Claire just wants to be the glamorous mother-of-the-groom—but when she realizes that her daughter-in-law has her own plans for the wedding, she steps back to focus on her own outfit, only for there to be a fight between her and Alice on the big day. Alice claims that Claire has destroyed the wedding by stealing her dream dress, while Claire sees nothing wrong in her actions. Who is wrong?
All I wanted was to be the mother-of-the-groom. That’s it. I just wanted to be the doting mother who loved her son more than anything—but this is the story of how my attempt to make my son’s wedding perfect turned into a day we’d all rather forget.
When Mark introduced Alice to us, she was unlike anyone I expected him to fall for. Mark, my son, is a lawyer at a top firm—a position that he secured straight after his graduation from Stanford.
“I’m going to be a lawyer, Mom,” he told me once when he was still in high school and doing an essay on the career he wanted to get into.
“I could easily see that,” I told him, making him breakfast as he worked away.
“It’s to help fight injustices. For children, specifically,” he said, drinking his orange juice.
Mark had big dreams, and I knew that my son was always going to reach for the stars.
Alice, on the other hand, was completely different from my son. Her entire personality was light and carefree, whereas Mark was serious and brooding. Alice was a self-taught coder, who freelanced from their cozy apartment. Their worlds, their politics, their interests didn’t align.
But they made it work—and they were a sweet couple for the most part. But love, as they say, is blind.
When Mark proposed to Alice, we were all invited to the scene to help surprise her.
“Please, Mom,” Mark said on the phone. “Alice isn’t close to her family, so to see you and Dad there will be good for her. She’ll know that she’s welcomed and supported.”
“Of course, honey,” I told him, already envisioning their wedding in my head.
I swallowed my reservations and offered to pay for the wedding. James and I had put money away for Mark’s studies, but he had always gotten bursaries which paid for it all.
“We can just use that money for the wedding, Claire,” my husband said over lunch the day after the proposal.
“It’s the best thing we could do for them,” I agreed. “This way they can save up to move out of that small apartment. I know Mark’s been talking about a house with a garden because he really wants a dog.”
When we told Mark and Alice, I thought that the gesture would bring us closer. I didn’t have any daughters, so I thought that this would be my chance.
I could get to know Alice better—and that would be good for Mark, to know that his wife and his mother got along well. Instead, the wedding planning only highlighted our differences.
After a few months into the wedding planning, I met Alice at a coffee shop so that we could go over the details. But we clashed on everything.
“I think roses are timeless,” I said, helping myself to a slice of cake.
“They are, but they’re also overdone in a sense,” Alice said, sipping her tea. “Mark and I want peonies.”
Our meeting went back and forth a few times—and we were stuck in a space where we just couldn’t agree on anything.
“Okay, how about this?” I asked her. “You go ahead with everything else, and just tell me what color your bridesmaids are wearing, so that there won’t be any clashes.”
“They won’t be wearing green,” she said. “I’m leaning toward pink.”
I paid the bill and we parted ways with the wedding planning.
But then, one afternoon Alice texted me.
Hi Claire, just picking out my wedding dress with the girls! I’m so excited! I wish you were here!
Attached were photos of her five top wedding dress picks.
I knew that Alice and I were on different ends of what we thought that the wedding should look like, but I wanted to be included in the big things. I wished that she had included me in the wedding dress shopping.
“At least she’s sending you the top picks,” James said as he read the newspaper next to me.
“I know, but it’s not the same,” I said.
“Do they look good?” he asked. “Can I see them?”
Together, we scrolled through the photos of the potential dresses. They were adequate choices, but nothing stood out.
Nothing that would fit the standard of my future daughter-in-law.
The dress that was Alice’s favorite and the first contender for the actual wedding dress wasn’t what I expected.
I typed back, telling Alice that it wasn’t quite the best choice. And I hoped that my financial stake in the wedding would weigh in. James and I hadn’t given the kids a budget. They had everything at their disposal.
Why not consider the second one? It might be more flattering for you.
James chuckled beside me.
“You’re at the point of over-stepping,” he said.
Before I could say anything, my phone pinged with a message from Alice.
