Part II
Over the next three weeks, I did what I always did.
I planned.
I made spreadsheets.
I calculated portions per person, factored in dietary restrictions. Linda’s daughter was gluten-free. Deborah didn’t eat pork. Aunt Patricia had a shellfish allergy Karen mentioned offhand like it was a footnote instead of a medical emergency.
I adjusted recipes. I found a twenty-two-pound turkey at the grocery store and reserved it. I priced out a bone-in ham. I made a shopping list that ran two pages.
I asked Brandon three more times if Karen had confirmed what she was bringing.
Each time he said he’d check.
Each time he didn’t.
On the Monday before Thanksgiving, four days out, I sent Karen a text myself.
Hi Karen, just finalizing the menu. Can you confirm what you’re bringing? I have you down for three sides and a dessert.
Her reply came two hours later.
I’ll bring my famous green bean casserole and maybe some rolls.
One dish.
One dish and some maybe-rolls.
After I had specifically asked for three sides and a dessert. After she had invited twenty people to my home.
I showed Brandon the text that night.
He read it, shrugged, and said, “At least she’s bringing something.”
“Brandon, she invited twenty people. She’s bringing a casserole.”
“What do you want me to do about it, Ashley? It’s too late to cancel.”
“I want you to back me up. I want you to call your mother and tell her that one casserole isn’t enough. I want you to be on my team.”
He looked at me with genuine confusion, like I was speaking a language he had never learned.
“I am on your team. I’m always on your team.”
“Then act like it.”
He didn’t call her.
He went to the living room and turned on the game.
That Monday night, something inside me shifted from frustration to something colder. Clearer.
I lay in bed and made a decision.
I would cook the Thanksgiving dinner.
All of it.
I would do it beautifully, perfectly, exactly the way I had planned. Not for Karen. Not for her twenty relatives.
For me.
Because I refused to let anyone say I couldn’t handle it.
I refused to give Karen the satisfaction of a failure she could blame on me.
Tuesday, I took the day off work. I went to the grocery store at seven in the morning and spent $347.
Turkey, ham, five pounds of potatoes, sweet potatoes, fresh cranberries, cream cheese, butter—so much butter—flour, sugar, pecans, green beans, mushroom soup, French fried onions, four different kinds of cheese, dinner rolls, pie crusts, canned pumpkin, eggs, heavy cream, chicken broth, celery, onions, sage, thyme.
I filled the cart so full I could barely steer it.
I came home and started prepping.
I brined the turkey. I made the cranberry sauce from my grandmother’s recipe, the one with orange zest and a splash of bourbon. I baked three pies—pecan, pumpkin, and sweet potato. I peeled and cubed potatoes and stored them in water. I prepped the green bean casserole, my version, not Karen’s. I made cornbread for the stuffing.
I worked for eleven straight hours.
By Tuesday night, my fridge was packed. Every shelf. Every drawer. Every door compartment.
It was a work of art.
It was $347 and eleven hours of my life, arranged in Tupperware and foil-wrapped baking dishes.
And then, at eleven o’clock, Karen called.
Brandon answered.
I heard his voice from the living room.
“Hey, Mom.”
Then a long stretch of silence while he listened.
When he came into the kitchen, his face had that look again.
The spineless one.
“So… Mom says Aunt Patricia is bringing her friend Donna and Donna’s daughter, and Linda’s son is bringing his roommate. So it’s more like twenty-three now.”
Twenty-three.
Three more people added two days before the event, after I had already bought everything, prepped everything, calculated everything down to the last bread roll.
“No,” I said.
Brandon blinked.
“What?”
“No. I planned for twenty. I shopped for twenty. I’m not adding three more people two days before Thanksgiving because your mother can’t stop treating our house like a hotel.”
“Ash, it’s just three more.”
“It’s never just anything with her, Brandon. It’s always one more thing. One more person. One more demand. And you always say yes because saying no might mean she’s upset with you for five minutes.”
His face hardened.
“That’s not fair.”
“You know what’s not fair? I spent $347 today. I took a day off work. That’s a day of PTO I won’t get back. I’ve been on my feet since seven this morning. And your mother is still adding guests like she’s updating an RSVP for her own party in my house.”
We stared at each other across the kitchen.
The fridge hummed behind me, full of food I had prepared with my own hands and my own money.
Brandon opened his mouth, closed it, opened it again.
“I’ll tell her no more additions,” he said quietly.
“Will you, though?”
He didn’t answer.
He turned and walked back to the living room.
A second later, the TV volume went up.
The game was still on.
The game was always on.
Wednesday night, the night before Thanksgiving, Karen arrived.
She wasn’t supposed to come until Thursday morning, but she showed up at eight p.m. with an overnight bag, her green bean casserole, and a store-bought bag of dinner rolls.
Not even the good kind.