The year I turned forty, my husband and I had finally saved up one and a half million dollars.

When I thought back on all those years of grinding away, never once stopping to see the world, the decision came easy. We both quit our jobs without looking back.

After that, we put the money into an investment portfolio and started planning a trip. I was so excited that I immediately shared the itinerary with our son, Jacob James, who was away at college.

The moment Jacob saw the budget breakdown, he called.

I was still buzzing with excitement about the trip when his voice came roaring through the phone:

"You're retiring at forty? Have you both lost your minds?"

"You only give me two thousand a month for my allowance, but you're planning to blow ten grand on a vacation?"

"I'm telling you right now, from here on out, you two get to spend five hundred a month, max. That money is mine. You brought me into this world, so you're responsible for me. Nobody touches that money!"

——

His tirade stopped me cold. I double-checked the caller ID. It was definitely my son, Jacob James.

My husband Arnold James and I had worked ourselves to the bone for over twenty years, juggling day jobs and side hustles, and we'd managed to buy two properties and save up a million and a half. Now, with investment returns alone, we were pulling in somewhere around twenty to twenty-five thousand a month. At a time when most college kids got by on seven or eight hundred, we were giving Jacob two thousand.

I genuinely could not understand why he'd say something like that. My first instinct was that something must have happened to him, so I tried to calm him down.

"Jacob, honey, we have plenty of money. Your dad and I budgeted ten thousand for this trip, and we're still earning every month. You don't need to worry about us spending too much. Did something happen at school?"

"Nothing happened to me! I'm saying why the hell do you two get to blow all that money on a vacation while I'm stuck on campus living like I'm broke? Do you even know what two grand a month gets me? My roommate's family gives him twenty-five thousand a month! A single pair of sneakers costs two grand! Are you even my real parents? You can't even give me that much? I'm walking around in three-hundred-dollar shoes. I can't even hold my head up!"

His voice dripped with resentment. "If you couldn't afford to raise me, you shouldn't have had me. Since you did, you owe me a decent life. Not one where I have to watch everyone else have things I can't!"

Jacob's little speech made everything crystal clear. Nothing had happened to him. College life had turned him into someone who measured his worth against everyone else's wallet.

"Enough!"

Before I could respond, Arnold snatched the phone from my hand and barked into it.

"Jacob James, what do you think you're doing? What did we teach you at home? We told you not to compare yourself to other people. You think we didn't look into how much things cost at your school? A full meal in the dining hall is eight bucks. You're there to get an education, not to keep up with the rich kids. Your mother and I worked our entire lives, and now we want to spend our own money on a trip. Do we need your permission?"

"What do you mean, your money? You're my parents. I'm your only kid. When you die, who's getting all of it? Me. So when you blow money now, you're blowing my money!"

Arnold's forehead pulsed with a vein as Jacob kept arguing his case. But the voice on the other end of the line wasn't finished:

"I'm telling you, transfer every cent in your accounts to me before you waste it all. And what's with retiring this early? Even if you have to sweep streets, you need to be out there earning for me! Otherwise, when you're old and frail, see who takes care of you!"

"Jacob James! You ungrateful little—!"

Arnold roared back, and just as the two of them were about to erupt into a full-blown argument, I snatched the phone away and hung up.

I rubbed Arnold's back, trying to calm him down, while sending Jacob a text telling him to think long and hard about whether what he'd done was right.

The message went through. Jacob never replied.

My son had always been a well-behaved kid growing up. Arnold and I loved saving money, sure, but we'd never shortchanged him. Not once. I just couldn't figure out what had happened to him in the six months since he'd left for college—how he could say things like that to the people who raised him.

Once Arnold had settled down, we pulled ourselves together, grabbed our suitcases, and headed for the airport.

I got carsick easily, so I couldn't look at my phone during the ride. But the thing wouldn't stop buzzing. A bad feeling crept over me. When I finally pulled it out, my stomach dropped. Jacob had messaged every aunt, uncle, and distant relative we had, telling them Arnold and I were mistreating him—that we couldn't even cover his basic living expenses, and yet we had the nerve to blow money on some extravagant vacation.

The messages kept pouring in. Some relatives were clearly just there for the drama. Others were scolding me for being a bad mother. My vision went dark as I watched notification after notification pile up. I dialed Jacob's number.

On the other end, Jacob sounded downright smug.

"Scared now, Mom? You and Dad are only forty. You have no business retiring and blowing money on vacations. If you ask me, you're both perfectly healthy—you should be working until you're seventy. Save up another ten million for me at least. I'm going to need money when I get married and have kids someday. I'm your only son. You owe me that."

I let out a cold laugh. Did he really think he could manipulate me? His own mother?

"Jacob, starting today, your allowance drops to fifteen hundred a month. When you figure out what you did wrong, I'll consider raising it back."