Sorry, but I disagree. This is the dress I’m choosing.
That night over dinner, as James was plating our salmon, I shared my frustration with him.
“Alice is not even considering my opinion, and I’m paying for the dress!” I exclaimed.
James tried to mediate; he also texted Mark to make sure that he knew how I felt, too.
“I think you should just leave the wedding planning to them now,” James said. “Put all your attention into yourself and what you’re going to wear.”
But it also turned out that Mark was able to persuade Alice to wear the dress I preferred.
I had to admit, it was the less stressful option, and I hadn’t been able to shop for my dress before that.
So, that’s what I did.
I went to a few different boutiques and eventually found my perfect dress. It was emerald green, which I knew brought out my eyes.
“That’s beautiful,” James said when I tried the dress on for him.
I had felt different. I no longer felt like the mother-of-the-groom who had been pushed aside. Instead, I felt beautiful in my own skin, my self-esteem growing every time I thought of the dress.
When the wedding week loomed upon us, James and I tried to make ourselves as present as possible. We went to all the events that Mark and Alice needed us to be at—including the rehearsal dinner where we saluted them and drank champagne to toast the festivities.
“All sorted, Mom?” Mark asked me. “Your dress and everything?”
I smiled at my son. Despite being in the middle of Alice and me, he was always checking in on me.
“Of course,” I said. “I’m ready to celebrate you and Alice.”
On the morning of the wedding, I put on my green dress and did my make up. It was everything I had wanted to look for my son’s wedding—elegant and sophisticated.
As I arrived at the venue, the air was thick with murmurs. I ignored them, thinking that everyone was just so used to me being dressed in comfortable clothing, that this was something different for them.
I went straight to the bride’s dressing room, hoping to see Alice and compliment her before she walked down the aisle.
Upon opening the door, Alice looked up—her joyful expression collapsing into one of utter devastation. She looked me up and down before bursting into tears.
“Why did you do this to me, Claire?” she sobbed, her voice choked with emotion.
Confused, I stepped into the room and closed the door.
“What’s wrong?” I asked her.
“Your dress!” she exclaimed.
“What about it?” I asked, second-guessing everything.
“It’s my dream wedding dress, just in another color,” she said, nearly shouting.
I was taken aback.
“Alice, honestly,” I said. “I didn’t realize—they look so different in color.”
But Alice wasn’t having any of it. She sat on the edge of the couch, her head in her hands.
“How could you?” she looked up and cried out. “You’ve made this day about you! Just because we didn’t take any of your suggestions!”
Mark, having heard the commotion from his dressing room next door, came rushing in.
“Mom? What’s going on here?” he asked me.
He looked from Alice to me, seeking an explanation.
Trying to calm the waters, I explained everything slowly.
“I didn’t see the resemblance, Mark,” I said. “I truly just loved the dress, and I thought—”
Alice stood up and marched toward Mark.
“No!” she exclaimed. “You thought that you’d show me what I could’ve had, but in green. Isn’t that it?”
“Mom, please,” my son said. “Let’s just try to get through the day. Please, for me.”
I agreed and left the dressing room. I just wanted to find James and sit quietly until the day was over.
I knew that Alice and I were walking a thin line, but I didn’t expect her to shout at me in the manner that she did.
Naturally, I was upset, but I didn’t want to ruin their day any further.
Reflecting now, perhaps I should have been more open to Alice’s preferences. It was her day after all, not just mine to orchestrate. The question of whether I was wrong hangs heavily over me.
Yes, in trying to enforce my vision, I might have lost sight of what was truly important—Alice’s happiness and Mark’s peace on their special day.
Was I wrong for what I did?
My Fiancée Vacuumed Up and Threw Away My Dead Mother’s Ashes from the Urn
I treasured my mother’s ashes for three years after her death. Her urn was that one sacred thing I asked my fiancée to never touch. But in her rush to make our home spotless, my fiancée vacuumed up the ashes, threw them out with the trash, and hid the truth from me.
Does the death of a loved one mean they’re gone from us forever? My mother Rosemary was my sun, moon, stars, and everything in between. After her death, I still felt her presence through the urn that held her ashes. Until the day my fiancée decided to “clean” our apartment, and my world shattered all over again.
