Chapter 5

Three days after the venue payment fiasco, my phone chimed with an automated alert from Evite Digital.

It was the final, updated e-invitation for Ivy's upcoming wedding, officially dispatched to all two hundred guests.

My finger hovered over the notification before I tapped it open.

There, right beneath Ivy and Noah's names, in glittering gold lettering, was the host line:

Hosted by Grant West and Sloane Vance -- Mother of the Bride

My name wasn't moved to Row Three. It wasn't at the bottom of the page. It had been completely erased from my daughter's wedding invitation.

What stung deeper than my erased name was the design itself.

When Ivy and I first designed the invitation months ago, I had spent weeks sourcing a delicate blue floral pattern inspired by my grandmother's sapphire brooch -- a piece of our family history I had passed down to her.

Now, the blue flowers were stripped away, replaced by Sloane's preferred gold-foil, dusty-rose aesthetic.

Every trace of my maternal presence and my effort had been systematically scrubbed clean before the big day.

My phone rang less than two minutes later. The caller ID read Ivy.

I tapped answer. Before I could say a word, the sound of my daughter's distressed, muffled sobbing burst through the speaker.

"Mom..." Ivy wept, her voice trembling over the line. "Why did you post that seating chart photo in the family chat? Aunt called Dad asking if we kicked you out! Sloane has been crying for two days!"

"I only shared the truth of the seating arrangement, Ivy," I replied quietly, looking at the sapphire brooch resting on my kitchen shelf.

Ivy sobbed harder, her voice cracking with indignation. "We are trying to organize a high-profile wedding! Sloane was just trying to refine the visual flow of the invitation design! Why can't you just compromise for once? Why can't you just be happy for me?"

It was the ultimate emotional weapon.

I closed my eyes, taking a slow, controlled breath. My hand rested flat against the kitchen counter, my fingers steady even as my chest burned. I didn't yell.

"Ivy," I said, my voice barely above a whisper, yet firm. "You removed my name from the host line. You deleted the blue flowers we chose together. You handed my title to Sloane."

"Because you walked out on the venue payment!" Ivy cried out, her tone shifting to desperate pleading. "Mom, please... just stop fighting Dad. If you just call Dad and apologize, we can still reprint a special program with your name on it! Please... I just want my mother to be part of my wedding preparations."

I just want my mother.

Those five words pierced straight through my resolve. For a heartbeat, my breath caught in my throat. My thumb trembled over the embossed blue petals on the paper proof in my hand.