A sudden, aggressive laugh burst from my chest.
“She abandoned it beneath the hallway radiator,” Robert smiled, his eyes glistening with unshed emotion. “I salvaged it. She truly adores you, Emma.”
“I know,” I whispered, carefully refolding the precious artifact.
Robert took a deep breath, steeling himself. “I have summoned your mother and Melissa for a summit this coming Sunday. Not a dinner. A tribunal. You are not obligated to attend.”
I looked down at the crude, beautiful drawing of the sun. I thought about the locked door on the porch. I thought about the ghost I had been forced to play in my own family.
“I will be there,” I said, my voice hardening into resolve. “It’s time to drag the monsters out into the daylight.”
Chapter 5: The Exorcism
Sunday materialized, bringing a cruel, mocking blast of beautiful spring sunshine.
I dropped Lily off at a trusted neighbor’s house and drove to the estate. The porch light was extinguished. There was no tantalizing aroma of roasted poultry bleeding through the brickwork. The dining room table was entirely barren, save for a solitary, ominous box of Kleenex in the center.
My father anchored one end of the table. Diane sat rigidly on the left, wearing immaculate pale blue linen and an expression that could freeze boiling water. Melissa sat opposite her, looking haggard, her hair pulled back into a chaotic knot. She radiated the defensive energy of a cornered animal.
I claimed a chair near the exit, tactically securing my escape route.
“Thank you for attending,” Robert initiated, folding his large hands on the oak wood. “I convened this meeting because the atrocities committed last week cannot be swept into the incinerator of family amnesia. Emma is not here to absorb your pathetic justifications. She is here because she was the victim of profound cruelty.”
Melissa instantly went on the offensive. “I am already aware I have been cast as the villain in this melodrama.”
“No,” I interjected, cutting her off before my father could. “You are merely aware that you were finally caught in the act.”
Melissa glared at me, her eyes brimming with toxic resentment. “Do you see this, Dad? This is precisely why I didn’t want her here!”
“Stop,” Robert commanded, his voice a low, terrifying rumble. “Diane. I want you to look Emma in the eyes and articulate exactly why you banished her from the porch.”
Diane looked at him as though he had requested she amputate her own limb. Slowly, agonizingly, she turned her sights on me. It was a historic moment; my mother was being stripped of her primary weapons—condescension, tactical sighs, and selective amnesia.
