My eighteen-year-old brother reached for one piece of chicken at dinner, and my mother-in-law slapped him so hard his fork hit the plate. “You greedy little freeloader!” she screamed. My husband didn’t defend him. He looked at me and said, “Don’t make this worse.” Four years of keeping the peace ended right there—because Diane still believed she was standing in her son’s house.

Diane stared at me.

“My name is on the deed. My money paid the down payment. My salary pays the mortgage, the property taxes, the utilities, most of the groceries and the WiFi you use while sitting on my couch criticizing how I live.”

“Claire,” Ethan said.

I held up my hand.

“No.”

Diane turned toward him.

“Tell your wife to stop this nonsense.”

Ethan suddenly became very interested in his plate.

That told me Diane had never known.

Not really.

Maybe she assumed.

Maybe Ethan had allowed her to assume.

I did not know which bothered me more.

Diane’s face flushed.

“Marriage means everything belongs to both people.”

“That is not what we’re discussing.”

“You’re humiliating my son.”

I looked at Noah.

“No. You humiliated my brother.”

“It was a tap.”

“You slapped him across the face.”

“He ruined my tablecloth.”

I almost laughed.

“Your tablecloth?”