Chapter 3: Everything I Wrote Down
I didn't answer her question.
I picked up the notebook, walked to the armchair by the window, and sat down with my son in my lap.
He was awake, making small sounds, his fingers curling and uncurling against my sleeve.
Anna stood in the middle of the kitchen.
She didn't move toward me.
She didn't sit down.
"Helen.
I'm asking you a question."
"I heard you."
"Then answer me.
What did you write in that thing?"
I looked up at her.
"Everything."
She laughed — a short, sharp sound that wasn't really a laugh.
"Everything.
What does that mean?"
"It means I wrote down the date.
The time.
What you said.
What you did.
What you decided without asking me."
Her jaw tightened.
"You were keeping a record.
Of me.
In my own son's house."
"My house," I said.
"Mine and Max's."
She turned away and gripped the edge of the counter with both hands.
When she turned back, her voice had dropped.
"I want to see it."
"No."
"Helen—"
"No, Anna."
She crossed her arms.
"You're being dramatic.
I came here to help you.
I gave up two weeks of my life to be here, and this is what I get.
A secret diary and a phone call behind my back."
I looked down at my son.
He had fallen back to sleep.
His breathing was slow and even.
"Day three," I said quietly.
"You told me I was holding him wrong.
You took him from my arms while I was feeding him and repositioned him without asking.
He cried for twenty minutes after."
"I was showing you the correct—"
"Day five.
You told me not to pick him up when he cried.
I looked it up that night.
Every pediatric source says the opposite.
Newborns can't be spoiled.
Responding to them builds security."
"That's modern nonsense—"
"Day seven." I kept my voice even.
"You gave him water.
Anna, he's three weeks old.
Newborns don't get water.
I found the bottle in the drying rack and I didn't know what to think."
The room went very quiet.
She hadn't expected that one.
I could see it in the way her shoulders dropped, just slightly.
"It was barely anything," she said.
"A few drops.
My mother did it with all of us."
"I know you thought it was fine.
That's why I called the pediatrician.
Not to get you in trouble.
To find out if I needed to worry."
"And did you?
Did something happen to him?"
"No.
He was fine.
But the doctor told me it can cause something called water intoxication in newborns.
It can be serious.
She said I was right to call."
Anna's face went through several things at once.
I watched her get there — not to guilt, not yet, but to the edge of it.
"I didn't know that," she said finally.
"I know you didn't.
That's in the notebook too."
She sat down at the kitchen table.
Not dramatically.
Just sat, like her legs had decided for her.
"What else is in there?"
"Enough for Max to understand what this week has been like.
Not to punish you.
Just so he knows."
She looked at her hands on the table.
"He's going to be angry with me."
"He already is."
"Because of what you told him."
"Because of what he heard.
He was on the phone, Anna.
He heard you talking about his wife and his son.
He made his own conclusions."
She was quiet for a long moment.
Outside, a car passed slowly.
The refrigerator hummed.
"I only wanted to help," she said.
And for the first time since she'd arrived, it didn't sound like a defense.
It sounded like something she actually believed, and was only now beginning to question.
"I know," I said.
She looked up at me.
Her eyes were wet — not spilling over, just wet.
"Then why does it feel like I've done something terrible?"
I didn't answer right away.
I looked at my son, asleep against my arm, his small mouth slightly open.
"Because some of it was," I said gently.
"Not all of it.
But some of it was."
She pressed her lips together.
Nodded once, barely.
Then my phone buzzed on the counter.
A message from Max.
May you like
*Landing in four hours.
Don't let her leave.*
