Chapter 8 - The Truth About The Son Diane Wanted
For days after the footage surfaced, Ryan could not stop hearing Diane’s words.
You can’t even give this family a son.
The obsession with a grandson had never been normal, but now Emma told him the full story.
Months before Lily was born, Diane had repeatedly pushed a strange idea: if the baby was a girl, Ryan and Emma should “try again immediately.”
After the traumatic birth, doctors made it painfully clear that another pregnancy anytime soon could be dangerous for Emma.
Diane did not care.
She called the medical advice exaggerated.
She claimed women had “become soft.”
Once Emma was discharged, Diane began talking about “other arrangements.”
At first Emma thought she meant surrogacy.
She was wrong.
What Diane actually meant was replacement.
“She told me,” Emma admitted one evening, voice shaking, “that men like you always end up with the woman who gives them what they’re meant to have.”
Ryan stared at her in disbelief.
Emma looked away.
“She said if I loved you, I’d make leaving easy before you had to resent me.”
That sentence explained months of quiet terror.
Diane had not merely bullied Emma for having a daughter.
She had been preparing her psychologically to accept losing her marriage.
Ryan felt physically ill.
His mother had weaponized Emma’s illness, her recovery, even her body’s limitations, until Emma believed she could be discarded for failing some imaginary duty.
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From that point on, Ryan stopped asking himself how much of the relationship with Diane could be salvaged.
The answer was none.
