“Mom,” he finally muttered, “maybe that’s enough.”
“Your wife is being dramatic,” she snapped.
Calm settled over me.
I secured June against my chest, opened my phone, and quietly began recording. I captured Margaret’s face, the collar, the laughing guests, and every cruel word she repeated.
Then I picked up the diaper bag.
“Nora,” Wesley said. “Where are you going?”
“Home.”
“You can’t leave in the middle of the party.”
I looked at him.
“You stood there while your mother put a pet collar beside our daughter and told her she belonged beneath your family.”
“It was a bad joke.”
“No,” I said. “It was a test.”
Margaret folded her arms. “A test of what?”
“To see whether I would keep allowing you to mistake restraint for weakness.”
I walked out without shouting.
Inside my car, my hands finally began to shake. I sent the unedited video to my father.
