Chapter 1

My cousin, Ivy, is thirty, but every holiday season, she's still made to perform for our older relatives in ridiculous costumes.

I've told Ivy more than once, "You're thirty, you're an adult. You don't have to act like a kid and do everything the elders say."

But every time, Ivy never dared to defy them.

Until this year, when she prepared another monkey costume for a performance.

I originally planned to just let it go.

But then she directly put the monkey costume on my six-year-old daughter, Lily.

"This year, it's our little Lily's turn to show respect to the elders!"

I stared, aghast, at my cousin, who was acting like a minion serving her masters by dragging others down, and at all the smug-faced elders in the room.

A wave of sorrow and anger washed over me.

Without hesitation, I ripped the monkey costume off Lily, took her hand, and walked out.

"A room full of people, hundreds of years old combined, and you still love watching others act like monkeys."

"Whoever wants to play the monkey can do it. But my daughter and I are done with it."