“You need to move out,” my mother declared right when I was still biting into my Christmas turkey

Maybe my mother had forgotten that part. Or maybe she’d never cared.

She didn’t flinch. “You need to move out,” she repeated, eyes fixed somewhere over my shoulder instead of on my face. “We’ve been talking. Tonight is your last night here.”

At the head of the table sat my mother, Bernice, carving the turkey with the electric knife I’d bought her last birthday. To her right, my younger sister, Ebony, glowed with the smug satisfaction of the golden child. Next to her was Brad, her husband, the kind of man who wore sunglasses indoors and used words like “synergy” and “disruption” while unemployed.

Brad picked up his fork and tapped it against a crystal wineglass.

Clink, clink, clink.

The sound cut through the Motown Christmas playlist humming in the background from the Bluetooth speakers I owned.