Chapter 2
Vivienne returned twenty minutes later.
She had been sent to the east wing because Gloria told her Noah’s clean blankets were stored there.
They were not.
That was deliberate too.
My wife entered the laundry corridor smiling faintly, still exhausted six weeks after giving birth.
Then she saw Camille holding Noah.
The open washer.
Gloria on the floor.
Me holding the phone.
The smile vanished.
“What happened?”
Camille started crying.
Vivienne went straight to Noah.
I let her take him.
The second he recognized her voice, his crying softened.
That nearly destroyed me.
“What did she do?”
I looked at Gloria.
“Tell her.”
My mother-in-law stared at the floor.
Vivienne’s face changed.
Not surprise.
Recognition.
That bothered me.
“Vivienne.”
She looked at me.
“What?”
“Has something happened before?”
Silence.
Gloria immediately said:
“She’s exhausted.”
I turned.
“You no longer speak for her.”
Vivienne closed her eyes.
Then whispered:
“I thought I was forgetting things.”
My stomach tightened.
She described six weeks of small incidents.
Noah’s bottle disappearing after she prepared it.
Clean blankets moved.
The baby monitor switched off.
A bassinet wheel unlocked after she remembered securing it.
Nothing catastrophic.
Just enough to make a new mother question herself.
Each time Gloria was there.
Each time Gloria said the same thing.
“You need rest.”
“You’re overwhelmed.”
“You’re not yourself yet.”
Vivienne had begun believing it.
She even stopped carrying Noah down the main staircase alone because Gloria repeatedly told her she seemed distracted.
I looked at the phone.
NURSERY.
BOTTLE.
I opened NURSERY.
Gloria entered Noah’s room alone.
She switched off the monitor.
Moved one blanket.
Then left.
My wife made a broken sound.
Gloria finally said:
“I was helping.”
Vivienne looked at her mother.
“No.”
Her voice shook.
“You were making me think I couldn’t trust my own memory.”
That was exactly it.
May you like
The washer was not the beginning.
It was the escalation.
