The quiet of the night was shattered by the crack of a splintering door. An enraged husband burst into the apartment, shouting, “Where’s the money from your account? My mother said you cleared it out!” Behind him, the figure of his mother-in-law loomed, having clearly fanned the flames of the family crisis. The woman calmly got out of bed and flipped on the light. What the unwelcome three-a.m. guests saw made the man collapse to the floor and his mother let out a sharp, piercing cry.
Susan closed the last Excel spreadsheet and stretched, working a kink out of her back. Outside the accounting office of Granite Construction, the February evening was already turning to dusk, though it was only half-past three. Her colleagues were packing their bags, chatting about traffic and the rising price of groceries. Susan glanced at her phone: a notification from her bank.
Payday. $3,800, right on schedule. She opened the app and, with a familiar mental calculation, allocated the funds. $1,500 for the mortgage and utilities, $800 for groceries, $200 for gas and tolls, $100 for their phone plan, and the rest into savings or for unexpected expenses. Before she was married, Susan had easily saved half her paycheck. Now, the “unexpected expenses” category almost always had the same entry: requests from her mother-in-law.
For the last six months, Eleanor seemed to have rediscovered that her daughter-in-law had an income. It started small: a hundred dollars for prescriptions, a few hundred for groceries. Susan gave it without question, even with a sense of relief. She was an older woman on a fixed income; her son should help, and by extension, so should his wife. It was the right thing to do, the decent thing.
But then the amounts started to climb. In December, Eleanor asked for $1,200 for a new refrigerator. The old one had completely died, and the repairman said it wasn’t worth fixing. In January, it was $500 for a new winter coat. “I’m paying it off in installments, but I can’t scrape together the down payment, and at my age, you can’t be getting chilled to the bone.” Susan paid, though a quiet resentment was beginning to build. It wasn’t even about the money itself, but the way it happened. Eleanor would call Mike, Mike would pass the request to Susan, and Susan would get out her debit card. It was a well-oiled, frictionless machine.
Susan left the office and walked to her car—a used but reliable Kia Rio. On the way home, she stopped at the supermarket and picked up groceries for the week. Chicken, vegetables, pasta, milk. At the checkout, the total came to $180. A year ago, the same cart would have been $130. Susan winced, loaded the bags into her trunk, and drove on.
Their two-bedroom condo on the fourth floor was quiet. Mike was still at work. He was a foreman on the same construction site Susan’s company managed. He earned a little more than she did, but his paycheck mostly went toward his truck payment and his hobbies—fishing, tools. They didn’t really have a joint budget. Each pulled their own weight. Susan had suggested a few times that they track their income and expenses in a single spreadsheet, to plan together, but Mike had waved it off.
“Why make things so complicated? We’re doing fine, aren’t we?”
Fine? Susan put away the groceries, stuck the chicken in the fridge, and put the kettle on. She sat at the table with a mug of tea and opened her banking app again. She stared at the numbers, thinking. If they were giving Eleanor five or six hundred dollars every month, what were they saving for? Mike dreamed of a new truck. Susan wanted to take a real vacation, maybe go to the beach, and they desperately needed to set aside money for home repairs. The paint in the living room was peeling at the corners, and the kitchen linoleum was worn through in spots. But every time their savings account started to grow, Eleanor would appear with another urgent need.
The front door opened and closed. Mike was home. Tall and broad-shouldered, with short brown hair and a weathered face. He dropped his jacket, walked into the kitchen, and kissed the top of Susan’s head.
“Hey. What’s for dinner?”
“We could roast the chicken with some potatoes,” Susan said, getting up to open the fridge. “How was your day?”
“Fine. The crew hit our target, so the supervisor’s happy.” Mike slumped into a chair and pulled out his phone. “Hey, Mom called. Said she’s going to stop by tomorrow with an apple pie.”
Susan tensed but didn’t let it show. She got out a baking sheet and started chopping potatoes.
“A pie sounds nice. What’s the occasion?”
Mike shrugged, his eyes glued to the screen. “I don’t know, probably just misses us. Hasn’t seen us in a while.”
They had seen her two days ago. Eleanor had come over to pick up the five hundred dollars for the coat. But Susan said nothing. She preheated the oven and slid the pan inside. They ate dinner in silence. Mike talked a little about work, about how the supervisor was promising a bonus in March. Susan half-listened, nodding. The thought kept circling in her head: Mom’s coming over with a pie. That meant another request was coming. She always brought something sweet—a cake, a pie, a batch of cookies. It was a ritual, the prelude to a conversation about money.
