I Let My Mother Think She’d Secured My Sister’s Wedding

Mark went still. My mother lunged for the phone and I moved it back just enough.

“Turn that off,” she snapped.

I didn’t.

The recording ended.

The washing of the baseboard heater filled the room. That old house always made little metal ticks when the heat came on.

Kelsey looked at my mother first, not me. “Mom?”

My mother straightened in her chair. “I did continue reading …