Chapter 2 - ONE HUNDRED TWENTY MILLION REASONS
I had tried, truly tried, to love Natalie. After Frank died, Jackson turned into a man made of polished surfaces—functional, successful, emotionally somewhere far away. Then he met Natalie West, and for the first time in years, I saw him laugh without effort. She was beautiful, poised, socially perfect, and she understood exactly how to perform warmth in public. But private moments always left a different residue. She joked about my age too often. She asked intrusive questions about estate structures disguised as curiosity. She dismissed our family traditions as provincial and old-fashioned, and every object connected to Frank seemed to irritate her—the pearls from my grandmother, his favorite china, even the original venue where three generations of Westbrooks had celebrated milestones.
The truth sharpened at the rehearsal dinner. I had stepped into the ladies’ room and paused outside a stall when I heard Natalie laughing with her bridesmaids. One of them said, “At least the old woman is paying for all of this.” Natalie replied without missing a beat, “There are one hundred twenty million reasons to tolerate her.” Then another voice asked whether she was worried about me staying close after the wedding. Natalie said, “Once the money lands, Jackson and I are gone. Distance, boundaries, new city, new life. I’m not babysitting his mother forever.” I stood inside that stall staring at the door and told myself not to ruin Jackson’s wedding over something I had overheard. By the next morning, that hesitation felt like cowardice.
