Chapter 10 - Lila Was Never Jealous of Noah
That became the major reversal.
Everyone assumed the arrival of a newborn would make a four-year-old jealous.
Books said it could happen.
Relatives joked about it.
Camille watched for signs.
Mateo reassured too aggressively.
Then every ordinary behavior became evidence.
Lila wanting Mateo at bedtime?
Jealousy.
Lila entering the nursery?
Jealousy.
Lila touching Noah’s blanket?
Jealousy.
Lila crying when Camille raised her voice?
Adjustment.
But the notebook revealed something else.
Almost every drawing of Noah showed Lila protecting him.
Covering him with hearts.
Standing beside the crib.
Writing:
MY BABY.
One page showed her putting a toy rabbit beside him.
Another:
NOAH LIKES SONG.
Another:
I WILL SHOW HIM MY PARK.
Lila had not been trying to remove Noah from the family.
She had been trying to add him to her world.
The conflict everyone anticipated was partly created by adults expecting it.
Camille admitted that when the first sock appeared in Lila’s toy basket, she did not see an innocent act.
She saw confirmation.
Then every staged incident reinforced the assumption she had already accepted.
Mateo did too.
That was the part he had to own.
He never punished Lila harshly.
But he started asking suspicious questions.
“Did you go into the nursery?”
“Are you sure?”
“Think really hard.”
Children hear distrust even when adults use gentle voices.
Lila began drawing because drawings did not ask her to “think again.”
They stayed where she put them.
Mateo sat beside his daughter that evening.
“Noah’s things kept showing up around you.”
Lila nodded.
“Did you ever want them?”
“The sock.”
He blinked.
“What?”
“I wanted the sock.”
She looked guilty.
“The first one?”
Lila nodded.
“It was tiny.”
Mateo laughed despite himself.
One sock.
The incident that started everything.
Lila had taken it because it was small and soft and belonged to her baby brother.
No jealousy.
Affection.
Camille had interpreted it through fear.
Then manufactured a pattern.
Mateo looked at Camille across the room.
She started crying again.
Not because this revelation made her less responsible.
Because it revealed exactly how far an ordinary misunderstanding had been stretched.
A tiny sock became evidence.
Evidence became expectation.
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Expectation became manipulation.
And a four-year-old eventually needed a notebook to defend reality.
