Chapter 4 - Three Days of Consequences
The doctor documented the redness and swelling.
A social worker asked Lily what happened without me answering for her.
“My aunt got mad because the flowers fell.”
“Did she hit you?”
Lily nodded.
“Did anyone tell you it was your fault?”
“Grandma said Mommy should say sorry.”
The social worker’s expression remained professional, but something in her eyes changed.
Because the incident involved an adult striking a child in public, the clinic made a mandatory report.
The police contacted Vanessa the following morning.
She told them Lily had run into her hand.
Then investigators received the videos.
That was the first collapse.
The second came from Grant.
He had married Vanessa less than an hour before the incident.
That night, he refused to stay in their honeymoon suite.
He watched the courtyard footage repeatedly.
Not only the slap.
The moment after it.
Vanessa did not look horrified by what she had done.
She looked furious that I had stopped her.
Grant called me on the second day.
“Has she ever done anything like this before?”
“Not to Lily.”
“That wasn’t my question.”
I told him the truth.
Vanessa had thrown things at former boyfriends.
Destroyed a bridesmaid’s dress during an argument.
Once slapped me when we were teenagers, then convinced our parents I pushed her first.
Grant went silent.
“She told me everyone from her past was jealous or unstable.”
“That is how she explains anyone who remembers her differently.”
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Their honeymoon was canceled that afternoon.
By the third day, Grant had moved out of the apartment they had leased together.
