Chapter 2 - JASON COMES HOME
Melissa opened Margaret’s invoice.
Her smile disappeared by the third line.
Margaret had kept it simple.
Childcare: $1,680.
Housecleaning: $720.
Groceries purchased for household: $812.
TOTAL: $3,212.
It represented only the previous thirty days.
Not nine months.
Not medical appointments.
Not laundry.
Not late-night fevers.
Not the week Margaret slept in a chair beside Thomas because he refused to settle after being sick.
Just one month.
Jason stepped farther into the room.
His eyes moved from the invoice to the clutter.
Then to his mother.
Then to his son sitting quietly on the couch.
Finally to Melissa.
“Melissa, you charged my mother after she cleaned your house and raised your son?”
Melissa stood.
“You don’t know what this is about.”
“I heard you ask her for two thousand dollars.”
“She lives here.”
“Because we asked her to.”
“She has been here almost a year.”
“Taking care of Thomas.”
Melissa glanced toward Margaret.
“This is exactly why I wanted to discuss it privately.”
Margaret laughed softly.
“You put the invoice on the table while your friends were texting you about brunch.”
“That is private.”
Jason dropped his overnight bag beside the door.
“Mom, what’s going on?”
Margaret picked up Thomas’s toy truck from beneath the coffee table and placed it into the basket.
“I’m leaving.”
Jason stared at her.
“What?”
“My things are packed.”
Only then did he notice the blue suitcase standing beside the hallway.
Melissa’s expression changed.
Not relief.
Alarm.
Margaret rolled the suitcase upright.
Then she slid several grocery receipts across the table toward Jason.
“Childcare, cleaning, groceries—three thousand two hundred twelve.”
She looked toward the window.
“And my workers already started outside.”
A hammer struck wood somewhere beyond the sliding doors.
Then another.
Jason turned toward the sound.
Melissa went completely still.
“What workers?”
Margaret looked at her.
May you like
“The ones on my property.”
That was the moment Melissa stopped pretending the invoice mattered.
