The security officers entered before my mother-in-law could reach the door.
My husband pointed toward her and told them exactly what the charge nurse had confirmed: she had deliberately covered our newborn son in an unknown black substance while I was unconscious.
For the first time since I had opened my eyes, his mother stopped shouting.
She tried to call it a misunderstanding. Then she said she had been frightened. Then she insisted she had only wanted her son to see the baby before anyone could clean him.
The charge nurse did not let her rewrite the moment.
“This incident is being documented,” she said. “You are not permitted to remain on the maternity floor.”
My mother-in-law looked at my husband as if he were supposed to rescue her.
