Chapter 6 - How She Made Me Look Crazy
The first time my father suggested therapy, I cried in my car for an hour.
Not because I thought therapy was shameful.
I already had a therapist.
He simply did not know.
I cried because he had said it after my mother accused me of “obsessive jealousy” toward her unborn child.
Now I understood the accusation had been designed.
Rebecca needed my father to distrust me before I discovered enough to threaten Project Lily.
Mark opened more files.
There were notes on me.
My work schedule.
Friends.
Therapist’s office.
Gym membership.
Even the coffee shop I visited on Saturday mornings.
I stared at the screen.
“They followed me.”
Tom nodded.
“Looks that way.”
“Who?”
“We need metadata.”
Another file contained photographs.
Me entering my apartment.
Me leaving Harbor Café.
Me talking to Susan outside my father’s office months earlier.
My father frowned.
“Why were you meeting Susan?”
I looked at him.
“I asked her whether you were actually planning to divorce Mom.”
He looked hurt.
“You knew?”
“I suspected.”
“Why didn’t you ask me?”
“I did.”
“You denied it.”
He remembered.
His face changed.
That conversation had happened five months earlier.
I asked why Susan Parker had visited the house.
My father told me it was business.
My mother later accused me of trying to “manifest divorce.”
I stopped asking.
Tom opened an invoice.
Private investigator.
Paid by Northbridge Consulting.
My mother and Caleb had hired someone to monitor me.
“What were they looking for?”
I asked.
“Leverage.”
Tom sounded disgusted.
The prescription photograph came from my apartment.
No forced entry had been reported.
My father looked at me.
“Who had a key?”
“Mom.”
Silence.
I had given her one three years earlier.
She said mothers should always have emergency access.
Apparently emergency meant photographing my anxiety medication.
Mark opened another email.
Rebecca to Caleb.
SHE TAKES SERTRALINE.
Caleb replied.
PERFECT.
My skin crawled.
Perfect.
A medication millions of people took safely became raw material for a lie.
They planned to describe ordinary treatment as evidence of instability.
My father read silently.
Then turned away.
“What?”
I asked.
He rubbed his face.
“She told me you stopped taking medication.”
“I never told her that.”
“She said your behavior changed because you had become noncompliant.”
I almost laughed.
“I take it every morning.”
My father closed his eyes.
“And I believed her.”
“Yes.”
His voice broke.
“I’m sorry.”
I wanted to scream at him.
Part of me did.
Not out loud.
Because sorry did not change the dinners where he told me to apologize.
It did not erase the night he said my suspicion was hurting my mother’s pregnancy.
It did not erase the birthday when he asked me to leave early because Rebecca claimed I made her blood pressure rise.
It did not erase the family group chat where he defended her and ten relatives silently decided I was cruel.
“I need more than apologies.”
I said.
My father looked at me.
“What?”
“I need you to stop believing whoever cries first.”
The sentence hurt him.
Good.
“You trusted her emotion more than my evidence.”
“I know.”
“No.”
I shook my head.
“You know now because the pillow fell.”
“What if it hadn’t?”
He said nothing.
“What if I had kept telling you the ultrasounds looked wrong?”
Silence.
“What if she had produced Monica’s baby?”
My throat tightened.
“Would you have cut me out completely?”
My father’s eyes filled.
“I don’t know.”
“That is the answer I’m afraid of.”
He sat down.
I looked back at the computer.
“Keep going.”
Mark opened a folder marked FAMILY.
Inside were social media screenshots.
My cousins.
Aunts.
Uncles.
Family friends.
Beside each person was a note.
Likely to support Rebecca.
Likely to support Daniel.
Likely to support Anna.
Neutral.
It was a war map.
My mother had categorized our family by usefulness.
My aunt Diane was marked:
FULLY LOYAL TO R.
My cousin Melissa:
EASILY INFLUENCED.
My father’s sister, Carol:
DISTRUSTS R — KEEP DISTANT.
Then my name.
ANNA — PRIMARY RISK.
I stared.
“Primary risk.”
My father looked sick.
There were suggested talking points.
Anna resents late-life pregnancy.
Anna fears loss of inheritance.
Anna has anxiety.
Anna is emotionally dependent on Daniel.
Anna previously expressed doubts about Rebecca’s fidelity.
Anna is controlling.
My mother had turned fragments of truth into weapons.
Yes, I had anxiety.
Yes, I hated the affair.
Yes, I was close to my father.
None of those things made me delusional.
But repeated often enough, with tears and concern, they had become a story.
Tom leaned back.
“This is sophisticated reputational isolation.”
My father stared at him.
“What?”
“They needed Anna socially discredited before any legal action.”
“Why?”
