Chapter 25 #2
“You tried to take my children,” Janie said, her voice steady as a sense of calm rippled gently through her.
It was as if Grandma Susan was right beside her, holding Janie’s hand, giving her strength.
“You stood in front of a judge and claimed I was an unfit mother. You weaponized my postpartum depression to try to prove I was a danger to my own daughters. You hired investigators to dig into my life looking for dirt.” She took a breath.
Listing all her mother’s foul tactics out loud in quick succession rammed home the depths her mother had plumbed, just for money, and rage whispered louder beneath the surface of her calm.
“You made it clear that the only thing that matters to you is that trust fund, and you were willing to destroy my family to get access to it.”
“That’s not… I never said…” Her mother’s careful mask slipped further, revealing the inner ugliness in her eyes that she worked so hard to hide. “I had legitimate concerns about the children’s safety.”
“No, you didn’t.” In the face of her mother’s continued protests, Janie’s bubbling anger subsided.
Something colder and clearer rose in its place, as she recognized her mother’s desperation and her lack of control, both so completely out of character.
“You’ve met the girls three times in their entire lives.
You don’t know their names without checking your phone.
You know nothing about them because you’ve never cared enough to know anything about them. ”
“I care about my granddaughters.”
Janie scoffed. “You care about their trust fund.”
Her mother stood abruptly. “How dare you speak to me this way? After everything I’ve done for you.”
“What have you done for me?” Janie stood too, and she was taller than her mother.
She had been since she was thirteen but had spent so much of her life trying to make herself smaller, more palatable, less threatening.
Now, she actually looked down at her. “You paid for college, yes, but you held it over my head every time I made a choice you didn’t agree with.
You criticized my career, my marriage, and my decision to have children.
You made it clear that nothing I did would ever be good enough. ”
Her mother grasped the back of her chair, her nails digging into the soft leather. “I had high standards because I wanted you to succeed—”
“You had high standards because you wanted me to reflect well on you. You wanted me to be an extension of your image, not my own person.” Years of suppressed words and emotions rose in Janie’s throat, fighting to finally get out and be heard.
“When I told you I wanted to go to law school, you said I would struggle. When I told you I was gay, you said I was confused and that it was a phase I’d grow out of.
When I told you I was marrying Hannah, you said I was making a mistake because she wasn’t from the right kind of family. ”
Her mother sneered. “She isn’t—”
“The right kind of family?” Janie clenched her jaw and shook her head. “What does that even mean? Hannah is kind and loyal and hardworking. She’s an incredible mother. She fought for our marriage even when I’d given up on it. She’s everything you’re not.”
Her mother’s expression turned to stone. “You’re overwrought. The postpartum depression is obviously still affecting your judgment—”
“Don’t.” Janie’s voice was sharp enough that her mother actually took a step back.
“Don’t you dare use my mental health as a weapon again.
It’s a medical condition that affects thousands of women.
” She grasped the edge of her desk, needing something to keep her in place lest she give in to the years of hurt and express it physically.
“I’m treating it with therapy and medication, and I’m doing better every day.
Having depression doesn’t make me a bad mother any more than having diabetes or asthma would. ”
“But staying with that woman—”
“That woman is my wife.” Janie tightened her grip on the warm wood in her hands. Attacking her was one thing, but her rage rose in decibels when her mother attacked Hannah. “She’s the love of my life. And she’s more family to me than you’ve ever been.”
The words hung in the air between them, sharp and final. Janie watched her mother’s face cycle quickly through the emotions of shock, hurt, fury before she settled back into that careful mask.
But it didn’t quite fit anymore. Janie could see the cracks, and the desperation underneath. The fear that she’d miscalculated was now visible, as was the knowledge that she’d pushed too hard and lost any chance of getting what she wanted.
“Your grandmother wouldn’t have wanted this,” her mother said, her voice sounding smaller and almost pleading. “She wouldn’t have wanted you to cut yourself off from your family.”
“You’re not my family,” Janie said, and the truth of her blunt statement settled into her bones. “Not in any way that matters. Family shows up. Family supports you. Family doesn’t try to take your children away because they want access to money.”
