My name is Ariel, and I am twenty-eight years old. I work as a senior accountant at a manufacturing firm in Denver, Colorado, where I have spent the last six years building my career from the ground up. I pay my own bills, own my own condo, and have never once asked my parents for a single dollar since I graduated from college. I thought that independence would eventually earn me respect in this family. I thought that proving myself would matter.
I was devastatingly, painfully wrong.
Christmas morning at my mother Patricia’s house had always been a complicated affair. But this year felt different. There was a sharpness in the air that I could not quite explain, a tension that had been building since I walked through the front door the night before. My father, Gregory, sat in his leather recliner, nursing a glass of bourbon and avoiding eye contact with everyone in the room. My mother flitted around the living room like a nervous bird, arranging presents under the tree with an intensity that suggested she was hiding something big.
Vivien arrived last, as usual, making her grand entrance in designer clothes and freshly highlighted hair. At twenty-five years old, she had never held a job for more than three months, never paid rent, and never once worried about where her next meal would come from. Our parents covered everything for her. From her apartment in the trendy part of town to her monthly shopping sprees and expensive spa treatments, the justification was always the same tired excuse.