Instead, she looked down at her hands.
For the first time in my life, my mother looked small.
Not weak.
Small.
Like a person who had spent years making herself big through control and had suddenly run out of people willing to shrink.
I almost softened.
Almost.
Then she said, “Your father would be ashamed of you.”
The car swerved a little because my hands jerked.
I pulled into the parking lot of a closed laundromat and stopped.
My whole body was shaking.
“Get out,” I said.
She stared at me.
“What?”
“Get out of my car.”
“It’s not your car. It’s that old man’s car.”
“It is the car I am driving. Get out.”
Her mouth opened.
Then closed.
For once, she seemed unsure of the script.
“Vesper—”
“No,” I said. “You do not get to use Dad as a weapon after spending the money he saved for me.”
