Chapter 3 - The Teddy Bear Was The Thing Bianca Hated Most
The next morning, Milo refused to go downstairs while Bianca was still in the house.
Adrian did not force him.
He called his sister, Caroline, and asked her to pick Milo up for the day.
Then he went downstairs.
Bianca was drinking coffee as if the previous afternoon had been nothing more than an unpleasant argument.
“You embarrassed me,” she said.
Adrian stared at her.
“I embarrassed you?”
“You hit me.”
“Yes.”
He took a breath.
“And that was wrong.”
Bianca blinked.
She hadn’t expected that.
“I should not have struck you. I’ll own that.”
Then Adrian’s voice hardened.
“But my bad decision does not erase what you did to Milo.”
“He is manipulating you.”
“He says you’ve been locking him in that closet for months.”
Bianca rolled her eyes.
“I put him there to calm down.”
“You locked the door.”
“Sometimes.”
“Why?”
“Because otherwise he comes running after me crying.”
“He’s eight.”
“He’s spoiled.”
Adrian stared at her.
Then asked:
“Why does he say you get angry when he talks about Hannah?”
For the first time, Bianca’s composure shifted.
Barely.
But enough.
“I am tired of competing with a dead woman.”
Adrian went completely still.
“What?”
“There. I said it.”
Bianca put down her coffee.
“That house is full of her.”
“The photographs?”
“The stories. The bear. Milo comparing everything.”
“He does not compare you.”
“He doesn’t have to.”
Her voice sharpened.
“If I make pancakes, Mom made them better. If we go to the beach, Mom loved this beach. If I tell him to put away that disgusting old teddy bear, suddenly it’s sacred because she bought it.”
Adrian stared at her in disbelief.
“He’s grieving.”
“For three years?”
“He lost his mother.”
“So now everybody has to live inside a shrine forever?”
That was the first moment Adrian understood the emotional engine behind Bianca’s cruelty.
She didn’t simply resent Milo.
She resented what he remembered.
Every time he loved Hannah openly, Bianca experienced it as rejection.
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And instead of behaving like an adult, she punished the child carrying the memory.
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