The command is clear beneath the suggestion. The former Mrs. Brown quickly pulls the sweater over her head, careful not to disturb her hair. When she emerges, smoothing the fabricover her torso, she looks like she belongs on the Brown family Christmas card.
“Perfect,” Mary declares, satisfaction radiating from her like heat. She steps back, admiring the visual effect of Arthur and Bea in matching green. The beginning of her living tableau.
My fingers cramp in tension as Mary turns to retrieve the next box. The family tradition comes into focus now—matching sweaters, a visual declaration of unity and belonging. Of family. And I’m sitting here in vibrant, defiant red, marking myself as an outsider. I want to ask Cillian if she did it on purpose, but I already suspect the answer.
“Cillian,” Mary says, approaching her son with the third identical box. Her voice softens as she extends it to him. “Your father had to talk me out of the reindeer pattern this year.”
It’s meant as a joke, but no one laughs. Cillian accepts the box with a tight smile. “I’ll open it later.”
“Pish-posh, besides, Star’s gift is next. You’re holding up the line.”
Apparently appeased that I’m next, he reluctantly agrees.
His fingers work methodically at the wrapping, neither rushing nor lingering. When he lifts the lid, there’s no surprise—just another green sweater, slightly larger but otherwise identical to his father’s.
The room grows quiet. Everyone watches as Cillian examines the sweater, running his thumb along the sleeve. I can feel the weight of expectation pressing down, the unspoken command to conform, to complete the picture.
Cillian carefully refolds the sweater and places it back in its box. Then, with deliberate care, he sets the box on the side table and makes no move to put it on.
“Thank you, but I’ll stay in my shirt,” he says.
The temperature in the room drops despite the crackling fire. Mary’s polished smile falters, her fingers tightening around herown sweater box until her knuckles protrude. Rejecting the sweater is a rejection of her authority.
“But,” she presses, her voice rising slightly in pitch, “it’s tradition.”
The word ‘tradition’ carries weight—a bludgeon disguised as nostalgia. Mary’s composure begins to crack, fine lines appearing in her façade like a porcelain cup under too much pressure.
“I know,” my boyfriend acknowledges, his voice gentler. “But I’m comfortable as I am.”
He moves closer to me on the sofa, his hand finding the small of my back again. The gesture is unmistakable—he’s choosing me, choosing us, over Mary’s choreographed family portrait.
Mary stands frozen, the remaining two boxes clutched against her emerald silk blouse. Her eyes dart between Cillian and me, calculation and hurt battling across features too disciplined to fully reveal either. Arthur watches the exchange with measured interest, making no move to intervene. Meanwhile, Bea fidgets with her sweater sleeve, clearly uncomfortable in her forced uniformity.
“Well,” Mary finally says, setting down her own sweater box with a controlled movement that betrays her agitation, “I suppose some of us prefer to stand out.”
I expect Mary to give me the last remaining box, but instead she turns away, moving toward a small side table where a generic gold gift bag sits. It’s clearly an afterthought, and not part of the main event. She lifts it with two fingers, as though handling something distasteful.
“Star,” she says, approaching me with cold eyes and an even colder smile. There’s definitely no sweater in there. “I wasn’t certain about sizes, so I thought these might be more appropriate.”
She extends the bag toward me while clutching the last box with her other arm. Mine–the bag–is lightweight, the tissue paper inside hastily arranged. No wrapping, no bow. Just a last-minute placeholder for a daughter-in-law candidate Mary never intended to acknowledge.
I accept it with steady hands despite my racing heart. Inside, nestled in crumpled tissue, is a box of department store chocolates. Nothing like the handmade ones I’d brought. These are the kind grabbed at the checkout of a grocery store. Generic. Impersonal.
“Thank you,” I say, meeting her gaze.
“I thought the box was for her,” Cillian says, darting his eyes to the last wrapped box in Mary’s hands. The one that so far has held matching sweaters.
“Oh no, this is for me!” Mary exclaims.
A present for herself.How selfless, I think sarcastically.
My voice doesn’t waver. Years of gallery rejections and artistic criticism have fortified me against attempts more sophisticated than this transparent slight to diminish my worth.
Mary’s smile tightens. “I wasn’t sure what you might like.”
The lie hangs between us. She didn’t try to know what I might like, didn’t ask Cillian, didn’t consider me worthy of the same careful selection process used for the precise shade of the family sweaters.
“Chocolate is always welcome,” I reply, setting the bag aside with the same care Cillian showed his unworn sweater—a small rebellion, a quiet dignity. Cillian glares at his mother before squeezing my knee.
