I had no choice but to head into the kitchen after I relieved myself and greet the morning with my less-than-trustworthy family.

“You really love that snow globe, don’t you?” My mom asked me after exchanging good mornings.

“Uh, yeah,” I stammered back.

“I saw you sleeping with it when I went to check on you this morning,” my mom went on. “Don’t worry, it’s back on the tree, safe and sound.”

My mom seasoning a bloody hunk of meat with thick kosher salt and bony bare hands took on a stomach-churning flavor given the details of what the snow globe showed me the night before. She didn’t have some motivation to off me, did she? Maybe I would skip the customary Christmas Eve prime rib this year? Too sick. So sorry.

I returned my mom’s statement with an awkward half-laugh/half-hiccup and went back to the tree to check in on the snow globe.

The snow globe was in its usual place, but I immediately noticed its contents were again different. A closer look revealed a familiar scene. It was of me in the living room, looking at the snow globe with the poisoning scene it showed me last night inside it. My breath halted in my lungs. Had the snow globe shown this scene to my mom when she took it from me earlier this morning. Did she know, that I knew about what she may have did?

“Rebecca,” my mom’s voice shot out from the kitchen. “You wanna help me with the pie?”

I had to play it cool. Not let on I had any inklings to my mom being some kind of parent murderer. It wasn’t easy, but I managed to remain composed through the entire production of a cherry pie.