My mother-in-law, Beverly, has never liked me, and nothing made her feelings clearer than our wedding day.
At first, I thought she was going to boycott the wedding to show her disapproval. Everyone was seated, and the ceremony was about to begin, but Beverly still hadn’t arrived.
I had just stepped forward to stand at the end of the aisle when the church doors banged open behind me.
The ceremony was about to begin, but Beverly still hadn’t arrived.
“How could you start without me?”
I turned, and my jaw dropped. Beverly strode toward me, wearing a white, floor-length gown with beaded sleeves. All she was missing was a bouquet and a veil.
“Well?” She stopped in front of me, hands on her hips.
“I… the time on the invitation was clear, Beverly. I believe it also stipulated that guests shouldn’t wear white.
She laughed. “Oh, don’t be so sensitive, honey.” She patted my cheek. “It’s just a dress. Nobody is going to confuse us.”
“How could you start without me?”
She walked away before I could reply. Marching up the aisle ahead of me, it was almost impossible to tell that she wasn’t the bride.
“The nerve of her!” One of my bridesmaids snapped.
I took a long breath and chose to let it go. I could survive one day.
I walked down the aisle. Brandon had tears in his eyes when he took my hands in his.
When we reached the vows, Beverly struck again.
It was almost impossible to tell that she wasn’t the bride.
“I, Brandon, take you, Sylvia, to be my wife, to have and to hold…” Brandon hesitated, frowning, as Beverly appeared at his side.
“Don’t mind me,” she said. “This is just such a big moment.”
The officiant looked at her, then at us. “Let’s give the couple some space, shall we?”
Beverly laughed. She acted like she was just a doting mother who couldn’t bear to be an inch away from her boy. It was “adorable” to everyone else. To me, it was an invasion.
And she didn’t stop there.
“Let’s give the couple some space, shall we?”
Beverly approached us during the reception with a glass of Cabernet Sauvignon. She was smiling, but it was the kind of smile a cat gives a mouse.
She reached out to hug Brandon, and the glass tipped. The dark red liquid splashed across my skirt. The stain spread like a wound.
“Oh, goodness! I’m so sorry. I tripped.”
There was nothing for her to trip on. She stood perfectly balanced on her heels.
“Mom, what the heck?” Brandon snapped.
The dark red liquid splashed across my skirt.
Beverly did not apologize. Instead, she clutched her chest with both hands.
“My heart,” she wheezed. “Brandon, you’re upsetting me. The stress is too much.”
I watched as our guests rushed to her side. Beverly’s sister and nieces escorted her away while whispering their concern.
I went to the bathroom with my maid of honor to try to rescue my dress. We eventually got the worst of it out, but the damage went deeper than a stained dress.
I watched as our guests rushed to her side.
I told myself she was just being dramatic. That it would end after the wedding.
I was wrong. It was only the beginning of a long, cold war.
Two weeks after the honeymoon, our photographer called. Her name was Lila. She was the daughter of one of Beverly’s best friends. She sounded like she was on the verge of a breakdown.
“I don’t know how this happened,” Lila said. “It was fine when I first checked the files, but now the SD card is corrupted. We tried every recovery software in the office, but the files are gone.”
It was only the beginning of a long, cold war.
“All of them?”
“It looks like every single one of your wedding photos is gone. I’m so sorry, Sylvia. I’ll keep trying, but…”
I slid my back down the kitchen cabinet and sat on the linoleum. I cried until my ribs ached and my throat felt raw.
It felt too convenient.
The daughter of Beverly’s friend lost the photos of the wedding that Beverly tried to ruin? It smelled like a setup, but we had no proof.
Every single one of your wedding photos is gone.”
Then, a week later, the phone rang. It was Beverly.
“Well,” she said, her voice bright and cheery. “Good thing I had Lila send me printed copies before that unfortunate accident.”
“What do you mean, Beverly?”
“Oh, I pulled Lila aside at the wedding and told her to send me a full album as soon as possible. I like to preserve family history. Why don’t you come over on Sunday? We’ll have a little viewing with the family.”
It was Beverly.
I was a fool. I actually thought, for a fleeting second, that this was her way of making things right. I thought she’d saved the day.
When we arrived at her house on Sunday, the living room was packed. Family and close friends were all squeezed onto the sofas.
The album sat on the coffee table.
Beverly stood beside it, her hands folded neatly in front of her.
I was a fool.
“I just think it’s important to celebrate family,” she declared as she opened the album with a dramatic flourish.
The air left my lungs.
There was a photo of Brandon and me standing at the altar, saying our vows while Beverly hovered nearby, and below it, one of Brandon and me exiting the church.
There was just one thing missing — me!
Beverly had cut me out of every photo.
There was just one thing missing — me!
She hadn’t used a computer to edit me out. She’d used scissors.
My dress was sliced away. My arm was missing from Brandon’s side. There were jagged, white edges where my face should have been. In every single photo, I was a silhouette of negative space.
