My aunt Carol leaned in.
“The venue holds 200 people. You’re only inviting 110. Don’t be greedy with the space.”
Greedy.
That word landed somewhere deep and old.
This is the part where I want to pause and say something because I think a lot of you already know exactly where this is going.
When someone calls you selfish for having a boundary, that’s usually the moment you learn the boundary was working.
I asked my mother directly how much would Briana even be contributing.
“Half the remaining balance,” my mother said breezily.
Like this was already settled.
“You’ll barely notice it.”
I would notice $7,000.
I notice every dollar actually because for 6 years I had been quietly funding this family’s entire lifestyle and not one person in that dining room seemed to remember it.
Here’s what family had actually meant financially for 6 years running.
I had covered my parents mortgage payments of $1,800 a month for 22 straight months during my father’s rough patch in his consulting business, $39,600 total.
I had covered my younger sister Natalie’s car payment of $410 a month for 18 months after her ex vanished and left her holding a loan, $7,380.
I had paid $10,500 toward my father’s surprise medical bills because they’d chosen a cheap insurance plan with a massive deductible.
I had given my aunt Carol an emergency loan of $4,500 for a plumbing disaster, never repaid.
I had paid $7,200 to replace the roof on the very house I was standing in.
I had given Briana herself $3,800 in rent assistance 2 years earlier when she was between jobs.
And there was another $6,220 scattered across smaller just this once requests I had genuinely forgotten about until I sat down and added it all up later that night.
Total: $79,200.
Total repaid: zero.