Chapter 4: Live

Kristen went live at seven from the showroom of Hearthside Home, in front of a wall of her own face.

The company was launching a line of dinnerware with her name on the box.

Kristen's Table, forty-nine dollars a plate.

I stood in the third row with Joyce, in a black coat, holding nothing.

Nobody had checked my name at the door. Hearthside's front desk had known me for six years.

Their freight went through Lanternway.

Kristen walked onto the little stage in a cream dress with a ring light behind her and tears already on her cheeks.

"I'm sorry to do this on a happy night," she told her phone. "My family needs me to tell the truth."

The screen behind her showed the live count.

Eleven thousand. Fourteen thousand.

"My sister-in-law cancelled my mother's cards and took her car in front of her church. My mother is sixty-three."

A murmur went through the room.

"She did it for no reason except that my mother joked at dinner. A mother can't even joke anymore."

Joyce leaned toward my ear.

"She hasn't mentioned the plate."

"She won't."

"Should I stop this?"

"No. Let her finish."

Kristen wiped her eyes and held the pause a beat too long.

"I won't say her name. I just want everyone to look at who she really is, a woman who thinks money makes her a queen."

That was the moment I had waited for since noon.

The chief executive of Hearthside came out from the wings.

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