Chapter 6 - The Projection Screen
"No, Mother," I said, stepping back so she couldn't touch me. "We will never go home again."
I raised my hand and signaled toward the community center across the street. On the second-story balcony overlooking the garden, my friend Marcus pressed a remote.
A massive projector screen, rigged between two oak trees on the public easement just outside the private garden's boundary, flickered to life. A bright beam of white light cut through the late-afternoon gloom, throwing high-definition images against the canvas.
It wasn't a photo montage of childhood memories. It was a visual ledger.
First came the forged letter Diane had sent to the Columbia admissions office, claiming Thomas had accepted a competing offer in Europe.
Next came the itemized bank transfers showing Diane withdrawing funds from my father’s life insurance policy to purchase her membership at the hunt club.
Then came the emails—dozens of them—sent from various burner accounts to my employers, warning them that I was dealing with severe substance abuse issues whenever I was up for an out-of-state promotion that would have taken me away from her.
The lawn went from tense silence to an uproar of murmurs. The remaining catering staff stopped serving. The bartenders put down their shakers and stared at the screen in open-mouthed disbelief.
"Turn it off!" Diane screamed, sprinting awkwardly across the lawn toward the projector screen. "Turn it off right now! Turn it off!"
She tripped over a decorative lantern, crashing hard onto her knees in the damp dirt. The sky-blue tailored dress ripped at the seam, exposing a scuffed knee. She scrambled in the grass, clawing at the earth like a madwoman, but the slides kept changing.
Every lie, documented. Every manipulated relationship, restored to truth.
"Look at it, Diane," Thomas shouted, his voice ringing with years of vindication. "Look at the life you stole from your son just so you wouldn't have to be alone in an empty house!"
Diane sat on her knees, surrounded by broken glass, crushed rose petals, and dirt. Her social circle had completely evaporated; the garden was empty except for the forty-seven people she had wronged and the few caterers watching in stunned horror from behind the buffet.
She looked at me from the ground, her chest heaving, tears finally cutting dark tracks through her heavy makeup.
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"I gave you everything," she whispered, her voice cracked and hollow. "Everything."
"You gave me a cage, Mother," I replied, staring down at her without an ounce of hatred—only an immense, liberating emptiness. "And today, the door is open."