“I was trying to protect them—”
“You were trying to control me like you’ve been trying to control me my entire life.
” Janie moved around her desk and walked toward the door; her grandma’s gumption was fading as the consequences of the conversation were beginning to take root.
She needed her mother out of her space. “I’m done, Mother.
I’m done trying to earn your approval and trying to be who you want me to be.
I’m done allowing you to make me feel small and insufficient.
I have a family who actually loves me. I don’t need you. ”
“You can’t just—Janie, please…” Her mother’s voice actually broke. “You’re all I have.”
And there it was. Not I love you. Not I’m sorry. Just You’re all I have.
Because Janie’s father had left her fifteen years ago, tired of the criticism, the impossible standards, and the way nothing was ever good enough.
Because her mother had alienated any real friends with her competitiveness and her need to constantly one-up everyone.
Because she’d built her entire life around appearances and status and money, and now she was sixty-one years old and completely alone but for the sycophants and shallow sidekicks.
A heaviness sank down into the pit of Janie’s stomach.
Was it pity? Perhaps a little, but mostly, it was exhaustion.
“You could have had me,” she said quietly.
“If you’d actually been interested in knowing me instead of controlling me.
If you’d supported my choices instead of criticizing them.
If you’d shown up for my wedding, met my wife with an open mind, been excited about your granddaughters instead of seeing them as obstacles to money you think you deserved. ”
“I never meant—”
“But you did. And you do.” Janie opened the door, a clear dismissal. “I hope you figure out how to be happy, Mother. I really do. But I can’t help you with that. I have my own life to live, and my own family to love. And you’re no longer part of it.”
Her mother stood beside the chair, still clinging to it for a long moment, her perfectly made-up face flitting through emotions Janie wasn’t interested in reading. Then she smoothed her skirt with hands that trembled slightly and walked toward the door.
She paused in the doorway, not quite looking at Janie. “When you were little, you used to tell me you loved me every night before bed. Do you remember that?”
Of course Janie remembered. She remembered being five years old, then six, then seven and all the subsequent years after that, desperate for her mother’s affection, saying I love you like a talisman that might ward off criticism or earn a smile instead of a correction. “I do,” Janie said.
“You haven’t said it in years.”
That was because she’d learned that saying I love you just gave her mother another tool to manipulate her.
Another pressure point to exploit. Love, to her mother, had always been conditional.
Transactional. Something earned through compliance rather than freely given.
Janie swallowed against her dry mouth, the rawness of this exchange worsening with every word. “No,” she said. “I haven’t.”
Her mother blinked rapidly, something Janie had never seen before.
Whatever was going on behind her mother’s crumbling facade, Janie didn’t want to know.
It was too late. Whether her mother was hurt, or angry, or even if regret was swimming around in her dark soul somewhere, Janie no longer cared. “Goodbye, Mother.”
“Goodbye, Janie.”
And then her mother was gone, her Louboutin heels clicking down the marble hallway toward the elevators, and Janie was alone in her office with the door still open and her heart pounding hard against her chest like it was trying to escape.
She closed the door softly. And then she just stood there, breathing, feeling like she’d run a marathon, or climbed Mount McKinley, or done something equally exhausting and monumental.
She’d just cut ties with her mother. Completely and finally.
She dropped into the chair her mother had just vacated and sat with her feelings, as Rae had impressed upon her to do. Beyond the galloping panic and the disappearing gumption, what was it straining for recognition?
Freedom.
The word settled into her consciousness with surprising clarity. She was free. She’d been carrying that weight for far too long, and she’d just hefted it from her shoulders.
Janie stared at the discovery documents from the AI copyright case that had seemed so important an hour ago. Now she was somewhat disconnected from it, like that was someone else’s work, someone else’s life.
Her phone buzzed. How’s your day going?
Janie stared at Hannah’s perfectly timed message for a long moment before responding. My mother just came to my office. I told her I’m done, and I cut ties completely. I think I’m okay. I don’t know. I feel weird.