I had barely been awake for half a minute.
“Get up,” he snapped, ripping the blanket off me. “You think you can disrespect my mother and still sleep peacefully?”
I sat up, startled, my heart racing. Pale winter light filtered through the blinds, but his face burned with anger—the kind he wore when he had already decided I was wrong and only needed to be pushed into submission.
“I’m not giving your mother any more money,” I said, my voice still thick with sleep. “I told you that last night. Nothing has changed.”
He let out a sharp, bitter laugh. “Unbelievable. She just needed a temporary loan.”
“She needed eight thousand dollars.”
“She asked family for help!”
“She asked me because she knows you don’t have it.”
That hit.
His jaw tightened.
For six years, I had watched his mother, Lorraine, turn every problem into someone else’s responsibility. A broken furnace, car repairs, mounting credit card debt—all framed as temporary emergencies someone else should cover.
Twice, I had agreed to help.
Once when Graham promised it would be paid back within a month. Once when Lorraine cried in my kitchen and called me “the daughter she never had.”
Both times, the money disappeared.
Both times, the story changed.
Both times, I was expected to smile and move on.
Not this time.
“She’s coming at noon,” Graham said. “You’re going to set the table and apologize.”
I stared at him. “For what?”
“For disrespect. For treating her like she’s a scammer.”
I threw the sheet aside and stood up. “If she doesn’t want to be treated like one, she should stop asking for money she never plans to return.”
