that challenges me intellectually and provides financial security that extends far beyond basic survival needs.

More importantly, I have relationships built on equality and mutual respect. The friends I’ve made don’t see me as someone who exists to solve their problems or fund their ambitions. The woman I’m dating is financially independent and emotionally mature, someone who contributes as much to our relationship as she receives from it.

The rage that consumed so much of my energy for so many years has transformed into something more useful: a clear understanding of my own worth and a determination to protect it from people who would exploit it.

I wake up each morning in my own bed, in my own house, and drink coffee on my own balcony while reading books I chose and purchased myself. The simple pleasure of autonomy, of being able to make decisions without considering how they will affect people who contribute nothing to my wellbeing, remains something I appreciate consciously every day.

The boy who once handed over his entire paycheck to people who mocked him for being tired from work is gone forever. In his place is a man who understands that generosity and self-sacrifice are virtues only when they’re offered freely and reciprocated with gratitude and respect.

Freedom, I’ve learned, tastes like coffee on your own balcony, surrounded by books you bought with money you earned and chose to spend on yourself. It tastes like the peace that comes from knowing that your value as a person isn’t measured by your willingness to subsidize other people’s irresponsibility.

And finally, irrevocably, I am free.