“I am her grandmother.”
“Then act like it.”
“I’ve done plenty for that child.”
“Her name is Mia.”
Eleanor flinched.
I took the little book from her hands.
“Alice trusted me with her daughter. Thomas chose Mia. I chose her long before I knew how I’d raise her. Neither of us has ever treated loving her like charity.”
“I never said that.”
“You’ve said it at dinners and in hallways whenever Thomas leaves the room.”
Several relatives lowered their eyes.
They’d heard every word.
None of them had stopped her.
“You call Mia lucky because Thomas accepted her,” I continued. “You speak about her place in this family as though it can expire.”
Eleanor’s voice rose.
“You’re ruining my birthday.”
“No. You invited people here to watch us be humiliated. You ruined it yourself.”
One cousin quietly stepped away from the table.
“You did invite us to watch,” she said.
Gregory picked up his jacket.
“What are you doing?” Eleanor asked.
“Leaving.”
“You can’t leave my birthday dinner.”
“I can leave a dinner built around hurting my grandchild, Eleanor.”
Then he looked at me.
“Do you have room for one more at the barbecue?”
“We have too much ice but no food. Let’s go home and make some.”
One by one, people stood.
The party she’d carefully staged began falling apart around her.
She wanted us isolated.
Instead, the room chose Mia.
Gregory picked up the cooler.
“I’m driving them home,” he said.
Thomas’s sister grabbed the daisies.
Two cousins followed.
Eleanor stared after them.
“You’re leaving my birthday?”
I took Mia’s hand.
Eleanor hurried after us.
“Alexis, don’t do this.”
I turned back.
“You won’t call Mia. You won’t visit her. You won’t send messages through anyone else.”
“You can’t keep my granddaughter from me.”
“I can keep my daughter away from someone who hurts her on purpose.”
Her expression tightened.
“You’re making rules now?”
“No.”
“I’m finally enforcing them, and Thomas will stand with me.”
Back at our house, Gregory rolled the grill out of the garage while Mia opened the cooler.
“Can I help?”
“You can hand me the tools,” he said. “You can also stop me if I burn anything.”
“I don’t know how, Grandpa.”
“Then we’ll both learn, sweetheart.”
Thomas’s sister spread our picnic blanket across the yard.
The cousins set out plates and drinks.
Before long, nobody cared that they were still wearing formal clothes.
My phone rang just as Gregory lowered the grill lid.
It was Thomas.
“What happened?” he asked.
I told him everything—the fake invitation, the deleted message, Mia’s little book, and Eleanor’s reaction.
For several seconds, he said nothing.
“Alexis, I’m so sorry.”
“I’m not.”
He paused.
“You’re not?”
I watched Gregory teaching Mia how to use the tongs while Thomas’s sister arranged the daisies in a glass jar. The cousins laughed as smoke drifted across the yard.
