Everyone was watching.
“My job isn’t the thing that needs to give,” I said.
Karen’s smile didn’t waver.
“Of course not. I’m just saying it might be nice to have some breathing room. Jennifer didn’t go back to work after the twins, and she’s never been happier.”
Jennifer nodded, sipping her gas station Moscato.
“It’s true. Best decision I ever made.”
“Jennifer’s situation is different from mine,” I said.
“Is it?” Karen tilted her head. “You’re both Whitfield wives.”
Whitfield wives.
Like it was a job title. Like it came with a dress code and a non-compete clause.
I felt Michael’s hand on my knee under the table.
A squeeze.
Not comforting.
Warning.
Drop it.
I dropped it.
After dinner, while I was loading the dishwasher alone, as always, I heard Karen and Michael talking in the hallway.
Their voices were low, but sound carried in that house.
“She’s getting difficult,” Karen said.
“She’s not difficult, Mom. She’s just independent.”
“Independent.”
Karen said the word like it tasted sour.
“Michael, I’ve held my tongue for two years, but that woman is not integrating into this family. She won’t leave her job. She won’t join the women’s group at church. She barely participates in the holiday planning.”
“She does all the cooking, Mom. She hosts every single event.”
“Hosting isn’t just cooking, Michael. It’s about being present, being warm. Your father’s mother, God rest her, she understood what it meant to be part of something bigger than herself.”
I stood there with a dirty plate in my hand, water running, listening to my mother-in-law describe me as a woman who wasn’t warm enough, wasn’t present enough, wasn’t enough.
And I waited.
I waited for Michael to defend me.
To say something sharp, something final, something that drew a line.
“I’ll talk to her,” he said.
That was it.
That was his defense of me.
“I’ll talk to her.”
Like I was an employee underperforming on a quarterly review.
He did talk to me that night in bed.
Lights off.
“Babe, can you just try a little harder with my mom?”
Try harder.
“How? Michael, I cook for her. I clean for her. I host her entire family every other week.”
“I know. And she appreciates it. She just wants to feel closer to you. Maybe go to lunch with her sometime or join that church group she mentioned.”
“I don’t want to join a church group. I work full-time.”
