My Mother-in-Law Told Me to Stay Away. So I Did, and Everything Changed

Chapter 3: The COVID Crisis and a Violent Final Confrontation

A year after that happened, Ethan finally left his job and realized his long-standing dream of starting a software sales business. He had been dreaming of starting his own business since before we got married.

Of course, he leveraged his previous job experience to accomplish this. Ethan worked harder than anyone else at his job to achieve this.

Although we’re still at the starting point, I was happy to see even a bit of Ethan’s dream becoming a reality. Our happiness continued.

A year after he started his business, a healthy baby boy was born to us. My parents were overjoyed at the birth of their grandchild.

Despite the nearly two-hour journey from my house to theirs, they visited us frequently, making each day extremely blissful. Naturally, we did not report the birth of our child to Ethan’s parents.

Well, even if we had, they probably wouldn’t have cared anyway, so it doesn’t really matter. We didn’t hear a thing from Ethan’s parents after that phone call.

Feeling relieved that we didn’t have to deal with that peculiar family anymore was somewhat comforting. Then, several months later, something happened.

The new coronavirus began to spread globally, and our country also declared a state of emergency and called for people to refrain from going out. Watching the news, all we saw were discussions about coronavirus.

As the call for non-essential outings to be refrained grew louder, it was clear that the restaurant and tourism industries were severely affected. My heart ached for them.

Suddenly, I wondered how the package tour company run by Ethan’s father was doing. But it was none of my concern.

No, I might have even cracked a smile imagining the state of his father’s business. Despite the circumstances, Ethan’s business was doing very well.

While there was some instability in our income when we first started the business, recently our income has been higher than when Ethan was an employee, and everything was going well. Around this time, Ethan started to receive a lot of calls from his parents’ home.

However, Ethan seemed to be avoiding getting involved with them, and he didn’t pick up the phone even when he noticed the calls. There were also some voicemails left, but because he decided not to be involved with his family anymore, he ignored them without even listening to them.

I often told Ethan,

“You don’t have to worry about me. It’s okay to get in touch with them.”

From my perspective, I despise his family, but for Ethan, they’re his family who raised him, and I felt guilty making him cut ties with his parents because of me.

However, Ethan told me,

“As I’ve said before, Amy is the most important person to me, not my parents. If they can’t accept Amy, even if they are my parents, I can’t value them.”

I felt sorry but also happy for Ethan’s unwavering kindness. Ethan was still receiving calls from his father and mother every day, all of which he ignored.

Then, one day, a letter arrived from Ethan’s family home. The letter simply stated,

“Our business is on the verge of bankruptcy and we have some financial matters we’d like to discuss. We need to talk as soon as possible.”

Pretty audacious for someone who had cut ties with us. Their nerve was just as strong as ever, and they demanded urgent contact.

Of course, we didn’t get in touch. Let him suffer; that’s what he deserves.

Next thing I knew, my cell phone was ringing. I didn’t notice the call as I was at work, but a voicemail was kindly left for me.

It seemed like Ethan had not been answering his phone, so the caller had reluctantly reached out to me instead. It’s quite audacious, especially when I had told them not to contact me.

Reluctantly, I decided to listen to the message that was left on my voicemail. All I got was a message saying,

“Is this Amy’s number? If Ethan continues to ignore me, I’ll come knocking. Let him know.”

That’s all it said. Two days after the voicemail was left, Ethan had the day off because it was Saturday.

We were enjoying a leisure family day at home. We had just finished lunch and were discussing what to do for the rest of the day when the doorbell rang.

When I checked the monitor, there stood my four in-laws. Seeing my shocked face, Ethan came over to check the monitor as well.

Ethan let out a heavy sigh and said to me,

“You don’t have to answer. They’ll give up and leave if we don’t open the door.”

However, I said,

“It’s fine. They’ve come all this way, so we should let them in. It’s kind of pitiful.”

Ethan thought for a moment, then said,

“Okay,”

and unlocked the door. Pitiful? No way would I ever feel that way about such diabolical in-laws.

I purposely didn’t tell Ethan about the voicemail. All of this was to lure them into our home.

Of course, my shock at seeing them through the monitor was just an act. I knew they would show up sooner or later.

There was a reason why I let Ethan’s parents into our house. The real retaliation is yet to come.

It’s time for a full-scale confrontation. The entire in-law family had come to our front door.