“Your name’s not on the list, Mom.”
My son, Avery, blocked me at the entrance of my granddaughter’s wedding in front of two hundred people. My name is Amelia Rivers. I’m seventy-two years old, and I’m a widow.
But they forgot one small detail. I was the one who paid for the entire event. Every single dollar of the $127,000 it cost.
Let me take you back to where this nightmare really began. It was a Tuesday afternoon in March when they first came to see me about Sophie’s wedding. I remember because Tuesdays were my volunteer days at the animal shelter, something I’d done every week since my husband, David, passed seven years ago.
But that morning, Avery called. “Mom, can Taylor and I come by this afternoon? We need to talk to you about something important.”
My heart did what every mother’s heart does when she hears those words.
It jumped straight to the worst conclusions. Was someone sick? Were they having marriage trouble?
In my seventy-two years, I’d learned that we need to talk rarely preceded good news. “Of course, sweetheart,” I said, trying to keep my voice steady. “I’ll make coffee.”
I canceled my shift at the shelter and spent the next three hours cleaning my apartment.
Not that it needed it. I kept the penthouse spotless, just like David had liked it. But cleaning gave my hands something to do while my mind raced through possibilities.
At exactly two o’clock, my doorbell rang. Avery stood there in his expensive suit—the charcoal Tom Ford I’d bought him last Christmas. At forty-five, he kept his father’s strong jawline and dark hair, though gray was starting to thread through it.
Behind him, Taylor wore a cream cashmere sweater that probably cost more than my monthly utilities. “Mom.” Avery kissed my cheek, that familiar woody cologne enveloping me for a moment. “Mrs.
Rivers.” Taylor’s smile was bright, perfectly white teeth against her tanned skin. She’d just come back from their vacation in Turks and Caicos, the third one this year. “Your home looks beautiful as always.”
I ushered them into the living room, the space David and I had decorated together over forty years of marriage.
The mahogany coffee table we’d found at an estate sale in Connecticut. The Persian rug we brought back from our anniversary trip to Istanbul. The Tiffany lamp that had been his mother’s.
The story doesn’t end here –
it continues on the next page.
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