An older lady’s framed photo, an urn, and glowing candles on a table | Source: Midjourney
The evening air was thick with memories as I stood in our living room, touching the silver frame that held Mom’s favorite photo.
She wore her favorite white dress and smiled at the camera, her eyes crinkling at the corners.
It had been five days since the accident that killed Mom, but some days, the pain felt as fresh as the morning I got the call from the hospital.
A man holding an older woman’s framed photo | Source: Midjourney
“Hey, Christian,” my sister Florence called from the couch. She had moved in after Mom passed, and her presence helped fill the echoing emptiness of my heart.
“Remember how Mom would always say grace before dinner, even if we were just having cereal?”
I smiled, running my finger along the frame. “Yeah, and remember how she’d catch us sneaking cookies before dinner? She’d try to look stern but end up laughing instead.”
A sad woman looking at someone | Source: Midjourney
“God, the way she’d put her hands on her hips,” Florence said, wiping her eyes. “Like she was trying so hard to be mad at us.”
“‘Lord give me strength!’” we said in unison, mimicking Mom’s exasperated tone, and for a moment, it felt like she was there with us.
The front door opened, and my girlfriend Kiara walked in, her footsteps hesitant. She’d been like that since Mom died, always hovering at the edges of our grief, never quite knowing how to step in.
A woman in the hallway | Source: Midjourney
“I picked up dinner,” she said, holding up a takeout bag. “Chinese. From that place you like, Christian.”
“Thanks,” I replied coldly. Something had changed between us since Mom’s death. It was like a wall had grown where there used to be an open door.
Two weeks after the funeral, I came home early from work to find Kiara packing a suitcase. The sight stopped me cold in the doorway.
“Where are you going?” I asked, though the answer was written in every careful fold of clothing she placed in the bag.
A woman packing her clothes | Source: Pexels
She didn’t look up. “I need some time, Christian. This… all of this… it’s too much.”
“Too much? My mother died, Kiara. What did you expect?”
“I don’t know how to help you!” She finally met my eyes, her own filled with tears. “You cry every night. You spend hours staring at her pictures. You and Florence keep talking about memories I wasn’t part of, and I feel like an outsider in my own home.”
“So your solution is to leave? When I need you most?”
A sad man looking at someone | Source: Midjourney
“Please try to understand—”
“Understand what? That my girlfriend of four years can’t handle a few weeks of grief? That you’d rather run away than support me?”
“That’s not fair!” Kiara’s hands trembled as she folded another shirt. “I’m trying my best! But it looks like you’ll take forever to move on, Chris.”
“Your best?” I grabbed the shirt from her hands. “Your best is packing your bags while I’m at work? Not even having the decency to tell me to my face that you care more about yourself than me… and my grief?”
A shocked woman | Source: Midjourney
“I was going to call you—”
“Oh, that makes it so much better!” I threw the shirt across the room. “What happened to ‘I’ll always be there for you’? What happened to ‘we’re in this together’?”
“I’m not equipped for this, Christian. I can’t be what you need right now.”
“I never asked you to be anything but present, Kiara. Just to sit with me, to hold my hand, to let me know I’m not alone. But I guess that’s too much to ask, isn’t it?”
A distressed man with a woman | Source: Pexels
She picked up her suitcase, her shoulders shaking. “I’m staying with my friend Shannon for a while. I’ll text you. I just… I need space to figure this out.”
“Figure what out? How to be a decent human being? Go ahead, run away. It’s what you’re good at, isn’t it?”
Kiara left without saying anything.
Florence moved in the next day, bringing with her the comfort of shared grief and understanding. We spent evenings looking through old photo albums, crying together, and laughing at memories of Mom’s terrible dancing and amazing cooking.
A man watching a woman leave with her bag | Source: Pexels
“She would have hated this,” Florence said one night, gesturing at the takeout containers littering our coffee table. “Remember how she used to say fast food was ‘the devil’s cooking’?”
“But she’d still take us to McDonald’s after doctor appointments,” I added, smiling at the memory. “Said it was ‘medicinal French fries.’”
“Chris, did Kiara call?”
