My name is Laura Méndez, and that day I was eight months pregnant, my body aching, my legs swollen, and my heart filled with a patience that was about to break.

We lived in a quiet residential neighborhood in Valencia, in an old house inherited by my husband’s family, with thick walls and even heavier silences.

My husband, Javier Méndez, was a construction foreman and left home before dawn, returning when it was already dark and he was exhausted.

That meant he spent most of his time alone with his mother, Carmen Méndez, a rigid woman with a cold gaze and sharp words.

From the first day, Carmen made it clear that I was not welcome in her world or in her house, even though legally it was also my home.

I came from a humble family in the countryside, accustomed to hard work and never complaining, but nothing prepared me for her constant contempt.

To her, I was neither a wife nor a future mother, but an opportunist who had trapped her son with a pregnancy.

I never said those things in front of Javier, but when we were alone, her insults were daily, calculated, and profoundly humiliating.

The pregnancy didn’t awaken any compassion in Carmen; instead, it seemed to give her an excuse to be even more cruel.

With swollen feet and an aching back, she forced me to clean the house from top to bottom, cook, wash, iron, and never rest.

If I sat down for a few minutes, she would yell at me that I was useless and that I lived off the sweat of her child.

I lowered my head and remained silent, repeating to myself that I had to endure it for my baby and to keep my marriage afloat.

Every night I went to bed exhausted, rubbing my belly, promising my son that it would all be worth it.

That day, the air felt heavier than usual, as if something dark was about to happen.

Javier had left early, and Carmen was eating breakfast in silence, watching me with that perpetual expression of judgment.

She asked me to thoroughly clean the kitchen because, according to her, it “smelled of poverty,” and I didn’t argue.

I grabbed the bucket and the mop and started scrubbing the floor, feeling dizzy and with a burning sensation that blurred my vision.

My stomach felt bigger than a squish and every movement took twice the effort.

As I stepped back to reach a corner, the mop handle barely grazed Carmen’s ankle.

It was minimal contact, almost imperceptible, but her reaction was immediate and violet.

She started screaming as if I had attacked her, calling me trash, a parasite, and a disgrace.

I tried to apologize, to explain that it was an accident, but she wouldn’t let me finish the sentence.

I felt a sharp blow to the face, a slap so hard it made me lose my balance.

Before I could react, she grabbed the bucket of dirty water and threw it at me mercilessly.

The floor was soaked, and I, disoriented, slipped and fell heavily to the side.

A sharp pain shot through my abdomen, a pain unlike any I had ever felt.

Then I felt the heat between my legs and knew, with absolute terror, that my waist had broken.

I lay on the floor, soaked, trembling, crying, silently calling for my baby.

At that precise moment, the front door opened.

Javier entered the house and froze when he saw me lying on the floor, soaked and screaming in pain.

Carmen stood rigid, with only one expression of guilt on her face.

That was the exact moment our lives were split in two.

Javier ran towards me, asking what had happened, while I could barely speak between sobs.

He took off his jacket, put it under my head, and called emergency services with trembling hands.

Carmen tried to speak, saying that I was clumsy, that I had fallen on my own, that I was exaggerating.

But something in Javier’s gaze changed forever when he saw the fear in my eyes.

The paramedics arrived quickly and lifted me onto the stretcher while I squeezed my husband’s hand.

Carme watched from the doorway, arms crossed, as if it were none of her business.

In the ambulance, the contractions began, and fear mingled with absolute clarity.

I knew I could no longer remain silent, that my silence had almost cost me my life.

At the hospital, while they prepared me for a premature delivery, I told Javier everything.

I told him about the insults, the humiliations, the daily psychological blows.

I told him how his mother forced me to work to exhaustion, ignoring my pregnancy.

Javier listened in silence, tears falling onto his hands, realizing his blindness.

Our son was born that same night, small, fragile, but fighting with a strength that broke my heart.