My future MIL had spent months trying to control our wedding, but I honestly thought the worst was behind us. Then I came home one afternoon and found something that made it impossible to keep pretending her behavior was harmless.

My future mother-in-law, Mavis, had opinions about our wedding before Ryan had even officially proposed.

When he showed her the ring he planned to buy, she said, “It’s lovely, but have you checked whether she’d prefer a larger stone?”

Ryan came home and told me about it wearing the exhausted expression of a man who had just survived a three-hour meeting.

I laughed.

At the time.

Once we were actually engaged, Mavis treated the wedding like a project she’d somehow been appointed to manage.

She hated the flowers because white roses were “too funeral.”

“Why can’t you just add a few tables?” she asked one Sunday.

“Because the room has a maximum capacity,” I said.

“Maximum according to whom?”

“The fire department.”

Mavis stared at me.

“People always use that excuse.”

Ryan nearly choked on his coffee.

Then came the guest list.

That was where everything got worse.

Ryan and I had agreed early on that we wanted fewer than one hundred guests. We were paying for most of the wedding ourselves, and neither of us wanted to spend the evening greeting people we barely knew.

One night, Mavis arrived at our apartment carrying a handwritten list.

“Eighteen people,” she announced.

Ryan looked down at the paper.

“Who are these people?”

“Family.”

He pointed at one name.

“Who’s Dennis?”

“Your second cousin.”

“I have a second cousin named Dennis?”

Mavis looked offended.

“You met him.”

“When?”

“Your grandmother’s seventieth birthday.”

Ryan stared at her.

“I was eight.”

“Exactly. So you know him.”

“Mum.”

“And his wife needs to come, obviously. They have two adult daughters, so they’ll need invitations too.”

“No.”

She blinked.

“What?”

“No more additions.”

“Now, Ryan…”

“We already gave you twenty-two spots. That’s more than either of us gave ourselves individually.”

Mavis looked at me.

Not at Ryan.

At me.

“You don’t have much family, though, do you?”

The room fell silent.

My parents had died when I was in college.

Mavis knew that.

Frank, Ryan’s father, looked up from his coffee.

“Mavis.”

She raised both hands.

“I didn’t mean anything.”

Ryan put down his glass.

“You knew exactly what you meant.”

“I’m only saying my side of the family is larger.”

Ryan pushed the list back toward her.

“No more additions. This is our wedding.”

Mavis stared at him for several seconds.

Then she smiled.

It was a strange smile.

Not embarrassed.

Not apologetic.

Almost vindictive.

“Of course.”

She folded the list.

“I understand.”

Frank didn’t say anything else, but he stopped looking at her.

A week later, I finally finished the invitations.

All ninety-six.

I’d spent three evenings checking addresses, applying labels, fixing mistakes, and putting stamps on envelopes until my fingers hurt.

When the last one was finished, I stacked them neatly in the exact center of our dining table.

I even climbed onto a chair to photograph them from above.

Then I sent the picture to Ryan at work.

“FINALLY DONE. Tomorrow they go in the mail!”

That morning, I’d cleaned the entire house because Ryan’s parents were coming for dinner.

Mavis knew this.

I’d complained to her over the phone about spending two hours vacuuming, wiping the baseboards, dusting shelves, and mopping both the kitchen and dining room.

There was absolutely no reason for anyone to clean my floors again.

Mavis and Frank had a spare key for emergencies.

Apparently, Mavis decided arriving early to “help” counted as one.

When I returned from a quick grocery run that afternoon, she was standing in my kitchen.

Beside her sat a bucket of gray water.

My invitations were inside it.

All ninety-six.

The envelopes had swollen and split open.

Ink ran down the paper.

Stamps floated in the dirty water alongside ruined address labels.

I dropped my grocery bag.

“What happened?”

Mavis turned around.

“Oh.”

Just that.

Oh.

Then she glanced at the bucket as if she’d only just noticed it.

“Honey, don’t panic.”

“What happened?”

“I was washing the floor.”

I stared at her.

“You were what?”

“Washing the floor. The bucket was beside the table, and I bumped it.”

She shrugged.

“The invitations slid right in. Just a mishap.”

I looked at the dining table.

Then at the bucket.

The invitations had been placed in the middle.

Not near the edge.

Not even close.

“You were mopping?”

“Yes.”