“Nope! Just texted. You know, I stayed with her through her father’s illness, her bad days, her everything. And yet here I am, alone in my own grief. I needed her, but maybe she just didn’t love me enough.”
An upset an sitting on the couch | Source: Pexels
The only way Kiara contacted me was through texts like, “Hope you’re okay.”
I typed and deleted, “I needed you, Kiara.” But sent, “I’m managing. Thanks.”
A month after Kiara left, she asked to meet at our usual coffee shop. She sat across from me, looking smaller somehow, her hands wrapped around an untouched latte.
“Shannon’s boyfriend confronted me yesterday,” she hesitantly began. “Called me selfish and cold-hearted. Said I abandoned you when you needed me most.”
A woman in a coffee shop | Source: Unsplash
I stayed silent, watching her struggle with the words.
“He was right,” Kiara continued. “I’ve started therapy, Christian. I want to be better. I want to learn how to be there for you, even when it’s hard. Especially when it’s hard.”
“How do I know you won’t leave again?” I asked, the fear raw in my voice.
“Because I love you,” she replied, reaching across the table. “And I’m learning that love means staying, even when it hurts. Even when you don’t know what to say or do. I’m sorry for being a jerk.”
A woman holding a man’s hand | Source: Unsplash
Life settled into a new pattern after that. Kiara moved back in, and three years later, we started planning our wedding.
Mom’s urn remained on its special table in the corner, surrounded by her photos and her plastic rosary — the one she’d carried everywhere, even to the grocery store.
“We should divide the ashes,” I suggested to Florence one evening. “You could have half.”
She shook her head, touching the urn gently. “No, let’s keep them together. It’s what Mom would have wanted.”
An urn on a shelf | Source: Midjourney
I nodded, tears welling up in my eyes as I thought about Mom and how much I’d miss her at my wedding. I’d already decided: the urn with her ashes would have a special spot in the front row of the church. It would make me feel like Mom was there, blessing me as I took this important step in my life.
The wedding planning consumed our days. And Kiara seemed different. She was more present and understanding.
She held me when the grief hit unexpectedly, sat through stories about Mom without fidgeting, and even asked questions about her sometimes.
Grayscale shot of bridal accessories | Source: Pexels
Then, the call from Florence came on a Tuesday evening, just three days before my wedding. “Hey, Chris? I was wondering if I could have Mom’s rosary. The plastic one? I found a photo of her holding it, and—”
“Of course,” I said, moving toward the urn. “Let me just—”
The words died in my throat as I opened it. Inside, where Mom’s ashes should have been, sat a Ziploc bag filled with… SAND? The rosary lay beside it, exactly where I’d left it three years ago.
The front door opened, and Kiara walked in carrying shopping bags. One look at my face, and hers drained of color.
“What did you do to Mom’s ashes?” I asked.
A man pointing a finger | Source: Pexels
She set the bags down slowly, her hands trembling. “Honey, it’s not what you think. I didn’t do it intentionally—”
“What did you do, Kiara?”
A long silence followed. Then she confessed, “I was cleaning while you were at work a few months ago. The apartment needed a deep clean, and—”
“And what?”
“I picked up the urn to clean the table and accidentally dropped it. It shattered. I quickly assembled the ashes into a bag. But the bag tore. The ashes spilled onto the carpet. I… I panicked. I vacuumed them up and threw the ashes into the trash outside.”
My knees buckled. “You vacuumed my mother’s ashes and threw them in the trash?”
A woman using a vacuum cleaner | Source: Pexels
“I didn’t know what to do. I got some sand from the park nearby. Found a replica of the same urn in the antique shop downtown. I filled it up with the sand. I… I thought you’d never open it again.”
“Never open it? You thought I’d never want to see my mother’s ashes again?”
“I was trying to clean the house. It was just an accident.”
“Clean?” I slammed my hand against the wall. “Those weren’t dust bunnies under the couch, Kiara! That was my mother! The only physical piece of her I had left!”
A shocked man | Source: Midjourney
“I’m sorry, Christian!” she sobbed. “I wasn’t thinking!”
