My mom stared at me like I’d just accused her of stealing a loaf of bread instead of detonating my entire life.

“I didn’t do anything to her,” she said coolly. “Lower your voice. You’re upsetting the girls.”

That snapped something in me.

“You told my wife to leave,” I said, stepping inside without waiting for an invitation. “You don’t just accidentally disappear with a suitcase and a note telling me to ‘ask my mom.’ What did you say to her?”

Emma and Lily clung to my legs, confused and frightened. My mom glanced down at them, then sighed dramatically, as if she were the one burdened.

“I told her the truth,” she said. “Something you were too blind to see.”

My chest tightened. “What truth?”

She walked into the kitchen and poured herself tea. Her hands were steady. Too steady.

“I told her,” she said, “that she was wasting her life.”

The words hit like a slap.

“Excuse me?”

“She gave up everything for you,” my mom continued. “Her career stalled. Her body changed. Her world shrank to daycare schedules and your moods. And for what? A man who comes home late and barely notices?”

I stared at her, stunned. “You think that gives you the right to break up my family?”

“I think,” she said sharply, “that someone had to say what you wouldn’t hear.”

I felt heat rise in my face. “You don’t know anything about my marriage.”

She snorted. “Please. I watched you turn into your father. Distant. Self-absorbed. Expecting the women in your life to hold everything together while you coast.”

“That’s not true,” I said, but the words felt thin.

She finally looked at me, really looked. “Isn’t it?”

My phone buzzed in my pocket. A message.

From Jyll.