Chapter 1 - DROP THE STICK
Valeria Aranda was already crouched beside the bed when Esther raised the wooden stick again.
One arm wrapped around her six-month pregnant belly.
The other protected her head and shoulder.
“You’ve ruined this family!”
The stick struck Valeria’s guarded upper arm.
Pain shot through her shoulder.
She twisted sideways, protecting her stomach.
Then the bedroom door burst open.
Alexander stopped in the doorway.
For half a second he could not understand what he was seeing.
His mother.
A wooden stick.
His pregnant wife on the floor.
Then rage took over.
“Drop that stick!”
Esther turned.
“Alexander, she—”
He crossed the room, grabbed Esther’s wrist, tore the stick away, and threw it across the floor.
Then he slapped his mother.
Esther staggered backward.
“Get away from my wife!”
Alexander immediately turned from her.
He dropped beside Valeria.
“Valeria… are you hurt?”
She was shaking so badly she could barely answer.
He slid one arm behind her shoulders and helped her sit against the bed.
Valeria grabbed his burgundy shirt.
Her fingers clenched.
Then she pointed at Esther.
“She was trying to hurt our baby!”
Alexander’s face emptied.
Esther looked offended.
“I never touched her stomach.”
Valeria started sobbing harder.
“That is not what I said.”
Silence.
Then Valeria whispered:
“She said if I took the baby away, I would regret it.”
Alexander slowly turned toward his mother.
“What does that mean?”
Esther’s expression changed.
Not guilt.
Fear.
And Alexander knew there was something else he had not been told.
The wooden stick itself was ordinary.
A short piece of hardwood Esther used to brace an upstairs sash window that no longer locked correctly.
That detail embarrassed Alexander later.
Nothing about the room had been prepared for violence.
No weapon hidden for weeks.
No conspiracy.
An ordinary household object became dangerous because Esther chose to use it that way.
That mattered to Valeria.
She did not want relatives saying:
“Esther lost control because the stick was there.”
The stick did not create the decision.
Neither did pregnancy.
May you like
Neither did grief.
The choice belonged to Esther.
