The woman, overwhelmed by labor pains, tried calling her husband. He answered while holding his mistress in one arm, his phone in the other, his tone cold and detached. “If it’s a girl, I’m not raising her. She’ll just clutter up the house… Go stay with your parents.” Then he ended the call. The next day, when he returned home, what he found shook him completely.

That night, heavy rain hammered the rooftops of Portland. Strong winds rattled the windows of old brick buildings in the Pearl District, and on the fourth floor of a narrow apartment, Hannah Pierce stood bent forward, gripping her swollen belly as another contraction surged through her body.

She struggled to breathe while her phone lay on the kitchen counter, and with shaking fingers she dialed her husband. “Andrew, please listen, it is time and the contractions are getting closer, I really need you because I am scared.”

There was a pause before his voice came through, flat and annoyed. “You cannot be serious right now, I already told you that if it is another girl then do not expect me to stay because I am not raising a second disappointment.”