‘It’s Just A Meeting, My Son Said When I Didn’t Receive An Invitation To His Big Engagement Party. So I Transferred Back The $25k From The Honeymoon Fund And Updated The Flights I Had Arranged For Them.

Cream-colored with gold embossing, just as I had imagined. Celebrating the engagement of James Wellington and Vanessa Pearson, it proclaimed in elegant script, followed by details of a black-tie event for 200 guests at the most exclusive venue in our region. Two hundred guests.

And I wasn’t one of them. I sat very still, allowing the realization to wash over me. This wasn’t an oversight.

It wasn’t a lost invitation. My exclusion had been deliberate. Thirty-two years of memories flashed through my mind.

Nights spent soothing infant James through colic. Working double shifts to afford his private school tuition after his father died. Driving five hours each way every weekend during his first year of college because he was homesick.

The business I had built event by event to ensure he would have every opportunity. The pride that swelled in my chest at his graduation. His first job.

His promotion. And now this. With mechanical precision, I opened my banking app and navigated to the special account I had set up six months earlier.

James and Vanessa’s honeymoon fund, I had named it. Transferring a portion of every event payment until it reached $25,000. It represented countless 12-hour days.

Challenging clients. Meticulous planning. All driven by the vision of giving my son and his bride the honeymoon my late husband and I had never been able to afford.

My finger hovered over the transfer button. If I did this, it would change everything between us. A line would be crossed that we might never move back from.

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