“Because if she produced evidence later, people would interpret it through the story already planted.”
I felt cold.
That was exactly what happened.
Every time I raised a concern, relatives told me to let my mother enjoy her pregnancy.
My cousin sent me an article about adult daughters resenting new siblings.
My aunt Diane told me I was lucky my parents were still in love.
Rebecca had prepared them.
The fake pregnancy was not only aimed at my father.
It was a shield against me.
Tom’s phone rang.
He stepped away.
Mark continued.
Another spreadsheet tracked payments.
Maya Torres.
Thirty thousand.
Private investigator.
Forty-two thousand.
Martin Keene.
One hundred twenty-five thousand.
Monica Ellis.
Two hundred thousand pending.
Trevor Kane.
Forty-five thousand.
Several unknown names.
One stood out.
DIANE M.
Twenty thousand.
My aunt.
I stared.
“No.”
My father saw it.
“Diane.”
My mother’s younger sister.
The woman who had defended Rebecca more aggressively than anyone.
The woman who sent baby clothes every week.
The woman who called me “heartless” when I questioned why my mother never had morning sickness.
“She knew.”
My father whispered.
I felt sick.
Mark opened the transaction details.
Payment memo.
FAMILY SUPPORT.
I called Diane.
My father tried to stop me.
I ignored him.
She answered cheerfully.
“Anna?”
“Did Mom pay you twenty thousand dollars?”
Silence.
My father closed his eyes.
I continued.
“Do not lie.”
Diane whispered, “Where did you hear that?”
“Did she?”
“It wasn’t like that.”
Every liar in my family apparently shared a phrase book.
“What was it like?”
“She helped me with my mortgage.”
“In exchange for what?”
“Nothing.”
“Did you know the pregnancy was fake?”
“No.”
Too fast.
I heard fear.
“Diane.”
“I didn’t know.”
“Did you drive her to appointments?”
Silence.
My father looked at me.
We both remembered Diane had repeatedly claimed she attended appointments.
“Yes.”
“What appointments?”
“She said we were going to the doctor.”
“Did you enter the clinic?”
“No.”
“Where did you go?”
“Anna…”
“Where?”
Diane began crying.
“Hotels.”
My stomach dropped.
“What hotels?”
“Sometimes she met someone.”
“Caleb?”
“I didn’t know his name at first.”
My father turned away.
“You drove my pregnant mother to hotels so she could meet another man.”
“She said Daniel was controlling.”
My father heard.
His face hardened.
“She said she needed someone to cover for her.”
“And you did.”
“She is my sister.”
“That is not an explanation.”
“She helped me financially.”
“There it is.”
Diane started crying harder.
“I never knew about the fake pregnancy until later.”
“When?”
“Two months ago.”
My father’s head snapped toward the phone.
“You knew for two months?”
She heard him.
“Daniel?”
“Yes.”
Silence.
“I’m sorry.”
My father laughed.
“Did everyone get paid except me?”
Diane sobbed.
“She said it was temporary.”
“What was temporary?”
“The belly.”
My father closed his eyes.
“She said a surrogate was carrying the baby.”
I looked at him.
Same story Maya initially received.
Rebecca had given different lies to different people.
Each tailored to what they would accept.
Diane continued.
“She said you would never accept surrogacy because of the trust.”
“That is nonsense.”
“I know now.”
“Did you know about Monica?”
“I met her once.”
My stomach tightened.
“When?”
“Three months ago.”
“Where?”
“Rebecca’s apartment in Arlington.”
My father stared.
“What apartment?”
Diane realized she had made another mistake.
“Daniel…”
“What apartment?”
My father’s voice became cold.
“Rebecca has an apartment?”
Diane whispered, “Yes.”
“Since when?”
“About a year.”
My father looked at me.
The affair had somewhere to exist.
Project Lily had headquarters.
“What address?”
Diane gave it.
Tom returned as the call ended.
“I have law enforcement contacts looking at Monica.”
My father told him about the apartment.
Tom wrote it down.
Then his phone rang again.
He answered.
Listened.
His expression changed.
“What?”
I asked.
He held up a hand.
“Yes.”
“When?”
Another pause.
“Understood.”
He ended the call.
“Monica Ellis went into labor forty minutes ago.”
My stomach dropped.
My father stood.
“Where?”
“St. Anne’s Medical Center.”
“Rebecca?”
Tom looked at me.
“She is there.”
The timeline had moved early.
Project Lily had scheduled the birth for weeks later.
But babies did not care about spreadsheets.
Monica’s labor had begun before the anniversary.
Before the trust activated.
Before Rebecca was ready.
May you like
And now my mother was standing inside a hospital with a real newborn about to enter the world.
---
