Evan approached and placed the breadsticks between us. His eyes moved from the spilled juice to Noah’s empty hands.
“Can I bring another apple juice?” he asked.
“No,” my mother answered. “He has water.”
Evan looked at me.
“One apple juice, please,” I said.
My mother leaned back. “We’re trying to teach him something, Ethan.”
“I know.”
Under the table, I squeezed Noah’s knee.
Inside my jacket pocket, my phone had been recording for forty-three minutes. The application made no sound and saved every file to an encrypted folder.
I had tested it three times that morning.
For years, my parents had treated Lauren’s children like royalty and Noah like an inconvenience. The twins received birthday trips, designer clothes, and framed photographs on my parents’ walls. Noah received lectures about gratitude whenever he asked why they had forgotten his school play.
I kept excusing it.
My mother was tired.
My father was old-fashioned.
Lauren needed more help because she was raising twins.
Meanwhile, I paid for nearly every family meal. I covered my parents’ property-tax shortage two years in a row. I paid the twins’ after-school fees when Lauren said she was falling behind. I even kept everyone on a phone plan in my name because my mother insisted it was easier.
They called it family support.
But when Noah needed one juice box, they called him spoiled.
Evan returned and placed a fresh apple juice beside my son.
Noah did not touch it immediately. He looked at my mother as though he needed permission.
“It’s yours,” I told him.
My mother tapped one fingernail against her wineglass.
“You undermine us every time we try to give that boy discipline.”
“He’s six,” I said.
“Exactly,” my father replied. “Start early.”
