Chapter 3Catfished by Mom

Blood soaked through her pajama pants in a wide, dark patch. She curled up on the ground, clutching her knees and wailing in pain.

Dad saw his chance. Instead of helping her up, he scrambled back into the car and tried to slam the door shut and lock himself inside. However, Mom caught it in time. She forced herself off the ground despite the searing pain and jammed her body against the door before it could close.

"You think you're getting away? You're not leaving until you give me that woman's name!"

She grabbed him by the collar and dragged him bodily out of the car. The two of them went at each other on the oil-stained garage floor, tearing at each other's hair and screaming the most vicious things they could think of.

I watched the whole spectacle on my screen, and when I had seen enough, I hit record. I clipped the segment cleanly—all the brawling, the screaming, the half-dressed chaos—and opened a video editor. I blurred both their faces just enough that it would not hold up to any real scrutiny.

Then, I pulled up the neighborhood group chat, the one with all 500-plus households from the complex. They used to love posting videos of me being punished in that chat for everyone to see. It was only fair to return the favor.

I set it to anonymous and hit send.

[Huge scoop! Mr. Barton from Building 3 in our complex just got caught cheating in the parking garage by his own wife! She went full action-movie on him. You have to see this!]

The video had not been up for ten seconds before the previously dead group chat exploded with hundreds of messages.

[Holy crap, isn't that Craig Barton from Building 3?]

[Yeah! I know his wife too, Pam Lewis. She's always walking around the complex with her nose in the air like she owns the place.]

[Oh my God, this is so embarrassing. He didn't even have his pants on all the way.]

[They deserve it! Those two have always been awful. They're up every night smashing things and screaming, keeping the whole floor awake.]

[Save it before the admin takes it down.]

I leaned back in my chair, thoroughly satisfied as I watched the messages pour in.

Half an hour later, heavy footsteps and the sound of something being dragged echoed down the hallway. Then a massive bang shook the apartment. The front door had been kicked open.

"You absolute piece of garbage! I'll kill you!"

Mom's raw, shredded screaming came from the living room. I cracked my bedroom door open just a sliver.

Dad was on the living room floor. His shirt had been torn to rags, buttons scattered across the tile. His face was covered in bloody scratches. However, he still had the nerve to stiffen up and try to argue his way out.

"What is wrong with you? I told you, she's a new coworker! She'd had too much to drink, so I gave her a ride to the hotel to sleep it off! What gave you the right to smash my car?"

Mom was shaking from head to toe. She jabbed a finger at his face and tore into him. "Gave her a ride to the hotel? Such a good ride that your pants came off? Do you think I was born yesterday?"

She lunged at him, grabbed a fistful of his hair, and shoved her phone screen against his face.

"Open your eyes and look! What is this?"

On the screen, the secretly recorded video played. It was the one I had sent from my burner account to the older-sister persona she had been using online. In the dim living room, Dad and a woman were wrapped around each other on the couch, kissing without a shred of shame.

Dad went still. He stared at the screen for a full ten seconds, his pupils slowly widening. "Where... Where did you get this?"

He jerked his head up and stared at Mom. "This was taken inside our house! You put cameras in our home?"

Mom let out a cold laugh, her expression caught somewhere between triumph and something completely unhinged.

"It's not a camera. Your precious son filmed it himself and sent it straight to me."