My sister demanded I give her my baby when he’s born

“Someone has to.” I was shaking now.

“You called her disgusting. You told me she ruined your life and now you’re using her as a prop to prove you’re a good person. What kind of mother does that?”

“The kind who’s been doing it alone for 14 years,” Carly was standing now.

“Well, you got everything handed to you. The husband, the career, the baby boy, and what do I get? Nothing.”

“That’s enough,” Dad said.

His voice was cold, final. “Enid, I think you and Zach should leave.”

“Gladly.” I grabbed my purse.

“But I’m telling you right now: I’m not giving her my son. Not now, not ever.”

Mom stood up. “If you walk out that door, there will be consequences.”

“What consequences?” “We have rights as grandparents. If we decide that baby isn’t being properly cared for…”

“Are you threatening us?” Zach finally spoke.

His voice was quiet but hard. “Because that’s what it sounds like.”

“We’re expressing concern,” Dad said.

“Concern?” Zach stepped forward.

“Your daughter just asked for our baby. Your other daughter made a child lie to protect her. And you’re concerned about us?”

Nobody answered. Carly was staring at me with that same cold smile from the kitchen like this was all going exactly how she wanted.

“We’re done,” I said.

I looked at Jordan one more time. She was watching me with this look I couldn’t forget, like she’d been drowning for years and someone had finally noticed.

“I’m sorry,” I said to her.

Then I grabbed Zach’s hand and we walked out the door.

Secrets Revealed and a Sinister Plan

I can’t even wrap my head around what just happened. My own mother looked me in the eye and asked if giving away my baby would really be that bad.

My father wouldn’t even look at me. And Carly just sat there crying like she was the one being attacked.

I defended her daughter—her daughter—and somehow I’m the villain. I’m done being the reasonable one.

Done explaining myself to people who already made up their minds. Carly wanted a war.

She’s about to find out I don’t lose. I thought I was ready for whatever she threw at me.

Then I came home from my doctor’s appointment and found the front door open. I ran inside and stopped dead.

Carly was straddling Zach on the couch, her hands pressed against his chest, her face inches from his. He was struggling underneath her.

“You could fix everything right now,” she was saying.

“Just say yes.” I didn’t hesitate to grab a fistful of her hair and yank her backward as hard as I could.

It was like I had been wanting to do that. She flew off of him and hit the floor.

For a second, she just lay there gasping. Then she looked up at me.

“You bitch!” She scrambled to her feet and came at me but Zach was already up shoving her back.

“He wanted it!” she screamed, clawing at the air trying to get past him.

“He was going to say yes. I saw it in his face.” “Get out,” I said.

“Get out of my house right now.” “Or what? You’ll call the police?”

She laughed and out came this sharp, unhinged sound. “And tell them what? That your sister came over to talk? That she sat too close to your husband? Who do you think they’re going to believe? The pregnant woman who cuts off her whole family or the poor grieving widow just trying to be part of her nephew’s life?”

“They’ll believe the security camera,” I said.

Carly froze. “What?” “The one in the living room. The one that’s been recording since you forced your way in.”

Her face went white. I was bluffing.

We didn’t have a camera, but she didn’t know that. “You’re lying.” “Try me.”

For a long moment, nobody moved. Then something changed in Carly’s face.

The desperation melted away and something colder took its place. “Fine,” she said.

Her voice was too calm now, too steady. “You want to play it this way, we can play it this way.”

She straightened her shirt and smoothed down her hair. “But that baby is mine, Enid. And one way or another, I’m going to get what I deserve.”

She walked toward the door then stopped, turned back. “You can’t watch them forever.”

Then she was gone. Zach sank onto the couch and put his head in his hands.

He was shaking. I sat down next to him and put my hand on his back.

The adrenaline was starting to fade and I could feel my own hands trembling. I had just walked in on my sister trying to assault my husband.

That sentence didn’t even make sense in my head. It sounded like something from a crime documentary, not my actual life.

“What happened here?” I carefully asked making sure he knew I wasn’t accusing him of anything.

He didn’t answer right away. He just sat there with his head in his hands breathing hard like he’d just run a marathon.

I rubbed small circles on his back and waited. I wasn’t going to push him.

“She knocked on the door,” he said, his voice barely above a whisper.

“I looked through the window and saw it was her. I wasn’t going to open it, but she kept knocking. Kept calling my name. Said she just wanted to apologize, that she felt terrible about dinner and wanted to make things right.”

He took a shaky breath. “I opened the door to tell her to leave. That’s it. Just to tell her to go away but she pushed past me before I could stop her.”

“Zach—she started talking about how you don’t understand, how hormones make pregnant women irrational. How I seemed like a reasonable person and maybe I could help her.”

He looked up at me with red-rimmed eyes. He looked so small in that moment.

I hated Carly for making him look like this. “I kept telling her to get out. I kept moving toward my phone to call you but every time I moved she moved with me, cutting me off, getting closer.”

His voice cracked. “And then she started talking about how I gave you a boy. How that meant I had something special, strong genes, and how it would be such a waste to only use them once.”

He stopped talking and stared at the floor. His hands were clasped together so tight his knuckles had gone white.

“She touched my arm. I pulled away. She grabbed my shirt. I tried to push her off but she just kept coming. She shoved me onto the couch and before I could get up she was on top of me and—”

He stopped, swallowed hard. “I couldn’t get her off. I was trying not to hurt her because she’s your sister and I didn’t know what to do. And she just kept saying she wanted me to get her pregnant.”

His voice was flat. “That I could give her a boy like I gave you. No one would have to know.”

He couldn’t look at me. He was staring at the carpet like he was ashamed, like any of this was his fault.

I pulled him into me and held him as tight as I could. “It’s not your fault,” I said.

“Do you hear me? None of this is your fault.” “I should have never opened the door.”

“You couldn’t have known. You couldn’t have known she would do something like this.” “But I did open it.”

His voice broke. “I let her in and she—” “Hey.”

I pulled back and took his face in my hands making him look at me. His eyes were wet.