No one in the family offered to take her in.

I revoked the two-thousand-dollar monthly allowance I’d been sending her for a year.

I didn’t leave her destitute — her pension and her home were untouched — but I would not fund the dresses and the lunches and the lifestyle again.

That set off a wave of messages from aunts and cousins.

An aunt sent a long note: a son must always honor his mother, no matter her flaws. I replied to the family group chat with a single video: Aurora on her knees at the baseboards while my mother laughed.

No caption.