Chương 8
Then I remembered the week after Dad died.
I had barely slept.
Lily had been three months old.
My milk supply had dropped, my father’s funeral had taken place on a Wednesday afternoon, and Patricia had called me fourteen times between midnight and dawn because she wanted to discuss a disagreement over flowers.
At four seventeen in the morning I had sent her a message.
I can’t do this anymore.
Leave me alone.
I was falling apart.
I looked at Daniel.
He knew.
He had been standing in the kitchen when I sent it.
“She has messages from when Dad died.”
Reyes nodded once.
“The draft quotes several.”
“Out of context.”
“I’m not making a judgment.”
“I was grieving.”
“I understand.”
“I had a newborn.”
“I understand.”
Daniel put his hand on the back of my chair.
“She was also sleeping about ninety minutes at a time.”
Caleb stared at me.
I hated that.
“What?”
he asked.
“Nothing.”
“You said you were fine.”
“I was not going to call you at four in the morning and tell you I was losing my mind because the baby wouldn’t latch and Dad was dead.”
His face changed.
“I would have come.”
“No, you would have said you would come and then overslept.”
The cruelty was accurate enough to sting both of us.
Caleb lowered his eyes.
Daniel squeezed the chair back once.
Reyes waited until the silence settled.
“The draft also refers to an incident at your father’s memorial.”
I felt heat rise into my face.
Daniel frowned.
“What incident?”
I knew immediately.
Patricia had cornered me in the church basement near the coffee urns.
She wanted to hold Lily.
I had said no because Patricia smelled strongly of wine and had been crying hard enough to stumble.
She called me selfish.
I called her drunk.
Then she tried to take Lily anyway.
Not violently.
Not like today.
But she had reached into my arms without permission, and I slapped her hand away.
Three people saw it.
At least three.
“She reached for Lily,” I said.
“And I hit her hand.”
Reyes wrote something down.
“Was there a report?”
“No.”
“Any medical attention?”
“No.”
“Any witnesses you can identify?”
“Yes.”
“Names later.”
Daniel looked at me.
“You never told me she tried to grab Lily.”
“She didn’t grab her.”
“She tried.”
“I handled it.”
“Apparently not.”
The words came out before he could soften them.
I looked at him.
He regretted them immediately.
“Emily.”
“Don’t.”
“I didn’t mean—”
“Yes, you did.”
Caleb shifted uncomfortably in his chair.
Reyes glanced toward the door.
We were becoming one more family argument he had to stand inside.
I looked down at Lily.
She had discovered her own fingers again and was examining them with solemn concentration.
I wondered how many adults had built entire stories around her before she could say a single word.
Patricia believed she belonged to the family.
My father had apparently placed her inside a trust.
Caleb had treated her like a bargaining chip in an argument he wanted to avoid.
Daniel and I had spoken about taking her to Seattle as if the trip itself were some kind of boundary we could draw around our household.
Lily did not care about any of it.
She wanted my necklace.
I tucked it inside my shirt.
“What does the draft ask the court to do?”
I asked.
Reyes looked at me carefully.
“To grant Patricia temporary decision-making authority pending an evaluation of your fitness.”
Daniel laughed once.
There was nothing amused in it.
“She’s not even related to Lily.”
“People can petition for different forms of relief depending on circumstances, but whether a court would entertain this particular filing is another question.”
“Could she take Lily with this paper?”
“No.”
“Could she convince someone she could?”
“That depends on who she showed it to and what she claimed it was.”
My stomach dropped.
Daniel understood too.
“She brought it to the airport.”
Reyes nodded.
“She had it in her bag.”
“So she planned to wave it around if anyone stopped her.”
“We don’t know that.”
“But she carried it through a security breach while trying to take our daughter.”
“Yes.”
The simple answer was worse.
A knock came at the door again.
A younger officer leaned in.
“Sergeant, can I get you for a minute?”
Reyes stepped out.
The door remained partly open.
Caleb sat very still.
Daniel paced to the window and back.
I watched a luggage tug crawl across the tarmac in the distance.
A worker in a reflective vest stood beside it drinking from a paper cup.
He looked cold even behind the glass.
Normal life kept happening with an almost insulting persistence.
Caleb broke the silence.
“She asked me for screenshots.”
Daniel stopped pacing.
My head turned slowly.
“What screenshots?”
“From you.”
“You have screenshots of my messages to Patricia?”
“No.”
He winced.
“I mean, not like that.”
“Then what?”
“She asked me if you’d been acting weird.”
I stared at him.
“And?”
“I said you were stressed.”
Daniel closed his eyes.
Caleb rushed on.
“I said everybody was stressed.”
“What did she ask you to send?”
“She wanted proof you were fighting with people.”
My throat tightened.
“Did you send anything?”
“No.”
He hesitated.
I saw it.
Daniel saw it.
“Caleb.”
He looked miserable.
“I sent one conversation.”
I stood so quickly Lily startled.
Her mouth opened.
I sat back down immediately and bounced her against my chest.
“What conversation?”
“The one after Dad’s funeral.”
I could not place it at first.
Then I did.
I had sent Caleb twelve angry messages because he had disappeared before the family dinner and left me to deal with Patricia alone.
I called him selfish.
I said I could not keep cleaning up after him.
I said I hated everyone.
May you like
The last message had been, I want to get in the car with Lily and drive until nobody knows where we are.
I had meant I wanted an hour without grief.
