Tessa was engaged to Preston and wore pearls the way other people breathed. She spoke about travel and luxury like they were her native languages. She treated Milo like an inconvenience. She smiled too often. The kind of smile that never touched her eyes. The kind of smile that felt like ice.
In the mornings, Bernice noticed faint scratches on Milo’s cheek and small pinprick wounds on his ears. Tessa always had explanations. Allergies. Sleepwalking. Nightmares where the boy injured himself. More than once, Preston repeated her words as if they were gospel. He truly believed his son was harming himself for attention.
Bernice suspected that someone was feeding that narrative. She suspected that someone wanted Milo labeled disruptive. Difficult. Dangerous. Someone who might benefit from sending him away to a place that would remove him from the home permanently.
That night, after the screaming stopped, Bernice made a choice. She decided she would no longer stand by while cruelty masqueraded as discipline.