The drive back to our townhouse took twenty minutes, but to me, it felt like an eternity suspended in cold, furious silence. Willa didn’t speak another word. She kept her forehead pressed against the cool glass of the passenger window, watching the streetlamps blur into streaks of amber.
When we walked through the front door, our kitchen was still warm from the morning. A vase of yellow daisies sat on the counter beside a half-eaten plate of blueberry muffins I had baked for Willa before dropping her off at Graham’s. It felt like a lifetime ago.
“Go take a hot shower, bug,” I said softly, taking her coat. “Put on your favorite fleece pajamas. I’ll make some chamomile tea.”
Willa nodded listlessly, leaving her lone, pathetic gift bag by the entryway bench, and dragged her feet up the stairs.
The moment the bathroom door clicked shut and the pipes began to hum with running water, my phone buzzed on the counter. The caller ID flashed: *Diane.*
I took a deep breath, trying to steady the tremor in my voice, and answered.
“Quinn, darling!” my former mother-in-law’s bright voice chimed through the speaker. Diane was Graham’s mother, but when Graham walked out on our marriage five years ago to pursue his whirlwind romance with Celeste, Diane had refused to abandon me or Willa. She had remained our rock. “Did she love it? Did the bracelet fit her wrist? I was so worried the chain would be too long, but the jeweler assured me it could be adjusted.”
Hearing Diane’s excitement felt like a razor against an open wound.
“Diane,” I said, leaning my forehead against the cool wooden cabinets. “Are you home?”
“Yes, I just sat down with a cup of tea. What’s wrong? You sound breathless. Did something happen at the party?”
“Graham and Celeste let Piper keep the bracelet.”
A heavy, suffocating silence fell over the line. For five full seconds, the only sound was the faint hum of Diane’s refrigerator in the background.
“What did you just say?” Diane’s voice dropped its usual warmth, turning dangerously calm.
“Piper took the bracelet out of the box, put it on her wrist, and refused to take it off. Celeste told Willa that the ‘W’ could stand for ‘Princess’ or whatever nonsense popped into her head. And Graham… Graham backed them up. He told Willa she was too old to be selfish. She came home without the bracelet, without the instant camera you sent, and without the art box her best friend Macy bought her.”
I heard the sharp clatter of porcelain meeting glass—Diane had set her teacup down with enough force to rattle the saucer.
“That silver bracelet was an heirloom piece from my grandmother’s collection that I had melted down and recast with Willa’s initial,” Diane said, her tone shaking with a fury I had rarely heard from her in the fifteen years I’d known her. “It is not a trinket from a toy store. And that camera cost over a hundred dollars of my own pension. Where is Graham right now?”
“At his house. Drinking wine on his patio, probably congratulating himself on maintaining domestic tranquility.”
“I am getting in my car,” Diane said instantly.
“No, Diane, wait,” I urged, rubbing the bridge of my nose. “If you go over there tonight, Graham will just use it to claim we’re ‘attacking’ his new family. He’ll play the victim. He’ll tell Willa that her grandmother is causing drama over material things, and Willa is already blaming herself. She asked me in the car if wanting her own gifts made her a bad person.”
A sharp, ragged gasp came from Diane’s end. “Oh, that poor baby. That sweet, gentle child. Graham has lost his absolute mind. Celeste has completely hollowed out whatever spine he had left.”
“I’m going to handle this legally and firmly,” I said. “I need you to send me the receipts for the camera and whatever appraisal or documentation you have for the silver bracelet. Can you do that?”
“First thing tomorrow morning,” Diane promised, her voice steely. “Quinn… don’t let him get away with this. He has spent three years treating Willa like an inconvenient leftover from his previous life just to keep Celeste happy. It ends now.”
After hanging up, I stared at my phone. As if on cue, another notification popped up. It was a text from Sarah, Macy’s mother:
*Hey Quinn, Macy just got home from the party. She was pretty upset. She said Celeste made Willa give Macy’s gift to Piper? Macy said Piper was already breaking the watercolor pencils on the coffee table before she left. Just wanted to check in. Is Willa okay?*
