**The Late Awakening of a MotherinLaw**
When everyone else had already gone, my motherinlaw finally remembered usonly when it was too late.
I have been with Louis for more than ten years. I married him at twentyfive. He isnt an only child: he has two older brothers, both long settled with careers, homes and familiesa pictureperfect family, as they say. Their mother, Geneviève Lefèvre, is a hardhearted woman who never hides behind anyone. She raised her three sons alone and never bowed her head.
From the moment we got engaged, I sensed a particular dislike from her toward me. Nothing outright, but her silences at dinner, the sideways glances, the calculated oversights all spoke loudly. I pretended not to notice. Perhaps I hadnt met her expectations? Perhaps she couldnt let go of her youngest?
Louis was her rock. After the older brothers moved out, he stayed to help her with errands, medical appointments, paperwork. Then I entered the picture, and everything changed.
I tried everything to win her over: slowcooked meals, invitations to celebrations, carefully chosen gifts. I even tried to call her mom, but the word got stuck in my throat. She kept a cold, distant demeanor, and I felt like an outsider in that clan.
When our son Gabriel was born, Geneviève became a bit more present. A brief respite, though: when the elder brothers gave her more grandchildren, our child faded into the background. She spent Christmas with them, called them weekly, and left us in the shadows. The worst part was that she forgot my birthday every year unless Louis reminded her. No card, no message. I suffered, then accepted itafter all, not everyone gets two mothers.
Years passed. A modest but respectable life. Our daughter Élodie arrived. Louis worked, I cared for the children, and my motherinlaw lingered on the periphery of our existencestill distant, still visiting only rarely. We never forced anything.
Last year, her husband died. The shock shattered her. Doctors, antidepressants, a diagnosis of senile depression. The older brothers dropped by once, left some groceries, and then nothing more. We visited her Paris apartmentperhaps not often, but more than they did.
Then, in midDecember, she invited us for New Years Eve. I need you, she whispered. I accepted, despite everything. You dont abandon a vulnerable person.
I was preparing foiegras and plating the Yule log while she sighed on the couch. Will François and Mathieu come? I asked. She shrugged, Whats the point?
Midnight approached. Suddenly she sat up: Sit down. I have a proposal. Her voice trembled. I asked my other daughtersinlaw to take me in. They refused. So move in here. In exchange, Ill leave you the apartment.
The shock hit hard. Years of indifference, now, because the others had turned away, she turns to me? As if a threeroom Paris flat could erase twenty years of coldness?
Louis said hed think about it. In the car, I broke downnot with screams, but with a knotted voice:
Listen, Im not a saint. I wont live with the woman who treated me like a ghost, who never attended her grandchildrens school plays. This sudden affection is just fear of dying alone. Why should we pay with our lives for what she denied us?
Its my mother he murmured.
A mother comforts, she doesnt discriminate among her children. She excluded us from her family story, now she reaches for her favorites.
He fell silent. I understood his anguish, and he understood me.
We never returned to RuedeRivoli. A few cold calls later, she blamed us for her disappointment. I think: what right does she have to expect anything? A smile bought with a few square meters?
No. Dignity has no price. If youre nothing on bright days, dont become a shield against the shadows.
It isnt revengejust the painful lesson of choosing those who truly choose you.
