In a moment that will forever be etched in memory, a mother-in-law’s seemingly innocent request for compote takes a startling turn as she unexpectedly pours it over her grandson.

As soon as my husband and I tied the knot, we immediately decided to live separately from our parents. We had our own two-room apartment, where our son, Andriy, was born soon after. My mother-in-law came to visit us quite rarely, and didn’t stay for long. I generally had a calm relationship with her: we never had much conflict.

But once there was an incident that left me holding a grudge against her. It happened six months ago. My mother-in-law came to visit us. We were sitting in the living room when she asked me to treat her to the compote I had made the other day. While I was fussing in the kitchen and bringing cookies and rolls to the dessert table, my 2-year-old son Andriy, swaying from side to side, walked in front of my mother-in-law, while she sat and rejoiced at her grandson’s success.

I served a glass of compote to my mother-in-law and then went to get a decanter and my own glass.Before I could turn around, I heard a scream from the living room. It turned out that my mother-in-law was reaching for a candy, and her glass of compote was on the corner of the table. She accidentally hit the glass, and it fell right onto her son’s leg, who was standing next to her, holding onto the table.

The son was very frightened, and the glass was not light… In general, Andriy did not walk for several days after that. And my mother-in-law, instead of picking up her grandson from the floor, started yelling at me, saying that I had left the child unattended, and that I shouldn’t have put the glass on the edge of the table. In short, we had a big fight that day. But that quarrel was more about my son’s fright and her unfounded accusations than it was about anger or hatred.