So she wasn’t making it up. Her mother-in-law did think she was an irresponsible spendthrift. But she wasn’t. Was she?

“We can’t ever judge how someone is handling their personal nisayon.”
— Rivki Silver, DMC Ep. 3

“What’s going on here?” Shira heard her mother-in-law ask.

Her voice was coming from the side of the house; she must’ve just come home from her walk. Shira shrank into the wingback chair in the den. She knew her mother-in-law couldn’t see her, or know she’d heard her, but somehow, she felt like the kid caught with their hand in the cookie jar.

“I just didn’t have a chance to push the furniture back, I’ll do it now,” Clarissa answered.

“Back?” her mother-in-law asked.

“Shira’s had a masseuse come to the house a few times,” Clarissa answered. “I moved the chairs in the office to make room for the massage table.”

“A masseuse?” her mother-in-law repeated.

Shira could hear the disdain in her voice, the way it rose and left itself hanging. But why? She hadn’t been feeling well, she was still a bit shaken from the near arrest, and she was just bored and miserable. A little self-care was never a bad idea.

Shira didn’t hear Clarissa’s response, maybe she just nodded. Her mother-in-law spoke again.

“Can you please put the chairs back? There’s some work I need to get done here now.”

“Sure.” Clarissa said, “Do you need the packages put away too, or can you work around them?”

“Packages?”