2.
【I'm being generous, letting you keep him for now. Once he's bored of you, he'll come running right back to me.】
【Everard and I are going back out to have fun. You just keep on birthing my little helm-child. Thanks for all your hard work, sis!】
The nurse saw the message too.
It made her grind her teeth.
"No wonder. No wonder only your mother-in-law's here. Your man's off keeping someone else company, is he?"
"Scum, all of them. A whole pack of scum."
"You just focus, keep your strength up. Once the baby's out, you'll have all the time in the world to make those people pay."
She was right. Once I got this piece of flesh out of me, I'd have the strength to deal with that pack of trash.
Everard and his buddies had been on their way to help Flora open her trendy new restaurant.
On the road, though, she gasped, pulled out a little charm folded into a triangle, and said to Everard:
"I got this safe-birth charm for your wife. It'll keep her and the baby safe. Let's swing by the hospital one more time."
"I'll have a nurse slip it to her quietly."
Everard was visibly moved.
"If Hope knew you were this thoughtful about her, she'd definitely see you differently."
Only, before he even reached the room, he saw his mother-in-law blocking his own mother from getting out the door.
His mother's hair was a mess, her clothes pulled out of place.
Flora clapped a hand over her mouth and gasped: "Is she bullying you, Auntie?"
"Oh no, oh no, my godmother's always so careful about how she looks, and now she's been pushed around like this. How could she do this?"
Her words were fuel on the fire, and they set Everard's temper ablaze.
"What gives you the right to hit my mother?"
His shout left my mother stunned.
She had just opened her mouth to explain when my mother-in-law shoved her over.
My mother-in-law ran up to Everard, sobbing:
"Everard, I've suffered so much. All I wanted was for your wife to give us a helm-child. Everyone knows a helm-child is clever and lives a lifetime of comfort."
"She doesn't appreciate a thing I do, and then she has her own mother come hit me."
"That last mother in labor is done delivering now. Even if she births a helm-child, I don't care anymore. I want to go home."
Everard looked at her with aching pity and nodded again and again:
"Let's go home. Let's go home."
My mother scrambled up off the floor, stumbling, and called after the group as they turned to leave.
"Son-in-law, I didn't hit your mother. I just wanted my daughter to be able to give birth in peace."
"Could you please go to the delivery room and see her? If she sees you at the door, she'll be so happy."
My mother's plea came out almost childlike, and all it earned her was a cold snort:
"You want me to go see her? Fine."
"Kneel and kowtow to my mother, apologize, and I'll go see her."
My mother-in-law refused, her tone imperious:
"No. A kowtow isn't enough. If she wants me to forgive her, she has to kowtow and say she's a wretch at the same time."
My mother froze, then slowly bent her knees anyway.
Her head struck the floor, once, then again.
"I'm kowtowing. I'm a wretch."
"I'm a wretch. Please go see my daughter."
"I'm a wretch……"
Please go see my daughter……
People came and went, pointing at the woman kowtowing outside the delivery room.
Their eyes full of scorn.
"Why's she kowtowing?"
"Did she do something to feel guilty about?"
After the birth, I walked back to my own delivery room, the doctor holding me up, and just as I reached the door I saw a crowd of people.
A faint, bad feeling stirred in me.
I quickened my steps, and near the door I heard my mother's voice:
"I'm a wretch. Please go see my daughter."
"Mom!"
