Chapter 1: Breakfast for the Camera

My mom? Everyone thinks she’s the perfect mother.

In our town, everybody knows her as the mom who wakes up at 5 a.m. sharp, every single day, just to make me breakfast. She stays up past midnight, watching over my shoulder while I scramble to finish my homework. On her TikTok, the comments are always gushing over how devoted she is—and, of course, there are plenty of digs at me, her only daughter. But the truth? Only I know how unhinged she really is.

Even before dawn, just as the sky was turning light, the kitchen blender’s roar ripped through my dreams. I groaned and rolled over to check my phone—4:30 a.m. I yanked the covers over my head. Useless. The noise seeped through everything—relentless.

Downstairs, Mom’s voice echoed from the kitchen, way too cheerful for the hour: “Good morning, friends! My daughter said yesterday she wanted breakfast sandwiches, so I got up extra early to make her homemade sausage and egg biscuits. The sausage is fresh from the local butcher, and the eggs are from our backyard hens—right here in our little suburban yard.”

I lay there, staring at the ceiling fan spinning lazily overhead, just feeling totally defeated. What’s the point? I drifted in and out, not sure how long, until I finally fell back asleep. When I opened my eyes again, predictably, I was late.

Mom was waiting, phone already filming, camera pointed right at me as I made my mad dash out the front door. “My daughter overslept, so she’ll have to eat her breakfast sandwich on the way.” I could already guess what the comments would be:

“Mom gets up early to make breakfast, but the daughter still sleeps in—so ungrateful.”

“Mom is a great mother, it’s just the daughter who’s lazy.”

“Poor Emily’s mom, makes me glad I don’t have kids.”

Great. Just what I needed.

At first, reading those comments drove me crazy. Obviously, I don’t need Mom to get up at the crack of dawn to make me breakfast—I could grab something from the school cafeteria like everyone else. But Mom insists cafeteria food is all processed junk, God knows what’s in the meat, and her breakfasts are the only healthy, clean option. That’s why I eat at home. I’m not the spoiled brat everyone thinks I am. Not even close.

“Our video hit a hundred thousand views, honey, aren’t you excited?”

I’m not. I don’t want to be famous. I don’t want a camera in my face every single morning.

I finally worked up the nerve to ask Mom to stop filming. She was fiddling with her ring light. Didn’t even look at me. “I didn’t even get your face, what’s the big deal? This is my job, okay? You just worry about school—leave the rest to me.”

It was obvious. My feelings didn’t matter. Not one bit.

Mom wasn’t always like this. She used to make breakfast, too—but it was simple, quick, and healthy. I liked it that way. Back then, breakfast was just breakfast. Not a show. Then she got hooked on making short videos, like she’d discovered a whole new universe. At first, people just suggested she try more kinds of breakfast, or said her meals weren’t balanced enough. But soon, Mom realized the fancier the breakfast, the more likes she got, and the faster her follower count grew. After that, she couldn’t stop.

Honestly, with all that food, there’s no way our family could eat it all. But I had to leave for school, so I never knew what happened to the leftovers. Most likely, they just got tossed. Mom cared about how it looked in photos, not how it tasted. And I couldn’t say a word about it.

One time, Mom made a huge batch of homemade mac and cheese and asked me how it was. I said it was good, just a little salty. Later, I saw her video. I nearly lost it. The title screamed: “Got up at 5 a.m. to cook for my daughter, only for her to reject it.” The comments all piled on me:

“Kids these days are so spoiled, don’t appreciate their parents at all.”

“It’s already good to have food, and she’s still picky.”

“Don’t bother making breakfast for her anymore. She’s got no gratitude.”

I confronted Mom about the video. She just shrugged. Didn’t care at all. “It’s clickbait. That’s the only way people watch.”

“It’s fine, sweetie. The internet forgets fast. Go on now, this video’s about me helping my daughter tidy her room.”

I walked out, feeling helpless, sneaking a glance at Mom’s account—hundreds of thousands of followers already. Her videos updated nonstop, each one with a headline more dramatic than the last. Her popularity? Just a fluke.

Back in second grade, our school organized a fall field trip. Mom only packed me a sandwich and some apple slices. A classmate’s mom brought egg tarts for everyone. I wanted one so badly, but before we left, Mom had warned me not to eat anything from other people. The egg tarts smelled amazing—sweet and buttery, with that perfect golden crust. Watching the other kids devour them, I couldn’t help but swallow hard.

I screwed up and ate something I wasn’t supposed to.

I thought if I didn’t tell Mom, she’d never know. But the moment I saw her angry face at the school gate, I knew I was doomed.

Mom dragged me home and made me drink bottle after bottle of water. I cried and fought, which only made her angrier. She stuck her finger down my throat, forcing me to vomit up the egg tart. She actually made me throw up. I couldn’t believe it. But so much time had passed, all I threw up was a puddle of yellowish water.

I clung to her leg, sobbing and apologizing. “Mom, I’m sorry, I won’t eat anything anyone gives me again.” Her expression finally softened a bit. She made me sit on the toilet, just in case. Then she went wild in the parents’ Facebook group.

A long rant got her a ton of likes from other parents. But that wasn’t enough—she posted screenshots online, hoping for even more attention. She wanted more. Always more.

Unexpectedly, a few screenshots went viral, hit trending a few times. Turns out, she wasn’t alone. Not even close.

Mom seemed to find her tribe and got even more convinced she was right. Someone commented that they wanted to see her daily parenting, so she created her TikTok account: “A Day in Emily’s Life.”

If Mom wasn’t totally unhinged… she really did love me. In the videos, she cooked for me, washed my clothes, picked me up from school, drove me to piano lessons—her whole world revolved around me. She truly was a good mother. After a few videos, people started to see her differently, and her followers exploded. Mom laughed out loud at the online praise.

I’d never seen her so happy. She soaked up the praise from strangers. Every time she posted a video, she’d stare at her phone, watching the likes and followers roll in. But there were so many similar videos; once the hype faded, Mom quickly lost her audience. Comments dwindled. Mom couldn’t stand it. She got up earlier and earlier, went to bed later and later.

Her next viral video was when she leased a plot at the community garden to grow vegetables for me. In the video, she tilled the soil herself, planted the seeds, nurtured the seedlings. She showed her dirt-streaked hands, her back hunched over the rows, even when she strained her back, insisting on letting me eat only pure, natural, homegrown veggies. At the end of the video, she showed a doctor’s note about her back injury. People freaked out: “Even the air has germs—are you going to stop your daughter from breathing too?” Mom pretended not to see those comments. She only saw the praise.

“Great mother, amazing, amazing, amazing.”

“A model for moms everywhere.”

“We also eat homegrown veggies—store-bought ones have pesticides and mess with kids’ brains.”

In a blink, two years passed, and I started middle school. Mom kept cranking out videos. Under the latest one, someone commented: “Your daughter’s in middle school already—how come she still can’t wash her own underwear and socks?” Mom replied: “Laundry detergent is full of chemicals. My daughter plays piano—she can’t be touching chemicals.” Then she posted a picture of my first place piano certificate, attracting a flood of mom fans.

So yeah, in those two years, I learned piano, ballet, golf, and even skipped two grades. Mom finally had proof she was right. All her hard work wasn’t for nothing. She’d raised an ‘outstanding’ daughter.