The car jumped backward so suddenly I barely got out of its path. I threw myself sideways onto the grass, one hand protecting my stomach while my bad knee folded beneath me. My husband finally grabbed the brake again.
My mother-in-law leaned out the window. “Why did you move?”
I stared at her. “You released the brake.”
My husband shook his head like I was the unreasonable one. “I thought you were holding the car.”
“With what?” I asked. “My injured leg?”
His brother laughed again, but weaker this time. He was looking at the dark stain spreading down my pants now.
I pushed myself upright against the car. Every time I put weight on that leg, something hot and sharp ran through my knee. My husband didn’t reach for me. He stayed behind the wheel and told me we were almost at the top.
“I’m done,” I said. “Give me my phone.”
My phone was sitting on the dashboard where he’d left it earlier. He glanced at it, then at me.
“You’re not calling anybody over this.”
I thought I had misheard him.
“Over this?”
My mother-in-law sighed. “You always make everything bigger than it needs to be. Get the car up the hill first. Then you can have your little meltdown.”
I looked at my husband. “You spent our fuel money on her. Your mother knows that, and I’m the one being dramatic?”
He opened his mouth, but his mother answered first.
“Of course I knew about her.”
That hit harder than the pain in my knee.
She folded her arms against the open window. “I told him if he was going to keep seeing that woman, he needed to keep his problems away from my house. I didn’t say he had to tell you every detail.”
My husband snapped, “Mom.”
Too late.
I had spent weeks thinking the missing money was another stupid financial mistake. I had blamed late bills, unexpected expenses, anything except the truth sitting three feet in front of me.
“It was just gas money,” my husband muttered.
“Gas money we needed to get home,” I said. “Gas money you knew we needed because I can barely walk this hill.”
His mother rolled her eyes. “Then stop acting helpless and finish what you started.”
