I still remember the exact texture of the silence that followed her words—not the kind of silence you hear when someone makes a beautiful toast at a wedding, but the jagged, breathless void that follows an assassination.
It was a Saturday in mid-September. The Bates Hall of the Boston Public Library had been transformed into a sanctuary of obscene wealth. Crystal chandeliers dripped like frozen tears from the high ceilings, casting a shimmering glow over silk tablecloths and floral centerpieces that cost more than a mid-sized sedan. I had paid for every petal, every vintage bottle of champagne, every string of the quartet playing softly in the background. My total investment in my son’s happiness stood at exactly four hundred and twenty-five thousand dollars.
I was standing near the dessert table, adjusting the lace of my burgundy dress, feeling the faint, vestigial ache of a mother watching her only child slip into a new life. Daniel was dancing with Samantha, his new bride, a woman with hair like spun silk and a heart I was only just beginning to realize was made of flint.
That’s when Samantha’s voice sliced through the ambient hum of the reception. She was standing barely fifteen feet away with a circle of her bridesmaids, all of them clutching champagne flutes as if they were scepters.
“I’m telling you, the woman is a leech,” Samantha said, her voice dripping with a casual, practiced cruelty. “She’s been hovering since the engagement, calling every week with ‘opinions’ Daniel never asked for. It’s exhausting.”
One of her friends giggled, a sharp, tittering sound. “The classic clingy mother-in-law. Does she have a life of her own?”
