Page 95 of Salty, Spiced, and a Little Bit Nice

“But I’m still not going back home. Even if you reinstate me back in the will and shower me with all the money in the world. Until you realize you need to stop controlling my life, you can’t be a part of it, and I can’t be a part of yours.”

She placed her cup back on the table, her gaze furious. “That’s not the correct response. I’ll give you five minutes to reconsider your answer.”

“That was the right answer, and my final one. I’m staying, and no amount of emotional or physical blackmail can change my mind.”

She let out a loud, impatient sigh. “Stop being dramatic. You’re always acting as if I’m doing something horrible, but you know I’m only looking out for your best interests.”

“No, you’re not. All you care about is the family business, the status and privileges that come with it. You don’t care about my best interests or my happiness.”

Her tone turned frosty. “Listen carefully, Ellie. I’m saving you from making a terrible mistake. If you’re doing this for him, it’s not a smart decision, and you’ll regret it. You don’t belong here, and people like us don’t belong with people like Alec Mackenzie.”

“I’m doing this for myself.” My tone rose. “You may not care, but I have a life here. I’m running my own business. I truly appreciate everything you’ve done for me and our family, but it’s clear that you value the family business more than your own child. I’ve had enough of living my life being controlled and suffocated by you. It’s time foryouto move on.”

She flinched, and a flash of something—fear? surprise?—flitted across her face, only to disappear the next second. People at neighboring tables were starting to stare, but my mother’s attention was laser-focused on me.

“You know that’s not how things are done in our family. If you go ahead with this, consider yourself cut off from whatever you stand to inherit in the future. You’re giving up all the privileges you grew up with. Choose wisely, because you’re not getting a second chance.”

I gave her a sad smile. “I don’t want your second chance.”

Her face paled, and her eyes, so much like mine, held nothingbut anger. “You’re being disrespectful, and you’re making a huge mistake.”

For a brief minute, I waited for the familiar guilt that would normally engulf me in a world of shame and regret.

But it never came.

Instead, a tidal wave of sadness washed over me. I knew I was about to lose my parents for good, but if keeping them meant giving up my future and my freedom, then I knew which choice to make. An enormous, empowering urge to walk away surged inside of me. I had never been more confident in my life, and I knew that it was the right thing to do.

“It’s not your life to run, and please don’t get started on your grand, self-sacrificing speech. Go ahead, cut me out of the family, out of the will, whatever you want.”

“You’re going to regret this,” my mother hissed. “In six months, you’ll come back, begging us for a handout, because you’re going to fail.”

“That’s what you thought when I left home, right? But you’re wrong. I had a lot of challenges when I first came here, but I handled everything without your help. Or your money. I turned a horribly damaged store into a beautiful bakery, and we’re opening in less than a month. I started a new life all on my own, and I’m doing just fine. So no, I won’t fail.” I paused to take a breath. “And one more thing. My condition isn’t an impediment. I’m not defined by it, and it doesn’t limit me. It doesn’t make me less, or different, and even if I fail, I’ll just get back up and try again. So please don’t come back into my life, unless you understand it isn’t yours to run.” I whipped out my phone and tapped on the Uber app. “I’ve requested a car to take you back to the airport. Goodbye, Mom.”

Without waiting for a response, I walked away from the café. From her.

And for the first time in a long while, I felt peace.

CHAPTER 28Hashtagging the Shit Out of Everything

After packing up my stuff, I called Kim and asked if I could stay with her and Jenna until I found a place on my own, and she immediately came over to help me move my things to their apartment.

We had a movie and bubble tea session that night, where we ignored the movie and drank every last drop of our tea. They listened to my story, then very supportively trashed Alec and called him all sorts of names for accepting the bribe money and breaking my heart. It didn’t make things easier, but having the two of them to chat with helped take my mind offhimthings.

The first few days after the confrontation with Alec were the worst, because almost everything I did and saw reminded me of him. My green plaid pajamas. The takeouts I’d bring back to Kim and Jenna’s place from Java Spice. The matcha and dark chocolate chip cookies that became one of the bakery’s staple items. Even removing and changing the site for my pump. The hardest of all was being in the bakery, which was supposed to be my safe haven, because he’d played a huge part in the place coming together.

As for my parents, well, I’d sent my father a long email to explain and apologize, which went unanswered. As expected, my mother called and left voicemails, sent emails and text messages, her tone starting at rage and quickly escalating into frightening hostility. Knowing that her threat of cutting me out of the will wasn’t working, she’d resorted to the oldest tactic in her book: guilt trip and manipulation. Her latest were increasingly aggressive messages of how she didn’t deserve to be treated this way by her daughter.

The more I read her messages, the more I doubted my decision. What if she was right, that I was throwing away a relationship with my own parents? Maybe I should have given them—her—another chance to work things out. After all, familial bonds were supposed to be the most important ones in our lives, right? Wasn’t that what the old Indonesian saying was all about? Always honor your elders?

But then my phone would light up with her latest angry text, and it would bring me crashing back to the realization that she would never change. Trying to resolve my issues with her would be futile, and no matter how hard I tried, or how much I wished for it, she would never be the mother that I needed. I was overcome with grief when reality finally set in: that I should stop hoping for the day when we might have an actual relationship. I had to accept that I needed to find ways to make peace with the past on my own.

So the next thing I did was to delete her messages, change my phone number, and remove theirs from my contact list, despite Eric and Naomi pleading with me not to. It felt strangely liberating, although I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t completely heartbroken about it.

But I knew that this was for the best.

And after what had happened, I knew I could handle whatever came my way.

It had been eleven long days since I’d confronted Alec and sent my mother away. Today was the bakery’s grand opening day, and I’d been a nervous wreck since I’d woken up. I’d arrived at three to start baking, a flurry of things-to-do on the checklist racing through my mind. Were the glass displays clean and shiny enough? Did I order enough napkins and pastry boxes? Where did I keep the display labels and pricing? Had I made enough cupcakes and donuts and brookies for the first day?

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