Chapter 10 - The wedding problem
Our wedding was supposed to be photographed by three magazines.
That sentence embarrasses me now.
Vanessa’s hospitality network had turned the event into a brand opportunity.
Historic estate.
Designer partnership.
Foundation donation.
Noah would walk beside me.
Claire had agreed reluctantly after we promised his involvement would remain small.
Then Noah began refusing rehearsals.
Not because he hated Vanessa necessarily.
Because rehearsals were boring.
He was three.
At one fitting, he cried when a tailor pinned his trousers.
At another, he ran out carrying a ribbon wand.
Vanessa became obsessed with:
“predictability.”
Her messages to the wedding planner were later obtained.
Noah has to be regulated before October.
Then:
I will not have screaming during vows.
And:
Adrian excuses everything because he feels guilty about divorce.
Then one message to her sister:
If Noah can’t behave, Claire will use it to keep him away from the wedding and everyone will say I’m the stepmother he hates.
There.
Image.
Control.
Fear of public rejection.
Not money.
Not inheritance.
Vanessa wanted a perfect family presentation.
Noah’s ordinary three-year-old resistance felt like a referendum on her legitimacy.
So she increased discipline.
Longer quiet chairs.
Removed toys.
Separated meals after tantrums.
Threats that:
“big boys who act like babies don’t go to Daddy’s events.”
Molly objected.
Vanessa heard sabotage.
Then the old dog cage entered her mind.
Not from a parenting manual.
From frustration.
She later admitted she wanted to:
“shock him into understanding consequences.”
A three-year-old.
Understanding consequences.
Through humiliation.
May you like
That belief was the core.
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