I dropped the final three envelopes onto the table with three sharp slaps.
“Paper Three. Formal revocation of permission to occupy this property. Effective tonight. Derek Holloway. Melissa Holloway. Sandra Voss.”
Melissa erupted from her chair, nearly knocking it backward. “You cannot do this! This is our home!”
I looked at the woman who had enslaved my mother, and the exhaustion of a twenty-hour flight finally hardened into absolute rage. “No, Melissa. This is a house I own, where my mother has a legal right to exist. You have been uninvited guests. Guests who forced the rightful occupant to scrub your patio on her hands and knees for a dinner party.”
June Aldrich stood up, purposeful and dignified, and walked around the table to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with my mother. A second later, the two church ladies joined them, forming an impenetrable human wall.
Melissa went completely feral, her voice cracking into a chaotic shriek about ingratitude, about how she had single-handedly held the family together while I abandoned them. Sandra began shouting about how “in her day,” families didn’t betray each other.
