Chapter 3

With a single beep, Leon hung up. I called again; he wouldn't pick up. I sent a message; he wouldn't answer.

It took this one phone call to finally show me the truth. Leon and his mother were cut from exactly the same cloth.

We'd met through a matchmaking setup. Eight months of easy dating, then a happy wedding. Everything had gone smoothly. We'd never once had a fight.

Leon's family bought the apartment, I paid for the renovations, so I brought no dowry money of my own into the marriage.

Leon accepted that quietly, but he had one condition: his mother would live with us.

I didn't object. I agreed without a fuss, because before the wedding they'd both played the part of honest, decent people, charmed me completely, and treated me wonderfully.

The second month after the wedding, Leon started traveling for work constantly.

His mother began letting her stingy, grasping nature show, too. Her attitude toward me wasn't as friendly as before, and she loved to nitpick over nothing.

I sensed something was off and brought it up with Leon a few times. He'd smooth it over, say he'd handle it, and then find another excuse to leave on a business trip.

By the time he came back three or five days later, the matter had quietly faded away. If I raised it again, he'd say I was being petty, and his mother would seize the opening to do it all over again.

That was when it hit me. So the two of them had been acting the whole time before the wedding, and once we were married they didn't want to keep up the pretense. Step by step, they were running an obedience test on me.

But what they didn't know was that I'm not some soft persimmon anyone can squeeze.

After hanging up on Leon, I put on the old woman's act myself, playing pitiful and helpless, and went crying to the officers that this couldn't be resolved.

"Officer, I'm so sorry, my husband's away on a business trip too, he can't deal with this. Otherwise… let me call a locksmith and see if there's a way to save the car."

"You can't even handle something this small? Which matters more, a life or a pane of glass?"

"There's nothing I can do. Please understand, officer. I'm not the one who makes decisions in this family. Everything has to go through my husband."

"Ugh!"

The officer let out a sigh. There was nothing he could do but tell me to hurry up and get it sorted.

Meanwhile, security brought over a few buckets of water and poured them over the car, but it barely helped. The moisture just evaporated.

My mother-in-law was sweating even harder now, her face red as a pumpkin, her hair plastered to it with sweat.

She kept waving at me, mopping frantically at her face to show how hot she was, fanning herself with her hand and sticking out her tongue to show how thirsty she was.

After all that flailing, her face went redder, her eyes went glassy, and she looked drenched, like she was in a sauna.

Even so, she wouldn't let go. She kept those throw pillows and stuffed toys clutched tight against her chest.

Before long the locksmith arrived, tried a few times, and threw up his hands.

"No good! This is a smart car, the door handles are the hidden kind. I can't get it open."

"The only option now is to break a window, or go in through the sunroof. You should check which piece of glass is cheapest to replace before you decide."

I played it up like I was going frantic, got a sheet of paper from security, wrote a line on it, and stuck it to the car window for my mother-in-law to see.

"We're going to break the glass to get you out. Move back a little!"

She glanced at it, gave a feeble wave of her hand, and still wouldn't agree.

The truth was, only I knew it: my mother-in-law couldn't read at all.

"It's no use, my mother-in-law still won't agree. She keeps waving me off. She just can't bear to pay for the glass."

"Is this really happening? At a time like this, she's still worried about paying for it? Her life's about to be gone!"

The officer slapped his thigh in frustration and took the note over to gesture through it himself, but she just kept waving her hand, until he was left helpless and furious too.

The minutes ticked by, and it was the hottest part of the noon.

The outdoor temperature had already hit a hundred and ten degrees, never mind inside the car. My mother-in-law was so hot she looked about to evaporate.

She couldn't hold out much longer. Her body, drained by the heat, actually started leaking a nosebleed.

Soon she lost consciousness, sinking down limp and dazed onto the back seat.