She didn’t, at any point, try to argue with me or suggest that I might have misunderstood. She didn’t say “Linda probably just assumed you’d be happy to help” in a way that was meant to soften the fact that Linda had told her something incorrect. She received the information and she updated.
This is rarer than it should be.
She called me two days later. She said she and Ethan had talked and she wanted me to know she understood I hadn’t offered and she appreciated me telling her directly. She said she thought they needed to rethink the plans regardless of how the family conversation went.
I asked if she was okay.
She said she was adjusting to the idea that the family she was marrying into had some communication patterns she hadn’t fully understood. She said it with a wryness that I appreciated.
“Is Ethan okay?” I asked.
She said he was upset about the whole thing but that the upset was pointed in the right direction, which was toward their parents and the situation rather than toward me.
I said that was good to hear.
She said, “Can I ask you something?”
I said yes.
She said, “Is this — is this a recurring pattern? The assumption that you’ll cover what’s needed?”
I thought about it. “The money part is new,” I said. “But the assumption that I’m fine and capable and don’t need things — that part isn’t new.”
She was quiet. “I’ll file that,” she said.