My phone vibrated against the hardwood floor, sending a dull buzzing sound through the silent room.
Another notification appeared on the screen, showing that Tyler had posted a new video from the luxury cabin.
He was standing in front of a massive stone fireplace while raising a glass of expensive bourbon toward the camera.
In the background, I could hear his friends cheering and laughing as Tyler added a caption about choosing himself and leaving toxicity behind.
Then a new post appeared from my mother-in-law, showing her smiling proudly at her son during the celebration.
“My son deserves to have a rest because some women only know how to use manipulation to get what they want,” she had written under the photo.
That was the moment that finally broke my spirit because I realized that they had discussed my pain as if it were a joke.
Earlier that morning, I had sent her a message telling her that the bleeding was getting worse and that I was scared.
She had responded with a short voice message telling me not to be a drama queen because she was washing diapers three days after she gave birth.
After she sent that message, she had blocked my number or simply ignored every other plea for help I sent.
My eyes began to flutter shut as a heavy fog started to settle over my mind and my heartbeat slowed down.
Suddenly, I heard the sound of someone pounding aggressively on the front door of the house.
“Olivia! Open this door right now!” a familiar voice shouted from the porch.
It was Isabel, my older sister, who lived on the other side of Nashville but always kept a close eye on me.
She had been calling me every few hours since the baby was born, and I had promised to send her a picture of Parker that afternoon.
When I didn’t answer her nine phone calls, Isabel didn’t wait for permission to come over and check on her sister.
I heard the sound of the back door being forced open with a loud bang followed by the sound of heavy footsteps running through the house.
“Olivia!” she screamed as she burst into the nursery and saw the state of the room.
She fell to her knees beside me and grabbed my face with her hands, her voice trembling as she dialed the emergency services.
I remember her wrapping a warm blanket around Parker and pressing every towel she could find against my body to stop the flow.
“Do not you dare die on me, Olivia, because we are not going to give those people the satisfaction of winning,” she whispered through her tears.
The rest of the evening was a blur of blue and red lights, the loud wail of sirens, and the frantic voices of paramedics.
One of the medical technicians mentioned that my blood pressure was bottoming out and that I was going into shock.
When the nurse asked how long I had been in this condition, Isabel answered with a voice full of pure rage.
“Her husband went on a birthday trip and left her to bleed out on the floor like she meant nothing to him,” she said.
Everything went black after that, and I slipped into a deep unconsciousness that lasted for nearly two days.
When I finally opened my eyes in the intensive care unit, I was surrounded by machines and the rhythmic beeping of a heart monitor.
“Parker,” was the first word I managed to choke out through my dry and swollen throat.
Isabel stood up from the chair next to my bed and gripped my hand so tightly that it almost hurt.
“He is going to be fine, even though he was dehydrated and terrified when we found him,” she reassured me.
I began to cry quietly as the weight of everything that had happened finally started to sink in.
Once I was strong enough to speak, I asked Isabel to hand me my cell phone so I could see what had happened while I was asleep.
There were dozens of missed calls from my mother and my neighbors, but there was not a single message from Tyler.
I opened his social media profile and saw that he had continued to post updates from his mountain getaway.
There was a photo of him eating a massive steak and another of him smoking a cigar with his friends by the lake.
“I really needed this weekend to get away from people who constantly play the victim,” he had written in his latest post.
Isabel snatched the phone out of my hand before I could see anything else that would break my heart further.
“You are never going back to that house and you are never going back to that man,” she said firmly.
“I am not going back,” I replied with a cold clarity that I had never felt before in my entire life.
Isabel let out a long sigh of relief, but I looked her in the eyes and told her that I wasn’t finished with Tyler yet.
“I want you to go to the house and pack up all of my belongings and everything that belongs to Parker,” I instructed.
“I will handle it today,” she promised.
“But I want you to leave the nursery exactly the way it was when you found me,” I added.
Isabel looked at me in silence for a long moment, her eyes searching mine for an explanation.
“The rug stays where it is, the bloody towels stay on the floor, and the empty bassinet stays in the center of the room,” I said.
“I want Tyler to walk into that house and see exactly what he chose to abandon when he walked out that door,” I explained.
The following day, I sat up in my hospital bed and used Isabel’s phone to log into our home security camera system.
At exactly six o’clock in the evening, I saw Tyler’s truck pull into the driveway and park in the garage.
He stepped out of the vehicle looking tanned and happy, carrying a shopping bag from a high-end jewelry store.
