My mom looked directly at me. “Edward, you’ve been doing such a good job hosting Thanksgiving every year, keeping everything so perfect. But we all thought it was time to. Well, be honest about a few things.”
A cold, prickly feeling spread through my chest.
“Honest about what?” I asked carefully.
“About how you’ve been acting,” she said, her tone deceptively warm, like she was delivering good news. “You’re always so serious, so controlling about everything. You have to have everything just so. The napkins folded a certain way, the turkey carved a certain way, everyone sitting exactly where you want them. And we’ve all been talking.”
“Talking,” I repeated, my voice tightening.
“Yes,” she said, nodding toward Clare. “In fact, your sister has been keeping a little list.”
Clare grinned and pulled out her phone. “Oh, yeah. We thought it would be fun to share all the times you’ve gone overboard, you know, to lighten the mood.”
My stomach dropped.
Before I could respond, Clare started reading from her phone.
“Let’s see,” she said, scrolling dramatically. “Last year, Edward made us all wait 40 minutes before eating because the rolls weren’t golden brown enough. Oh, and the year before that, he got mad that Uncle Tom brought store-bought cranberry sauce and not homemade. Oh, and remember when he made us all go around the table and say what we were thankful for twice because he said the first round didn’t sound heartfelt enough?”
Laughter rippled around the table.
I sat frozen, gripping my chair so hard my fingers achd.
“And who could forget?” Clare continued, grinning. “The time Edward sent out a seven-page PDF with Thanksgiving guidelines with diagrams of the table setting.”
The table erupted into laughter now. Real loud laughter.
My aunt wiped tears from her eyes. My uncle said between chuckles, “You really did that?”
My mom beamed, clearly pleased with herself. “See, we’re all just having fun, honey.”
I could feel my ears burning. My chest felt tight, like someone was sitting on it.
Clare wasn’t done.
“And this year,” she said dramatically, “we thought we’d do something special to help you loosen up a little.”
Before I could ask what she meant, two of my cousins jumped up and disappeared into the hallway, returning with a huge cardboard box. They set it on the table in front of me.
“Go ahead,” Clare said. “Open it.”
I hesitated, but everyone was staring at me expectantly, so I reached out and lifted the lid.
Inside was a cheap paper crown, a plastic scepter, and a sash that said, “Thanksgiving King.”
For a second, I just stared at it, not quite understanding.
Then Carol clapped her hands. “Put it on,” she said.
“Come on, Edward,” my mom urged, smiling like this was the sweetest thing in the world. “It’s just a little joke.”
I sat there frozen, but before I could say anything, Clare grabbed the crown and shoved it on my head, and one of my cousins draped the sash across my chest.
Someone snapped a picture.
Someone else started chanting, “Speech. Speech.”
I wanted to sink through the floor. They were laughing. All of them laughing at me. Not with me. At me.
“This is what you wanted, right?” Clare said mockingly. “You’re the king of Thanksgiving. Everything has to be your way. So, we figured we’d make it official.”
The room roared with laughter again.
I stood up abruptly, the chair scraping against the floor. The laughter died down just a little, enough for everyone to notice the look on my face.
“Edward,” my mom said cautiously.
I looked around the table at my mom’s expectant smile, at Clare’s smirk, at Carol’s raised eyebrows, at the cousins barely containing their laughter.
And for a split second, I thought about screaming, about telling them how cruel they were being, about how much work I put into making this day special every year, about how this house, this table, this meal were the only reasons they even had a Thanksgiving to gather around.
But instead, I just stood there in silence.
And that silence was louder than anything I could have said.