Locked up in Heaven

When the waiters brought out buckets of instant noodles, the entire room fell silent.

Every guest froze. Then, the whispers started. Their expressions turned strange, eyes full of disdain.

My mother-in-law, Nancy Tucker, looked like she had just swallowed poison.

As for me, I acted like nothing was wrong. I picked up the microphone and cheerfully waved to everyone to start eating.

"What are you all waiting for? Go on, eat. Don't tell me none of these flavors suit your taste," I said.

Nancy's face twisted in disbelief. She could not hold it in anymore and snapped at me, saying, "Jessica! This is a joke, right? You're serving instant noodles at a wedding banquet?"

I let out an icy laugh. "What else should we be eating at this wedding banquet?"

All eyes turned to me at once, sharp and piercing.

Nancy's face flushed red. She looked like she wanted to disappear into the floor.

"What kind of wedding serves this? Other people prepare full meals with meat and seafood! You're humiliating the Jones family!"

The guests' murmuring grew louder.

"I mean, even poor families wouldn't do this. At worst, they'd cut a few meat dishes. Who serves instant noodles at a wedding?"

"And they're not even poor. This has to be some kind of joke, right?"

Exactly. Even families with little money would try to make their banquet look decent.

However, at my wedding, every single guest had nothing but a cheap cup of instant noodles in front of them.

No sausages. No eggs. Nothing extra.

I smiled at everyone.

"You're overthinking it. This is today's menu."

My husband, Erick Jones, finally snapped out of his shock. Then, he slapped me across the face.

"Jessica, how can you be this cruel? Just to pocket the 15,000 my mom gave you for the wedding, you'd do something this disgusting?"

A flicker of guilt crossed Nancy's face, but she quickly covered it up and turned the blame on me.

"Everyone, please judge this situation for us. Haven't we treated our daughter-in-law well enough?

"We gave her a wedding fund of 130,000 dollars. Even with gold prices so high, we still spent over 10,000 on her jewelry.

"Why would you still steal from the banquet budget and embarrass us in front of everyone?"

The guests began pointing at me, their faces filled with disgust.

"This daughter-in-law is vicious. If we didn't know better, we'd think the Jones family did this on purpose."

"Seriously. I've seen gold diggers, but never one this shameless. Erick is really unlucky to marry someone like her."