The Day After the Wedding, My Mother-in-Law Demanded to Enter My Room, but Ricardo Suddenly Turned Pale When I Opened the Door

Fourteen hours after the wedding, my mother-in-law slapped me in my own apartment, while my husband grabbed me by the wrists and ordered me to apologize to her.

It was the next morning. In the new apartment in Zapopan, the pale sunlight fell on the wooden floor, while the electronic lock of the door was still beeping when I saw four dusty suitcases in the living room. A purple plastic doll was hanging from one of the handles.

“Why is this here?” I asked.

Ricardo was standing by the kitchen door and avoiding my eyes.

“Carla needed somewhere to spend the night. I gave her the code.”

“What if you had asked me?”

“Mariana, don’t make everything so formal. She’s my sister.”

Carla had already opened the door of our bedroom. She sat on the bed with her shoes on and put the box with my wedding dress on the floor.

“I need the big room,” she said. “You will sleep in the study for several weeks.”

For a moment I thought I was hearing badly. I was still holding my small copper keychain, on which hung a little house of red enamel. My father had given it to me on the day I received the apartment key for the first time.

“Get up from my bed,” I told Carla.

“Yours?” she sneered. “This house belongs to Ricardo too.”

“No. I bought this apartment.”

The silence froze the room.

A week earlier, I had signed a document for an apartment worth 3,200,000 pesos at a notary’s office. For seven years I had worked at a public elementary school and had saved 900,000 pesos. My retired parents gave me another 1,300,000. I covered the remaining amount with a mortgage loan that was approved only in my name.

The absence of Ricardo’s name was noticed by his mother immediately.

“In eight days you become my son’s wife,” Ofelia said, tapping her fingers on the table. “Why isn’t his name in the document?”

“Because I am the buyer.”

Ricardo was looking at the floor. I explained that our marriage had been registered under a regime of separation of property.

Ofelia became furious.

“People will say that my son lives off his wife’s back!”

“If he wants half a share, he can pay 1,600,000 pesos today.”

At that moment such silence fell over the room that it seemed as if all the clocks had stopped working at the same time.

Now Carla was sitting on my bed, while Ricardo was standing on her side.

“It’s only for a few days,” he told me. “Mother will come soon and talk to you.”

“You haven’t even come out of the tent yet, and you’re already moving people into my house?”

Carla pressed her lips together.

“We are family. And you act as if everything belongs only to you.”

“Because I alone paid for it.”

I picked up the suitcase and dragged it into the hallway. Carla immediately jumped up.

“Don’t touch me!”

“Your things are going outside.”

At that moment the door opened again. Ofelia entered as if she had lived here for years. She was holding a heavy leather bag, and the room filled with her strong perfume.

“You are throwing my son and my daughter out of the house?”

“They entered without my permission.”

Ofelia came up to me.

“This house also belongs to my son.”

“No.”

I felt the slap before my face began to burn like fire. A buzzing sounded in my ear. Ofelia raised her hand again, but this time I stepped back.

Ricardo grabbed me by the wrists.

“Enough, Mariana. Mother is sick with high blood pressure. Apologize to her and let Carla stay.”

I looked at his fingers, which were gripping my skin. At that moment I realized that at the wedding I had not put on a white dress—I had walked into a trap.

I put my hand into my pocket and took out my phone. A recording that I had started a few minutes earlier was already open on the screen. Ofelia leaned toward me, while Ricardo’s hands were still on my wrists. I brought the screen to her eyes and said:

“Now, mother of yours, repeat once more that this house belongs to your son, before this voice…”

A red dot was blinking on the phone screen. Ofelia immediately snatched at my hand, but the device did not fall to the floor.

“What are you recording?” she shouted.

“What you yourselves are saying.”

Ricardo released my wrists and reached toward the phone.

“Delete this, Mariana.”

“First, do not put your hands on me again.”

Carla stopped at the door. For the first time, fear appeared on her face.

“Mother, let’s go.”

“We are not going anywhere!” Ofelia shouted. “This woman is destroying my family.”

I put the phone in my bag and walked toward the lock.

“In ten minutes none of you will be here.”

Ricardo blocked my way.

“If you call the police, will you tell everyone that your husband is abusive?”

“You yourself told me that when you grabbed me by the wrists.”

Surprise flashed across his face. It was as if he heard his own words for the first time.

In the evening I called my lawyer, Nora. She asked me for the marriage documents, the apartment document, and the recording. Half an hour later she asked only one question:

“Mariana, are you sure you will meet these people again?”

“I am sure.”

“Then come to my office tomorrow morning. Bring everything with you.”

At night Ricardo tried to apologize, but there was no regret in his voice.

“Mother was angry.”

“You were angry too when you grabbed me.”

He said nothing.

In the morning I went to Nora’s office. She listened to the recording to the end and her face changed.

“This is not only evidence of violence,” she said. “Something else is hidden here. Look who sent you this message last night…”

I looked at the phone lying on Nora’s desk. The message had been sent from Ricardo’s number, but the text did not belong to him.

The message said: “If we cannot throw her out of the house today, I will take care of the documents tomorrow.”

Attached below was a photograph. It showed the registration document for my apartment, although I had never given that copy to the notary.

“Who sent this to you?” I asked.

“It is an anonymous number,” Nora answered. “But the time of the message exactly matches the minute when Carla demanded to enter your room.”

We played the recording again. Ofelia’s voice sounded through the room.

“This house also belongs to my son.”

Then my voice.

“No.”

Then the sound of the slap and Ricardo’s words:

“Mother is sick with high blood pressure. Apologize to her and let Carla stay.”

Nora stopped the recording.

“This is important for the police. But the main thing is something else.”

She took a sealed folder from the drawer.

“Your mortgage bank contacted us in the morning. It turned out that during the last two weeks an additional loan application was submitted in your name.”

My blood froze.

“I submitted nothing.”

“I know. The application includes a copy of your identity document, a sample of your signature, and a certificate claiming that Ricardo is a co-owner.”

Ricardo entered the office at that very moment. Ofelia and Carla stood behind him.

“This is a family matter,” Ricardo said.

“No,” Nora replied. “This is already a matter of document forgery.”

Ofelia turned pale.

“Mariana, we were only trying to make sure the apartment was protected.”

“Protected from me?”

Carla began to cry.

“Ricardo told me that you had agreed.”

Ricardo looked at her.

“Be quiet.”

That one word revealed everything. Carla’s face relaxed, while Ofelia put the bag on the table.

Nora opened the folder. Inside were the bank’s response and a printout from a security camera showing Ricardo scanning copies of my identity documents in the back room of the wedding hall.

“This is impossible,” he whispered.

“You did it yourself,” I told him.

Ricardo stepped back.

“Mariana, it was only a formality. The apartment was still supposed to become our family’s shelter.”

“With my parents’ money?”

He could not find an answer.

Nora looked at the phone. A new call appeared on the screen. The number belonged to the bank’s security department.

She answered the call, listened for several seconds, and then looked at me.

“Mariana, they are telling you that another borrower’s name is recorded in the forged application. This person has now gone to the bank and says that he did everything on Ricardo’s instructions.”

The color disappeared from Ricardo’s face.

But the worst thing was that Nora added next:

“This person is a witness at your wedding and has already begun giving testimony to the police…”