Taught a Lesson to the Husband, Mother-in-law, and Sister-in-law
“Wheres my dinner, Emma? Im asking, wheres the food?!”
Emma didnt even look at her husband. She sat perched on the edge of the sofa, gently rocking a bundle that occasionally emitted a grunt.
“Shh, Rosie,” she whispered. “Shes finally asleep! I spent half the day at the GP, then picked up a prescription, then”
“Dont care where you swanned off to!” her husband stomped into the living room, coat still flapping. “Its me who works, I pay for everythingfor you, for that child!”
When I come home, I want to see a hot meal on the table, not your sulky face and non-stop wailing in the background.
What, may I ask, have you done all day?
“I was looking after your daughter,” Emma replied, finally meeting his eyes. “Her cheeks have broken out again.”
Doctors are useless, so Ive been desperately trying to find something thatll help.
Have you, even once, asked how shes feeling?
“Whats to ask? Shes got lungsmeans shes alive. Youre her mother, you figure it out.”
Your main job is to keep me comfortable. Why else did I bother getting married?
So I could eat frozen pies and be up all night?
“You married me because it was convenient,” Emma snapped. “And I married you because everyone kept saying, Its time, its time.”
Well, here it isthe time!
Danny scowled, marched over to the pram in the corner, and gave one of the wheels a mighty kick.
The pram rolled and crashed into the chest of drawers.
Emmas daughter in her arms let out a shriek and erupted into another session of screaming.
“Shut her up!” Danny roared. “Or I cant be responsible for myself!”
A year ago, Emmas life was unrecognisable.
She was the girl who turned heads: always stylish, whip-smart, with a full diary every weekend.
Danny had seemed the catch of the century: good-looking, ambitious, relentless in getting his own way.
They had their share of Shakespearean rowsjealousy here, make-ups there, usually with an audience.
When Danny turned up with a ring, Emma hesitated, but her parents insisted.
“Emma, honestly, how long are you going to keep flitting about?” her mum would say, dolloping cottage pie onto her plate. “Youre twenty-seven now.”
Dannys dependable, from a good family. Youre talking about getting your own flat. What about children? Wholl look after you in old age?
“Mum, what old age? I like workingI just landed that new project.”
“Work doesnt mean anything,” her dad chimed in, head buried in his Telegraph. “A woman without a familys like an oak with no roots. One day youll wither, and thatll be that.”
Danny loves you. A bit of characters nothingeveryone has it. Youll get used to each other.
Emma caved in. She made that one mistake shed remember every sleepless night after.
The wedding was a spectacle, the mortgage a lead weight, and pregnancy hit her from nowhere.
It all happened too quicklyshe barely had time to grasp the whole ‘wife’ business when suddenly she was a vessel for new life.
Shed been hoping for a son. She imagined teaching him the offside rule, gentle and quiet like her.
But scan said: “Girl.” Something inside her snapped.
Labour was a horror show. Complications, drips, endless hospital corridors reeking of disinfectant and despair.
When she was finally sent home, Emma felt like a badly-glued vase.
She stared at the tiny creature in the crib, feeling nothing but a low-burn irritation.
“Why is she always crying?” she asked her mum, whod come to help.
“Colic, love. Just put up with it. We all did, so must you. Shes hungry.”
“She doesnt latch! Mum, everything hurts!”
“Then youre doing it wrong. You have to try harder. Youre a mum nowwant is over, now its all have to.”
Meanwhile, Danny had quietly checked out. The first two weeks he played the devoted dad, then ran out of steam.
The smell of baby sick annoyed him, the mess of muslins offended his tidy mind, but most of all, Emma was no longer his personal geisha.
***
“Mum called,” Danny announced from the kitchen, watching Emma one-handedly half-stirring a near-empty pan of soup while holding a fretful baby under her arm. “Says Caroline is in tears again.”
Caroline, Dannys sister, was three years older, married five years, no kids.
Any time she glimpsed one of Emmas baby posts or heard about her niece, shed spiral into a full-on sulk.
“What do you expect me to do? Apologise for giving birth?” Emma hurled down the ladle.
“You could try being less smug. Mum says youre showing off, with all this baby business.”
And anyway, she reckons youre a lousy housewife. Theres dust on the skirting boards, Emma.
“Your mum hasnt set foot in our house for two weeks, Danny. How does she know dust from shoe polish?”
“She senses it!” Danny whacked the table. “And shes right. Look at yourself. Covered in baby food, eyes like a badger.”
Youve turned into a proper old biddy from the sticks.
“If you helped with her, if you got up just once at night”
“I work!” he bellowed. “Wrap your thick little head around that? I bring home the bacon.”
Your only job is the house and the kid.
By the way, were going to your parents place this weekend. They calledsaid the baby needs fresh air. Mine are coming too.
“I dont want to go. Its freezing, the waters useless, your mum and mine will skulk around gossiping behind my back.”
“Couldnt care less what you want. Parental summonsend of. Bags packed, eight oclock, dont whinge about it.”
***
The weekend was a disaster. Emmas parents, tipsy on grandparenthood, literally snatched Rosie from her arms.
