Chapter 8 - The Digital AssaultPeace lasted exactly forty-eight hours before the retaliation began.
I was at the warehouse on Monday when my phone started buzzing relentlessly. I ignored it until my lunch break. When I finally checked, I had thirty-two missed calls from aunts, uncles, and cousins I hadn't spoken to in years.
I opened Facebook. Brianna had posted a long, tearful video. She sat in the dingy motel room I had paid for, holding a tissue. In the video, she claimed that Rebecca had suffered a "hormonal breakdown" and forced me to kick my elderly mother and sisters out onto the freezing streets with no warning. She accused Rebecca of faking medical emergencies to control me.
The comments were brutal. Extended family members called me a coward, a traitor, and a husband blinded by a manipulative woman.
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My first instinct was to reply, to post the pictures of the ruined apartment, to expose the truth. But then I remembered Elaine, the social worker. They control the atmosphere. They use intimidation. Engaging with them would only drag me back into their chaos.
I took screenshots of everything, deactivated my social media accounts, and blocked every extended family member who had called me. I would not let their poison reach my wife.
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