The Audit of The Snake

January 2026

The eucalyptus oil hung in the air—sharp, clean, almost clinical. Years ago, that scent meant reset: a deep breath before the next rush, the next demand, the next day that required me to be pleasant on command. Today, it pressed down on me like a hand.

I lay face down on the massage table with my forehead in the padded horseshoe, staring at the beige weave of the carpet. In the corner, a speaker played “nature sounds”—wind chimes and water meant to make everything feel harmless.

Colette worked in silence for a minute, then her thumbs found the knots under my shoulder blades and held there. The pain was bright and direct. My body didn’t argue. It just told the truth.

“We’re leaving the snake behind,” she murmured, more to the room than to me. “The horse comes in February. Time to move.”

I closed my eyes. I didn’t see a horse. I didn’t see open space. I saw my own muscles—tight in the way they’ve been tight for years. Not sore from work, not stiff from age. Tight from bracing. Tight from swallowing.

My joints ached with a life I’d spent managing. My blood pressure had climbed. My jaw stayed clenched even in sleep. My shoulders lived up near my ears like they were waiting for impact. Anxiety wasn’t a mood anymore; it was a setting.

For most of my marriage, I told myself it was normal. Some families are just intense. Some mothers are just like that. Some wives just have to endure.

The music kept tinkling. Colette’s hands kept moving. And in the quiet, my mind did what it always does when there’s finally room: it went straight to what we were about to do.

Court.

Not a dramatic threat. Not a bluff. A calendar reality: appointments, filings, documents. The unglamorous work of protecting what Sam built, and what his brother had been taking.

Because this wasn’t only about a mother-in-law who never liked me. It was about control that had finally moved from the dinner table to a courtroom.

A few days earlier, an envelope had arrived in the mail—cream paper, familiar handwriting. It sat on our counter, waiting. The return address didn’t matter. I knew the shape of it by now.

Inside was the partnership check—an account for Sam and his brothers. The account name, neat and official: JMS. Jerry Jr., Mark, Sam.

But the parents still held the checkbook. The parents still held the pen.

Susan’s loopy, practiced script filled in the amount. Jerry Sr.’s shaky signature anchored the bottom. On the outside of the envelope, Jerry had written, I hope this finds you well. Susan added, Love, Mom and Dad.

That word—Love—was the part that made my stomach turn.

It wasn’t affection. It was a claim.

It was their way of saying, We still decide. We still distribute. We still get to play benevolent. We still get to call it family as long as we keep our hands on the checkbook.

They didn’t mail it as a gift. They mailed it as a reminder.

And after thirty-five years of being treated like the problem—greedy, difficult, disrespectful, too much—I finally understood the simplest thing I’d spent decades dodging: this was never going to be resolved through goodwill.

You can’t negotiate with a system that wants you gone.

Colette’s palm pressed between my shoulder blades, and my breath caught. The hinge arrived the way it always does now—not as a thought, but as a physical line.

Enough.

Not “I’m tired.” Not “I’m frustrated.” Not “Maybe we should.”

Enough.

I thought about Monica—how she used to light up every room, and how, year by year, she grew thinner and quieter until her multiple sclerosis seemed to swallow the space her life should have filled. Years ago, I told a doctor, “I’m worried about her. She’s starving.” I didn’t mean food. I meant she was starving to matter—to be chosen—and the person who should have chosen her kept choosing his mother instead. Now, when I see someone living with an illness like that, my mind goes there first—not as a diagnosis, but as a question: what has been happening around her?

I’ve watched what this kind of control does to bodies.

I’ve watched what it did to hers. I’ve watched what it tried to do to mine.

And I thought of Sally—grown now, far away, carrying an anger that scares me because it feels familiar. When I hear the sharpness in her voice, I don’t just hear adulthood. I hear inheritance—the kind you don’t put in a trust.

Colette moved her hands down my arms, slow and steady. Outside that room, the world kept spinning—headlines, wars, another famous family splintering in public. Proof that money and visibility don’t dilute control; they just spotlight it. But my life had narrowed to one truth I could no longer soften.

We were done being managed.

The fight had moved into the legal system because that’s where control goes when it loses access to your compliance. Paper. Threats. “Love” written in blue ink as if it were proof.

But the body keeps the score, even when the mind tries to be polite. My blood pressure didn’t rise because I was “sensitive.” It rose because I’d spent decades living inside someone else’s rules.

Colette tapped my shoulder. “All set,” she said. “The horse is waiting.”

I pushed myself upright. The eucalyptus cleared my head for one clean second. My muscles felt sore in a way that told me something had finally been touched—something real.

I slid off the table and stood, feet on the floor, spine upright.

But the check wasn’t a gesture. It was evidence.

We weren’t walking into court to make a scene. We were walking in because the inheritance was being used the way it always had been: as leverage. And once you understand the mechanics of a dysfunctional family, you can’t unsee what’s been there all along.

Next, we stopped pretending this could be solved with manners. Then we filed. We sued the company and the board for minority shareholder oppression. We sued Mark for breach of fiduciary duty. We put the truth where it belonged: on the record.

I stepped out into the daylight and pulled a full breath into my chest.

This wasn’t a family discussion anymore.

It was a case.

Not peace.

Air.