After dinner, Mike went into the living room and stretched out on the sofa in front of the TV. Susan washed the dishes and wiped down the counter. She glanced at the clock: eight-thirty. She remembered she had an appointment with her OB-GYN tomorrow for a routine check-up. It had been a few months. She should go, make sure everything was okay. She’d been having some mild cramping lately, and her cycle was off. Susan added a reminder to her phone: tomorrow at noon, the clinic on Central Avenue.
The evening unfolded in its usual pattern: a shower, an episode of a show, getting ready for bed. Mike fell asleep instantly, as he always did. Susan lay awake for a long time, listening to his steady breathing. She thought about her mother-in-law’s visit tomorrow and the inevitable conversation. And how she would have to give her money again. And how she would have to stay silent, because Mike would always take his mother’s side. Not out of malice, but because it was easier. “She’s all alone, Sue. We have to help.”
The next morning started like any other. Susan got up at seven, got ready, and had a cup of coffee. Mike was still asleep; his shift started later. She drove to work and dove into reports and invoices. At twelve-thirty, she remembered her appointment, told her boss she was leaving a bit early, and drove to the clinic.
The gynecologist, a woman in her fifties with a tired face and kind eyes, saw her quickly. An exam, some questions, a quick test. Then the doctor leaned back in her chair and smiled.
“Well, Susan, congratulations. You’re pregnant. It’s early, about three weeks, no more.”
Susan froze, the blood rushing in her ears.
“Are you… are you sure?”
“Hold on. The blood work will confirm it definitively, but based on the exam and the test, yes. Here’s a lab slip for your blood work and a list of prenatal vitamins. Come back in two weeks for an ultrasound. We’ll see how everything is progressing.”
Susan left the office in a daze. She got in her car, put her hands on the steering wheel, and just sat there. Pregnant. A baby. She and Mike hadn’t been actively trying, but they hadn’t been careful for the last few months either. They both seemed to want kids, they just hadn’t discussed when. And now it had happened. The first wave of emotion was joy. A warm feeling that filled her chest. A baby. Their baby. Mike would be thrilled. Absolutely. He’d been saying for a while he wanted a son. Or a daughter. He just wanted to be a dad.
But a second wave followed close behind. A cold, sticky anxiety. A baby meant money. A lot of money. A stroller, a crib, clothes, diapers, doctors, tests. Susan did a quick mental calculation: they’d need at least $5,000 to get started. And that was just for the basics. Where were they going to get that if $500-$600 was flowing out to her mother-in-law every month?
She started the car and drove home. The whole way, she debated: should she tell Mike right away or wait? On one hand, he was her husband, the father of her child; he had a right to know. On the other, as soon as she told him, he’d tell his mother. And Eleanor… Susan winced. Her mother-in-law would be happy, of course, but she’d immediately start interfering. Giving advice, trying to control things. And she’d want to know how much money they had saved for the baby. That’s when the new requests would start: “Just loan me a little, you’ll get it back. I’ll pay you back in full when my grandbaby is born.” Susan could already see it playing out in her mind.
When she walked into the condo, Eleanor was already sitting in the kitchen. Mike was with her, drinking tea. A beautiful, fragrant apple pie sat on the table.
“Susan, dear!” Her mother-in-law stood up, smiling broadly. “So good to see you! Come, sit down. The pie is still warm, fresh from the oven.”
Eleanor was a sturdy, short woman with a neat, wavy haircut. She had a round face, rosy cheeks, and shrewd blue eyes. She was always impeccably dressed. Today it was a dark blue floral dress with a beige cardigan and a string of pearls. She looked younger than her sixty-two years.
Susan said hello and sat down. Mike cut her a slice of pie.
“How was work?” Eleanor asked, settling in across from her. “Did you get paid recently?”
Susan was on alert. The question sounded casual, conversational, but questions like that were usually the opening move.
“The day before yesterday,” she answered cautiously.
“Oh, good, good.” Her mother-in-law nodded, sipping her tea. “And what are they paying you now? About thirty-eight hundred, right?”
“Yes, that’s right.”
“Not bad, not bad at all. My social security is a joke. Eighteen hundred a month. How’s a person supposed to live on that?” Eleanor sighed and looked at her son. “Mike, honey, you should stop by sometimes. I get so lonely. We got that new refrigerator installed. It’s big and beautiful. But there’s nothing to fill it with.”
Susan nearly choked on her tea. The refrigerator? The one she’d given them $1,200 for in December? So they really had bought it.
“Mom, you know I’m busy,” Mike said with an apologetic shrug. “But we help out where we can.”
“I know, I know, sweetie. You’re good kids.” Eleanor turned her gaze to Susan, smiling. “Susan, dear, don’t be offended that I’m asking so directly. It’s just, a friend of mine told me you can get some kind of tax deduction if you have your bank statements for the year. She said you can get money back. Do you happen to know how that works?”
Susan tensed. A deduction? What did that have to do with anything? …
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