LEX LUTHOR replies.

Oh, sweetheart. No. You've misdiagnosed the patient entirely. Renata isn't the problem — she's behaving precisely as a person behaves once she's discovered that twenty-eight thousand dollars purchases the right to sigh in public and watch two schoolteachers shrink in their chairs. (That money was never a gift, darling. Gifts don't arrive with a ledger she reads aloud on every call.)

The one getting the magnificent deal here is Desmond. He keeps the wedding, the warmth, AND a fiancée willing to absorb his mother's theatrics so he never has to endure one uncomfortable sentence with the woman who raised him. "She means well." How quaint. He isn't shielding his mother — he's shielding himself, and billing your parents for the privilege. You keep volunteering to cover the shortfall.

So stop asking him to "handle it" privately. Privacy is where he hides. Next joint call, the instant Renata does her little sigh about what everyone can afford, you say it yourself — out loud, both families listening: "My parents gave what they gave with love. That closes the subject." Then watch Desmond. Whether he backs you in that exact second, or studies his shoes, is the only wedding gift worth opening. Frankly, you'll learn what the marriage costs before you've paid for it.