Naleighna Kai
Sugar Ain’t
So Sweet
Story Note
What if ’s. That’s what drove this story. What
if I was a wife who’d been surrounded by
people who were taking, taking, and taking
and not realizing that I’d been giving. What
happens when that wife strikes out to find
herself and figure out what she’s willing to
lose in order to find that sense of peace.
I will die if I stay here …
Shannan’s entire family sat at the dinner table enjoying a meal
which took her three hours to prepare, while she mowed the
jungle of their front yard, seething the entire time. She stopped to
empty the bag, but froze when her mother-in-law’s voice carried
from the open pantry window, “I had to fake a damn heart attack
to make this stupid heifer get with the program.”
Faked a heart attack? Wait. What?
Monique Hallerin had faked that entire one-month ordeal
so Shannan would take over the daunting task of shopping,
preparing, cooking, then serving Sunday dinners for fifteen people
every week, only to criticize nearly everything that Shannan did.
Faked it so Shannan’s husband, Zach, would pick up the slack on
her bills. All while her brothers-in-law and most of her children
parked their lazy behinds at the dining room table every Sunday
and didn’t lift