As for whatever Jacob had told the relatives, I couldn't have cared less.

What I cared about was how my once-obedient son had turned into this overnight.

I was about to hang up when Jacob blurted out, "Four thousand isn't even enough! And I have a girlfriend now—how can you cut my allowance? You promised me! You said if I got a girlfriend in college, you'd double it!"

"Double it?" Arnold grabbed the phone from my hand. "Fifteen hundred. That's it. Not a penny more. Your mother and I worked ourselves to the bone raising you, and look at how you've been talking to us. Look at what you've been doing. You sit down and think about where you went wrong. Once you realize your mistakes, then we'll talk about your allowance."

He hung up and powered off my phone for good measure.

"We're about to board. We spent half our lives grinding away. It's time we enjoyed ourselves."

When we arrived at our destination, Arnold dragged me straight to the sights. He loved taking photos—snapped dozens of me and posted every last one to social media.

Jacob's call came almost instantly. His voice was sharp with accusation.

"Have you two lost your minds? You actually spent twenty thousand of my dollars on a vacation? Send me the rest of that money right now! Do you seriously want me to starve to death at school?"

"You're both going to get old someday, you know. If you treat me better now, maybe I'll treat you better later..."

He didn't get to finish. Arnold hung up. After a long silence, he took my hand and sighed.

"Honey, what do you say we have another kid?"

That night, Arnold and I had a very long, very serious talk.

Jacob had a point about one thing: Arnold and I were both still in good health. I'd always been mindful about staying fit, so having a second child really wasn't out of the question.

We'd actually considered it ten years ago. Back then, we'd sat Jacob down and seriously asked for his opinion. He was only ten at the time, and he'd said he didn't want a little sister or brother. So we'd scrapped the plan.

We just never expected that six months of college would be enough to turn him into a completely different person.

I picked up my phone. The screen was flooded with messages from Jacob:

"Mom, I know I was wrong. I really don't have any money left. My girlfriend and I can barely afford to eat."

"My girlfriend's family is really messed up. They favor her brother over her and won't give her a cent. I had no choice but to ask you and Dad for money."

"I'm sorry for the way I talked to you and Dad when I asked for money. I got too heated. I'm sorry, Mom."

Reading those last few lines, my heart softened instantly.

I showed the messages to Arnold. "See? Jacob knows he was wrong."

The words had barely left my mouth when a friend request popped up on my screen. The note read: Hi, ma'am. I'm Jacob's girlfriend. I accepted it immediately.

Remembering what Jacob had said about the girl's family situation, I felt a pang of sympathy. I'd escaped that kind of household myself, the kind where daughters were treated as less than sons. It wasn't until I met Arnold that my life finally started turning around.

I was just about to ask the girl if she needed any help when her messages started rolling in, one after another:

"Ma'am, you and your husband are still so young. Why did you quit your jobs and stop working? My parents live out in the country and they still raise chickens and ducks just to help support my brother!"

"You two are perfectly capable of earning money. You should be working hard and saving up a marriage fund for Jacob. How can you justify going on vacations? Spending $20,000 in one trip? That's Jacob's money! What do you two old folks even need to spend money on? $500 a month for living expenses is more than enough. You should be picking up extra work in your spare time. Jacob already promised me: my family wants a $750,000 bride price, plus a house in Manhattan for my brother."

Reading those words was like a bolt of lightning striking my brain.

Now I finally understood why my once sweet, obedient son had turned into this.

I was shaking with rage. Arnold took the phone from my trembling hands, and the moment he read the messages, his face went dark as a thundercloud. He blocked the girl without a word, then fired off a message to Jacob:

"Jacob James, I'm telling you right now: you break up with that girl immediately. If you stay with her, don't blame me when I cut off every last cent of your allowance!"

Jacob called back within seconds.

"Why should I? Candice Henson didn't say anything wrong! Your money is my money anyway! I'll do whatever I want with it! You used to give me everything I asked for. Why is it suddenly a problem when I ask for a little cash?"

"Enough, Jacob! You've gone way too far these past few days! I'm freezing your card right now so you learn who's in charge. You break up with that girl, or don't come crying to me when I take my belt to your hide!"

After hanging up, Arnold was still seething. He blocked Jacob on every platform and app he could find.

I sat there, replaying the last eighteen years of raising Jacob in my head. We'd given him a comfortable life. Maybe not extravagant, but solidly middle-class. When he wanted guitar lessons, we paid for them. When he wanted music classes, we supported him without question. We'd never let him suffer a single hardship. So why? How had we raised such an ungrateful wretch?

Over the next few days, our trip was all but ruined. With everything that ungrateful boy had put us through, neither Arnold nor I had much heart left for sightseeing.