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I was cleaning my sister’s house when I found her newborn son inside the washer and his grandmother holding the lid. I pulled my nephew out, and she slapped me hard enough to split the inside of my lip against my teeth. I tasted blood, grabbed the vase beside the sink, and struck her across the temple before she could reach the baby again. She stumbled into the wall, leaving a smear of blood beside her hairline, then lunged forward and ripped my screaming nephew from my arms. My brother-in-law came home, saw my swollen mouth and his mother holding the baby, knocked her down, took his son, and ordered her out while a bruise darkened beneath her cheekbone. Before she crossed the doorway, she shouted one detail about my sister’s pregnancy that made him freeze—because only three people on earth were supposed to know it. ㅤ
My father's girlfriend put my newborn half-brother into a wide glass chili jar and laughed while he screamed, and my grandmother was the one who tore him out. Grandma slapped her away from the baby. That woman grabbed Grandma by the hair and dragged her through the dining room so violently that blood streaked across the floorboards. I got there just as she raised the jar again, ripped the extinguisher from the wall, and smashed it into her head until she collapsed. My father came through the back door and still tried to call it an accident.