"No clothes? Then go naked. My mother made this with her own hands. You're nothing but a mistress's spawn—I'd rather destroy it than let you wear it."
The room erupted into chaos. Grandma Evelyn, who normally guarded the family's image like a hawk, stood frozen in place—a rare moment of inaction.
Greta draped the shredded fabric over Noel's bare shoulders, glaring at me with undisguised fury.
"How can you be so vicious? In front of all these people—where is he supposed to put his face? It was just borrowing a shirt! Do you have to be this petty?"
I watched her twist right and wrong without a shred of shame. A cold laugh escaped me.
Then I raised the scissors and cut through every single fastening on the qipao she wore—the one my mother had sewn by hand.
"You've forgotten the vow you made to my mother—that you'd never betray me. That's fine." I let the scissors fall. "I haven't forgotten. What's between us is like this dress now. Severed beyond mending."
"I wish you and your little family a hundred years of happiness."
I walked out through a room of stunned faces.
The full-moon banquet didn't recover after that. Noel fainted from the humiliation, and Greta rushed him to the hospital.