Right before our Thanksgiving family dinner Chapter 1

Right before our Thanksgiving family dinner, my sister suddenly offered to braid my hair.

I had barely sat down when I heard a sharp snip right behind my ears.

Seven years of waist-length hair, chopped off right at the nape of my neck.

My sister, Chloe, paused for two seconds before collapsing onto the sofa in a fit of hysterical laughter.

"Oops, I accidentally cut too much! Oh my god, Maya, you look like Lord Farquaad!"

My mom looked at the piles of hair scattered across the hardwood floor and started laughing too.

"Well, it's an improvement, honestly. You always walk around with your hair in your face like the girl from The Ring. At least this saves us a trip to the salon."

I clenched my fists, my throat painfully dry.

My dad impatiently waved us toward the dining room.

"Hair grows back. Why do you think Chloe only pranks you and not anyone else? It's because she loves you and wants to get a rise out of you. Sit down and eat."

My eyes instantly burned with tears. I turned to look at my boyfriend.

He was looking down at his phone, transferring money to my sister.

"Twenty bucks. A bet is a bet."

Feeling my gaze on him, he casually waved his phone at me.

"Chloe bet you'd start crying in one minute. I bet you'd last three. You really let me down, babe."

The entire room erupted into laughter again.

I stood completely frozen in place.

When I was sixteen, Chloe wrote "LOSER" in permanent marker on the back of my favorite hoodie, making me the laughingstock of the school for an entire semester.

When I was twenty-one, she hid my prescription glasses, making me completely bomb my senior thesis presentation.

Every single time I got angry, they would just laugh and ask: "Why can't you take a joke?"

This time, a wave of profound, bone-deep exhaustion washed over me.

All these years, I was never a daughter, a sister, or a partner.

I was just a prop they used to keep Chloe entertained.

But this time, I didn't want to play their game anymore.

* * *

Chloe finally stopped laughing, picked up a chopped lock of my hair from the floor, and held it under her chin like a beard.

"Mom, look! Do I look like a caveman?"

My mom laughed so hard she nearly spilled the gravy.

"Throw that away, it's dirty."

Chloe pulled out her phone and started snapping photos of me, the camera shutter clicking rapidly.

I raised my hand to block my face.

"Stop."

"I already got them." She snickered, already swiping through filters on her screen. "Thanksgiving exclusive. I already have the caption: From Princess to Lord Farquaad in one snip."

I lunged forward to grab her phone.

My boyfriend, Ethan, smoothly stepped in and pulled her behind him protectively.

"Come on, relax. It's not like she's posting an ugly picture of you."

The next second, my phone buzzed.

Chloe had dropped a photo of me—eyes red, hair jagged and completely uneven—into the extended family group chat.

A wall of “LMAO” and laughing emojis instantly flooded the screen.

My aunt sent a sticker of a cartoon character pointing and laughing.

My cousin asked if it was a new avant-garde trend.

My mom actually typed out a reply: "Chloe's hand slipped. Gave her sister a bald spot."

Followed by three crying-laughing emojis.

I stared at the messages, my hands growing ice cold.

"Delete it."

Chloe rolled her eyes. "It's just the family group chat. I didn't post it on Instagram."

My dad slammed his fork against his plate.

"Are we eating or what? We've been waiting on you. Are you seriously going to ruin Thanksgiving and turn this family into enemies over some hair?"

I was the one who had my hair hacked off.

Yet somehow, I was the one ruining the holiday.

I didn't say another word.

After I sat down, my mom placed a piece of turkey on my plate. Acting as if absolutely nothing had happened.

"Your grandmother wants to FaceTime tomorrow, so don't give me that attitude. She's old, if she sees you sulking she'll think we're abusing you."

Chloe immediately chimed in.

"You should probably wear a beanie, Maya. If Grandma sees that haircut her blood pressure is going to spike."

The table erupted into laughter again.

Ethan even reached over and patted the top of my ruined hair.

"It is a little prickly."

I flinched violently, dodging his hand.

His hand hovered in mid-air, his smile fading.

"Is that really necessary? I didn't even say it looked bad."

I looked up at him.

He had already turned away to pass the mashed potatoes to Chloe. "Chloe, tone it down. If you make your sister cry again, I'm the one who has to spend all night coaxing her."

Chloe stuck her tongue out at him.

"Isn't that the perfect opportunity for you to play the good boyfriend?"

They tapped their glasses together in perfect synchronization.

As if they were the ones who had been dating for seven years.

Halfway through dinner, I got a text from the Regional Director at my firm.

There was an opening for a transfer to the New York office. They had been holding the position for me for a month.

Double the salary, three-year contract.

I had previously turned it down twice.

The first time, because my mom said New York was too far from home.

The second time, because Ethan said we were getting engaged by the end of the year, so there was no point in relocating.

The Director sent one final message: "Are you absolutely sure you don't want it? You have until midnight to change your mind."

I stared at the screen for a long time.

In the living room, Chloe was giving a dramatic reenactment of the exact facial expression I made when the scissors cut my hair.

My mom said my eyes bugged out like a cartoon character.

My dad chuckled, saying I was much more fun to prank when I was a teenager because I used to cry immediately.

Ethan smiled and added, "She's exactly the same now. Zero character development."

I lowered my head and typed back two words.

"I'll take it."