Chapter 2 - The Questions Maya Was Afraid to Answer
Maya woke shortly after 2:00 AM.
David was sitting beside her bed.
Liam slept in a hospital bassinet nearby, bundled beneath two warm blankets.
For several seconds, Maya simply watched her husband.
“You should sleep,” she whispered.
David looked up.
“So should you.”
She tried to smile.
It didn’t work.
An IV line ran into her arm.
Her skin still looked pale, but some color had returned to her face.
David moved closer.
“Maya, I need you to tell me everything.”
Her eyes immediately shifted away.
“Nothing happened.”
“Don’t protect them.”
“I’m not.”
“You’re afraid of my mother.”
That hit.
Maya’s fingers tightened around the hospital blanket.
David lowered his voice.
“I need the truth.”
Maya stared toward Liam.
“When you left for Germany, things were okay for the first two days.”
“What changed?”
“Your mother decided I was recovering too slowly.”
David said nothing.
“She said women in her generation didn’t lie around after having babies.”
“You had abdominal surgery.”
“I told her that.”
“What did she say?”
Maya gave a tired laugh.
“She said doctors make everything sound dramatic because they’re afraid of lawsuits.”
David’s jaw tightened.
“What else?”
“Chloe started coming over with Mark.”
“To help?”
Maya hesitated.
“At first.”
David already knew what that meant.
“They ate here.”
“All the time.”
“The food I bought for you?”
Maya nodded.
“They said there was too much and it would spoil.”
“Twelve containers of Liam’s formula don’t spoil in eleven days.”
Maya looked down.
“Chloe took some.”
“Why?”
“She said Ethan’s cousin had a baby and the formula was expensive.”
David stood so suddenly the chair scraped against the floor.
Liam stirred.
David immediately froze.
He waited until the baby settled again.
Then he sat back down.
“How many?”
“I don’t know.”
“Maya.”
“Four, maybe five.”
David stared at the wall.
Each container had cost almost seventy dollars.
The money wasn’t the point.
Liam needed that formula because the pediatrician had recommended it after feeding problems in the hospital.
“Why didn’t you call me?”
Maya’s eyes filled.
“Because every time I tried, your mother was there.”
David felt his stomach turn.
“What?”
“She kept saying you were under pressure.”
“Maya—”
“She said if I bothered you while you were working, your project could fail.”
“That’s insane.”
“I know that now.”
“You knew it then.”
Maya’s eyes met his.
“Yes.”
That answer hurt more.
Because it meant fear had overridden what she knew.
“She told me you were already worried I wasn’t handling motherhood well.”
David went still.
“I never said that.”
“I know.”
“I never even thought that.”
“I know, David.”
“Then why would you believe her?”
Maya swallowed.
“Because she knew things about our conversations.”
David frowned.
“What things?”
“The argument we had before you left.”
David remembered.
He and Maya had disagreed over whether he should cancel the Germany trip.
Maya had insisted he go because the contract mattered.
David had wanted to stay.
Only the two of them knew about that argument.
“I never told my mother.”
“I know.”
A chill moved through him.
Maya continued.
“She knew what you said.”
“Exactly?”
“Almost word for word.”
David looked toward the ceiling.
Then toward the corner of the hospital room.
Cameras.
Suddenly he remembered something.
Their apartment security system.
Two indoor cameras.
One facing the entryway.
One in the living room.
Installed after a burglary in the building six months earlier.
They were motion activated.
Cloud storage.
Thirty days.
David slowly stood.
“What?”
Maya watched him.
“The cameras.”
Her face changed.
“David.”
“The apartment cameras.”
She looked frightened again.
“I forgot about them.”
“So did I.”
David pulled out his phone.
He opened the security application.
The password still worked.
Hundreds of motion alerts filled the screen.
December 21.
December 22.
December 23.
David scrolled.
Maya reached toward him.
“Maybe you shouldn’t.”
He looked at his wife.
“I absolutely should.”
He selected December 23.
A video loaded.
The living room appeared.
Maya was on the couch holding Liam.
Eleanor stood over her.
There was no audio for the first second.
Then the sound activated.
David turned up the volume.
His mother’s voice filled the hospital room.
“If you call David again crying, I swear I will tell him exactly how useless you’ve been since he left.”
Maya covered her mouth.
David didn’t move.
On the screen, Eleanor reached down.
She took Maya’s phone.
And slipped it into her own pocket.
David stared at the video.
Then at his wife.
“She took your phone?”
Maya whispered,
“For six hours.”
David looked back at the screen.
The timestamp continued moving.
And then Chloe walked into frame carrying three grocery bags.
Not into the apartment.
Out of it.
David hit pause.
He enlarged the image.
Inside one bag was Liam’s formula.
Inside another were the groceries David had purchased for Maya.
David took a screenshot.
Then another.
Maya whispered his name.
May you like
But David was already opening the next recording.
And what appeared on that one made Maya begin to cry.