It looked like a wedding between a groom and his mother.
“You cut me out,” I whispered, tears springing to my eyes.
Beverly gave me a sweet, pitying smile. “Oh, honey, the lighting wasn’t flattering for you. I just fixed it.”
It looked like a wedding between a groom and his mother.
The room went silent. I looked around, but nobody said a word. They just stared at the mangled pages.
Brandon’s face turned a deep, angry red. “You destroyed our wedding album. Are you insane?”
Immediately, Beverly’s hand went to her chest. “Oh, my heart. I can’t handle this stress. My blood pressure is skyrocketing.”
Her sister rushed to her side, glaring at Brandon.
“She has a condition!” someone shouted.
Just like that, the script flipped.
“You destroyed our wedding album. Are you insane?”
Not one person defended me. They were all watching, waiting to see if I would cause a scene.
In that moment, a cold, quiet realization struck me. If I kept trying to keep the peace, there would be nothing left of me to protect. She would erase me piece by piece until I was just a jagged edge in my own life.
I closed the album. “I’m leaving.”
I walked out the door. No one stopped me. Brandon followed a moment later, leaving his mother surrounded by cooing relatives on the sofa.
Not one person defended me.
That night, I went to my desk and prepared a thick manila envelope.
See, Beverly thought she held all the cards because she had the only copies of the photos and an Oscar-worthy performance of a “heart condition” to hide behind. She was wrong.
There was something very important that Beverly didn’t know.
The next morning, I drove to her house.
I left the envelope on her kitchen counter with a short note: For Beverly.
Then I returned home to wait.
There was something very important that Beverly didn’t know.
Twenty minutes after I got home, my phone rang. I picked it up.
Beverly was sobbing. For once, it wasn’t the fake, dramatic sob she used for an audience. That was raw and real.
“No… nooo,” she wailed. “That can’t be real.”
“Oh, it’s real.”
“Please. Forgive me, Sylvia! I will do anything for you.”
“Anything? I’m glad to hear you say that, Beverly. Do you have the documents in front of you?”
“Please. Forgive me, Sylvia! I will do anything for you.”
“Yes.” I heard papers rustling on her end.
I hadn’t sent Beverly an unpleasant letter or a threat. Instead, I’d drawn a firm boundary and provided motivation for her to stick to it: a copy of my first ultrasound. Brandon and I were pregnant.
“We’ll start with the one labeled ‘Conditions for Contact.’ If you want to contact our child, you need to sign that.”
“My grandbaby…” Her voice broke. “You can’t keep my grandbaby from me.”
“I can. And I will. If I have to.”
I hadn’t sent Beverly an unpleasant letter or a threat.
“This is unfair! A written apology and financial responsibility for restoring the wedding photos? These have nothing to do with the baby.”
“They’re about taking accountability and repairing trust. What you did wasn’t a joke, Beverly. You destroyed our only wedding album. You humiliated me. You tried to erase me from my own marriage.”
“I was emotional—”
“And if you can’t control your emotions well enough to behave like a decent human being, then that only reinforces the need for these documents.”
What you did wasn’t a joke, Beverly.
“How dare you!”
“This ties in directly with the other conditions: You will not use medical episodes, emotional distress, or guilt to control situations involving my child; you will never speak negatively about me to or in front of my child; and you will not publicly embarrass, undermine, or attempt to exclude me through jokes or staged incidents.”
Her voice cracked on that last line. “You can’t do this to me.”
“You did this to yourself.”
“You can’t do this to me.”
“Fine, I’ll apologize. I’ll pay for the album. I’ll tell everyone I was wrong. Just don’t cut me out. Please.”
“Then you know what to do. And if you cross these boundaries, my attorney will be in touch.”
I hung up the phone. I felt a strange sense of peace. It wasn’t triumph, exactly. It was just the feeling of finally standing on solid ground.
That evening, my phone started buzzing. The family group chat was lighting up.
Beverly had posted a long message.
“Then you know what to do.”
I owe everyone an apology. I damaged the wedding album out of jealousy and insecurity. It was a cruel thing to do. It was wrong. I take full responsibility, and I will be paying for the professional restoration of all the photos.
Moreover, Beverly forwarded an email to me. It was an invoice from a high-end photo restoration and data recovery service in the city. At the bottom, it said: Full payment: processed.
Two days later, Lila called me. “I don’t know what your mother-in-law did. But she paid for the expedited digital recovery service. It’s a lab that specializes in damaged hardware. We got most of the files back.”
Full payment: processed.
I felt a knot in my stomach loosen. “They’re intact?”
“Yes. The raw files are fine. I’ll send the download link tonight. I am so sorry for the stress this caused.”
That evening, as I looked through the digital gallery, I felt a sense of stability and safety that had been missing from my life since my wedding day.
Beverly had tried to erase me, but I’d shown her I wouldn’t go down without a fight. All it had taken was an ironclad boundary.
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