Chapter 5
The ledger went back six months.
The first entry began three weeks after Theo’s mother, Sofia, died.
I stared at the date.
Three weeks.
My son was barely sleeping then.
Neither was I.
Winifred moved into the estate “to help.”
That was the phrase.
Help.
She handled meals.
Guests.
Household schedules.
Theo.
I let her.
I had been trying to keep the Armano organization from fracturing while learning how to wake up beside an empty half of the bed.
Winifred filled the space.
Too efficiently.
“What happened three weeks after Sofia died?”
She said nothing.
I looked at Anthony.
He sighed.
“The memorial lunch.”
I remembered.
Theo cried when someone moved Sofia’s chair.
Winifred carried him out.
I thought she was comforting him.
Anthony continued.
“She took his blanket.”
“Why?”
“He wouldn’t stop saying Mommy.”
My hands tightened.
Winifred rolled her eyes.
“The whole room was grieving.”
“And?”
“He was making it worse.”
I stared.
Three years old.
Making adult grief inconvenient.
“So you punished him.”
“I redirected him.”
“No.”
I shook my head.
“You made pain expensive.”
She laughed bitterly.
“You think loving a dead woman forever helps him?”
“I think he gets to miss his mother.”
“He needs a future.”
“He has one.”
“With you teaching him to worship loss?”
I almost smiled.
There.
Projection.
She believed remembrance itself was weakness because memory kept people outside her control.
I looked at the ledger again.
Every punishment targeted attachment.
Mother.
Father.
Favorite toy.
Comfort object.
Even birthday gifts.
Nothing random.
“Why does it bother you when Theo loves something?”
Winifred’s face hardened.
“It doesn’t.”
“Yes.”
My voice stayed quiet.
“It bothers you when he loves something you cannot replace.”
Silence.
My mother’s music box.
Sofia’s photograph.
The wooden race car made by me.
Every object connected him to somebody else.
Winifred was not teaching detachment.
May you like
She was trying to become emotionally indispensable.
And my son had resisted her without even knowing there was a fight.
