Chapter 4 - The Three-Block Distance
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At 9:15 AM sharp, my phone vibrated on the passenger seat. The main nursery monitor went offline, just as I anticipated.
I tapped the screen of my laptop to activate the hidden cellular camera feed. The video flickered to life in crisp, high-definition 4K color, complete with high-sensitivity audio feed.
My breath hitched in my throat. My hands froze on the steering wheel.
The nursery was in total disarray. Clara was on the floor, wearing a thin cotton robe, clutching her surgical incision with one hand while her entire body shook with violent, uncontrolled sobs. Spread across the dark hardwood floor in front of her were thousands of tiny, jagged shards of amber glass—the remains of her post-surgery pain medication bottle.
Standing over her was my mother.
Eleanor was holding two-week-old Leo against her shoulder. The baby was screaming hysterically, his tiny face turning bright red, his fists flailing in the air.
"Please... Eleanor, please," Clara gasped, her voice raw and cracked from crying. "Give me my baby... he's hungry, he needs me... please..."
"He doesn't need a pathetic, useless girl who can't even stand up," Eleanor sneered. Her face had completely transformed. The warm, grandmotherly smile was gone, replaced by a cold, sadistic sneer that made her look like an absolute stranger.
"I dropped the bottle because my hands were shaking!" Clara wept, reaching out a trembling hand toward the baby, only to recoil as her knee brushed against a sharp piece of shattered glass on the floor. "Please, just let me hold him..."
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Eleanor took a step backward, intentionally moving the crying infant further out of Clara's physical reach.
"You dropped it because you are weak," Eleanor hissed. "And weak mothers raise broken children."