“Emma, youre holding her all wrong!” her mother hollered from the gazebo. “Support her head! Who bundles a baby like that? Give her here!”
“Just leave me alone,” Emma muttered, marching to the far end of the garden.
Danny ignored his wife and daughter the entire trip. He sat with his father-in-law, discussing the MOT on the Skoda and stoking the fire when his mother decided to lecture Emma.
“Oh, Em dear, whats happened to her cheeks? Rash again?” his mother, Patricia, squinted into the buggy. “Not looking after her, are you? Probably eating the wrong things.”
My Caroline, if she ever had a baby, would treat it like crown jewels. Shes so particular
“Then get Caroline to have onewhats stopping her?” Emma shot back.
Patricia clutched her pearls.
“Danny! Did you hear that? Shes making fun of your poor sisters misfortune!”
Danny leapt up, grabbed Emmas elbow and squeezed, hard.
“Apologise to my mum. Now.”
“Let go, that hurts!”
“Say sorry. Do you think you can get away with anything?”
Emmas own parents looked on in stony silence. Her dad finally muttered:
“Emma, dont be rude to your husbands mother. Danny is rightshow some respect.”
In that moment, Emma finally understood: she was on her own. Everyone was against her.
A husband who saw her as hired help, parents who valued respectability over her happiness, and a mother-in-law determined to demolish her marriage out of barely concealed envy.
***
The straw broke a week after they got back home.
Their daughters stomach was troubling her, Emma was running on empty after two sleepless nights.
When Rosie finally dropped off, Emma sat down right on the kitchen linoleum and closed her eyes.
The front door banged open. Danny strode in, mood blacker than Yorkshire tea left brewing an hour.
“Why are there bin bags in the hallway?” he barked, instead of hello.
Emma didnt answer. She didnt even have the energy to move her lips.
“Oi, Im talking to you!” He strode into the kitchen, jostling her with his foot. “Get up and take them out. Now.”
“Take them yourself,” she mumbled. “I honestly cant. My backs killing me, and all I want is one hours sleep, Danny. Please.”
“Oh, you cant?” He seized her by the collar of her dressing gown and yanked her upright.
The fabric ripped.
“Look at her! Princess cant cope. Other women pop out five, work the fields, and this one falls apart over one!”
In the next room, the baby wailed awake again. Danny, fuming, stormed in.
“Again! That racketagain!” He lunged at the cot and shook it roughly. “Be quiet for once!”
Rosie choked on her own scream, terrified.
Emma hurtled after him, trying to push him away.
“Dont touch her! Get away!”
“Shes ruined my life!” Danny roared and slapped Emma, hard across the face.
She crashed into the wall, bashing her head on the wardrobes edge.
Her vision blurred. Worse, Danny wasnt stopping.
He reached into the cot and, utterly enraged, pinched their babys tiny leg.
Rosie screamed as Emma had never, ever heard.
Something inside Emma finally snapped. Self-pity, weariness, her distant feeling toward the babyall gone in an instant.
All that was left was fury.
She grabbed the heavy ceramic bulldog statueone of her mother-in-laws latest masterpiecesand stepped forward, hand raised.
“Do that again,” she hissed. “Touch her once more, and Ill smash your skull open.”
Leave. Now.
Danny froze.
“Oh, threatening me now? In my flat?”
“The flat was bought while we were married,” Emma said, voice cold and crisp. “We paid the mortgage from my maternity and your bonuses, and it was paid off early with my parents help. Its half mine.
But right now, I dont care. Leave before I call the policeand report you for assault.”
Danny, theres a mark from your hand on my face. Therell be bruises on our daughter.
Maybe you wont go to prison, but I swear youll be hiring lawyers for the rest of your days.
Emma marched out of the bedroom and dialled 999.
***
It dragged on for ages. Danny tried to rally Patricia and Carolinethey called, they texted. The threats flew, the insults too, but Emma didnt cave, just blocked their numbers.
When her own parents turned up trying to make peace, she simply shut the door in their faces.
“Either youre on my side, or you forget our address.
Your son-in-law raised his hand to your newborn granddaughter. If thats normal to you, weve got nothing to talk about.”
Her dad looked shamefaced, her mum cried, but after seeing the bruise on baby Rosies leg, both fell silent.
Neither could make excused for violence against a baby.
Emma didnt just file for divorceshe actually went to Dannys office. Calm as a monk, she brought along a folder.
No shouting matches; just quietly showed securitywho happened to know her dadthe nanny cam video. Danny had bought it himself before Rosie was born.
The footage captured everythingincluding the nursery episode.
Danny was gently told to resign of his own accord. Reputation is everything in their company, and a scandal like that is bad for business.
On hearing her son had lost his job, Patricia took to bed with the vapours, and Caroline, worried Emma might post the video online (given how many mutual friends they had), fell suddenly silent.
***
Now Emma enjoys the quiet. The moneys sometimes tight, but she doesnt complain.
Danny gave up his share of the flat in lieu of child support, which suited her perfectly.
Her exs family forgot the child ever existed, and her father hasnt visited once.
As for Danny, every time he meets a new woman, he tells them hes never been married.
