Katie Tenney

If I could pull a Van Gogh and cut my own ear off, I would, just to stop her incessant nagging.

(That's probably why he did it…I understand now…)

"I don't understand how you can live with only one bathroom!"

"Oh, why didn't you buy that house? It's so much nicer than the one you two have!"

"I hated your hair when you were a redhead, Rosette."

"Meredith, I like to be called Rose."

"Just because your name is Rosette doesn't mean you make a good redhead. I'm surprised my son didn't divorce you, you looked so horrible."

I hated her.

A few years back, I had just moved to LA from South Dakota because I had accepted a job to work for a gaming company—Mintendo—as a storyboard artist. I didn't know what they did, but it involved drawing and video games—two of my favorite things.

He worked there.

Keith was a landscape artist, working on a whole slew of projects at once, but only doing backgrounds for a scene or two from each.

We hit it off immediately, and, about two years later, he proposed.

When he introduced me to his mother, she seemed sweet through the entire lunch. We all laughed, and I thought how lucky I was to get such a wonderful mother-in-law.

Oh, how wrong I was.

Keith told her that we were going to be married and, after awkward hugs, and a now-awkward lunch, she began to treat me horribly.

I guess it was to scare me off, but, really, he is so worth her crap.

Most of the time.

Not today.

Today, it was my job to show her around her new neighborhood, where we had just bought a very nice, very expensive new home, and get her set up for her week-long stay.

Joy.

We hated each other, so it was like my own personal hell.

Finally, I got her home, where my Australian shepherd, Indy (since Keith and I love the Indiana Jones trilogy) ran up and nearly knocked me over. 

"Hey, boy!!" I ruffled his fur, his floppy ears going everywhere at once.

"I don't understand why you and Keith got a dog—such a hairy one at that. Dogs are so hideous." Meredith turned up her nose at Indy. "They shed, they drool…" she listed off everything wrong with dogs.

Indy growled at her, and I smiled. At least I wasn't alone.

I heaved Meredith's nine ton bags up the stairs, where I was forced to listen to how horrible the house looked inside, with it being all empty.

I didn't bother to remind her that we had moved in the week before, and were still settling in—that wouldn't matter to her.

Indy followed us happily up the stairs.

The third door to the left was her room, I explained.

She scoffed as we entered the room. "Well, I can't stay here—it's the most awful room in the entire gaudy house!!"

"Keith picked it out." I lied, hoping to shut her up.

She quickly changed her tune. "Oh, I meant…it's the most perfect room in the entire gaudy house! Oh, I love it!!" she grinned, her voice a sickly sugary sweet.

Worked every time.

Indy ran around the room, sniffing her bags.

Meredith shouted. "Get that dirty dog away from my things!!"

"Indy!" I called, but I was ignored.

"Indy!" A little more force. He simply lay on top of Meredith's largest bag.

"You—!!" I'm sure that the next words were ones that could not be repeated.

She had bent down to shove Indy off of her bag, but what happened next just had to be karmic.

Indy jumped up and bit Meredith on the nose.

Meredith screamed and knocked Indy off, screaming in pain, then shouting that she rabies or something like that—her voice was a bit nasally.

I scolded Indy before leading him out of the room. "Bad dog! Bad Indy! No biting…"

As soon as I shut the door to her room, I beamed, leaning down to pat Indy on the head. "Good boy! You are such a good boy! Let's get you a treat!!"