My hands were trembling when I held that box wrapped in shiny paper. It was Christmas. The living room was packed with relatives. The tree lights were blinking above our heads. And I had just received the worst gift of my life. Victoria, my daughter-in-law, had handed me a cooking apron in front of everyone.
It was a cheap apron, the kind they sell at the dollar store or in a discount bin for five dollars. The fabric was rough, a dirty gray color with ridiculous ruffles on the edges. Everyone was staring. Some smiled uncomfortably. Others looked away. And then my son, Jason, my only son, the boy I raised alone after his father died, burst out laughing.
It wasn’t a nervous laugh. It was an open, clear, cruel gap.
“Perfect, Mom,” he said, wiping a tear of laughter from his eye. “You are going to need it to serve us Sunday dinner.”
Victoria clapped as if Jason had said something witty. I felt the floor opening up beneath my feet. I felt the air turning thick, unbreathable. I swallowed my tears with such force that my throat hurt. I stood up in silence. Nobody expected what I was about to do. I walked toward the tree with my legs shaking, picked up the large box I had left there earlier, and placed it in front of them. My voice came out steady, even though inside I was crumbling.
“Now open my gift to you.”
Victoria ripped off the paper with that fake smile she always wore. Jason helped her open the box. And when they saw what was inside, when they understood what it meant, their faces transformed.
But to understand how we got here, I need to tell you the whole story.
It all started three years ago when I buried my husband. Arthur had been the love of my life for forty years. He worked as a mechanic until his very last day, always with hands stained with grease, always with that tired smile, but full of love. He left us a small but paid-off house in a humble but decent neighborhood in the suburbs. That house was everything we had. It was the fruit of forty years of sacrifice, of sleepless nights, of meager meals so that Jason could go to college.
I worked cleaning offices for twenty years to help with the bills. My knees were destroyed. My back was never the same, but it was worth it. Jason became an accountant, got a good job, and I thought we could finally rest. I thought the sacrifices were over.
How wrong I was.
Jason met Victoria at a business conference downtown. She came from a family with money, the kind that lives in gated communities with huge lawns and imported cars. She wore designer clothes, spoke with that refined accent that only people who never had to worry about paying a utility bill have. The first time she came to my house, I noticed how she looked at everything. Her eyes scanned the walls with peeling paint, the old furniture that Arthur and I had bought secondhand, the curtains faded by the sun. She said nothing, but her expression said it all: contempt, disgust, pity.
Jason was so in love he did not see anything. Or maybe he did see, but he had decided to ignore it. When he hugged me that day, he whispered in my ear,
“Mom, she is different. You will see.”
And I wanted to believe him. I wanted to believe that my son had found true love.
The wedding was elegant, expensive, in a ballroom that cost more than what Arthur earned in an entire year. Victoria insisted that I wear a dress. She chose a beige dress that made me look like a shadow among all the guests in their elegant attire.
“It is understated. Perfect for you,” she told me with that smile I still did not know how to decipher.
During the reception, they sat me at a table in the back, far from the head table where the bride and groom and Victoria’s family were. When I asked Jason why, he told me it was protocol, that this was how elegant weddings were done. I swallowed my pride and smiled for the photos. I clapped when they cut the cake. I cried when they danced their first dance.
But something inside me was already starting to break.
The first few months were subtle. Victoria began visiting my house less frequently. When she came, she always found excuses not to stay long. We have a dinner reservation. Jason has work. Traffic on the interstate is terrible. Jason’s calls became shorter, more spaced out. When I called, Victoria answered and said Jason was busy, that he would call me back later, but the calls never came.
On Christmas of that first year, they gave me a blender, a generic blender that cost twenty dollars. I had given them two thousand in cash so they could start their life together. I said nothing. I smiled and said,
“Thank you.”
Because that is what mothers do, right? We swallow it, we endure, we forgive.
Then came the day that changed everything.
Jason appeared at my door on a Tuesday afternoon without warning. He had dark circles under his eyes. He looked tired, nervous.
“Mom, I need to talk to you,” he said.
I brewed coffee. We sat at the kitchen table where we had talked so many times when he was a boy. And I waited.
“Victoria and I want to buy a bigger house,” he began, without looking me in the eyes. “But we need money for the down payment. I have been thinking. And, well, this house has value, Mom. If you sell it, you could give us that money and come live with us. It would be perfect. You would be in a better house with all the amenities, and we would have the house we need to start our family.”
I felt as if they had thrown ice water on me.
“Sell your father’s house?” I asked. “The house where you grew up?”
Jason rubbed his face with his hands.
“Dad is gone, Mom. And you do not need all this space. You would be better off with us. Victoria already has everything planned. You would have your own room. You would not have to worry about anything.”
But something in his voice did not sound convincing. Something in his words sounded rehearsed, as if he had repeated them in front of a mirror until he memorized them.
I spent three nights without sleep thinking about Jason’s proposal. I would wake up at three in the morning, walk through the house, touching the walls, remembering. Here Arthur had painted when we were expecting Jason. There Jason had taken his first steps. In that corner, we had put the Christmas tree for thirty years. Every nook held a memory, a piece of my life, a piece of my heart.
But Jason was my son, my only son. And if selling the house meant being close to him, if it meant helping him build his future, maybe the sacrifice was worth it. Maybe this was my last chance to be useful, to show him that a mother is always there.
I called Jason on Friday morning.
“All right,” I told him. “I will sell the house.”
I heard his sigh of relief on the other end of the line.
“Thank you, Mom. You will not regret it. I promise. You will live like a queen with us.”