“Clearly!” I picked up the urn, cradling it to my chest. “You weren’t thinking when you decided to ‘clean’ around the one thing I specifically asked you never to touch. You weren’t thinking when you vacuumed up my mother’s remains like they were dirt. And you certainly weren’t thinking when you replaced them with sand and lied to my face for months!”
“Please, Christian, we can fix this—”
“Fix this? How exactly do you propose we fix this, Kiara? Should we go dumpster diving? Should we sift through garbage bags looking for my mother’s ashes?”
An emotional, teary-eyed woman | Source: Midjourney
“I’ll do anything—”
“Did you even try, Kiara? Did you even attempt to salvage anything? Or did you just panic and run to the park for sand, like you always run away when things get hard?”
Her silence filled the room like poison.
“That’s what I thought.” I started gathering Mom’s photos from the table before dumping the sand from the urn. “You know what the worst part is? I actually believed you’d changed. I thought all that therapy and all those promises meant something. But you’re still the same person who left me when my mother died. You’re still running from the hard stuff.”
Close-up shot of an angry man yelling at a woman | Source: Pexels
“Our wedding’s in three days. Please… I’m sorry. Don’t leave me. Where are you going, Christian?”
“Away from you!” I grabbed my keys and things. “I can’t even look at you right now.”
Before stepping out, I looked back, hoping stupidly for a sign of regret. Anything to show she understood what she’d done.
But Kiara just stared at the floor, her face unreadable, and already distant. My chest tightened, and the last bit of hope drained out of me. Without another word, I turned and left, the empty urn heavy in my hands.
A man walking away with a suitcase | Source: Pexels
The hotel room I checked in felt sterile and cold. I sat on the edge of the bed, Mom’s photos spread around me. My phone buzzed continuously with messages from Kiara, but I couldn’t bring myself to read them.
How would I tell Florence? How could I explain that the last piece of our mother was likely buried in a landfill or blown away like dust because my fiancée treated her remains like dirt?
As dawn broke, I stared at the urn one last time, realizing I was left with only emptiness and betrayal.
A distressed man | Source: Pexels
Things would never be the same, and I didn’t know if I’d ever be able to forgive my fiancée. Maybe I didn’t want to. Maybe I never could. But deep down, in a corner of my heart, I hoped my mother would forgive me.
I took the rosary, feeling the familiar smooth plastic under my fingers.
“The night before your accident, you made Florence and me promise to keep it safe, Mom. Said it would help us find our way when we felt lost,” I whispered, tears brimming in my eyes.
“Maybe that’s why you wanted us to have it. Because you knew that someday, we’d need something more than your ashes to hold onto.”
A man holding a rosary | Source: Pixabay
I clutched the rosary tighter, remembering Mom’s words, “Love isn’t in the things we keep, dear. It’s in the memories we make and the forgiveness we offer.”
I don’t know if I can forgive Kiara. Every time I close my eyes, I see Mom’s ashes being sucked away into nothing. How do you forgive something like that?
I stepped out onto the seashore nearby. The city lights blurred through my tears as I clutched the empty urn and rosary to my chest. A gentle breeze stirred, reminding me of how Mom used to say the wind carried whispers from heaven.
An emotional man’s eyes | Source: Unsplash
“I’m sorry, Mom,” I said, looking up at the sky. “I’m so sorry I couldn’t protect your ashes. I had one job — to keep you safe. But I failed. But I want you to know… wherever you are… that you’re still here with me. In every breath I take, in every memory I hold, and in every prayer these beads have witnessed. I love you, Mom. I’ll love you until my last breath and beyond that. Please forgive me.”
The wind seemed to wrap around me like one of her warm embraces, and for a moment, I could almost hear her whisper, “There’s nothing to forgive, dear. Nothing at all. Love you too.”
Silhouette of a man standing on the seashore | Source: Pexels
This work is inspired by real events and people, but it has been fictionalized for creative purposes. Names, characters, and details have been changed to protect privacy and enhance the narrative. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental and not intended by the author.
The author and publisher make no claims to the accuracy of events or the portrayal of characters and are not liable for any misinterpretation. This story is provided “as is,” and any opinions expressed are those of the characters and do not reflect the views of the author or publisher.
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