Chapter 6
Ethan had been given a job.
That was the word Valentina used.
Job.
Make Ruby prefer him.
Sit beside her.
Take Serena’s books away if she brought them downstairs.
Tell Ruby stories where their current family was the only family that mattered.
At eight, he thought this was how children helped their mothers.
I sat with him alone.
“What did she promise you?”
He looked ashamed.
“That you’d call me son.”
My chest tightened.
“I already do sometimes.”
“I know.”
He looked down.
“She said it didn’t count.”
“Why?”
“Because you call Ruby your whole heart.”
Children remember exact phrases adults throw casually.
I had said that.
Of course.
Ethan had heard.
Valentina had heard.
I looked at him.
“Does that hurt?”
He hesitated.
“Sometimes.”
Good.
Honest.
I nodded.
“It should have been my job to notice.”
His eyes lifted.
Not absolution.
Recognition.
“I love Ruby differently because she is my daughter.”
He nodded.
“And I care about you because you live in my house, eat at my table, argue with my guards, and cheat at cards.”
He almost smiled.
“That is real too.”
His face tightened.
“But not same.”
“No.”
I did not lie.
Equality does not require pretending every relationship is identical.
Valentina had made difference sound like rejection.
That was the trap.
Ethan whispered:
“Mom says if I’m not the same, I’m less.”
There.
I understood her entire parenting philosophy.
Hierarchy everywhere.
If not first, worthless.
If not central, erased.
No wonder she was trying to remove Serena.
No wonder she moved Ruby.
No wonder she needed Ethan in the chair.
I leaned forward.
“Do you think Ruby being loved takes something from you?”
He looked toward the playroom.
“No.”
“Then don’t let adults teach you otherwise.”
His eyes filled.
“I didn’t want her room.”
“I know.”
“I slept there once.”
“That’s okay.”
“No.”
His face broke.
“She cried outside.”
My hands became cold.
“When?”
“Last week.”
Ruby had apparently tried to return to her room after Valentina started “transition nights.”
Valentina told Ethan to stay in the bed.
Told Ruby the storage-room cot was hers.
He obeyed because his mother threatened to send him back to his biological father’s relatives if he “ruined this family too.”
I closed my eyes.
Two children.
Same weapon.
Belonging made conditional.
I looked at Ethan.
“You do not keep your place here by taking hers.”
He started crying.
Good.
May you like
Not because I wanted pain.
Because he finally heard the sentence nobody else had given him.