A queen. That word would remain etched in my mind as a cruel mockery.
The selling process was fast. Too fast. Victoria knew a real estate agent who had a buyer in three weeks. The house sold for three hundred thousand dollars. It was not a fortune in today’s market, but it was everything Arthur and I had built.
The day I signed the papers, I cried in the bathroom of the title company office. I cried for Arthur, for all those years, for the house that would no longer be mine. When I walked out, Victoria was waiting for me in the car with that perfect smile.
“You will see, Margaret. This is the best for everyone. Jason and I have already started looking for the perfect house. It will be beautiful, with a garden, with a pool. You are going to be so comfortable.”
I nodded, wiping my tears. I wanted to believe her. I needed to believe her.
I moved into Jason and Victoria’s house two weeks later. It was a nice house. I could not deny that. Two stories, modern kitchen, elegant furniture. But when Victoria showed me my room, I felt something break inside me. It was a small room at the back of the house, next to the laundry room. A simple twin bed, a tiny closet, a window that looked out onto the alley.
“It is temporary,” Victoria explained. “Until we find the new house. There you will have a beautiful room with a private bathroom and everything.”
Jason was standing behind her, silent, looking at the floor. I wanted to ask him why he said nothing, why he allowed this, but I swallowed the words. I arranged my few belongings in that room that smelled of detergent and closed the door.
The first week was strange but tolerable. I tried to be useful. Make breakfast. Clean a little. Victoria always thanked me with that smile that never reached her eyes.
“How sweet, Margaret. But you do not have to do anything. Rest.”
However, the second week, everything changed. Victoria started leaving me lists in the kitchen. “Things to do today,” the paper said. Do the laundry. Iron Jason’s shirts. Clean the bathrooms. Prepare dinner. At first, I thought it was temporary, that maybe she was busy with work. But the lists became longer, more demanding. Wash the windows. Clean the oven. Dust all the furniture.
I was sixty-six years old. My knees hurt. My back protested with every movement. But I did it. I did it because I thought it was my way of paying for being there. Because I thought this way I was helping my son.
One day, Victoria invited her friends over for tea. I was in the kitchen preparing the snacks when one of them came in looking for the bathroom. She saw me with the apron on, my hands covered in flour, and asked,
“Are you the new housekeeper?”
Before I could answer, Victoria appeared behind her.
“Oh, no. She is Jason’s mom. She lives with us and she loves to cook, right, Margaret?”
The way she said it, with that poisonous sweetness, made me feel small, invisible, insignificant. I nodded and went back to my snacks while I heard their laughter in the living room.
That night, when Jason arrived from work, I tried to talk to him.
“Son, I need us to talk.”
He loosened his tie, tired.
“What is it, Mom?”
I did not know how to say it without sounding ungrateful, without sounding like a complaining old woman.
“It is just that I feel like I am doing too much work around the house. I thought I sold my house to be with you, not to be the maid.”
Jason sighed, annoyed.
“Mom, nobody is forcing you to do anything. If you want to help with the house, great. But do not come complaining later. Victoria works all day. I work all day. Is it too much to ask that you help a little?”
His words fell on me like stones. Help a little. As if cleaning the entire house, cooking three meals a day, washing and ironing were not enough.
But the worst had not happened yet.
One night, two months after moving in, I heard voices in Jason’s home office. The door was ajar, and I recognized Victoria’s voice, furious.
“It has been two months, and you still have not talked to the architect. We need to start construction on our house. Your mother gave us three hundred thousand dollars, Jason. It is more than enough for the down payment.”
My heart stopped. Three hundred thousand. I had given all the money to Jason the day after the sale was finalized. He told me he would put it in a special account, that he would invest it wisely for the new house. I moved closer to the door, holding my breath. Jason replied with a tired voice.
“Victoria, I already told you, the money is invested. It needs time to grow.”
She let out a sarcastic laugh.
“Invested in what? Because as far as I know, we have not seen a single cent of profit. And meanwhile, your mother is here living for free. Eating our food, using our utilities. It is the least she can do. Help with the housework.”
I felt the world stop. “Living for free,” as if my three hundred thousand dollars meant nothing. As if forty years of sacrifice were invisible.
That night, I could not sleep. I stared at the ceiling of that small, cold room, wondering at what moment I had lost my son. At what moment Jason, the boy who cried in my arms when he had nightmares, had become this man who allowed his wife to treat me like garbage.
The next day, Victoria handed me another list. This time, it was longer than ever. And at the end, there was a note: “Please, when you finish with this, serve dinner at eight o’clock sharp. Jason and I have important guests.” She did not sign with her name. She did not put a genuine please. It was an order, direct and clear.
I took the list with trembling hands and went to the kitchen. While I peeled potatoes, while I chopped vegetables, while my tears fell on the cutting board, I knew something had to change. I could not keep living like this. I could not keep being invisible in my own son’s life.
The guests arrived at eight o’clock sharp. They were colleagues of Victoria’s, elegant people with expensive clothes and perfumes that left an intense trail throughout the house. I had spent four hours cooking, preparing a menu that Victoria had dictated to me that morning: shrimp appetizer, gourmet salad, stuffed chicken with wine sauce, and chocolate dessert. My feet were killing me. My hands smelled of garlic and onion, but everything was ready.
I set the table with the fine china Victoria kept for special occasions, folded the napkins as she had taught me, lit the candles. When I finished, I retreated to the kitchen, expecting them to call me to serve. And they called me, again and again.
“Margaret, more water.”
“Margaret, the sauce is cold.”
“Margaret, we need bread.”